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The creature that filled the massive doorway had to hunch to get through. The ground trembled with each step he took.
Delphine paused. The sight of the massive ogre rendered her immobile.
I rushed forward, but I wasn’t sure what’d stopped her. She’d been powerful a moment ago. Between one heartbeat and the next, Del had been stopped dead in her tracks. The ogre chuckled as it stomped forward.
Locke shoved Del away from him. She barely registered his hands on her. All of her attention remained on the ogre.
I couldn’t let her work anymore. I didn’t have it in me to stand by and let this unfold. The ogre bellowed with laughter, lowered his head, and rushed Del like a bull. Rage hit my blood and turned it molten. My glamour fell away as my vision turned red.
I couldn’t’ hold my disguise together anymore, not when the magic of my beast ran this strong. My horns appeared and grew in length. Tusks pressed against the inside of my lower lip. Every time my feet hit the ground, I felt my body grow in size until I was half the size of the ogre.
We crashed together, the ogre and I. Hands slamming into one another, he shoved me back. I dug my heels in and cracked the pavement, sending bits of it flying through the air. Snarling, I leaned in and shoved back. We came to a grounding halt with neither beast moving the other.
That’s when I heard the click of another crossbow. At first, I paid it no mind. I passed it off as Delphine’s.
10
DELPHINE
That damned ogre.
It was the same one from my nightmares. It was the same one from my memories. He’d found me once before. When the overhead door opened, he’d recognized me. Even with a glamour wrapped around myself, he’d recognized me.
The look on my face, stricken down to my core, had given me away.
My blood turned to ice and froze me like a basilisk’s gaze. I stood there, unable to run, unable to do anything other than panic. Anger rose, indignation at my own inability to fight trying to burn away at this frigid ice around my bones.
Nothing could melt it. Nothing could free me. I stood there, locked in terror. Self-hatred trickled into the pit of my stomach, but even that acrid sensation wasn’t enough to free me.
A blur of red crossed over my vision. A beast I’d never laid eyes on before crashed into the ogre. The two caught each other, hand locked in hand as they shoved one another. The red demon lost ground, but a snarl ripped out of him before he pushed back and brought the ogre to a halt.
I caught the gold tips of the beast’s curling horns and realized who I was looking at. It was Arven. Brow furrowed in rage, he bellowed a roar and pulled back his fist to slam it into the ogre’s jaw.
I almost didn’t hear the cock of a crossbow. It was such a familiar sound that it pushed my brain over the edge and released me from the grip of terror…only a moment too late. The bolt hit me in the stomach. I looked down at the flimsy piece of wood and scowled in disbelief.
“It’s going to take poison tips to bring me down,” I growled as I lifted my head.
Locke gaped at me. The crossbow now hung limp in his hand. He had to fight to pick his terrified jaw up off the ground.
“You,” he whispered accusingly.
For a moment, I wanted to cock my head in confusion. The tone was unexpected. He looked at me as if I were a ghost.
Before I could move, I realized that Locke had, in fact, poisoned his crossbow bolts. A curse slipped out of my lips before my eyes rolled back and darkness claimed my vision.
The impact as I hit the ground rattled my bones and made my jaw clatter. I could still hear. Though my vision was black, and my body rendered immovable, I heard Arven’s roar and the sound of flesh hitting flesh. A body hit the ground and made it tremble.
The sound of pattering footsteps running away told me that Locke was making a run for it. I would have cursed if I could have moved my lips. Arven paid Locke no attention. It was like the beast had taken full control of him now. I couldn’t see him, but I heard the anger ripping his voice apart as he fought through the men that Locke threw in his way.
I wanted to sayI’m dying over here, idiot.
Arven couldn’t save me. He couldn’t even save himself.
The Golden Beast of the D’Or Court had lost control and was ripping through Locke Balefire’s men at an alarming rate.
Slowly, my mind faded. Unconsciousness dug its freezing fingers into me and dragged me back into a nightmare where the ogre was waiting for me all over again.
* * *
