Page 8 of Wrath of the Fae

The Fae man, Jakob, is bleeding. His face is battered and bruised. His tattered clothes are muddy and torn. He has no weapon. No wings. Just the rags on his back and the love of his Mate. His left hand has the exact same markings as the woman in the water, and he hunches over in pain as he looks at me in the sky.

‘Your Lord doesn’t like it when she screams?’ I ask the soldier.

They all shuffle back a few steps, gripping their swords tighter.

‘Strange. I love it when they scream,’ I add. ‘In fact. I insist on it. I’ll show you, shall I?’

The leader narrows his eyes.

‘Princess Rhea?’ he whispers. ‘How… you are at the palace. You and your husband-’

I reach out my hand and watch as each soldier grabs at their throats. They scratch and claw against my invisible fist wrapped around their airways. Their feet lift from the ground as they choke and gasp, kicking out as they rise higher and higher. Swords fall to the ground, one after the other.

No weapon can help them now.

‘You have seen my sister?’ I ask, beating my wings to move me closer. As I reduce the space between us, he looks ready to drop with dread, perhaps now realising who I am. ‘You have seen her? Have you seen Cyrus? Reid?’ I demand.

The ground shakes harder, and chunks of stone fall from the cliff's edges.

‘Tell me where they are! TELL ME WHERE MY SISTER IS!’ I yell, my voice a demonic roar.

Something wooshes past my ear. A blur of black and a harsh blast of air from fiercely beating wings.

‘You didn’t say you had company, Pup!’ Lucca laughs, flying straight for the soldiers. ‘Is that why the ground’s rumbling? Are you all excited?’

He withdraws a dagger and soars past the first, slicing his throat gracefully. Then another. And another. Three swift swipes and all three fall silently in a heap within seconds. Lucca stops mid-air and looks at them, twirling the blood-soaked dagger in his fingers as he grins wildly. His deep red hair falls past his shoulders in a tousled mess. He refuses to keep it its natural blonde as he clings to a sliver of who he was before returning here.

‘You want the rest?’ he asks me with his mischievous, boyish grin tinted with a bloodthirsty need for pain. ‘Or can I have them?’

‘Mine,’ I reply.

I lift the remaining two soldiers higher, making Lucca chuckle. I clench my fist. Even from here, I make out the snapping and grinding of their bones. But it’s not their throats I crush. It’s their legs, twisting and bending them into a mangled mess. They still can’t fully breathe, so their screams are pathetic wheezes. I drop them to the ground once they fall unconscious. The flames from their torches rest in the dirt, illuminating their faces, and I admire the vibrancy of red staining the pristine white of their uniforms.

Lucca lands before the still kneeling Jakob and lifts him roughly by the scruff of his neck.

Lucca grins almost maniacally as he stares into the man’s trembling face.

‘Who the fuck are you then?’ Lucca asks, glancing at his clothes. ‘You sure as shit ain’t First Kingdom.’

Below, Iliana has lost her grip and slips into the water with a splash. Lucca sidesteps to the cliff’s edge and peers down.

‘And who the fuck is that?’ he asks. ‘You having a pool party without me, Pup?’

‘She’s hisMate,’ I reply, nodding to Jakob.

I hear the coldness in my words. The flatness and distance of my tone.

‘You’re Mated?’ Lucca repeats, looking between the man and her down below.

He twitches, and I feel his undiluted hatred and anger at the mere mention of the word. Lucca is classed as a rejected Mate. A dangerous and frightening creature. One everyone fears. Not only because his temper can be as lethal as a gun or because he is hyper-fixated on causing pain to anyone that mentions El or my sister, but because he’s something all men fear. A man without the love of his life.

‘Let me guess. Some Lord fancied your girl and took her, so you stole her back and did a runner?’ Lucca continues, swiftly regaining his composure.

Jakob is reluctant to answer. I’m sure he is. Running off with another man’s“property”is punishable by death. He has no idea who we are. He doesn’t trust us.

The splashing and panicked cries of the woman in the lake continues. Jakob’s eyes dart between us all.

I fall to the water’s surface so fast, the wind rushes past my ears and blows my hair upwards. Grabbing the woman’s hand, I lift her high before dropping her beside her Mate. I place my feet on the cracked and shattered earth and tuck in my wings. Lucca releases Jakob and steps back.

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