He charged the fae lord. He needed damned opposable thumbs to wield his spears, but the speed and ferocity of the wolf sizzled inside him. He called on the verita luna,feeling the crazed shift of bone and skin and fury. Muzzle gaping wide, he howled—but his clawed fingers kept hold of the iron weapons as he wavered, caught between wolf and man in the il-luna.
He heard Merrilee cry out and knew he had crossed a line, revealing the secret darkness at the heart of the beast, uglier than any wound that would never scar over. A dangerous, forbidden halfway point where he might lose his grip on himself in any shape. But he would not let their place, their chance, be stolen by thieving fae.
The Lord of the Hunt, focused as he was on Vaile, spun only at the last moment, stunned by the attack.
Beck raised the spears high above his head and brought the points slicing downward.
The fae lord shrieked as the iron carved through the antlers at his brow. The gleaming bones fell, smoking from the severed ends. The fae’s wail seemed to shiver the stars and the corpselight torches of his followers went black. No preternatural blood spurted as the helm cracked apart.
And whatever authority the helm had given the lord shattered too. He stumbled backward, clutching at his head. His followers fell back around him, crowding toward their toadstool gate.
One of the killers swooped low, reaching for the severed horns.
Beck snarled and leapt, his elongated jaws snapping at the leathery wings. The fae veered off, wobbling with a piece torn from the vane, though he swiped with a vicious claw that didn’t quite reach.
“Beck!”
He turned with a frustrated roar, spears rattling forgotten in his own clawed hands.
Merrilee watched him, empty hands outspread. “Beck, enough. They are fleeing.”
He stepped over the horns. “Mine.” The word was garbled, ugly in his half-shifted throat.
She smiled around the wariness in her eyes. That look—like she wasn’t sure of him, even though she’d never been sure of him, of them—stuck in his throat like another howl, a wail to shake the stars down from the sky. “Antlers do make good chew toys.”
He crouched back on his haunches to kick at the horns. “Not. Not these.” He hissed out the words. “You.” As mangled as his tongue and his thoughts were, he could not stop them. The breathless word twisted past his reluctance to be rejected, past his understanding of her reticence, like a feral creature determined to be freed. “You. Are. Mine. Alone.”
Around them, the rogue fae and the werelings had forced the invaders back to their circle. Even the winged killers dropped from the skies as the toadstool ring glowed a sickly pale green and began to collapse, the mushrooms withering so fast the last black batwing barely cleared the closing portal. The werelings pierced each husk with their spears, and oily smoke spiraled up.
Merrilee didn’t glance at any of it. Her gaze was fixed on him even though he wanted her to look away from the il-luna monstrosity he’d become. Where was the gallantry in action here? He was frozen in this ugly, fearful place.
If she ran from him now, she’d be right.
But instead she walked toward him, the flame-colored silk shifting around her long legs. When she was bare toe to clawed foot with him, she reached up to grab his muzzle. “No way.”
He sank to his knees as the il-luna passed, and she was right there beside him, cradling him with her arms strong around his shoulders.
She kissed the shaggy hair at his temple and whispered, “You are mine, too. Together.”
Chapter 11
Merrilee took them all back to her cottage. The great room had never held so many people—people, werelings, and fae.Luckily she had enough wine, though not enough glasses, so she shared her bottle with Beck.
Nally blinked at the rogue fae,Vaile, and his white-winged wife, Olette. The two had brought with them the strongest of their kin who had escaped the cruel reign of their vicious queen. “The portal worked? I thought maybe, but… It really worked.”
Beck glared at him. “You may never give your Alpha a ‘maybe’ again, ever.”
The doctor ducked his head. “Yes, sir.”
Merrilee nudged Beck’s shoulder. “Or maybe not. There’s a lot we have to learn about what the spores can do.”
He turned his glare to her. “Or should do.”
Olette shook her head. “Spores that open portals between the realms in ways we’ve never dreamedandpathways into the secret magic inside humans as well?” She cast an apologetic glance at Josh Reimer—the cowboy had left his surprisingly unflappable horse tied at Merrilee’s porch with an admonition to not eat the carnations—and at Claudia who was seated very close to Orson. “This is…disquieting.”
“Things change,” Merrilee said. “Can’t do anything about that.” She felt Beck’s golden gaze on her, and as much as she was enjoying this impromptu party—the first of many in her quiet town, she supposed—she wished everyone would go away.
Vaile flipped the broken antlers between his fingers. “When I was one of the queen’s hunters, I wondered at the power in these bones. I suppose things will be changing for me too.”