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Not even when Aldis looked into my fang-filled face and screamed like she was being mauled.
My feet naturally found the Fee paths, and I dug my claws in, refusing to let them go. I didn’t stop until I smelled the fresh air of the Arbor and saw the Mother Tree rising above us.
Then the rising shape of Beasts. Aldis’s sobs echoed in my ears.
But the monster within me had finally arrived. And I wasn’t going to let Ash die.
Chapter Eighteen
“Take them,”I snarled at the Beasts.
I didn't see Torr or Draven in the Arbor. But as one of the Beasts reached for the girls, Aldis shrieked, flailing away.
Freya grabbed her, wrapping her arms tightly around the terrified girl. “Go, Salem,” she said, burying Aldis’s face against her shoulder. “I’ll handle it from here.”
I nodded, barely seeing one of the Beasts extend a hand to Freya as she stared up at him stoically. There was a quizzical look in the Beast’s dark eyes as he took in the sight of a woman who wasn’t going to scream at him.
I had to find Ash before the iron-tipped arrows killed him.
Turning back to the Wood, I allowed it to speak to me, giving me the Fee path that would cover miles in a blink.
Within minutes, I was prowling the forest where Ash had fallen. His blood still saturated the leaves, and there was… a body.
He had torn one of the men limb from limb. I hardly spared a glance for the red-soaked pieces as I followed the trail of Beast blood, the copper stench thick in the air.
Soon I came across another body. This man had been gutted. He was still alive, his eyes glazed with pain. His lips moved, blood bursting in tiny bubbles.
I almost laughed. He wasn’t asking for help. The man was spending his last breaths calling me a bitch.
Pathetic. He didn’t deserve a second chance.
I gripped his throat with my claws, and tore it out. The light left his eyes, and I wiped my hand clean on the dress I fully intended to burn the first chance I got.
Ash’s blood trail became fresher as I stalked through the Wood. There was no sign of Oleg. I found an arrow embedded in a tree branch, and soon the trickling sound of a brook caught my ear.
Beneath that sound was a harsh growl, a gasp for air.
I followed it silently, finding the stream.
Ash was half-collapsed in the water. His gray fur was scarlet, saturated with blood from the twenty or so arrows lodged in his back. Rage made him look absolutely feral as he snarled up at Oleg.
The man was bloodied, but he had avoided the worst of Ash’s claws. Oleg gripped an ax, raising it up over his head to deliver the death-blow.
“Not today,” I whispered, and Oleg flinched.
He turned to look at me, blanching. “Salem.”
“Oleg.” I stepped out from the trees, flexing my claws. “You will not live to kill any more of the Beasts.”
He sneered at me, turning his back on Ash and readying his ax for me. “We’ll burn out every last one of you apostates. The Father will thank me for this.”
He swung hard, but the monster within me was far quicker. I dodged the blow, then darted in, burying my claws in his collar bone.
Oleg shrieked, the sound of a dying man. As I buried my hands deeper, gripping the bones that I would rip out, I heard Ash’s snarl.
He rose up, dripping water and blood, and attacked. A horrible ripping sound filled the air.
Oleg collapsed, going utterly limp. I just barely managed to release my claws before I was pulled down with him.
