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Faster,the titan barked.
I was too wrecked to even gasp when Andryas knelt beside me, too close to my shadows, almost touching, almost—
I bucked off the ground with a broken scream, my eyes rolling back into my skull and pain twisting into my back, my arms, my—into my soul, where my magic was bound to me.
No!
They couldn't take my shadows. They were mine, nothis.But the titan's magic pressed me down, froze me in time, and I couldn't even twitch my fingers to stop Andryas slashing the vile severing blade through my shadows.
He cut them away like the feathers of a wing, one by one, and didn't stop even when I blacked out.
15
Halwen
Ishould have known better than to expect Cronus to go easy on us. But the Chimera he sent to slow us down or murder us—I couldn't say which he planned to happen—ended up on the business end of Harvey's sun soul form. Wynvail took immense pleasure in pointing out it was a half-breed and not a full-blooded Chimera or Harvey wouldn't have been able to kill it, even as an archdemon and a sun soul. Emlyn elbowed him in the ribs for that comment.1
"Malakai!" Emlyn yelled as we walked. We'd been shouting his name for hours now, walking in what felt like circles, following the path Cronus led us on. It was either walk, or try to climb the walls again. That hadn't gone so well for me the first time; for obvious reasons, I was reluctant to get crushed by a wall again.2
"Kai!" I screamed, my voice hoarse, straining my eyes at the end of the passage as if he’d be right there. "Malakai!"
"What if he's not here anymore?" Harvey asked, his wing wrapped around me as he trudged on at my side. He kept pasting a smile onto his face; watching it slip was painful. "Can you feel him?"
I shook my head, hurt arrowing through my soul. "I can't feel any of you anymore. I thought the bonds would start to heal when you remembered me, but…" I shrugged, like it was only a minor concern and not something that kept me up at night. At least it would if I ever slept again. I hadn't slept in … what felt like months.
"They'll repair," Emlyn assured me, turning to give me a look so pure and supportive that I swallowed a lump in my throat and forced a nod. If Em believed we’d be okay, there was a special kind of magic in that.
"Kai!" I yelled, my voice breaking on his name. "Wynvail, can you send up another beam?"
He'd speared the Labyrinth with his bright, moon-silver power four times now, hoping Kai would use it to track us.
"If you sayplease,"he replied smoothly, earning a glare.
Whatever genuine side he'd shown when we found Harvey was swept back under his dickhead personality. I'd resisted the urge to punch him in the dick at least twice.3
"I'm not sayingpleaseto you," I sneered, my nose wrinkling and lips pulled back from my teeth.
Wynvail shrugged, his hands in his pockets as he walked casually, like he was out for a stroll between business meetings. At least his perfect trousers were rumpled and stained. I got a kick of satisfaction in seeing every dirty smear marring his perfection. The blood smeared across his chest gave me less satisfaction. Stupid mate bond.
"Kai!"I screamed, staring up the walls like I'd spot him perched on top of one, his red tail flicking and a smirk on his face. "Come the fuck on, Malakai!"
"There's another wall moving," Emlyn said, his arms crossed over his chest. It was an intimidating pose, but I knew his arms were wrapped around himself because he was scared we'd never find Kai. And he was probably drained by spending so much time with a stranger; Wynvail might have been related to Harvey and Wane, but he wasn't family. "Can you hear that?"
"Shut up hissing," I spat at Wynvail.
"I'm not making a noise," he snapped, his eyes flashing.
No, he was hissing, scraping something across the ground—
"Shit," Harvey breathed, realising before I did.
I spun, and my breath skittered out of my chest when I saw Kai blazing down the stone corridor to us. His steps scraped the ground, blood spattered his head, his knuckles, and covered his shirtless chest. It dripped down his leg too as he pulled it stiffly along, clearly injured. There was something animal and feral in his expression, and a little shiver went down my spine. There was no magic coming from him, though, only animal brutality.
"Kai," Emlyn warned, angling himself in front of me. Wynvail went one better and shoved me behind himself. I shoved him right back, rushing across the Labyrinth to Kai.
"Where are you hurt?" I demanded, reaching for his face, scanning his bloody body.
My heart stuttered when bloody hands grabbed my waist, and Kai lifted me off the ground. Before I could ask what he was doing, he slammed my back into the nearest wall and looked over me, shaking and intense and very obviously out of control.
