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My heart battered against my ribcage as the change took her. A blade cut through the air toward Talia’s head. With a growl, I shoved my hand over her twitching frame, not certain my magic would work. The sword bounced off my enchanted palm, leaving only a thin cut, and the attacker, in his glittering red suit, stumbled backward. From somewhere behind me, a woman in a silver gown dove at my wife. I dropped to a knee, spun, and grabbed her sword before it reached Talia’s throat. My fingers closed around the blade and yanked. Blood seeped out through my fist.
The woman toppled sideways as her blade ripped from her grasp. With a shriek of disgust, the woman thrust herself backward.
I stood and locked blades with a winged man. I blocked. Cut. Blocked again. If I took even a single step away, the next attacker would be upon Talia.
Her body bucked and writhed. Each limb elongated, her muscles stretching thin across bone. Choking, gurgling sounds erupted from her limp mouth. The change was taking too long; the pain itself would be enough to knock her unconscious.
“Enjoying the show?” called Fabian. “The change is fascinating to watch in slow motion. I can make it last all night. Each breaking bone, each ripping muscle. So. Very. Slow.”
I roared in rage. My borrowed sword sent two more attackers staggering backward.
Hot blood raced through my veins, feeding me with energy I’d never known. My magic was returning in dizzying waves. Talia’s limbs knocked against the marble tile, and her brown skin had gone blue at the joints. Her neck was striped with black veins.
“Stop!” My guttural yell drowned out every other sound.
For a moment, everything paused, save for Talia’s awful writhing.
Fabian locked eyes with me across the sea of bloodthirsty courtiers. His muscles tensed, and he leaped into the air. I swept my arm in a circle, and an inferno encircled Talia and me. Pure white light radiated all around us. Angry faces and upraised swords flickered in and out of view on the other side of the flames, but for a moment, no attacks could reach us.
I dropped to a knee and called out one last spell.
Her chest expanded, each rib visible as her disintegrating dress faded into fur, and her body went still. It was over.
My wife, my love, was dead.
41
Talia
The pain ceased, and it felt like I was floating in a strange sea. My eyes blinked open.
I wasn’t floating, but my body felt entirely different. I couldn’t understand why my skin felt so strange pressed against this shining floor. White light surrounded me. Angry shouts rang in my ears.
“Ev, take her!” Rafael yelled.
Everence bent down and shoved a hand under my back. The first man who swung a knife at Rafael received a punch in the jaw that sent him sprawling backward into two other charging, murderous nobles. Hector was at his side in a heartbeat—two brothers against dozens of fae.
Rafael stuck his sword into a man’s stomach. The man held the sword as he fell away, and Rafael was weaponless again. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t call out.
My body felt like it was made of lead. Everence was humming softly, scooting me backward. I could hear everything. Light glinted off tiny shards of ice in the air. All around me, breaths hissed between clenched teeth, clothing whispered, and shoes scuffed. The flutter of Rafael’s hair and the strain in his muscles drew my attention.
Rafael ripped a sword from a woman who swung it directly at his neck. Holding the blade with his bare hand, he spun and smashed the face of the tiger-striped fae sneaking up with a dagger. He flipped the sword and held the point out toward the next set of eager attackers. They hesitated a moment, then charged as one. He leaped into the air and blasted them all to the ground with a burst of magic.
They grunted and moaned, but all three stayed pinned to the terrace.
Rafael whirled his sword faster than my eyes could track, fending off attacks from three sides. Hector fought beside him, a blur of motion.
But still, they were terribly outnumbered.
Pressing my hands to the ground, I moved to stand, but it felt strange.
Instead of hands and feet, there were paws. And fur.
A roar tore from my open mouth, and the way the noise rattled inside my head satisfied the rage I now felt. All the fae on the terrace turned to face me.
Rafael spun, his eyes wide. “Talia!”
Like a dam reaching down into my bloodstream, I shut off the flood of terror that wanted to take over and focused on a single fighter. If his glamour hadn’t given him wolf ears and fangs, or if he hadn’t been growling as he attacked my husband, I might have struggled more to insert my claws into his shoulder. As it was, I did it easily. His howl of pain, however, curdled my blood.
