Page 52 of Held

The drumbeat stuttered to a halt.

At first, Wick assumed it was because the ritual was over. Then Briar gasped against his cheek, shoving at him.

Wick swayed back. “What is it?”

Briar didn’t respond. She stared up at him, her eyes wide with panic.

“Shit,” she whispered.

A scream rang over the crowd.

Wick jolted up, his cock sliding out of Briar as he looked at the village folk.

They were clamoring, yelling, and pointing at him in horror. Not at his chest, where the glamor had conjured his head. But his true face, exposed for the whole village to see.

The glamor had failed. They were in the presence of a Skullstalker. Suddenly, the mountain cliff looming overhead was not the biggest terror today.

Briar climbed off the altar, her hands raised. “Everything’s okay! He won’t hurt you!”

But it was too late. The village was already fleeing, the bowl of gold clattering off the pillar and scattering coins as people ran for the town.

Briar swore. “Wick, time to go!”

Wick turned to her. But before he could wrap her in his arms and take flight, an arrow flew out of the crowd and buried itself in his shoulder.

Wick roared. He whirled to face the shooter, expecting a villager.

A bounty hunter stared back at him. He had wavy hair and a rakish smile. The last time Wick had seen him, he was outside Wick’s cave, telling his gang to retreat.

Renault reloaded his crossbow and aimed a second time, grinning viciously.

“Now,” he yelled.

A net descended from the sky and slammed Wick to the ground.

Fifteen

Briar wanted to laugh in Renault’s stupid, sniggering face.

He really thought he could get his cronies to drop aneton Wick? As if some rope could hold him? He was aSkullstalker. Naked or not, he could tear that flowery rope apart with one claw.

But Wick smashed into the ground with surprising force. Then his skin started smoking.

Briar yanked her fur robe back on, cursing loudly. Usually when chaos broke loose, it was time to get out of there as fast as possible. But she couldn’t leave Wick. Especially not when he was trapped under a flower-knotted net that was burning him.

Briar covered her hands with the fur robe and yanked at the net. Her finger slipped out of the fur onto the thick rope, and she flinched. But her skin didn’t blister. Was it only dangerous to Skullstalkers?

Wick’s eye cracked open. It was wet and comfortingly fiery, even if the flames were smaller than she’d ever seen them. He was struggling against the ropes, his movements getting more panicked by the second.

Briar opened her mouth to tell him she would handle it.

“Bri-i-ar,” yelled Renault through the fleeing village folk.

Briar bared her teeth and whirled to face him.

Renault strolled calmly through the thinning crowd, stepping around a limping Madame Thatchbore who was staring at Briar while a harried-looking man led her away by the arm.

Renault had two of his cronies at his side. One carried an ax, the other was bending to scoop up the spilled gold from the offering bowl.

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