Page 150 of Lifebound

We stayedthere for another few minutes, just enjoying the light of the plants and the crystal, trying to see better to wherever that tunnel led, but it went too far up just a few feet in, so all we saw was moss.

The light of those plants remained in the center of my mind when we continued ahead, and I was trying to imagine what mermaids actually looked like, so I wasn’t paying attention to my surroundings at all.

So, when Rune stopped abruptly, I slammed into his side, completely disoriented.

“What is it?” I asked, but he didn’t answer me. His eyes were ahead in the darkness that the light of the birds couldn’t reach. His body was suddenly locked tightly, muscles tense, eyes unblinking, and he wasn’t even breathing.

My stomach fell all the way to my heels. My instincts were on fire all at the same time.

“Rune?” I whispered.

He finally moved back, his hand around mine, pulling me with him. But it was already too late.

Everything changed so fast. One minute we were all alone and it was pure bliss underground, and in the next, everything went to hell.

Bright yellow light went on in the darkness ahead. “There she is,” said the man who’d made it.

I held on tightly to Rune’s arm when I saw the mask he wore, white and golden and scary as all hell.

And the man was not alone.

Another bright yellow light went off right next to him to reveal another mask, almost identical to the first. By then I knew enough about fae to understand what they were—Seelie. Both these men were Seelie fae.

“I honestly thought the grogs got you. We found your blood and your things—I thought that was that,” said the first guy again, and it was so hard to breathe, like the entire tunnel suddenly ran all out of air.

“But he wouldn’t have it without seeing your body or…you know, pieces of it.” The man directed his thumb to his friend.

“Should have made a bet on it,” the friend said, his voice dark and cheerful at the same time. “I knew you were in on it, too, bastard.”

“Regardless—all’s well now. You’re here, and I’m afraid we can’t let you get to the prince.”

The sound of metal rubbing against metal filled the air. I stepped back involuntarily, and Rune immediately moved in front of me. He wasn’t afraid despite the fact that these men here had swords. Big swords that shone golden under the lights, and they were slowly coming toward us.

My God, what the hell were we going to do now? There was nowhere to go, unless we ran all the way back to Blackwater.

My heart squeezed and my lungs emptied. Were these men going tokillus now when we made it this far?!

“Hand over the mortal, bastard, and we’ll let you live,” the man said, and Rune stood tall, arms to his sides. Hands open and ready.

“Afraid I can’t do that, Sunny. But I can give you a chance to walk away, just this once.” Rune sounded completely normal, like he was talking about something as insignificant as the fucking weather.

The masked men looked at one another.

A moment later, they raised their swords.

Rune raised his hands. “Suit yourselves.”

His skin glowed white and shadows spread from his right palm. They didn’t slam onto the men like I expected—they just gathered into a ball of darkness half the size of Rune’s body. He then reached both hands inside it, andpulled outtwo swords, shorter than those of the men, the blades thinner, and they shone silver under the lights of the birds that flew over his head.

Meanwhile I could hardly believe my eyes.

“The bastard wants to play,” one of the masked men said. “No magic or the ceiling will fall on all of us.”

“No magic,” Rune said, again, like he was talking about the mud on his boots.

In my mind, I screamed out his name.

In reality, all I could do was watch as the three men ran for one another, and their swords met in the middle.

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