Page 10 of The Stolen Bride

But it did fall, dripping to the ground.

In unison, the trio of warriors zoomed their gazes to my tree and grinned.

“Aw,” my taunter sneered. The feathers in his wings rippled, the graceful motion filling me with unease. “Is it scared?”

I gnashed my back teeth. But, um, those wings were for sure real. Which meant the trio was indeed turul-shifters of legend.

“I suggest you move along,” I snapped with all the vim and vigor I possessed. “King Viktor is on his way. Will catch up to us any moment.”

“Even better.” The blond wiggled claw-tipped hands. “Normally I’d fly up, but today I think I prefer a slower route to build anticipation.” With a thump, thump, he embedded the nailtips in my tree’s trunk and began to climb with fluid agility.

Oh, no, no, no. He would reach me in a matter of seconds. I scrambled upright, thinking about jumping. I could hit the ground and run. Probably break an ankle, too. Not a great plan, but currently my only option.

Wait. My ears twitched, snared by the sound of a familiar growl. Viktor! My onlookers must have heard him, too. Or felt the shocking waft of aggression blanketing the area because wow! Hostility electrifiedthe air.

The climber dropped, as the other shifters tensed and hissed. Heck,Itensed and hissed.

Whoosh!A blur whizzed into my periphery seconds before a powerful body slammed into the blond, tossing him a good distance. The shifter crashed into a tree with such force, the trunk split.

Viktor halted directly in front of the other two, and I gawked. He’d changed again, his bone structure sharper. Harsher. His irises glowed, filled with rings of glittering gold. Just as before, he’d almost doubled in size, and jagged black lines flashed beneath his skin.

He wasn’t the only one who’d changed. The shifters sprouted feathers over their skin while their noses and mouths elongated, developing into beaks.

Their transformation seemed to delight Viktor. He didn’t huff and puff, as if he’d lost control, but he did exude a savage bloodlust. “You think to touch what’s mine,” he oh, so calmly stated. Two voices poured from his mouth, one deep and husky, the other deeper and huskier.

I pressed my palms to my stomach. Was this a genuine berserkerage? It must be. Never, in all my days, had I encountered such an inhuman man. And the other guys were honest to goodness birdmen!

“Oh, I dare,” the blond bragged as he clambered to his feet. “No mercy!”

The trio dove at Viktor in unison.

Ding, ding, ding. The fight was on. Viktor didn’t budge from his spot. Just stood there and swung his arms with incredible speed, delivering one swish of his claws after another. Shifter parts flew, minus their bodies. Arms, throats. Organs. Blood sprayed and gushed as the leftovers plopped to the ground. No one got up. Or moved. Or breathed.

Bile singed my throat, my gaze jumping from macabre sight to macabre sight. The horror of it all. True death, nothing fabricated. Viktor still hadn’t budged from his spot. Only difference was, wet crimson now coated his hands.

“I told you not to run, drágá.” He didn’t glance up at me. “Come down and face your consequences. Stay up and suffer more.”

I chewed on suddenly dry lips. “You killed those men. Murdered them right in front of me.”

“Ja, and they weren’t even my first victims of the day. Come down.”

This couldn’t be a berserkerage. Not a full one, anyway. He remained aware and coherent, and I wasn’t dead. Well, not yet. Even more startling, I wasn’t afraid of him. Shocked and disgusted, yes. But not afraid.

Benjamin had nailed it. Something was wrong with my emotions.

As calm as Viktor was, I should go ahead and obey him. But I didn’t want to.

When I retained my position in the branch for several seconds, he finally flipped his attention to me. Fury swirled inside irises the same green as the Hungarian forest. The gold rings no longer blazed, allowing me to appreciate the rest of his face. He was handsome. Annoyingly so.

“Come down,” he demanded. “If not, I will fetch you.”

“Fetch me then.” If I was going to spend more time with him, and it looked like I was, I should make my boundaries known. “Until you tweak your attitude, I’m good here, thanks.” To prove my words, I got more comfortable, dangling my legs over the branch. “Besides, you shouldn’t punish me for guarding myself. That’s what you’d want your loved ones to do, right?”

He huffed and puffed big-bad wolf style. But he didn’tcome get me, as threatened. He didn’t even mention the fact that I wasn’t among his loved ones. Instead, he wiped his hands on his pants as if he hadn’t a care.

Hmm. Perhaps defiance was the right MO with him. “What’s a firebrand?” Had to be a berserker thing, yet it was a term my mother had never used in her stories. And how had she known such tales to begin with? Had she believed I hailed from Malachi’s lineage? Hadshehailed from his lineage? Had my birth mother? Who raised my sister? If I really had a sister. What about my dreams? What if I’d truly glimpsed the future? This situation proved stranger things were possible. Butme, bow to someone like this guy? No, thanks.

Not even a whisper rose from my captor.

---