Page 61 of Of Nine So Bold

The hell it would.

I strode forward, distantly noting Lars stumble when I pushed him aside so that I could grab Byron’s shoulder.

I would apologize for my rudeness later. Right now, there wasn’t a moment to waste.

My magic flowed through the scholar, burning with the light of my ancestors’ angelic gifts, bright and gold like the sun. But the spell fought back, snapping and snarling like a fanged snake, determined to inject its poison into my abilities as well.

Rage and fire suddenly surged toward me from one side, nearly startling me into ceding ground to the poisonous spell. Dark and deadly like a flow of lava from beneath the earth, it barreled toward my power. This wasn’t the spell.

It was the demon.

The antithesis of my own abilities.

Opening my eyes, I gasped out, “Demon, what are you?—”

The demon snarled, his fangs bared. He stood on the other side of Byron, one massive hand gripping the scholar’s opposite shoulder. On the ground, his tail still held the Huntsman down, while the vicious claw at the end of one wing pierced the cursed man’s shoulder, pinning him to the dirt.

“Focus, angel,” the demon snapped.

Holy gods.

I balked at taking orders from the creature, but it also had a point. Even now, the trap was gaining ground.

Closing my eyes, I scanned the battle before me. I’d just regained my abilities as a vampire, and part of my gifts was tied up in the fight I now faced. Coming close to the demon’s power could weaken me once again, doing untold damage to meandthe others. But if I did nothing?—

A cool sensation swelled in my mind, coming from behind me. Frost and crystalline light, as radiant as a winter goddess but laced with shadow.

Gwyneira.

Her power flowed around me. The pain of the demon’s gifts abated as if a soothing balm now separated us, allowing us to act without harming each other.

How in the gods’ names was she doing this?

“Hurry,” the princess gasped.

Details were irrelevant.

I wouldneverfail her.

My magic raced across the surface of the spell, seeking a way to dislodge its grip. Nearby, the demon growled, the sound hungry and savage like a predator intent on destroying its prey. “Mine. Don’t touchmine.”

The threat reverberated through his magic. His power followed, tearing into the curse like his magic had claws.

The trap shuddered.

I took the opening.

Using my magic like a knife, I sliced at the spell, carving away piece after piece that tried to reach the princess and Byron. Over and over, the curse tried to fight me, but the demon’s power was there every time, shielding my flanks, burning it before it could strike at my back.

Time lost all meaning. My awareness of the others around me slowly faded away. There was only the curse, only the battle. Only the princess who was somehow aiding me even as this horrific magic tried to consume her and the scholar whole.

Again.

I could feel my fangs pressing into my chin, as long as they’d ever been. My heart had long ago stopped beating. No matter what I did, Gwyneira was always in danger. Always on a knife’s edge, a hair’s breadth from tipping into darkness. It was enough to drive one mad.

I’d relish the moment we removed the queen from this world and protected Gwyneira once and for all.

The trap faltered. Its grip on the Huntsman lay in tatters, the black ribbons of its presence nothing but fragments now. I didn’t relent, striking at each one, slicing at them while the demon’s magic burned every fragment left in my wake, until the last hung like a threadbare strip of aging fabric before my mind’s eye.

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