Page 44 of Bound By Deception

Mouth twisting, she stepped forward to meet them.Careful,she warned herself.You’re slower and weaker in this body.

Aye, in her Shee form, she was deadly, but even as a Marav woman, armed only with a broom, her training didn’t desert her. She could fight.

Ducking the swiping blades and meaty fists, Bree went for their eyes, throats, and groins, using the end of the broom handle to cause as much damage as she could. But the enforcers were druids, and just like her, they’d been trained to kill.

Their tattoos flared to life then on their naked arms, glowing as they drew on their magic.

Bree’s heart jolted as the odor of pine and campfire enveloped her, before she checked herself. As a Shee, just the smell of druidic power would weaken her. But as a mortal, it didn’t affect her. Nonetheless, summoning their magic made the enforcers even more formidable opponents. They worked together now, backing her up against the perimeter wall.

Sharp iron bit into her upper arm as one of their blades nicked her. Bree waited for an agonizing burn to follow, although there was nothing but a warm trickle of blood.

Jaw clenched, she ducked another meaty fist and spun, kicking Drago in the cods.

He grunted a curse and staggered. Such a blow would have brought down most opponents, but the warrior-druid recovered with alarming swiftness.

All the same, Bree couldn’t believe these two idiots were taking her on. She was the chief-enforcer’swife. What did they hope to achieve—quell her before dragging her into the shadows to defile her as they had Mirren? Did they think she wouldn’t breathe a word to her husband?

And then she saw the gleam in their eyes, the grim fatalism.

No, they both knew they’d gone too far. They intended to kill her. A dead woman couldn’t betray them.

Above the pounding of her heart, Bree heard shouts nearby. The sound was steadily growing louder. Soon, they’d have company.

The enforcers had her cornered. However, she used the hard surface of the stone wall to spring back at them, kicking high this time. Her sandaled foot caught Drago, who’d recovered from the blow to the groin, under the chin, while she drove the end of her broom into the guts of his companion.

But she was panting now, her muscles burning from the strain of the fight. She wouldn’t be able to keep this up for much longer.

Her assailants were down, but just for an instant. Blood pouring from his mouth, from where he’d bitten his tongue, Drago drew another knife. He came at Bree again, murder in his eyes.

He never reached her.

Something huge barreled into him. Bree reeled back, catching the blur of dark-green fur as she did so.

Skaal.

Hackles raised and teeth bared, the fae hound pinned Drago to the ground.

Snarling curses, the big man struggled wildly, yet a deep growl from Skaal, as she pressed her massive jaws close to him, made his face blanch. The glow of his tattoos faded.

A heartbeat later, the chief-enforcer himself pushed past Bree, an iron dagger clenched in his hand, and stabbed her second attacker through the shoulder, pinning him up against the wall.

The enforcer let out an agonized wheeze and tried to fight him off, but mac Brochan twisted the blade.

Grunting, the man sagged against the wall, sweat gleaming on his brow.

Bree leaned against the perimeter wall. She still grasped the broom handle in one hand, while she raised the other hand to her chest, against her pounding heart.

It was a humbling moment.The whoresons almost had me.

She glanced right then to where Torran looked on. He stood a few yards away, a knot of wide-eyed servants crowding behind him. The chief-enforcer’s second’s face was all sharp angles, outrage simmering in his grey eyes.

Swallowing, Bree tore her gaze from Torran to see that her husband had shifted his focus from the enforcer he’d just subdued. Instead, mac Brochan was watching her.

His gaze cut into her like an ax-blade, and Bree’s stomach swooped.

Fuck.

Had she just unmasked herself?

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