Chapter 34
REDVYR
My soul shook when I saw her on the scaffold, the smoke from the burning flames licking up from the bottom of the pyre. My rage renewed, burning higher than the blaze trying to devour my dear one.
By the gods, I had made it in time, but just barely.
When the crowd finally realized that we were charging up their main road toward the town square and had started screaming and running for their lives, it was too late. We were already upon them.
My command was to for my men to kill only the townsfolk who stood in our way and let the others go. But the moon fae guards of Mevia were all to die. Gael would die by my own hand.
Several moon fae guards were drawing their swords, facing us for the fight. And by all the hells, they would get one. But my first priority was Jessamine.
Charging up the stone steps, I leaped completely over the line of guards and landed at the base of the fire encircling her. Without hesitation, I leaped through the flames and blocked her body with mine.
“Redvyr,” she cried, her voice cracking.
Slicing through her bonds, I swept her into my arms and launched off the back of the stone platform.
I didn’t have to call for him. Wolf sprinted toward us, snuffling her hair.
I wanted to hold her, reassure myself that she was safe, but she wasn’t.
Not yet. But I would make damn fucking sure she always would be after today.
Taking a brief moment to brush my cheek against hers, I tossed her onto Wolf’s back. “Go! Take her where I told you!”
Then Wolf launched into a run back toward the river, Jessamine clinging to his fur, but looking back at me.
The sound of clanging swords called my name. I rushed back onto the stone stage, where ten moon fae surrounded one fucker in fancy clothes. That had to be him.
“Gael!” I bellowed.
He instantly turned his head to face me, his eyes widening with a touch of fear. He should be afraid. I marched toward him, one of his guards leaping in front of me and slashing his sword at my chest.
With a deft movement, I clasped his wrist and snapped the bone backward.
“Ahh!” my opponent cried, dropping his sword.
With a swift plunge of my blade into the center of his throat, crimson blood spraying, he fell backward. I spun back to Gael.
He saw me coming, stared up and then leaped into the sky, his wings beating hard and taking him into the air.
“Fucking coward,” I muttered, pulling the long blade from the scabbard at my hip.
With a quick aim, I let it loose, sending it flying toward my target. It hit exactly where I wanted, ripping a hole through one of his wings. He spiraled and fell.
Pushing my way through the battle, I launched off the stage and sprinted toward where he had fallen behind a building. When I rushed down the alley, he ran around a corner up ahead. I chased after him, but when I rounded the corner he was nowhere in sight.
I knew he couldn’t fly, so I let my beast fae hunting senses take over. He smelled of sickly perfume and floral-scented soap, so it was an easy trail to follow, guiding me directly through the back door of an alehouse.
I stood in a storage room stacked with barrels and bags of barley. His scent led me into the main hall of the tavern. I didn’t have to guess where he was, following his foul aroma to the bar.
“You can come out, Gael, or I’ll drag you out.”
Suddenly, he popped up and threw a dagger at me before taking off for the front door. I swatted the dagger away and dove for him, tackling him to the floor.
“This is how you want to die, my lord?” I held him down with one hand wrapped around his throat. “Running and hiding. I should’ve known. You parade yourself around like a great cat, but you are nothing more than a tiny mouse.”
He struggled and kicked, trying to pry my hand free from his throat to no avail.
“You can have her,” he choked out.
I loosened my grip. “What did you say?”
He must not have heard the warning in my voice, for he prattled stupidly on.
“You can have her. Jessamine. She means nothing to me. You want to get some pups in her, I’m sure. She’s healthy for breeding. I’ll even throw in some coin. Just let me go.”
“She means nothing to you?” I struggled to keep from digging my claws into his throat.
“Nothing at all.”
I leaned forward, bearing my fangs. His eyes went wide as I growled, low and feral, “She means everything to me.” My grip tightened. His eyes bulged. “She isn’t a horse to be bred, you fucking bastard. She is my gods-given mate. My heart and my soul.”
A nearly silent step behind me was my only warning that someone approached. I rolled to the side, the blade of an auburn-haired guard clashed with the wooden floor of the tavern, barely missing Gael who scrambled away quickly. His broken wings dangling behind him, he limped for the door.
I picked up a table and threw it at the guard.
He cried out as he tumbled to the ground with the table landing on its side on top of him.
Leaping across the room, I leaned all of my weight on the table, pinning him to the floor.
Using my tail, I dragged his sword on the floor to my hand and then plunged it into his stomach, straight through the wooden floor.
Wasting no time, I ran after Gael, finding him hobbling quickly back toward the fighting.
“Guards!” he cried out. “Help!”
I stalked after him. He came out of the alleyway, his breath dying in his throat as he called out again, “Guards!” He limped a few more steps and stopped, staring.
There was little sound coming from the battleground of Mevia’s town center.
And I knew why. When I exited the alley, it was to find the town center empty of all the fae folk.
The Mevian guards were all dead on the ground, and the beast fae warriors who’d joined me to save Jessamine stood over them, bloodied and whole. Not a single warrior had fallen.
Breathing hard, spattered with the red blood of our enemies, black-steel blades in hand, they stood facing Gael.
Bezaliel, Leifkyn, Dayn, Brohm, Haslek and every warrior of the Vanglosa clan, as well as Behrvyne and Walgar with a party of each of their own warriors.
They all stood strong, our wolves surrounding them, staring at the last enemy to be put down.
“You see what happens, Lord Gael.”
He spun to face me, his eyes wide with fear.
“When you take what is not yours to take from the beast fae.”
He swallowed hard, glancing back at the line of beast fae warriors that stood taller than any moon fae, armed and ready should any more come barreling out from behind buildings.
But I knew there would be no second assault.
The people of Mevia were learning a valuable lesson.
They were watching from behind closed doors and shuttered windows.
“You should not stir the beast that lives within us,” I called loud enough for those hiding in their homes and shops to hear me. “If you make us your enemy, you will die.”
That was all I had left to say. With two long strides, unsheathing the sword in the scabbard across my chest, I made quick work of Gael, severing his head from his body with one hard strike of my blade, my sword clinking against the stone beneath.
Bezaliel met me halfway across the cobblestone courtyard, a granary sack in his hand.
I dropped the still-dripping head of the moon fae lord of Mevia into the sack.
“Do we burn the bodies for them?” he asked me.
“No. This is as much their mess as it was their lord’s. They followed him. They can do the work of disposing of their own dead. Maybe that will let it sink in.”
“Let what sink in?” asked Behrvyne, now gathered near me with Walgar.
Behrvyne frowned as he looked at the buildings behind us. He had never been to a town in Lumeria, and he didn’t know what to expect of their people.
“That when they follow an evil lord, they are complicit in the seeds he sows.” I gestured to all of the fallen Mevian guards, every last one now dead. “This is as much their mess as it was their lord’s.” I pointed to the sack Bezaliel held in his fist.
“They won’t soon cross a beast lord, that is for certain,” said Behrvyne.
Pausing, I swept my gaze to all of the warriors spread across the town square. “Thank you, to all of you, for…”
My words stuck in my throat. My heart skipped a beat as I finally took a moment to think of Jessamine and how close I came to losing her.
“I am glad we were here to help,” said Walgar, raising a hand to my shoulder. “We should inform King Gollaya.”
I nodded.
“I will send our sprite to him,” said Walgar. “You go fetch your mate.”
“Thank you.”
“We will meet you back at J?hl Tundra,” said Bezaliel. “I’ll go with Brohm, Leifkyn, and Dayn to make your delivery.” He tightened his hold on the sack.
“It may be a few days before I return.”
Bezaliel smiled, as did Behrvyne who chuckled as he added, “We wouldn’t expect anything less.”
With that, I turned and jogged down the main road out of Mevia and toward the Borderlands. I had something to say and something to do to Jessamine that I should’ve done long ago.