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He met my gaze once again. Go. Save this forest.
Then he was gone, the life in his beautiful star-filled eyes snuffed out forever.
The Keeper of the Forest had died.
A shocked gasp tore from my lungs. The ground trembled and shook, and a high-pitched keening wailed through the forest. Trees groaned as they tugged their roots from the earth and swung their branches at the fae.
Behind me, Kit let out a strangled yell, then took up chanting again. I chanced a glance over my shoulder with blurry eyes—vampire-fae scaled the waterfall’s rocky walls from above, heading straight for the cave.
The rocks trembled and crumbled beneath the creatures’ grasps as Kit’s earth magic shook them loose, dropping them into the water.
Angela tumbled out of the narrow entrance. Raising the jeweled dagger above her head, she ran forward. “I got it!”
As soon as she cleared the water’s edge, her gaze fell on the stag, and she slowed to a stop. She shook her head, a disbelieving look on her pale face.
Kit released her hold on the pool. The two walls of water crashed together, drowning the creatures who’d made it to the bottom.
“How could you?” Angela screamed at the neamh-mairbh consuming the stag, devastation ringing in her accusation. Gripping the dagger tight, she pointed it at them as they twisted their necks to stare at her, blood staining their teeth and mouths.
A burst of dark energy rocketed out from Angela and the dagger, slicing through the creatures like a sharp blade. With gaping mouths, their bodies separated wherever the magic touched, and they collapsed to the ground. The desiccated bodies shriveled away, dissolving into the moss.
Thane appeared beside Angela and grabbed her free hand, earning a surprised yelp from the witch. Her eyes rolled up, and she collapsed into his arms. Without hesitating, Thane jumped them away. A twinge in our soul link meant he’d left the Otherworld.
“You’re mine, Veronica…” a phantom yet familiar voice whispered, the words carrying through the trees and flames on wings of magic.
I whipped my head toward the sound, squinting to identify individual shapes behind the thick smoke. Then I saw him.
No…
The natural red highlights in Colin’s auburn hair sparkled in the firelight as he stepped forward. His blue-green gaze met mine, set within a face I once considered handsome. Now, his smug smile promised nothing but cruelty and immeasurable horrors.
He thought I was his?
I narrowed my eyes, fueling my gaze with every ounce of hatred I possessed.
No fucking thanks.
Roaring flames burst outward from Ivan’s body, creating an inferno and incinerating the remaining nightmares in his radius. He disappeared and reappeared beside me, grabbing Kit and my hands. I reached for Lena, gripping her hand tight as the world fell away.
When we reappeared in my penthouse living room, we stumbled forward and nearly collapsed. The city’s twinkling lights sparkled through the giant windows, mocking me with their cheeriness.
A quick glance around the penthouse showed Thane and Angela weren’t here, but my soul link pulsed with his presence in this realm. They were safe.
Holy fuck, that had been way too close.
And now Colin knew we had the third dagger.
Fucking fuck!
Before my legs gave out completely, I sank onto my L-shaped couch and dropped my head back onto the cushions. I stared at the vaulted ceiling. My emotions were all over the place, but grief seized my heart in a vise above all others.
The world had just lost a legend, a powerful being that humans knew nothing about and whose presence Community members only mentioned in whispers. If they even knew enough to whisper.
I might not have known the Keeper long, but no one in their right mind could deny the stag’s ethereal beauty or his otherworldly presence. He had protected the fae realm for millennia, and thanks to one fae man’s creepy infatuation with his cousin and subsequent thirst for power, the stag was gone.
What did his death mean?
Who would protect the Otherworld now?
