Mara
Ican’t stop staring at him. Aaron’s standing over two headless warlocks with blue-gold light still crackling off his fists and the blood is everywhere—the ground, the bodies, splattered across my arms and drying warm against me.
The copper smell of it fills my nose and pushes out everything else, even Aaron’s scent.
I wipe my forearms across the shirt Torin just pulled over my head but the blood smears instead of coming off.
Torin stays close. I can smell the fear buried under his usual scent.
He reaches up and pulls the band off his wrist, gathering his locs and pinning them back like he needs something to do with his hands.
His bright green eyes keep cutting between me and Aaron, and I know what he’s thinking because I’m thinking it too—we just watched Aaron skin two men alive and take their heads off with their own conjured blade.
My tail is swinging behind me in fast, erratic arcs and my lion is pacing inside me, alert and watchful. Every instinct I have is telling me to go to my mate. But Aaron isn’t looking at me. His eyes are fixed on something past the tree line.
I follow his gaze and my ears snap forward. Tiana is standing at the edge of the forest with her hand pressed over her mouth, tears running down her face.
“What happened?” I ask Torin. “How did the warlocks get out of the Glen?”
“The seal didn’t hold.” Torin keeps his voice low, watching Aaron the whole time. “I heard King Amir and Angie discussing it earlier.”
Aaron hasn’t moved. He’s locked on Tiana with his hands still glowing and he’s looking at his sister like she’s the next threat. My lion feels it—a fracture between those two that runs deeper than tonight, that was already there before the warlocks ever broke out of the Glen.
Tiana steps out of the forest and walks toward us with magic sparking at her fingertips.
Her hands hang loose at her sides but her fingers are spread and her weight is low—my lion reads it the same way she reads any predator trying to look calm.
The tears are still wet on her face but her expression has gone hard and her steps don’t hesitate.
Aaron’s glare deepens with every step she takes. His magic flares brighter, the glow climbing up his forearms, and he doesn’t speak until she stops in front of us.
“I knew you would betray me.” His voice is low and raw, nothing like the Aaron I know. “Try to take her from me when you know she’s all I have.”
I’ve sensed the tension between Aaron and Tiana before but I could never place it—a sharpness when he spoke to her earlier.
But he’s never sounded like this. Whatever fear drove him to trap me in our suite has curdled into a voice I don’t recognize, like the man I love has stepped back and left his magic standing in front of me.
I step between them and press my palm flat against Aaron’s chest. His heart is slamming so hard I can feel it through his shirt and his skin is hot—the magic running through him turns his body into something that almost burns.
“Stop.” I keep my voice steady even though my hand wants to shake. “No, Aaron. Stop.”
My voice hits him and the feral edge drops. His shoulders fall and the glow on his arms dims and when he looks down at me his eyes are Aaron’s again.
He cups my face with both hands and presses his forehead against mine. His palms are still warm from the magic and I can smell the fear under his frustration now, buried deep.
“Baby, are you alright?” His voice breaks on it.
“I’m okay,” I tell him. But he’s already pulling back, his attention dropping to my arm where the gash from the warlock’s magic is still healing.
I watch the panic take over his face. His nostrils flare, his scent goes sharp with worry, and his fingers hover over the wound like he’s afraid to touch it.
“I’m okay, Aaron. See?” I turn my arm so he can see the skin knitting itself closed, slow but steady. “I’m already starting to heal.”
Tiana reaches us. She stops and her gaze cuts to me and my ears flatten against my head. She was right. She told me to go home and I didn’t listen and now look at what that got me.
Aaron pulls me into him. He buries his face in my neck and his scent floods me—coffee and sandalwood and the sharp metallic edge of fear underneath.
“I thought I was going to lose you,” he says into my neck.
“I keep telling you I’m not going anywhere.” I press my hand against the back of his head and hold him.
His scent shifts. The worry pulls back and frustration takes its place, hot and bitter, changing the coffee-and-sandalwood into an edge that makes my ears snap upright.
“Aaron?”
Tiana tears the air open and through the portal I can see the entrance to Wintermoon Medical—the wide archway and warm light spilling from inside where dragon shifters are already moving through the lobby.
“I’ve got her.” Tiana reaches for me. “I’ll make sure she gets looked over.”
The bolt of magic that hits Tiana’s hand is fast and vicious. She yelps and snatches her hand back, shaking it out, and when she looks up at Aaron her eyes are blazing.
“Aaron!” I snap.
“Don’t fucking touch my mate.” Aaron’s voice comes out cold. “Don’t ever go near her.”
“Aaron, stop—“
Torin’s hand closes around my arm and pulls me backward. I hiss at him, my claws pressing against my fingertips, but he doesn’t let go. He pulls me behind him and holds me there with his body between me and the two Blackwoods.
“Can you smell that?” Torin keeps his voice low. “That’s two Blackwoods about to go at each other. We need to move.”
Past him, Tiana is still shaking her hand out. The skin across her fingers is already bruising.
“You are out of your fucking mind,” Tiana snaps.
“Oh, yes.” Aaron cocks his head to the side and the gesture is easy, almost bored, and my lion presses flat inside me. “Absolutely. What’s your angle, Tiana? You hate my mate that much?”
“You are a selfish asshole.” Tiana takes a step toward him. “You locked your mate and put her into a magical coma, forcing her to astral project.”
Torin stiffens behind me. “Wait—what?”
“Why don’t you tell us all what the fuck is really going on here, Aaron?” The portal to Wintermoon Medical is still open beside Tiana, warm light spilling across the ground behind her.
Aaron’s hands curl into fists at his sides. His magic is back, light crawling up his arms, and he goes quiet.
“I’m going to fix this,” he says.
“Really?” Tiana puts her hands on her hips. “When? After you blow Wintermoon the fuck up? You’re too selfish and your magic is out of control.”
She points at the portal. “Now, unless you’re gonna speak up, I’m taking Mara to Wintermoon Medical.”
“You touch her and I’ll fuck you up.”
“Aaron, what is wrong with you?” I push against Torin’s arm but he holds me firm.
“Yeah, man.” Torin shakes his head. “You need to chill out. Don’t speak to your sister that way.”
Aaron looks at us—me and Torin, and then he looks back at Tiana. His eyes are darker than I’ve ever seen them.
“Get back,” Aaron says.
“Man, you are out of your mind.” Torin pulls me farther from them and I dig my feet in.
“Torin!”
“You haven’t seen Blackwoods fight before.
” Torin doesn’t stop pulling until we’re behind the tree line.
He drops his voice near my ear. “It’s like watching two cats fight.
You let it run its course and never break that shit up.
” He shakes his head. “I tried once and got turned into a mouse for two days. Hated that shit.”
I stare at him, stunned, and he just shrugs.
He puts his hand on my arm and leans in closer.
“Aaron is powerful,” he whispers, “but Tiana matches it. I think she’s not sure of herself in the way Aaron is, which gives him an advantage.
” He straightens up and holds my gaze in the moonlight.
“Watch your new family show you what they can really do.”
“Don’t fuck with me, Aaron.” Tiana’s voice carries across the clearing, steady and sharp. “I may not have been able to beat your ass in the past, but believe me when I say you don’t wanna try me now.”
Aaron lifts his hand and a ball of blue light gathers in his palm, growing fast, swelling until it’s the size of his head and the heat rolling off it reaches me from where I stand. The light churns inside it like something alive.
“I’m gonna make you wish you never bothered my mate,” Aaron says. “She wouldn’t be in this position if it weren’t for you.”
Tiana lets her hands fall to her sides. She studies the magic churning in his palm and her jaw sets.
“You got some dark magic in you or something?” she asks.
“Maybe.” Aaron sneers.
The ball of blue light ignites. Fire erupts from it and rockets toward Tiana in a spiral of blue-gold flame that lights up the clearing.
She moves before it reaches her—her hands shoot into the air and the magic that explodes from her fingertips shifts from blue to blinding white. Her eyes go completely white.
The air crackles. Darkness rolls across the sky as clouds swallow the moon and the clearing drops into shadow.
Lightning splits the sky above us and slams into the ground around Tiana in jagged bursts that send dirt and debris spraying.
The fireball hits the wall of white light pouring from her palms and disintegrates into sparks that scatter across the clearing like dying stars.
“You got me fucked up.” Tiana’s voice has changed—deeper, resonant, vibrating with whatever is pouring through her. The white light pouring off her is steady and her hair is lifting around her face from the static. “I’m gonna beat your ass and then tell our mom I did it.”
Aaron throws two more fireballs. They launch from both hands, the flame spinning toward her. Tiana holds her palms out and white light erupts from them, colliding with both fireballs at once. The explosions send shockwaves through the clearing. My tail wraps around my waist and holds on.