80. Sina
My heart seized as the man from my nightmares stepped through the treeline. Smoke hung low over the clearing. Blood soaked into the dirt at our feet. It looked exactly like one of my nightmares, except for one crucial difference.
I didn’t have to face him alone.
I forced myself to stand straighter even though my legs trembled, my monsters solid at my back as I lifted my chin to face the beast who had tried to take them from me.
How fucking dare he.
After everything he had done to me, he had the audacity to clap like this was some kind of performance for his entertainment. Nik growled from my left, low and lethal, and the sound vibrated through my bones. I echoed the sentiment with the glare I fixed on Keith.
“Well, well, well. Little mouse,” Keith taunted as he stepped fully into the moonlight.
“Don’t fucking call me that,” I snapped, my hands curling into fists at my sides.
“I didn’t think your little hive would survive my rogues,” he said, almost amused, his gaze sweeping lazily over the bodies scattered across the bluff before settling back on me. He looked physically ill with satisfaction, drinking in the carnage like it was a fine wine.
Bastard.
I imagined wiping that look of satisfaction right off his face. I imagined breaking every smug bone in it.
Rafe’s bear chuffed behind me, hot breath brushing the back of my neck. His steady warmth pressed against the bond, grounding me even as my rage pulsed sharp and bright. He could feel it. They all could.
I was practically vibrating with it .
Keith took a single step closer, posture relaxed, hands loose at his sides like he wasn’t standing in a graveyard of his own making. The dumbass thought he was in control. He had always thought that. He had always mistaken cruelty for power.
“You should have run away, pussycat, when you had the chance,” Harlow taunted from just behind me, his arm hooking around my neck and pulling me flush against his chest. The contact wasn’t restraint. It was possession and a warning to Keith all wrapped in one. A reminder that I wasn’t alone.
Keith’s eyes glowed orange as he lingered near the treeline, careful and calculating. He thought the shadows protected him. He thought distance made him untouchable. I didn’t look away from him. I couldn’t.
This time I wasn’t the prey cornered in the dark. This time I was the reason the dark had teeth.
The image came to me so vividly it almost stole my breath.
His charred body at my feet. Smoke rising from ruined flesh as I dragged him to the edge of the bluff and kicked him into the black water below.
I had never considered myself violent. I had survived violence.
Endured it. Adapted to it. But standing here now, staring at the man who had tortured me for years alongside his brother, something vicious and hungry unfurled in my chest.
Revenge.
Keith spread his arms slightly, taking in the carnage like a king surveying a battlefield. The rogues lay scattered around us, dead because he had promised them a taste of me. My monsters wouldn’t let anyone live who threatened what was theirs.
“Useless mutts,” he sighed, as if their deaths were nothing more than a minor inconvenience .
I smiled at him, my lips curling cruelly. Not because anything about this was funny, but because he had miscalculated so badly it was almost pathetic.
“You really thought you’d win against my monsters?
” I asked softly, a laugh threading through my voice.
“How stupid can you be? Arrogance will get you killed, Keith.” His gaze snapped back to mine, irritation flashing bright in the orange glow of his eyes.
“Your first mistake was promising the rogues they could have me. They died because of you. And now my mates won’t let you live for threatening what belongs to them. ”
Every single one of my mates growled at that, the sound layered and lethal behind me. The air shifted—heat and restraint and barely contained fury pressing at my back.
They were waiting for my lead. Waiting for me to call upon them. For the first time ever, I felt fucking powerful.
Harlow’s arm tightened slightly around my shoulders as he leaned closer. “Your second mistake was showing your face here,” he said conversationally. “You’ll die for both.”
Keith’s mouth curved into a menacing smile, but there was strain in it now. He wasn’t as comfortable as he wanted us to believe.
“The dragon won’t allow you to kill me,” he said with smug confidence. “If I die, so does his brother and the whore he has with him.”
The words hit the air and died there.
That wiped the satisfaction from his face.
Because I didn’t flinch. I didn’t panic. I didn’t look back at Kiron in fear. Instead, I laughed. The sound surprised even me. It wasn’t hysterical. It wasn’t brittle. It was cold.
“You really thought we wouldn’t check?” I asked quietly. “You thought we’d just take your word for it? ”
Keith’s gaze flicked past me for the first time, really seeing the men at my back. The bond between us thrummed hot and possessive, a living thing that wrapped around my ribs and held me upright.
“And this time,” I said, stepping forward out of Harlow’s loose hold, “you’re not looking at a broken girl. You’re looking at the reason you’re about to burn .”
He took a minuscule step back.
I saw the doubt in his posture.
“Give me one good reason I shouldn’t have my mates kill you where you stand.”
He tried to smirk again, but it didn’t land the same.
“I have securities in place. If I don’t come back others will come. More rogues will hunt you,” he insisted, glancing toward my dragon.
Kiron answered him with a growl that shook the trees. Smoke billowed from his nose, curling into the night air. His massive purple form loomed behind us, wings partially unfurled, scales shimmering under the moonlight like something carved from wrath itself.
“Think about this,” Keith pressed. “You’re your brother’s keeper. If I die, so will he.”
Harlow burst into laughter. Not a chuckle. Not a snort.
A full, unhinged cackle.
“How dumb do you think we are?” he asked, wiping at the corner of his eye like this was the funniest thing he’d heard all night. “They’re safe. Tucked into bed. Guarded. You don’t have anyone left to bargain with.”
Keith spluttered, scrambling to recover. “You’re wrong. I have them tucked away. I—”
All of my beasts took a single step forward in unison.
Keith whimpered.
He fucking whimpered .
The sound slid through me, cold and satisfying. The monster who had haunted my nightmares for years was afraid. Finally . I crossed my arms over my chest and let him see exactly what he had created.
“You assumed we wouldn’t figure out your bluff,” I said evenly. “And now, for your arrogance, you’ll die.”
“Burn him.”
The words left my mouth steady and clear.
“What? You can’t be serious, Sina,” he choked out.
But I was.
After everything he had done to me, I didn’t want mercy. I wanted him to suffer, to burn until all that remained of him was ash on the wind.
A sharp caw split the smoky night. I looked up just as a dark shape cut through the moonlight.
Elias dove out of the sky, wings beating hard as he swooped low over the clearing before banking toward me.
He landed on my shoulder in a rush of black feathers, claws careful as they settled into the fabric at my collar.
I lifted my hand and stroked my fingers gently along the sleek feathers at his throat. He gave a soft, indignant little squawk like he’d flown halfway across the world just to make sure I was still breathing.
“You made it back.”
Nik moved to my right. Rafe stepped in close behind me. Harlow’s hand came to rest at my hip. My hive surrounded me. I felt whole.
I turned to my dragon. Kiron towered over us all, scales shimmering deep violet beneath the moonlight, smoke curling from his nostrils in slow, controlled breaths. He wasn’t wild. He was waiting.
For me.
I walked to him without hesitation and placed my palm against his snout. Heat radiated beneath my touch, his scales warm and smooth.
“Avenge me, Kiron. Then come home to me. ”
He huffed softly.
Harlow leaned close to my ear. “Come with your mates, little vixen. Let your dragon take out the trash.”
I pressed a kiss to Kiron’s scales and let Harlow lead me away from the clearing.
But I didn’t want to leave. I wanted to watch my tormenter go up in flames.
I needed to see him die for myself. I stopped at the treeline and turned just as Keith tried to run, but he didn’t make it three steps.
Kiron reared back and unleashed dragon fire.
The flames swallowed Keith whole. His scream tore through the night and then cut off abruptly as the fire consumed him. The air filled with ash and heat. When the flames died, nothing remained but smoke drifting toward the dark water below.
I exhaled slowly, the tension leaving my shoulders as Eli tucked himself beneath my chin. I stroked his feathers lightly.
I’d been marked by death, burdened by everything that had tried to break me. And now I was blood mated to monsters. I looked at each of my mates and smiled, because there was nothing in this world that would ever stand between me and them again.