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“I thought I’d lost her hounds and soldiers,” I said, biting back tears, my voice cracking. “My stallion and I had traveled hundreds of leagues overnight in the river, in freezing water. I didn’t think there would be any way for them to catch up so fast.”
I’d been tormenting myself, trying to figure out how the witch had reached me in record speed. The only explanation I came up with was magic.
Shadow grunted. “She took my family, my neighbors, my friends.”
Of course, he considered his workers his friends. He was more like my father than I cared to admit. Papa would have scolded me for exactly the same reasons. “Never abandon your people,” he’d say. They were the glue that bound Tritonia together.
My hands were shaking with anger. “She would have taken them anyway. That witch is collecting shifters to work in her farms or to become a part of her army and fight for her and expand her territory. Her plan is to take over Haven.”
“Why are you such a coldhearted bitch?” Shadow’s insult slapped me in the face like a backhand from one of the pirates.
Time in the cell had certainly made me dead inside. Cold in terms of affection.Fuck.He would be, too, if he’d been tortured. But I wasn’t that heartless that I didn’t care about his, or the rest of the shifter’s suffering. Unless…? Was I beginning to emulate the witch I hated so much? The prospect had me retching.
“Fuck you,” I said, spit flying from my lips. “Every waking moment, I mourn their capture. Their desperate faces haunt my dreams.”
Shadow yanked at his chains again as if he disagreed with my answer.
It felt like a hundred daggers pierced my chest, all twisting, carving what was left of my heart out.
“I should have let you kill me,” I said.
I leaped out of my seat to leave, but a hand clamped my wrist.
“Snow.” Phantom’s hoarse voice called me back.
His eyes, a pale brown like a beautiful amber stone, begged me not to go. One of his fingers traced the inside of my wrist. The sensation both drove me crazy with desire and repulsed me. For saving my life from the hunters, he deserved my attention. I owed it to him to keep vigil, and I decided to sit on the edge of the bed. With Phantom’s hand firmly clamped on my wrist, I was a mess of emotions.
Shadow’s gaze landed on us, and his eyes narrowed.
I gently freed myself from Phantom’s grasp, taking bold but shaky steps, crossing the room, my pulse scaling the closer I got to Shadow’s bed.
“I’ll get you out of the collars,” I said, staring him dead in the eye. “And I’ll free your people from the slave camps. You have my word.”
Shadow’s face twisted from side to side. His eyes burned bright green. A roar flung from his mouth. Black fur sprouted from his skin.
“Don’t come closer.” He panted, squeezing his eyes shut, his face all scrunched, muscles tense.
Why was he changing? What was happening to him? Instinctively, I reached for his ankle to calm him, but that sent him into a frenzy, his body shaking, bones cracking and changing shape. He was shifting, and by the look of it, against his wishes. Fear slithered in my belly, and I released him.
The guards pushed me away and unsheathed their swords.
“Get away,” Shadow growled a moment before he completely transformed.
Arms freed of the shackles, the panther lunged at me, his claws inches from my skin. Chains bound to his collar held him back, and he roared, obviously frustrated at not being able to get me.
The feeling in my gut turned slimy and sickening, and I backed away.
The guards held their swords with shaking hands.
Flare started shaking in the next bed and woke with a start.
“What the fuck?” he said as the transformation claimed him, too.
Snarling, he kicked and wriggled, trying to get free of the collar, his claws slicing up the blankets and mattress.
A cold and sticky sensation dripped down my spine. I couldn’t move. Fear bound me to the spot. Only two guards separated me from certain death if those panthers got free.
Someone seized me around the waist and lifted me into the air, carrying me away.
