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From the deck, my men yelled. Some were cheering me on, others were telling me to get out of the cage. Somewhere in the melee, I thought I glimpsed a being I hadn’t seen for thousands of years. I had just enough time to wonder if I was going mad before another wave of searing pain sliced across my face, blinding me in one eye.
Warmth poured from the gashes, spilling down my mangled cheek and neck.
The injury mattered little because I had the creature right where I wanted it.
Unsheathing my cutlass, I swung fast and wide, blocking another blow. It was swelling, making itself bigger and more dangerous, but if I was right about the reinforced wards—and I desperately needed to be right—the enchantment on the cage would be enough to hold that monster. At least until we hit the eddy.
Then it would all come down to craftmanship and speed.
I sliced with my blade again and again, spilling the thing’s disgusting blood without an ounce of mercy. It returned the favor every chance it got, carving and gouging faster than my body could heal itself.
There were no taunting words and witty quips. Pain burned and ached and screamed inside me, but this part of the fight was all about two things; violence and buying myself a few precious seconds to flash safely out of the enclosure.
If I didn’t time it just right, the demon would end up on the deck of the ship with me and my men. We would most assuredly lose it then. The creature would be yanked back to the island, and my odds of getting another shot at it anytime in the next decade would be slim-to-none.
Finally, as my boots slipped on the blood-soaked boards for the hundredth time, and every breath felt like shards of glass scraping down my windpipe, I saw the opening. One second, I was in the cage. The next, I was glaring at the thrashing creature from the deck, panting from exertion.
I’d known it was going to put up a hell of a fight, but holy hell.
A few of my men had moved too close to the edge, no doubt caught up in the brutality of the battle. Petra might not be able to kill them, but the creature wouldn’t hesitate to make them bleed for their recklessness.
“Everyone back!” I rasped, ignoring my own order as my blade clattered on the wooden boards. I had to brace myself on the railing just to stay upright.
They shuffled back at the order, but irritation still rolled through me. “Better yet, to your stations.” That was where they all should have been in the first place. “Get this ship moving.”
Could I blame them for wanting to watch? Not really. Violence and bloodshed had the power to captivate people in a way that little else did. Save, perhaps, for sex.
With that thought, I checked my connection with Never and was met with dead silence.
Was that good or bad?I couldn’t tell, and while I didn’t want to wait even a second longer to find out, I couldn’t leave just yet. Not until I was sure that warded cage would hold.
As my men scattered to the far corners of the ship, I watched the demon. It dragged those monstrous claws against the weathered wood. It kicked and pried at the boards. And when that didn’t work, it threw the full weight of its body back and forth against the inside of its new prison.
All it managed to do was shake the contraption. Even if it did have enough sense to set the cage to swinging enough to bash it against the hull of the ship, the wards shouldkeep both structures in one piece.
There were far too many shoulds and maybes in this plan for my liking.
I was fully healed when I flashed to the beach where I’d left Never a moment later, but that didn’t stop my heart rate from picking up when I couldn’t find her along that dark stretch of sand.
“Fuuuuuck!” The harsh expletive filtered out from the trees, and my blood curdled. That was Never. I was sure of it. Except, I still couldn’t feel a goddamned thing coming from her, and somehow, it sounded like her curse was coming from everywhere.
Another scream rent the air, and I was running before I thought to move my feet. My boots weighed a thousand pounds as they sank into the sand with every step. Branches clawed at me as I shoved my way into the shadows, but I barely noticed over the thrum of my heart beating like an angry bird trapped in my chest.
I charged through the darkness, pausing only when Anya’s cruel laugh tinkled through the claustrophobic greenery. Turning in an uncertain circle, my senses were trying to search everywhere at once.
Come on, Never. Let me in.Even just a crack would guide me to her.What the hell was I thinking teaching her to block me out?
Anya’s voice had come from the opposite direction I’d been running, but my gut, tangled as it was, told me to keep going.
Surging forward, the soles of my boots pounded the damp earth and soft fallen leaves, until they brought me to a scene that made my knees weak.
Never was fighting to get up off the ground. Her back was soaked in blood.
The vicious pixie hovered over the woman who owned my heart, those turquoise wings flitting excitedly. The look on her face, pure and wicked delight, sent the anger swirling beneath my skin through the roof.
She will pay for this.
Everything inside me clenched tight—my stomach, my lungs, my throat—and I started forward on stilted legs.
