Page 28 of The Crimson Princess
“Assuming you can do such a thing,” he says, casting doubt on my skills, I already doubt, “why exactly, princess,would you want to do that?”
“You said you and my mother were friends.Just friends.”
His lips twitch as if he’s pleased at my anger which is far more telling than I’d like to admit where Toren comes into play. “It wasn’t your mother I tasted.”
“Then who?” I snap, not believing him at this point. There’s a reason my father doesn’t trust him and I was too foolish to see the truth.
“Your father.”
Chapter fourteen
Ialmostlaughwiththeridiculousness of his claim. He’s had the blood of my father on his tongue?No, he hasnot.“Oh,please.” My tone is saccharine and sarcasm. “Youhave nottasted of my father, theking of Ravengale.”
“Believe me, the blood of that man would be my last choice in a bundle of sour grapes, but in war, living instead of dying requires we survive any way possible.”
“What does that even mean?”
Before he can feed me more of his bloody lies, the frostburns are on their feet, all of them growling now, and we are not their target. They rush to the right and form a line between us and the forest and that’s when I spy the red eyes of rogue werewolves. Rogues are the werewolves who rejected their king’s magic that would have bound their need to shift.
I draw my blade and Toren steps to my side.
“How long has Ravengale been dealing with a rogue infestation? I haven’t seen a rogue werewolf since the war, when their own king exiled the rabid bastards of their kind to the Third World.”
“I didn’t know we had an infestation. I’m not even sure how it’s possible.”
“Every time the gales open the portal for the Challenge, it leaves them vulnerable.”
He’s not wrong. That vulnerability has been a fear I’ve had plenty of times without his influence but I leave that unspoken.
“The problem I have right now,” I say, “is that unless they just arrived, which I find doubtful, they have to be shifted to blend inwith our villages, growing bolder and hungrier.” I glance over at him. “I can take care of myself, but who else will they hunt?”
“Then we fight.” He draws his blade and as suspicious as I am over his gale blood claims, the red eyes peering through the deep echo of darkness are not only lethal, they seem to be multiplying. I’ve managed four at once, but never double that number, and right now, that’s what we face.
I step wide and forward and it’s as if the frostburns react to my intent at battle. They lunge forward, toward the forest where the werewolves seek shelter. My pace quickens into a jog, but within seconds there are screams from the woods. Suddenly, Toren is gone, and I have no idea if he’s used his super speed to move ahead of me or to abandon ship. Screams of mortal pain lift in the air and I accelerate, time standing still as growls, moans, and more screams tear at the seams of an otherwise silent night.
But as I draw nearer to the expected battlefield where frostburns and werewolves rip each other to shreds, there is nothing but darkness and foliage. Impossibly, when I swore the rage was here, in this very spot, moments before, the battle has shifted deeper into the forest. Rushing toward the line of trees to find the frostburns battling the weres, the fur of the frostburns is stained crimson, and not from their own injuries. Were bodies clutter the ground, amongst dirt and brush, all with their throats ripped out.
Toren stands twenty feet away, and I watch as he steps behind a werewolf, and yanks his fur, tilting his head back and slicing the neck of the bulky beast, bristly hair all over his otherwise naked body. A shifted werewolf is bigger than a gale or a vampire, certainly larger than the frostburns. They’re powerful and ridiculously strong but their necks are their weakness, the kill spot as the guardians call it, though it’s no easy slice. Their skin is thick, and it takes strength and/or magic to make that cut deep enough to bring death.
Toren’s opponent’s body crumbles to the ground, blood spewing from his artery, but in that moment, my eyes are drawn the opposite direction. A frostburn is on top of a werewolf, whileanother were lunges at the frostburn from behind. I lunge with him, a swift leap that defies a normal gale’s ability. Before the were ever touches the frostburn, the magic of my blade pierces his neck. A moment later, blood gurgles from the beast’s mouth and it collapses on the ground.
I remain on ready, as my gaze hunts the next attack that doesn’t come. Toren steps in front of me, waves his hand, and the corpses disappear. “It’s over,” he announces.
It’s in that moment that the frostburns surround us, double the numbers they had been before, and I have this sense they mean us no harm. They too, have declared the battle over, and yet remnants of it linger, blood inking their glorious white fur with crimson; splattered all about their fur as if a painter has used a brush to create intricate designs on each. Only when every last frostburn has joined the circle, it seems, do they launch into a victory song, their voices weaving together in harmony.
To live to hear the beauty of a victory howl is a gift one cannot appreciate until you’ve fought for your life, and ended another to keep your own. The hair on my arms lifts and a shiver slides down my spine and for long moments, me and the vampire king stand enveloped in their victory cries. But just as suddenly as they start, they end. Something shifts in the forest beyond our view, deep in the darkness, something we all feel, but cannot see or hear, and the frostburns are instantly filled with rage.
I blink and they’re running toward the woods at full speed, and within seconds, me and Toren are left on the outskirts of the tree line.
“There must be more of them,” I say and when I would run after them, Toren captures my arm and turns me to him.
His touch shocks me, my skin instantly burning hot, my awareness for him as male, far too present in the middle of a battlefield. Intending to break the connection, I whip around to face him, but he holds onto me, almost as if he anticipated my move and to what end? “Let go,” I say. “I need to fight.”
“The frostburns went for the weres’ throats and did so with practiced precision. This was not their first werewolf battle. Fight when necessary and fight hard when you do, but this is not one of those times. Let them do what they do.” He speaks those words as a command, as if I am one of his underlings and I bristle in rejection.
“You don’t tell me when to fight.”
He tugs me closer, our legs aligned, the heat of his body fire ripping through every part of me. “Unnecessary risk is not how you stay alive, princess. And I want very much for you to stay alive.”
