AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Vienne.
She wasn’t just scared, she was in grave danger, terrified for her life.
I had to get to her. Now.
“Keep driving them back,” I yelled to Brentley, who was the closest to me. “They’ll surrender soon. And when they do, round up the prisoners into chains before they can change their mind and try to keep fighting.”
“What?” he cried, glancing at me as he wiped at a thin trail of blood that poured from a cut on his forehead. “Where do you think you’re going? We’re in the middle of a fucking battle here, mate!”
“I have to get back to the castle,” was all I said before I took off running toward the trees away from him. “You’re doing fine.”
“Urban!” he yelled, incredulously.
But I wasn’t going to be dissuaded from my new goal. Vienne was in trouble.
It would take too long to order them to lower the gate. Besides, I didn’t want to risk the castle in case Far Shore surprised us and managed to get the upper hand, so I veered toward the secret passage.
I scrambled through the tunnel in the dark. It felt as if it took me forever to cross under the moat and explode into the wine cellar, but it was probably only a matter of minutes.
Following the tug of fear from my mark, I ran headlong down the halls until I reached the Red Chambers where Vienne was.
Two men had her pinned to the floor, one holding down her arms while the other sat on top of her, spreading her legs apart as he lifted the skirt of her dress toward her waist.
“Hey!” I shouted, pure rage shooting through my bloodstream.
These two were going to die painfully. I was going to make damn sure of it.
They startled at my voice, and the dead man holding Vienne’s wrists immediately let go so he could spring to his feet and come at me. But the first bastard didn’t appear as if he was going to stop with his part of the rape. Worried I wouldn’t get to her in time since I had to go through the dick advancing on me first, I met Vienne’s eyes from across the room.
As soon as her gaze clashed with mine, showing me all the terror I could feel from her, I nodded and knelt to the floor, freeing my dagger from its hiding place. Then I slid it across the marble, hilt-first, in her direction.
It skidded right into her hand as she reached out her arm. As soon as her fingers wrapped around the handle, she swung it up and buried the blade just under her attacker’s chin until the end thrust out through the crown of his head.
Reassured she was taking care of herself, I finally stood from my crouched position to come up in a twirl, putting all my strength behind my swing so I could cut my own attacker, who was bearing down on me with a spear, in half when I whirled to face him. Surprise lit his features before his severed torso began to slide off the bottom half of his body and both parts thumped dully to the floor in separate pieces.
“Vienne,” I called, racing past the bisected corpse to get to her.
With a teeth-gritted grunt, she heaved the dead man on top of her off and immediately set about batting at her skirt into place to cover her exposed legs as she sat up. Breathing hard, she gaped at me from brown eyes glazed with trauma.
“Are you okay?”
I reached out to help her up, and she took my hand, nodding.
“Yeah. Thanks for the dagger.” She sounded out of breath.
Once she was standing, I smoothed her hair tenderly out of her eyes, but a red mark on her cheek made me swear under my breath. No one bruised my one true love. No one even thought about raping her. I wished I could kill the two bastards for this all over again.
“Damn,” I cursed myself. “I should’ve given you your own dagger ages ago.”
“Well, there’s no need now,” she told me on a shaky laugh as she hugged mine to her chest. “As I plan to just keep this one for the rest of my life.”
With a surprised chuckle, I bowed before her. “That would be my honor, my lady.”
She looked up into my eyes as I straightened, and we shared a moment, just looking at each other, relieved the other had survived. She seemed rattled but still solid enough to keep herself together and going. That was more than I could’ve hoped for. My relief must’ve echoed through her because before I knew it, we merged together in the same instant for a hard, fast kiss.
“Thank God you’re okay,” we said in unison.
Then, we pulled apart, me asking, “Where’s Anniston, Allera, and the others?” just as she said, “We need to go help the others.”
