Page 49 of Guarded By the Nightmare

I blinked and thought back. “His right.”

Sylas nodded, and made a circle in the air, on Nolan’s right-hand side. “I’m going to put your arm into that hole there,” he announced, and I tilted my head so I could see through it, a dinner plate’s worth of darkness hovering in space. “On the other side is a cadre of ravenous beasts that will eat anything I give to them. The problem for you is that their mouths are very small and their teeth aren’t very sharp. It will probably take them a thousand bites to get up to your elbow. I promise you will feel each and every one, and then whenthey shit your essence out the other side I will gather it up and feed it to you. Or, you may choose to answer me.”

Sylas said everything so matter-of-factly it made my jaw drop.

“I’m protected!” Nolan shouted—which was an answer, of sorts.

Sylas moved an arm, just to telegraph what was coming, I realized, because he could’ve done it invisibly too, and Nolan’s right arm rose like it had puppet-strings attached to it.

“Are you so certain?” Sylas taunted him, and I realized he would be taking his time with Nolan, just because he could—he didn’t feel the need to act as purely as I did.

“What the fuck did you do to Ella!” I shrieked, rushing up to shove Nolan’s hand higher, putting his fingers into the interdimensional hole.

Nolan started screaming right after, and I yanked his hand back, finding all of his fingertips bitten down into stumps.

“No—NO!” he howled—and I remembered asking for help, too, when I had needed it, and not getting any, and it helped to harden my heart.

“Fuck you!” I shouted back at him, and spit on his bleeding fingers. “What did you do to Ella!”

“We needed her!” he said, his knees buckling, as he faded into snotty sobs. “Okay? It’s why Trent was with you. We needed someone pure—and you sure as fuck weren’t.”

I planted a boot into his chest, knocking him backwards. “How do we stop it?”

“You can’t,” he said, and his sobs turned into harsh laughter. “There’s powers at large here—the golden wolf—you came as closeas it’d been to being stopped in a century—but we were still stronger.”

Sylas came to my side. “He’s going into shock.”

“That hardly seems fair.”

“I have ways of regaining his attention,” he said, creating another circle with his hand, showing off another darkened disc. “Shall I press this one against your genitals?”

Nolan’s eyes went wider still, as he dredged fresh adrenaline up from somewhere. “No!”

“Then tell me everything about your magic that you know. Now,” he demanded.

Nolan looked at me, his mouth opened—and then the two of them disappeared.

“What—the—” I sputtered—then I clenched my fists at my side and shouted, “Fuck!”

My anger echoed down the empty field—then I heard the screeching of revved engines nearing, closely followed by braking tires.

My mouth went dry. “Sylas?”

More tires, and now doors slamming, and men shouting to one another.

I felt how a fox must feel during a foxhunt, and I had already felt that way once before.

I bit back a scream and turned to run.

35

SYLAS

“Consider your next words very carefully,”I said, with my hand wrapped around the human’s jaw to keep it shut. I’d taken him someplace dark and cold, full of shuffling sounds of danger, like large reptiles were coming near, their scales sliding over stone. “The creature you were about to insult is my queen, and she shouldn’t have to listen to the likes of you ever again.”

I’d read the flash of hate in his eyes—he was going to say something ruthless to my Mina, rather than tell me what I want.

“Her friend. Tell me what was done to her,” I demanded, letting him go.

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