Page 37 of Bound to the Orc Warrior

Shadow drops the black bird into the bag and says, “If I wanted to kill it, it would be dead already, orc.”

“I wasn’t certain if you knew the trick to defeating them,” Wranth growls.

I raise my hand. “I sure don’t know it, but I want to.” Because anything that can stop that horrible lethargy is knowledge worth having.

“If you kill an individual bird, it does nothing to stop the sluagh at the heart of the flock.” Wranth clamps the top of the bag closed and looks at me. “But if you trap one, it incapacitates them all.”

“Not all.” I point to where another group of the birds spiral towards the ground.

“That’s a different sluagh.” Wranth ties the top of the bag closed and shoves it into my hands. “Keep hold of this one to keep it trapped. If you drop it, the rest of its flock will be free to attack.”

“But it’s in a bag!”

“Magic has its own logic.” He gives a shrug. “It only seems to work if someone holds the trapped bird.”

“Put it in my saddlebag.” Zephyr trots over. “That’ll count as me holding it.”

“Got it.” I shove it into the closest pack and close the top. Then I trace a finger around the vicious bite on her shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“I’m better than okay.” She brandishes her horn, which is covered in green blood. “I’m victorious. And I’ll heal quickly—that’s part of unicorn magic.”

An angry shriek jerks all of our attention toward the river.

While one cloud of birds hangs over my head, wings flapping in eerie unison, the other flock reaches the river bank, near where the two defeated kelpies lie still. Instead of settling on the ground, the birds fly closer and closer together. They should hit each other, but instead they…

“What the hell?” I breathe.

The birds touch and freakingmeld, joining together in a mass of wings that forms into a humanoid figure wrapped in a tattered black cloak with a heavy hood. Red eyes blaze from a dark-gray face, the surface of which seethes with the constant motion of a hundred fluttering wings.

“Oh, god,” I say. “Why is it doing that?”

“It’s the soul stealer’s victims,” Wranth growls, his hand tightening on his sword hilt until his knuckles go light green, and his entire body thrums with tension. “Each wants to get away, yet each remains trapped.”

“I think I’m going to be sick.” The words come out muffled by the hand pressed to my mouth. They keep calling these things soul stealers, but it’s hard to comprehend what that really means until you see one like this. “So all those birds…”

“Each of the birds but one are victims trapped in eternal torment,” Zephyr says.

For once, Shadow sounds deadly serious. “It’s a fate worse than death.”

“You would think so, cat sith,” the soul stealer says, speaking with a chorus of voices. “So few of your kind find their immortality with the sluagh.”

“You can’t catch us.” Shadow smiles, but there’s no humor in it.

“Immortality? Humph.” Zephyr stomps. “What you offer is no such thing.”

“I am over five-hundred years old.” It offers its own smile, one filled with too many triangular red teeth. “I remember a time before Alarria, before we were sent here to—”

Wranth startles. “To what?”

“Never you mind, orc.” The air of malice surrounding it grows more intense, and the chorus of voices it speaks with grows more discordant. “Now, give me the witch. Her soul is sweet, and I am so very, very hungry.”

I gasp, my fingers flying to my forearms. “You’re the one who bit me back at the standing stone!”

“You’ll be mine, little witch.” Its red eyes bore into me. “Your soul will feed me forever.”

“Oh, hell no.” I shake my head, my skin crawling.

Wranth growls and steps in between us. “You will never touch her again. Do you not see we’ve already defeated your allies?”

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