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Heat it as much as you can stand, Talon had said. She could protect herself from the overwhelming heat, but if Talon was nearby, he’d be caught in the crossfire. Though he could protect himself too, so long as he was conscious.
A sharp sensation pierced through her foot. Arianna barely had enough time to draw in a breath before that gnarled hand dragged her beneath the surface. She was half blind in the murky river and spun only to have sharp teeth sink deep into her shoulder.
Undiluted terror shrouded her senses as images of Rion’s twisted face assaulted her mind. Arianna saw the challenge in his gaze. The unrelenting anger as he commanded her to tell him—to tell him—no, this wasn’t Rion. The room shifted back to liquid and she struggled against the thin body. It had wrapped its arms around her torso and its bony legs around her waist.
Another set of teeth pierced through her foot and Arianna lost her breath again. She fought desperately, wriggling against the iron grip of its fangs and claws. For a moment, Arianna imagined she felt Rion’s panic down that single thread, followed by his anger.
But their bond was too weak. She wouldn’t be able to feel those things now. She—the ancient thing in her body answered her mate’s call with glowing calculated anger of its own. It lifted a massive head and cracked one eye open to survey the threats lying beyond.
It didn’t crawl to the surface this time. The world didn’t slow. Instead, the raw magic in her veins ruptured through the veil holding it back and burst from her in a violent sea of blue and white.
She remembered her days as a slave and the cracks of the whips. The way the iron-tipped barbs had ripped into her flesh. Arianna recalled the day her wrist had snapped and the endless days after when she’d fallen to the mud, her energy spent.
But more than the pain or tears or loss, Arianna remembered that she had always risen. Always survived. Always triumphed.
Because she wasn’t weak.
The bodies pinning her sprang away and Arianna shot to the surface. She gulped down air and again looked for her friend, using magic to calm the water around her body. Everything moved faster and faster and she used dozens of tendrils of magic to search through the river’s stormy current. For a heartbeat, thrashing, anything that would tell her Talon lingered in the depths.
She found nothing.
Another set of claws wrapped around her ankle, but instead of fighting, Arianna breathed deep and allowed them to pull her down. She could sense three pairs of eyes staring at her in triumph, all suspended in her bubble of calm. Their teeth snapped, the sound muffled to near silence by the water. She felt the current ripple further away, telling her there were even more of them approaching, ready to devour her alive.
But the magic beneath her skin roared and Arianna internally screamed with it.
Heat built in her core, down her arms, through her legs, then the closest creature jerked its hand away. Another swam closer only to snap its teeth again.
The temperature rose and rose.
Bubbles formed just outside a protective layer shielding her from the boiling liquid. Her frozen skin reacted to the heat, tingling as it warmed. The creatures retreated further, using their own magic to prevent the river from sweeping them away.
One turned to flee, but she wouldn’t let it get far.
Arianna felt for her friend a final time and when she still didn’t find him, Arianna prayed he was out of the water and unleashed hell upon them all.
She knew now with utmost certainty that whatever creatures lingered in the mountains that separated Móirín from Brónach weren’t the Dark Fae. Not even close. The Dark Fae were foul things with sharp teeth and claws that only possessed enough awareness to kill and maim.
The Dark Fae were the creatures surrounding her, beasts from legends forgotten through the ages. They were the things willing to rip the skin from a Fae’s bones while they were still alive. And she would eradicate them from the land one at a time.
Two more fled and Arianna sent boiling tendrils of water darting after the frantic creatures. The water muffled their shrieks of pain. They thrashed, losing control of their magic as they tried and failed to cool the water boiling their skin. But despite their wordless pleas, Arianna held firm.
They tore at their own bubbling flesh now as if they might stand a chance of surviving without it. Still, the water grew hotter and hotter until eventually the creatures stopped moving altogether. She pushed that heat just a little more, feeling it press against the barrier she’d created for herself. Just a little more to be certain nothing could ever hope to survive.
Arianna bolted for the surface, her lungs straining. Air. Fresh and crisp and cold. Her body, suspended in a single cool ring of water, glided toward the bank.
The river took care of the rest. It washed the boiled corpses away, along with whatever else she’d killed in the process. Part of her felt sick that innocent creatures had been caught in the middle, but something would eat well tonight, at least.
Arianna crawled onto the grass, but she couldn’t allow herself to rest. Not until she found her friend. He was out here somewhere. She refused to accept otherwise.
A far off howl echoed from within the dark trees. There were more of those things still prowling the woods.
She studied the tree line, then surveyed herself. She didn’t know how the raging water hadn’t dislodged her twin knives, but the rest of her arsenal had vanished along with the pack that held their food and a map of the area.
She peered into the darkness. The silence was deafening and her skin crawled as she strained to hear any sound that might tell her which way she needed to go.
No hissing or screaming creatures. No sound of Talon’s war cry. Just the angry swell of the river as it lapped at the bank, ready to pull her back down again.
Downstream. That would be the best place to start looking. Arianna stood only to collapse again. Pain seared through her foot and she winced at the puncture marks peppering the top of her boot.
