CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE
Ailsa
DAVIEN’S ROARS TORE through the room with such force that even the walls seemed to recoil from him, the sound raw and unrestrained in a way I had never heard before. There was nothing controlled about it, nothing calculated—just fury and something far worse beneath it.
Fear.
What made it worse was the growing pit in my stomach that told me his fear was for me, not for himself.
He moved like a storm unleashed, all precision abandoned in favour of sheer, brutal force as he tore through them one by one, bodies hitting the ground in rapid succession in his effort to reach me.
It dragged me back to the forest—to the hounds and the way he had fought them, relentless and unyielding, as though the world itself had no right to stand between him and whatever he was trying to protect.
He was unstoppable.
Until he wasn’t.
The room was plunged into darkness so suddenly it stole the breath from my lungs, the chaos cutting off as though the world had been silenced mid-scream.
There was a shift in the air as something—no, someone—entered the space.
“That’s quite enough of that.”
The voice slithered through the dark, low and smooth, carrying something beneath it that made my skin prickle.
The light in the room snapped back on and with a mere flick of the newcomer’s wrist, Davien dropped.
One second he was standing, defiant and deadly.
The next, he was on his knees.
Like it was nothing.
I tried to reach him, tried to surface my magic like I’d managed in training. But it was futile. Nothing happened. It was gone. As was my strength, and for the first time I was reminded of what it was like to be human.
I quickly understood that whoever—whatever—this newcomer was, he nullified supernatural power. All except his own.
I looked to Davien who seemed to have come to the same realisation as he thrashed against the hands holding him down.
His look told me everything.
We were fucked.
We couldn’t fight.
We couldn’t even run.
“Who the fuck are you?” Davien snarled, confirming that this was unprecedented. He didn’t know what was happening either. “Release me at once.”
The man sauntered toward him with a careless ease that honestly terrified me. He studied the room, his nostrils flaring. “Oh, how cute, this is quite the development isn’t it.”
Taller than any man I’d ever seen, his presence alone seemed to warp the space around him.
Massive leather wings folded neatly behind his back, their dark sheen catching the light in unnatural ways, like oil over water.
His frame was broad, powerful, the muscle evident beneath the structural lines of what looked like standard issue uniform, though nothing about him felt standard.
His skin held a warm, sun-kissed tone, and his black hair fell to his shoulders, loose and slightly tousled, framing his face in a way that made him look almost too perfect, beautiful in a way that felt dangerous.
He was like the guy that had come for us at the witch’s house but so much bigger and so much more terrifying.
No one dared to breathe, never mind speak. He didn’t seem to mind, clearly enjoying the sound of his own voice. “Do you think that makes her yours?”
My pulse was racing. Who the fuck did this guy think he was? Was he talking about me? “I don’t belong to anyone dipshit.”
His attention snapped to me and then he laughed. Low and amused. “Oh, I see why you like her,” he said, tapping his finger idly against his chin as he moved closer. “I think I’d quite like a taste myself.”
“Don’t even fucking think about it,” Davien growled, the sound feral.
The stranger clapped his hands as though thoroughly amused at the whole situation. “Too late.”
He tilted his head as he looked at me, really looked this time and my chest tightened painfully under the weight of it. His green eyes bore into me, they were anything but soft and gleamed in a way that made my stomach twist.
I felt locked in place, unable to breathe. “She really is quite the specimen. I can see why you tried to keep her to yourself.”
Up close, it was impossible to ignore his looks, he looked like a fucking Greek God.
He smiled, slow and deliberate, the sharp tips of his fangs catching in the light and reached out a hand, stopping just a hair’s breadth away from my face.
For a moment, I thought he might touch me.
Instead, he pinned me with his terrifying gaze.
My body locked. Every instinct screamed at me to move, to run, to do something. But I couldn’t even breathe properly, my lungs refusing to cooperate as the sound of my own heartbeat thundered in my ears.
“Get the fuck away from me.”
“If only I could,” he sighed, pausing a moment before turning away from me, bringing his attention back to Davien.
What the fuck was that supposed to mean?
He walked up to Davien who was still on his knees, struggling against the restraints he was now under.
He brought his hand to his chin, forcing Davien to look up at him.
And he studied him with a similar curiosity as he had me.
“You’re not what I imagined. I’ve been watching you for a while now, and you’d always seemed so controlled, aloof…
boring really. But here you are, full of vigour, ready to fight, I like it. ”
“What do you mean?” Davien asked. Had this creep watched the two of us together all this time?
“I had left you and your little partner so many clues,” he exhaled as though he was disappointed. “But alas, you never did catch me, did you?”
My brows scrunched together as I tried to catch up to what was going on. Marlette’s glassy eyes widened and her face paled as she tried to step back. “You’re the one we’ve been hunting since summer,” she whispered so low. I only just about picked up the words.
“What are you?” Davien scowled.
The man—or whatever the fuck he was—placed a hand over his heart, feigning offence. “You can’t just ask people what they are, Davien.”
Was this related to the case Davien had been on before I appeared? I remembered the notes I’d gone through, something about unsolved murders that had been unusual.
“I’d be offended, but then again I was placed into a forced sleep for over a millennium," he paused, letting the words really settle and the hairs on my spine rose at how still everyone went.
The fear in the room was palpable. Even Davien seemed paralysed.
“You may have heard of me in your bedtime stories,” he said, with the sort of self-satisfaction that made my teeth itch.
“I am Besian Durnin, one of the old Princes of Arveri.”
He straightened as though the title alone should bend the room to him, as though we were all meant to drop to our knees in reverence.
I blinked at him.
“Sorry, never heard of you,” I said, my tone dry as dust. “Though I can't say I ever imagined a king doing lackey work.”
A sharp intake of breath rippled through the officers around us, their discomfort immediate and palpable, but Davien’s grin—brief, feral and completely inappropriate, given the situation—flickered in my periphery, and for some reason that only encouraged me.
“Shouldn’t you… I don’t know, be lounging in your palace with someone feeding you grapes? ”
Besian chuckled so earnestly that the entire situation could have been mistaken as friendly, then his voice dropped dangerously low. “Are you offering?”
“Like hell she is,” Davien snapped, answering for me, rage seeping from his every pore.
“Urgh,” Besian sighed, dusting his sleeves as though we had all become terribly tedious. “I’m bored of this now.”
Then he clicked his fingers and everyone sprang into motion
Everything moved at once.
Hands grabbed me from behind, forcing my arms back before I could even think to resist. Cold metal snapped tight around my wrists, biting into skin that felt far too human, far too fragile. I twisted instinctively, but it was useless. My strength was dulled to the point where I couldn’t break free.
Across from me, Marlette was seized just as quickly, her protests dissolving into broken sobs as cuffs were locked around her wrists as well.
“Move,” one of them barked, shoving me forward.
“Get your hands off—”
A sharp shove cut me off, forcing me to stumble.
“Don’t touch her!” Davien roared.
I turned just in time to see them dragging him back, four—no, five—agents struggling to restrain him as he fought. A baton cracked hard against his ribs, then another blow followed, and another, but it hardly slowed him.
He fought hard.
Still trying to get to me.
“Ailsa!” he shouted, his voice raw, desperate.
Another hit landed, this one snapping his head to the side with a sickening force, and my stomach dropped. Despite everything that had happened, the thought of him fighting to get to me, of him in pain… it stirred something deep within me.
I did care for him. It didn’t matter that I didn’t want to.
I did. And now he was being taken from me.
They dragged him further back, separating us with brutal efficiency, hauling him toward a different vehicle entirely.
“No—” I tried to move, but a hand tightened painfully on my arm, yanking me in the opposite direction.
“Ailsa!” he roared again.
Then a sharp grunt of pain.
And then he was gone.
They shoved me into the back of a vehicle, Marlette forced in beside me moments later, her shoulders shaking as she cried, her head bowed.
I stared at her and something cold settled in my chest.
“How could you?” I spat at her. Any respect I’d had for her disappeared in an instant. “He trusted you.”
She didn’t look at me.
Just kept shaking her head, over and over, like she could somehow undo it. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, broken. “I’m so, so sorry—”
“Yeah?” I snapped. “Well that really fucking helps, doesn’t it?”
She flinched.
Sorry didn’t fix this.
Sorry didn’t change anything.
Sorry wouldn’t save us.
The anger simmered, building, twisting into something sharp. Why did everyone always have to fucking disappoint me?
I was so angry at her, at him, at this new guy, at all of them. Then it dawned on me and my stomach dropped. “Did you hand my sister over too?”
Her head snapped up, eyes wide with genuine fear. “No,” she said quickly, shaking her head. “No, I swear it.”
I held her gaze for a long moment, searching for any sign of a lie.
“Just me and Davien then,” I muttered, leaning back against the cold interior of the vehicle, bitterness settling heavy on my tongue. “Great.”