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The final door waited at the end of the hall, black iron, southern sigils painted across the frame over older marks carved deep into the stone. The bond dragged me toward it hard enough to hurt.
Two guards stood outside.
The left one saw Tarek and scowled. “Why is there a flower delivery in lower holding?”
Mandi lifted a hand. “Long story.”
The right one’s gaze landed on me. Recognition hit his face.
“There she is,” he yelled.
Kalon moved half a step in front of me.
The guard noticed. “You with her?”
Kalon’s shoulders squared. “Yes.”
The guard smiled. “Cute.”
He went for his gun. The other one lunged at Kalon, who met him halfway. The impact slammed both men into the wall.
Mandi screamed, “I do not have the combat skills for this,” and threw the entire flower arrangement into the first guard’s face. White wolf roses burst everywhere. They latched onto any available skin and started shredding.
I stepped forward, tripped over my own hidden tail, and slammed into the wall shoulder-first. Pain flashed down my arm. “Fuck.”
The first guard grabbed Mandi by the coat. Her eyes went black. Not metaphorically. Fully black, ink spreading across the whites. The air around her warped. Every whisper I had ever heard in a coffee shop, every rumor she had ever collected, seemed to crawl into the hall at once. Voices overlapped. Scarn kills men who fail. Southern command cleans house. The tower eats traitors. The prisoner is already free. Your friends sold you out. Your name is on the list. Your name is on the list. Your name is on the list.
The guard’s face went gray, and he let go of her. Sam kicked him in the knee. He went down with a scream.
By this time, the other guard was done plucking flowers from his body. Unfortunately, roses could only do so much damage. They were fragile, after all.
Kalon took an elbow to the jaw, staggered, then drove the baton into his opponent’s ribs. The guard dropped to one knee but grabbed Kalon’s coat and pulled him down too.
The third guard on the door, older than the others, less eager, less stupid, drew his weapon and aimed past everyone.
At me.
Everything slowed.
Not in a cool way.
In a my-body-has-chosen-terror-and-poor-circulation way.
I froze.
All that magic, all that hunger, all that hot pink power burning under my skin, and I froze like the powerless girl I had been yesterday. Like every version of myself that had ever stepped aside to let someone else pass.
His finger tightened on the trigger.
Kalon shouted my name.
The tail snapped loose from my thigh.
It whipped out from under the dress and struck the guard’s wrist.
The heart-shaped tip slapped bare skin with a wet little crack.
He groaned.
