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Standing alone in the center of the clearing is Gregory.
He’s shivering violently and covered in mud. He’s still clutching that fucking relic with trembling hands as he stares in wide-eyed, in hysterical horror at the bloody patch of dirt where Lackey used to stand. His men are gone. His relic is useless.
His gaze snaps to mine. I offer him a slow, razor-sharp smile, my glowing crimson eyes pinning him to the spot.
I raise a single clawed hand, using my shadow magic to nudge the lingering dark air behind him. The shadows clear a single, obvious path that leads straight up the stone drive toward the estate’s front steps.
Gregory looks at the path, gasping for breath, his mind so broken by fear that he scrambles toward without a second thought.
Like a fucking moth to a flame.
I turn my back on the woods, following him at a leisurely pace, my pulse humming with a predator’s triumph through the link. The Devil Dog materializes out of the shadows, padding next to me.
The bait is taken, and my mate is waiting at the top of the stairs.
Chapter nineteen
Bellamy
The door to the bedchamber stays shut for less than two minutes. I stand in the middle of the room, listening to the thuds of Gregory’s relic slamming against the wards down the mountain. Vesper has already lowered his magic, allowing Gregory to think his magical tool actually works. The sound rattles the glass windows, sending tiny vibrations straight through the floorboards under me.
I take a deep breath, telling myself this is the plan. Gregory wouldn’t get past anything if Vesper didn’t allow it.
Stay inside. Wait for the storm to pass.
I look at my hands, flexing my fingers as the mark on my neck hums with a fierce pulse. A humorless laugh escapes my lips. Vesper spent years living like an isolated king, protecting his territory, but he still forgets that I’m not his delicate prisoner anymore. I am his mate. I’m part of his family, and I refuse to cower in a locked bedroom while my home is under attack.
I fix the collar of my dark purple shirt, ensuring my mark stays completely exposed, like armor forged for my battlefield, before I step out into the grand hallway. I walk briskly down the corridor, heading for the upper gallery that overlooks both the grand foyer below and the sweeping, fog-bound driveway outside. Somehow, the air in the house is thick; humming with a dark charge that makes the fine hairs on my arms stand on end.
The moment I reach the gallery, the soul link in the center of my chest blazes to life.
It’s intoxicating.
Through the bond, I’m suddenly connected directly to Vesper and the Devil Dog as they move through the lower treeline. I can feel everything they feel, and see through their shadow-sight into the woods in front of them.
And beneath the hungry, feral obsession of their hunt, I feel the dark thrill driving them. I freeze. It’s the same dark thrill I’ve always been afraid to admit lingers in my own blood, too.
Vesper and the cryptid are having fun. That should scare the shit out of me, but it doesn’t. I want Gregory and his men to suffer. Maybe I’ve always been this fucked up, or maybe they made me this way, either way, I’m not going to play innocent anymore.
They’re toying with their prey, moving through the dark woods like living nightmares. I feel Vesper casting thick, suffocating clouds of pitch-black darkness that swallow the headlights of Gregory’s trucks. I feel the Devil Dog weaving between the ancient pine trunks, flashing its glowing crimson eyes through the fog just enough to drive the men into a screaming, blind frenzy.
Vesper and the Devil Dog, work together, using their magic to open paths, leading the men one way or another, never realizing they are running circles while being tortured with fear.
Down in the treeline, the men are losing their fucking minds. I hear the distant, muffled gunshots as they fire blindly into the dark, followed by the frantic shouting of men.
Suddenly, a massive, dizzying rush of raw, electric power surges through the bond, slamming into my chest so hard I have to grip the cold railing of the gallery to keep my balance.
The Devil Dog has struck.
Through the link, a vivid, shadowy vision flashes across my mind. I see Kyle Lackey, the fucker who used to lock me in Gregory’s basement. The man who used to grin while holding me down. I see Kyle standing out in the open, his gun raised, his face twisted in horror as the shadows extend, revealing the cryptid from his nightmares.
It suddenly attacks, slamming into him hard. Kyle’s rifle goes flying, and a sick, satisfied smile tilts my lips.
In a single, fluid, horrific motion, the cryptid pins Kyle to the ground. I can hear him screaming for help. The men shoot blindly, unaware that the bullets flow right through the Devil Dog and sink into Kyle’s flesh.
Suddenly, Killian is there like the Grim Reaper, whispering something to the man that’s about to die.
The Devil Dog shreds Kyle’s body, dives into his chest, and devours his soul.
