Queen of Blood and Vengeance (Secrets of the Faerie Crown #4)

41. Arran

41

ARRAN

I shifted. There was no way I could control myself, not with Veyka in such endless danger. She was formidable. She was one of the best fighters I’d ever seen, in any kingdom. I’d only ever seen her defeated by two—Gwen, and myself.

But still, I shifted.

My beast was faster. Even with the huge trees and ivy laden walls inside the fortress, my beast was faster.

“You cannot interfere,” Morgause purred as I paced the edge of the Pit.

I did not need her to tell me. I’d fought in the Pit dozens of times over the centuries. Sometimes over real things—a female who’d used my mother’s name in dishonor. Other times for less noble reasons, like the fact that my beast had not killed in a few weeks and was hungry for blood.

Logic deserted me as I paced back and forth around the circular Pit. Terrestrial spectators backed out of my way, edging back into place once I was several yards away. I did not notice any of them, my attention focused on the flashes of white as Veyka fought her way around the Pit. The first level was only ten feet wide. The next level narrower still.

Her knife locked with Mordred’s hatchet. My beast threw his head up toward the sky and howled his displeasure. I had no feelings that I could parse. Not like this, with the wolf fully in control.

But as quickly as the stalemate occurred, it ended as Veyka spun to bring down another attacker. The herd had thinned. It was time for next level. But Morgause did not move.

I snarled, bounding along the edge of the Pit. I was before her in a second, saliva dripping from my fangs, bared and brutal. I would rip out Morgause’s throat and deal with the fallout later.

I shifted only long enough to snarl— “Call them down to the next level.”

I punctuated the command with another snarl from the jaws of my wolf.

Every second that the fighting in the Pit continued, Veyka was vulnerable. She could not bleed, that was true. But there were other ways to kill her. If that was Morgause’s plan—to eliminate Veyka in a way that absolved her from any blame, she was a fool. She did not understand me at all.

Morgause’s eye twitched, but she didn’t delay any longer. She called down into the Pit: “Descend.”

Mordred jumped. So did Veyka and a half dozen others.

Mordred turned away from Veyka and engaged the female shifter on his left.

Veyka kept her back to the wall, limiting her opponents’ angles of attack. She’d always been formidable, but she’d spent these last months getting even better. I recognized techniques from Gwen’s arsenal as well as my own. Even a particular twist and kick combination that Barkke had patented when we were young together in Eilean Gayl.

But she’d already fought today. And no matter how good she was, she was not invincible.

A male I did not recognize, who’d eschewed his shifted form in favor of a brutal set of claw-like metal knives protruding from a gauntlet across his knuckles, landed a swipe across her abdomen that would have gutted her if she hadn’t danced back just in time. As it was, she should have bled. Her bodice was in tatters. But the scabbards kept the blades from even breaking the skin.

She spun, burying her dagger to the hilt in the center of a huge female’s chest. She did not pause to pull it out, her other hand already flicking her other knife toward the male who’d swiped at her stomach.

Mistake.

I realized it a second too late. Mistake! Veyka! My beast roared. But she was already crumpling.

The massive female twisted Veyka’s wrist, dislodging the knife. Veyka couldn’t get traction in the puddle of blood. Her opponent flipped her, slamming her down onto the stone floor hard enough that the ground beneath my paws shook. But that was not the sound that echoed in my ears.

It was the snap of bone.

She could not bleed. But her bones could still break.

Two screams twined together as they ripped out and over the Pit, Veyka and her opponent both powerless to contain their pain.

I did not think. I leapt—only to be slammed back by a pulse of magic.

The wards kept me out, kept me from her. The Pit was as old as the fortress itself, built by forbearers whose existence had passed out of memory. No one alive knew how the wards around the Pit worked, only that they prevented outside interference.

Fuck that.

I leapt again, the force sending me rolling as it knocked me back from the invisible barrier.

Again and again. It made no difference. I could not reach her—not physically.

But that was not my only pathway to Veyka.

My beast roared his dissent, but I forced myself to shift back into my fae form. Veyka was still screaming. Only seconds had passed. Maybe less… one heartbeat? A full minute?

Veyka was still screaming.

I wrapped myself around the golden thread that linked our souls, sinking into the primal connection that evaded all reason, including time and space. Even the void bowed before the power of our mating, that bond between us the only thing that tethered Veyka and prevented her from being lost in the void.

The ancient wards of the Pit were no match.

I felt them yield.

I shifted, bounding down the first level and onto the second in one leap. Veyka was already shoving the massive female off of her, her opponent clearly incapacitated. But there was no space for reason over the roaring in my head. I ripped the female’s head from her body. Then her arms, her legs, until she was nothing more than pieces. Pieces that would never be able to harm my mate again.

Veyka stared.

For once, there was no blue ring of desire in her blue eyes. But they were certainly burning.

What have you done? she hissed without moving her mouth.

The roaring ebbed. A low growl replaced it, vibrating against the fur in my chest. Veyka stood, but she did not reach for the beast.

They will think less of me. That I’m weak. That I need you to protect me.

All the other fighting had stopped. Only two contenders still stood. Veyka and, pressed against the wall on the other side of the Pit, Mordred. My son.

The growl started to build again.

Veyka’s eyes darted around the Pit, then back to me. You should not have come down here.

If you’re waiting for an apology, that’s too damn bad. I told you—you belong to me. I will not sacrifice your life for Annwyn, nor for anything as trivial as a seat at the Round Table. Wards and traditions be damned.

Her eyes narrowed, but the fire in them banked.

“Get out,” she said. We will fight about this later.

I recognized a promise when I heard one. I tensed the muscles of my haunches and leapt the thirty feet out of the Pit in one bound. Our audience jumped back to make room, but they did not wait for me to shift before scrambling back to the edge. I could not miss the way they watched, different than before. One eye on Veyka… the other on me.

Fuck, she was right.

I’d lived in this court for three hundred years. How could I be so fucking stupid, to sacrifice the integrity of her victory for my own selfish, unfounded fears. She would have won—there was no other outcome. Veyka could stand a few broken bones. She’d withstood much worse. I forced myself to flick my ears away from the Pit, to listen to the words spoken around me. To gauge the level of damage my pride had done…

But those were not the whispers circulating around me.

“—enough to overpower ancient magic—”

“No one has seen power like that in thousands of years…”

“—above the laws of nature itself.”

I let the words slide through my consciousness, across that golden bond, down to where Veyka stood quivering on the edge of the Pit’s second level. Neither she nor Mordred waited for a signal from above. They met each other’s gazes and they jumped.

I emptied my thoughts, clearing the whisperings and any lingering guilt or rage. Veyka needed none of that now. She needed a clear mind as she approached the last round of the Pit.

The final descent.