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“What are you talking about?” I snarled before I could stop myself. “I told you not to talk about Ash. Don’t ever talk about him.”
Balor went very still before slowly straightening. The unsettling gleam in his eyes reflected the silvery moonlight as he grinned, wide and sharp. “He hasn’t told you?”
Apprehension twisted my insides, keeping me silent. Told me what? What hadn’t Ash told me?
“His perverse power is infiltrating the forest.” Balor gestured around him again, looking gleeful that he got to tell me this. “He’s killing everything. Perhaps this is what happens when mortal scum thinks he can play make-believe as a fae monarch.”
“That’s not—” I swallowed, looking at the trees again, a terrible sense of dread sinking into my gut when I once more noticed the wilting branches, the browning leaves, the crisp snap and crunch of dead things with every tiny shift of Balor’s feet.
Ash was doing this?
“It’s reaching deeper every day,” Balor rasped. “Getting closer and closer to unseelie. He’s going to wipe us out, Lonan. Destroy us all until he’s the only one left. Surely you can see that’s what he wants.”
“That’s not what he wants.” Ash would never want that. I knew it without a doubt.
“Naïve little fool,” Balor hissed. “You’re blinded by this sick desire you have for him. You should be ashamed, Lonan. Have you really just become his vapid little plaything and nothing more? Does he even speak to you or just keep you chained to his bed? Is this really what you’ve been reduced to?”
“Shut up,” I gritted out. “I told you not to—”
“You know you can’t stay here,” Balor interrupted. “You know you won’t stay here. All you’re doing is letting that vile little dog destroy more and more of us, of all life, while you delay the inevitable.”
“Call him that again, and I will—”
“Enough,” Balor snapped. “Gods, enough of the empty threats. You’re an embarrassment. Come into the fucking forest and do it.” He seethed, baring his teeth at me. “You want to kill me? You want to slice me in half, make me pay for every insult to your seelie dog, cut out my tongue, slit my throat? Come and fucking do it, Lonan.”
I was breathing hard as I stared at him, sweat dampening my hair. I wanted to cut him in half. I wanted to slice off his tongue and gouge out his eyes and rip the hair from his head strand by strand. I’d never relished killing before. I’d never drawn it out or tried to make it particularly painful. I’d never wanted to make a living being suffer.
But I wanted him to suffer.
My eyes darted down to the silver sword hanging from his hip. And I realised, in a sickening rush, that I had forgotten to pick up my dagger on the way out of the bedroom. I’d been too concerned with getting out into the cooler air, my mind cloudy from the relentless heat in the bedroom.
“You’ve become as pathetic as that mongrel,” Balor spat when I didn’t move or speak. I was trying to decide whether I would be able to cross the distance between us and grab his sword before he could. “All these empty threats from both of you. Gods, it gets so damn boring, Lonan. You can finally kill me and you’re too much of a coward to fucking do it.”
His harsh bark of laughter almost made me flinch. He spread his arms wide, a stain of pale skin and white hair in the dark gloom of the forest.
“I killed the dog’s parents, and yet here I still am.” His grin was ghoulishly wide and sharp. “I cut off his fucking arm and here I still am. I took you out of the air with a crossbow and here I am, opposite the most feared fae assassin alive, taunting him while he stands there and does nothing. You’re a joke, both of you. Two little boys who tried to play grown-up games and got scared when they became too real. It would be funny if it wasn’t so fucking sad.”
It felt like I was going to explode from fury. My bones were reshaping themselves before I could even register it, fur splitting through my skin and sprouting thick and dark as I dropped onto all fours as the wolf. A savage snarl tore from my throat as I lunged closer to the treeline and snapped my teeth at him.
Balor jolted, taking a quick step back before reaching down and swiftly drawing his sword. “Try not to make the same mistake you did last time, little brother, by lunging directly onto my sword, hmm?”
I snarled again, pacing back and forth along the treeline just opposite. Balor smirked, dropping to his haunches so his face was level with my lowered head. My hackles were raised, a low, threatening growl vibrating my chest.
“So there is still something left in that wan little shell.” He smiled at me, a sickening smile, and tilted his chin to expose his neck. “Come on then, Lonan. Come and tear my throat out.”
I was vibrating with tension as I bared my teeth at him. My gaze dropped to his pale neck. I wanted to do it. I wanted to hear his panicked breaths and feel his bones crunching between my teeth. I wanted to see the life leave his hard, cruel eyes.
“That’s what I thought.” Balor sneered when I didn’t move, standing back up. “Look at what he’s reduced you to. You should think yourself lucky that I still want you, Lonan. I can’t imagine anyone else will.” He gestured at my back legs. “What good is a lame wolf?”
I froze, my heart stuttering as I suddenly remembered in a sickening rush. My leg.
My head whipped around, and I stared in horror at the empty space where my back leg should have been. Now that my brain had finally registered it wasn’t there, I lost my balance in a jarring rush and stumbled, teetering to the side before toppling back with a pathetic whine.
“Such a pity,” Balor muttered, his lip curled as he gazed down at me. “My poor little brother. You’re not yourself. You need to come home, hmm?”
I tried to get up, but panic was making my limbs shake, making them too unsteady, sending me tumbling back down every time I managed to get my front paws under me.
My leg. My leg is gone again. It’s gone. It’s gone it’s gone it’s gone
