Page 5 of For Her, He Falls

They need backup. Now.

'Mark, what's your position?' Tristan asks, his eyes darting as if he could see the different possibilities playing out.

There's a pause where the only sound is the cacophony of death and violence on the other side of the gate.

'Still standing. We can buy you some more time, but...' The Beta's voice cracks, his thoughts flooded with emotion. 'Amara is down. I can't get to her... Tristan...'

Mark won't defy his Alpha, even for his mate.

This is what it means to be king; to choose between jeopardizing a battle or saving the ones you love.

But I am no king.

Whatever Tristan decides, I know the choice will eat him alive. So I bear the burden and make it for him, Goddess forgive me.

I close my eyes and signal my father.

'Do it now.'

The order ripples across the nightwalker's forces, and there's a flutter of leather and cracking bones as dozens of the vampires waiting along the wall drop their crossbows and transform into a swarm of bats. The others on the bridge do the same, shifting in a storm of black wings as their screeching fills the air, drowning out the sound of the heavy gate opening to allow our injured to retreat.

Then the world falls into mayhem.

Our forces charge forward under cover of leathery wings and shadow, and I glimpse the carnage as it trickles in through the open gates.

The Banes' army leap and lunge at the Rovers and nightwalkers alike, their claws tearing into flesh and bone. A misty dawn continues to break over the fortress, casting an ethereal light over the battlefield.

Then my mate turns to me with understanding in his eyes.

"I'm not sorry. Not for any of it," Tristan tells me, and it's a miracle I can hear him over the roaring conflict consuming our surroundings. "Whatever happens, love... don't be sorry."

All I can do is nod before his wolf tears out of him, and I echo his transformation. We shift as one, like a single soul in two bodies, one of golden brown fur and the other of silvery white.

Then we join the fight.

The air is thick with snarls, screams, hisses, and howls. Beside me, my mate is a blur of fur and muscle, claws slicing through the air. I am his mirror, echoing his movements as instinct takes over and my jaws clamp down on enemy limbs.

Existence fades into a nightmare of death and desperation.

All these lives... all this fear and hate... I lose all sense of everything except for two things: the feel of Tristan fighting by my side and the certainty that I will make Viktor pay for this if it's the last thing I do.

'There are two Alphas on the bridge and one that's already through the gate,' Nico says, his message urgent but less pained than before.

I want to ask him if Mark made it to Amara. I want to ask him if my friend is still alive. But there's no time, and knowing it won't make a difference. Not while the fight is still unfolding in all directions.

We have to move fast.

'Describe them to me.'

Most of the nightwalkers have shifted back into their corporeal forms, but the few still swarming above us will help keep track of the Alphas. Once we're indoors, phase three relies on the army branching out enough to isolate the targets. The winding stone corridors will confuse and scatter the enemy, but it will also make it harder to identify and locate a single wolf.

'For starters, they're freaking huge,' Nico reports. 'One's a grey wolf with a scar along his snout and a streak of black fur down his back. He's on the western side of the bridge, and he's got a Beta fighting by his side. The other's coat is grey and brown with white along his chin and chest. He's got narrow eyes and broad shoulders, and he's moving toward the gate with an entire entourage. He'll be through in minutes.'

'I'm going after him,' Mark snaps suddenly, and there's nothing but rage and determination in his voice.

'Perfect. The skinny vampire girl is going for the scarred one. She's covered in blood, and none of it is hers.'

Helena. Thank the gods.

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