Page 159 of Beyond the Faerie Gate

Praedra stares for a second, mouth open in surprise, but it only lasts a moment before she snaps her jaw shut.

“Rose.” I’m not sure who says it, but all of us rush forward as one.

Caed is the only member of her Guard who doesn’t drop to his knees beside her. Praedra lunges forward to hold her cousin back and starts dragging him away.

In the back of my mind, some part of me notes that Caed looks just as stricken as the rest of us. But I can barely pay attention to anything beyond the choking woman in Florian’s arms.

Her mark throbs on my paw. The Call is a riot in my blood, sending me all of her fear and pain. Urging me to save her.

But it’s too late. Even if a healer was right here, that wound…

The two siblings are covered in blood. Rose’s purple eyes are wide and panicked.

“Don’t fight,” she chokes, coughing more blood onto her brother’s lap. “Ple—”

Her words cut off, her eyes turning glassy for a second.

Fire licks across her body and all of us reach for her, only to hiss and withdraw as a matching burn scalds us. I don’t need to raise my paw to realise that a second mark of failure has just appeared beside the first.

In a blink, her body is gone, and in its place is her mark, scorched onto the stone beneath Florian.

A thump alerts me to Bree’s arrival, and the púca folds his wings behind him as he takes in the scene with horrified eyes.

Where the fuck was he when Rose was putting herself in harm’s way?There will be time to chew him out later. Right now, I plan to unleash my anger on the two people who deserve it the most.

My head snaps up, glaring at Caed and his cousin as she straps them both into one of the metal and cloth contraptions, abandoning the second.

Praedra’s blade skewered our mate, and now the two of them think they can just run away? No chance.

How the fuck can Caed even bear to touch his cousin after she just killed our Nicnevin?

He doesn’t deserve Rose.

I growl low, readying myself to pounce after them, but a hand on my fur stops me. I look back at Bree, teeth bared in fury.

The púca’s voice is broken, but he doesn’t budge. “She wouldn’t want this.”

My wolf can’t speak, so I shift back and roar. “She didn’t want to die, either!”

Caed opens his mouth, still numb from shock, but he doesn’t get a chance to form whatever taunt he’s undoubtedly thinking of. Praedra yanks both of them over the edge, and he’s forced to take control of the immense fake wings she’s strapped to his back or let them both plummet to the ground below.

A second later, they both wink out of sight.

Glamour.

Drystan must reach the same conclusion I do, because he grumbles, “The asshole is part fae. That explains a lot.”

I’m not in the mood to discuss Caed’s parentage.

“We can’t just let them go,” I hiss.

Only I don’t hear his reply because Florian slumps against me. The black veins forking like lightning across his body are turning his skin a horrible shade of grey.

Iron poisoning.

“No.” Not him too. “Someone get me a healer!”

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