But then things shift. The tide changes quickly between one breath and the next.
Gabriel is fighting with a soldier, the clashing of their swords lingering in the air, and I happen to glance up as I gather more magic in my palm. My brows furrow as I look past the broken net, past the soldiers, to the place where the prince and king were standing.
Only, the king is gone. He’s vanished, but IknowI saw him. The crown prince is on his own, holding a sphere of scarlet magic and looking utterly undisturbed by the scene unfolding around him as if this situation were an everyday occurrence.
And then he tilts his head and looks directly at me. Our eyes meet, and the flame I’m holding sputters, then dies.
Crown Prince Severus’s lips curl into a wolfish smile—cold and dark, it’s like looking evil in the eyes. A glimmer of scarlet shines in his eyes, and his stare is everything wrong with this world, everything that Gabriel is not. It’s darkness and violence and a threat of something so terrible I can’t put a name to it.
A raven’s caw comes from above me, and the new bond in my chest writhes. Concern that doesn’t belong to me but is a mirror to my own floods through me. Something iswrong.
I know it like I knew the girls would be in trouble at the Winter’s Eve Ball, like I know my own name. I am desperate to escape the prince’s awful gaze, and yet for the longest moment I cannot.
I’ve never felt more like prey than I do now. As if one wrong move, one wrong breath, will allow this predator who shares blood with the man I love to destroy me.
My entrapment feels like it lasts for an eternity, but in reality it only goes on for a few seconds. But by the time I break the prince’s gaze and look away, it’s too late. My knees knock together, and my center of balance shifts.
Only, it’s not just in my head.
It takes a moment for me to realize that the ground itself is quaking. The trees are shuddering, and leaves are quivering. Everything is moving. Trembling.
Breaking.
Shouts come from all around me. Gabriel calls my name. Someone roars. All I can do is stare at the net, that shimmering barrier, as everything shakes.
Another heartbeat, another breath, and the worldshatters.
There’s an explosion beside me. Behind me. All around me.
Everything goes red, then white, then dark.
There’s a ringing in my ears, and it’s so loud I can barely hear myself think. It is shrill. Deafening. All-consuming.
Seconds pass. They are both endless and over in the blink of an eye, eternal and barely-there. And when my vision clears and refocuses, nothing is as it was.
The rebels are moving. Running. Fighting. Swords clash and mouths move, and they should be producing sound, but I can’t hear them.
I can’t hearanything.
The part of me that spent years taking care of injured animals knows that I’ve been wounded, but I can’t think about that. A hand clamps down on my arm, and I scream before I realize it’s Gabriel’s. He’s looking at me, panic in his eyes that I somehow feel inside myself, as he yells. A command? A request to leave? To fight?
I don’t know.
I point to my ears and shake my head. “I can’t hear you,” I shout. The words don’t reach my ears, but his eyes widen, so maybe he understands?
There’s no time to wonder. A soldier charges towards us, brandishing a bloodied sword. Gabriel releases my arm and raises his weapon, meeting the attack head-on. Their weapons clash, and the resounding silence is as loud as a clap of thunder.
Gabriel looks over his shoulder and shoves me back, bellowing a command. Even though I can’t hear anything, I know he told me to run.
And maybe it’s the panic coursing through my veins, or maybe it’s because there is nothing but deafening silence in my ears, but I stagger back. I move away from the worst of the battle and try to pay attention to my surroundings.
A distracted warrior is a dead warrior, Birdie.
Gabriel’s voice echoes in my mind, the lesson one of the first he taught me when I was learning how to defend myself. Those weeks in the woods when it was just the two of us seem so long ago.
He was right, though. Distractions do kill.
Taking a deep breath, I force myself to pay attention and assess the situation. I can’t let panic overwhelm or distract me. I must stand my ground so I’m not a burden to Gabriel or anyone else.
