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Fenn took stock of Sienna as he scooped her up and felt a fire licking through him he doubted he’d ever known. It made a mockery of the rage he’d experienced the first time he’d purposely used his power, back when he’d been human. If his skin could burn, his body would have been engulfed in the flames of his anger.
She had blood caked beneath her nose and smeared around her lips, undoubtedly from the nasty break in her nose. Lesser scrapes and scratches across her face, loosened threads along her sweater, her neck would bruise, and contusions forming that were hidden beneath her clothes.
He barely heard Sulien’s declaration as War and Famine arrived in his wake.
Sienna seemed to hear it, though, because she turned more into his embrace and made a pained whining sound, as if she wanted to speak and cry at the same time but was incapable of either. The sound of her suffering only fed the beast inside him. He had no way to ease her pain, to heal her wounds or even safely numb the afflicted areas. He could only offer her vengeance.
“Don’t coddle that freak, Fenn,” Florence said, her tone sharp. Offended.
Sulien let out a whistle. “Gotten a little cocky there, haven’t we?”
“I did expect the young one,” the man who’d put his hands on Sienna said, “but does this little rescue really require all three of you? And what happened to Conquest? I thought he was going to put me in my place.”
Fenn looked up, studying the man who looked so strangely similar to Cassian. “What are you after?” It wouldn’t change the outcome, but just in case it was something another might pursue, he should probably ask.
Florence bounced forward, her sickening energy pushing against the tangible swirl of his temper as if she thought she could walk right through it. She pouted at him and folded her arms beneath her breasts. “Fenn, you have to let me kill her so I can absorb her power!”
Sienna stiffened in his arms.
Fenn narrowed his eyes at the woman he sincerely regretted not killing the first time she’d popped into his afterlife.
Cassian found his tongue first. “I beg your pardon?”
The man who wasn’t Cassian, but may well have similar ancestry, took hold of Florence’s nearest arm and tugged her back from the tendrils of Fenn’s magic. “Now look what you’ve done, fool,” he said sharply. “Do you expect they’re going to cooperate with that plan?”
“No,” Fenn said. The darkness rippled with the sound of his voice. “You’ve done enough. Where is Piper Jacobsen?”
Florence rolled her eyes. “Which one of those stupid sisters are you really hung up on, exactly?”
Sulien tapped his foot on the slab floor, almost as if he were impatient.
“I’ll return the elder sister to you,” the man said, holding Fenn’s stare. “If you’ll return the youngest to me.”
Fenn tightened his arms around Sienna as if either foe could wade into the pool of his void and take her from him. “Never.”
Florence planted her hands on her hips with a huff. “You’re not thinking clearly. You don’t evenlikehumans!”
“Are you sure you want to refuse,” the man beside her said, “without consulting your little toy first?”
“This is ludicrous,” Cassian interrupted. He stepped as near to Fenn’s side as the undulating swirl of power allowed. “What you’re proposing is impossible for her—” He pointed crudely toward Florence. “Or the power I sense in you. Unless you’re hiding who you really are and think playing this sort of game, inthistown, is a wise choice.”
The other man smiled coldly. “I don’t believe I’ve attempted to explain who I am.”
Sienna’s body shuddered in Fenn’s arms, drawing his focus from the irritating back-and-forth. He glanced down at her just in time for her to flatten her palms against his chest and, with a trembling inhale, push herself away.
Bloodstained Hands
Hersister’slifestillhung in the balance.
How could she, for a single moment, have allowed herself to forget that?
Sienna was safe and protected in Fenn’s arms, surrounded by his magic she didn’t fully understand, and even more-so with two of his allies standing nearby. She could remain as she was, keep her pounding head bowed, and make it home alive. Bloodied, but alive. She could see Maya again and thank Rajan for guarding her sister. But she could do none of that if she wanted to do what she’d set out to do and rescue Piper.
She vaguely heard Florence’s obnoxious voice in the background, pleading with Fenn to forgive her. Even now. The woman was a true lunatic.
Fenn’s arms tightened around Sienna and his firm, almost growling, voice reverberated through her with a single word. “Never.”
Tears rushed her eyes again and Sienna couldn’t really distinguish anything that was said after as her heart thundered in her ears. She hadn’t clearly heard the question, but Fenn’s response felt like the kind of statement she ought to take note of. The kind she might have been giddy over, even … under different circumstances.
