Page 180 of A Warrior's Fate

Isla dug deep, racing to the staircase and propelling herself up and over the gaps, fumbling up the shaky incline. Some of the wooden boards, already unsteady from the bak, clattered to the ground.

The first thing she saw as she lofted onto the first floor was the lifeless stare of the slain man. He slumped against one of the chairs, crimson oozing from the large gash in his chest. Broken glass lay at his side. A vial, maybe. Whatever was inside, a darker liquid, swirled with his blood.

Isla whipped around to see his companion had shifted, his wolf’s fur a dark gray. His eyes—dim and empty.

Rogues.

These men were rogues.

A blade glinted on the ground a few feet away from him, beside another fallen lantern. Abandoned once he’d realized exactly what he was facing.

A nightmare.

Death.

There was no time for Isla to deal with her conflicted heart. Rogues had come to destroy the city, to take lives, but right now, these men were wolves as much as she was. And there was a much bigger issue for her to deal with.

Isla lifted her head and called for Rhydian and Ameera, hoping to the Goddess they’d hear.

All attention came her way.

In the split moment, the rogue wolf met her eyes, then caught the flash of the crescent lumerosi on her fur. He took a step back, another, another before he darted out the front door, left ajar.

The fleeing had caught the bak’s attention.

She needed it on her. Needed to keep it inside this house, contained. And if she couldn’t kill it here, she had to, at least, get it down into the basement again.

Barely a strategy was enough for her.

She growled, reacquiring the bak’s eye and letting it take a few steps towards her before she maneuvered through the living room and to the front door, slamming it closed.

The bak broke through every piece of furniture to get to her, ripping cloth, splintering wood, shattering teacups. And it all became like the Hunt again as she evaded it, going into the dining room, the kitchen. It destroyed everything in its path, like the grisly landscape of the Wilds.

A game of endurance.

This was a game of endurance, and though she’d been more sleep-deprived and undernourished during the Hunt, she knew she would die if she didn’t act now.

On another pass through the living room, hiding her scent, Isla dove behind the chair where the dead rogue sat. She’d let the bak get close and launch herself at it, knock it off balance, go for its throat.

Step.

She moved closer. The bak sniffed the air, trying to discern her location.

Step.

She crept in, lowering on her haunches.

Step.

She yelped as her paw met a shard of glass and the fallen man’s blood. And all she felt was an unrelenting, venomous burn.

The bond went taut. She thrashed, her wolf struggling against—

No.

This was more than she’d felt from the doorway, but it was still familiar. Too familiar. From when a blade had been pressed to her stomach over a month ago. From when the substance that laced it hampered her, consumed her.

She did all she could to remove the glass, and when it had finally been wrenched free, the wound healed quickly. As if she’d never been injured. But she still felt it working through her, through her wolf. The whimpering wasn’t her own. That piece of her separated, pulled away.

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