Page 126 of Steel Heart Iron Claws

Could I even…killhim?

With a grimace, I brace to shove my hand forward again to direct the buck to stab Artain in the heart this time, but before I can?—

Artain moves inhumanly fast, swinging around his bow. He draws and nocks an arrow, pulling back the string to aim at the buck.

Reality slams back into me—my lungs, my heart—as I’m thrown out of the buck’s body and returned to my own.

I scramble to regain control over the deer, weaving my fingers to direct theirmovements.

Go!I scream in my head.Run!

But the deer are sluggish from the aftereffects of my possession. Their feet wobble. The buck shakes himself, lilting to the right. He charges Artain, but Artain easily tucks into a roll to evade him.

When he rises, it’s with his bow drawn again. He fires at the youngest doe, bringing her down with an arrow straight to the heart.

“No!” I scream.

Artain nocks again—two arrows this time. He aims and fires both simultaneously to take down two more does as they flee through the doghobble.

I flail forward, clawing my way out of the den.

Artain whips around to nock another arrow. Before I can reach him, he fires on the mother doe, who crashes into a river birch. Her little fawn bounds after her, bleating, and Artain trains his sights on it as he nocks yet another arrow?—

I look away as there’s a sickening squelch.

My heart aches, but it’s too late.I did this to them. I’m a monster. I got all of them except the buck killed…

No.

No—if anyone here is a monster, it’s the man with the arrows.

With a battle cry, I burst out of the den and throw myself on Artain as he aims a sixth arrow at the buck.

I wrestle the arrow from his bow, throwing my hip into his side as I snap the arrow over my knee.

The buck takes off into the woods—the last of his herd.

Gasping, I launch myself onto Artain’s bow, trying to pry it out of his hands. His initial surprise gives way to a slow cackle.

“Little princess, you want a tussle, is that it?”

My vision bleeds into red as I slam my knee up toward his groin, but he blocks me with a downward swing, gracefully catching hold of my thigh in the process. His fingers dig into my ass as he drags my body flush against him.

“We’re going to have alotof tussles, starting tonight, then every night after,” he says breathily. I struggle, but he swipes my foot out from under me, slamming my back down against the riverbank.

Climbing on top of me to pin down my limbs, he forcefully smooths the tangled hair off my face. “We can start early, if you like.” He laughs. “After all, we have a long time until sunset.”

I should be disgusted, but I’m still too brutalized by the raw pain of losing the deer herd to feel much of anything at all. Their still-warm carcasses bleed out around me, their blood running in rivulets around the depression where Artain has me pinned.

He grabs my head and twists it toward the closest deer carcass.

“See what happens?” he murmurs in my ear. “When you use your power against me?”

“Their blood is on your hands,” I spit, cheek smushed to the mud. “And I’ll make damn sure you don’t get a chance to harm another breathing thing in this forest—including me.”

Before Artain can offer a retort, I bring my knee up between his legs.

This time, I catch him unaware. His eyes bulge as a moan peals out from his lips. In the split second that his guard is down, I dig my heel into the ground and use the force to cantilever my hips upward, throwing him off me.

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