Listening to his father talk to his advisors. Humiliation was a rolling wave as they spoke about the fragile princes. Shim was weak in body and they worried Lach’s mind wasn’t strong. Lach didn’t try to defend himself. It wouldn’t make a difference. They wouldn’t listen. If only they would bond, the king bemoaned.
I am bound. I am bound. I am bound.
And yet he was alone.
The hag continued her tour of his brain, seeking knowledge. He felt her satisfaction that he was bound to Bronwyn. It was something she could use, but where was the bitch? The question pounded through him.
Where is Bronwyn?
Each time she asked, his heart squeezed tighter. The hag was everywhere, in every cell of his being, crawling across every inch of his skin. He could smell the rank scent of the hag filling his nose and the clammy touch of her hand on his head.
This was what she wanted to do to Bronwyn. He could see it plainly. The hag wanted Bronwyn for much more than just a quick execution. She wanted to take her time with Bronwyn. She was curious. Bronwyn had survived when she shouldn’t have. The hag wanted to know why, and when she figured it out she would find a way to make that power her own.
The vision of what the hag really wanted made Lach gag. He felt bile bubbling up. The hag had him in her hand. He didn’t know where Bronwyn was. He said it like a mantra. Over and over until he was singing it in his head.
Then you are of no use to me.
That cold hand squeezed, and Lach’s heart skittered and froze, an aching agony invading every inch of his limbs. He wasn’t Lachlan anymore. He was pain. He was despair. All the loneliness he’d ever felt seemed to have been distilled and poured down his throat like a noxious poison.
This was how he ended. This was what he’d been moving toward all of his life.
And then it stopped, the hand on his heart pulled away. Lach felt the dirt on his face, but he could only groan.
“Your Highness, we need to move.” Roan had a hand on his arm, pulling him up.
“What he means is we’re getting our asses kicked. Move yours, McIver.” Dellacourt didn’t mince words.
Lach forced himself to focus. The dead lay all around him, but the hag had cut his connection to them when she’d found her way inside his brain. Without the added soldiers, they were woefully outnumbered and Lach was still feeling muddled.
He struggled to his feet, reaching for his sword. The villagers had come out in mass. They fought for their daughters and wives and sisters. They fought with pitchforks and frying pans and bows and arrows.
“What made her stop?” Lach asked.
“Bron.” Roan pointed to spot a hundred feet to the left where Bronwyn stood staring at the hag.
As though the hag had a direct line to the remaining soldiers’ brains, they all turned, abandoning their personal fights and started toward Bronwyn.
“No.” Lach didn’t give a shit how unsteady he was. He wasn’t letting that fucking hag get close to Bron. He pulled free of Roan.
“Lachlan, don’t.”
But Lach wasn’t listening. He had to get to Bronwyn before those soldiers did.
Gillian stood to the side and Duffy close to her. Shim was next to Bronwyn, his eyes watching as the soldiers came near.
“I want that bitch alive.” The hag’s voice echoed through the square.
Of course she wanted Bron alive. She wanted to dissect her and find out what made her tick. The image of what the hag intended to do to his bondmate made Lach run toward her, willing to do just about anything to keep it from becoming truth.
Bron put a hand out to Shim, who just stood there doing absolutely nothing. Nothing at all. His twin simply stood there like he was perfectly happy to let the soldiers take her. Duffy turned, and his small face went white with surprise. He dropped his axe and started running Lachlan’s way.
“Lach, no.”
Duffy hit his center with the force of a very small but stubbornly powerful train. Lach was knocked back, his ass hitting the dirt, his sword falling from his hand.
Duffy leapt up, putting a hand on his chest. “Let Shim do his job.”
Lach sat up, ready to get to his feet and throw himself in front of his bondmate when he noticed that the fighting had stopped. The villagers had moved back, disappearing into houses or creeping close to walls. And all eyes were on one woman. Bronwyn.
The soldiers began to rush, but Bron nodded Shim’s way and there was a whooshing sound that filled the air. Heat smoldered as a ring of fire appeared, surrounding the soldiers and trapping them in a neat cage of flames.
But his brother wasn’t satisfied. The flames grew and engulfed the soldiers, their dying cries filling the air.
It was all over in seconds, the flames so hot they disintegrated everything that had stood in the ring.
Shim turned to the hag, a smile on his face. With a flick of his wrist, he sent a long line of white and blue flames toward the hag.
“Damn it. Get down!” Roan roared over the crowd.
Lach hit the deck, taking Duffy with him just as Shim’s flames hit the shield the witch had in play and bounced back toward them. Scalding heat brushed over Lach, reminding him that he knew what it meant to be caught in his brother’s power.
“Sorry!” Shim yelled his way. “I didn’t know about the shielding.”
Bron stepped forward, not seeming to care that there was still a powerful hag who had been sent to ensure her death. “Did my uncle send you?”
The hag smiled showing perfectly even teeth that seemed a bit too sharp for her face. “The king sends his greetings, Princess Bronwyn, and promises a glorious family reunion.”
“I don’t think I’ll take him up on that just yet.” Bron stood, her shoulders back. “You aren’t welcome in my village, hag.”
The hag sighed, her elegant gown moving with the sound. “I know when to take my toys and go home. By the way, dear, I spent some time in that one’s head. A dark thing he is. Be careful that he doesn’t eat you up with his ambition. He wants the crown. He’ll say he loves you to get it, but you don’t think the Unseelie will really accept a Seelie queen now, do you? Good luck, dear. Even if you get a crown, it won’t mean much when your head is separated from your body. And, Death Lord, I have a parting gift for you.”
The air around the hag shimmered, and then her hands flew out, a visible cloud racing his way.
Just before it engulfed him, Duffy leapt, tossing his body into the cloud. Darkness covered the gnome, enveloping his body until there was nothing of him that wasn’t black smoke.
Duffy screamed. Lach started to reach for him, but Roan and Dellacourt pulled him back.
“Don’t you dare. You can’t help him now,” Roan said, pushing him back.
Shim tried to get to Duffy, too, but Bronwyn got in his way. “Please.”
The eddy cloud shifted as the hag disappeared once more into its depths. The sky cleared and brilliant sunlight rained down.
Shim dropped to his knees, covering his eyes. Lach squinted, trying to see his little brother, the truly fierce one of their clan.
The cloud was gone and Duffy remained. His body was still, so still. Lach pushed past the vampires whose implants were safely guarding them from the sun’s bright rays. Lach struggled himself, but Gillian and Bronwyn had covered Shim. They struggled to get him under the cover of the buildings.
Lach put a hand on Duffy’s chest, praying for the beat of his heart.
One eye opened. “Damn me, Lach, but that was something.” Duffy sat, flexing his muscles. “I don’t think I like that hag. I’d rather just fight soldiers. A sword has got to hurt less than that damn cloud.”