Page 86 of Dark & Dreadful Brutes

Veil, my energy was fading fast. Faster than the enchantment was melting.

That didn’t bode well for me.

I tried to pull back, to conserve the tiny bit that remained, but failed.

Panic replaced focus as I fought the leash on my magic and tried to get my flames back under control. They flared brighter in response, burning against the power within the stone. Despite my pull, it continued draining me more and more.

I sucked in a panicked breath as my body began to sway.

The weakness in my limbs was thick and heavy.

The world started to spin around me.

Veil, I was burning myself out again.

This burnout felt bigger and fiercer, though.

My body trembled, and my knees did too.

The trembling was too much.

One of my knees slid off the edge of the stone. As my center of gravity shifted, the rest of me followed my knee, and I plunged downward.

The water engulfed me as I fell unconscious, and my last thought was of the comfort I’d felt when Ravv held me in his arms that morning.

Chapter 19

Ravv

“Cree can protect her,” Gleam chastised me, as she and Coarse walked up to my side. “The rest of the idorr can too.”

I remained where I was, leaning my back to the wall while I watched Laeli kneel on one of the enchanted stones that constantly froze the river. “I have a bad feeling about this,” I told her.

She plopped down beside me. “Your feelings aren’t always accurate.”

“Which is why I let her go,” I grumbled.

Laelie wanted the chance to prove herself. Though she had nothing to prove, I would allow her that opportunity.

She needed to know that I would support her, if I was ever going to convince her to be my life partner. The woman still thought she was my lesser, for whatever damned reason.

“Something is off,” Coarse said, standing on Gleam’s other side and staring out at the glacier with narrowed eyes. All we could see was the ice, the river, and a strip of the ocean. If we squinted, we would see the tiniest bit of the Endless Wilds off in the distance.

“I agree. Have you seen anything to be suspicious about?” I asked him.

“No.”

I hadn’t either.

But there hadn’t been any sign of the cult since we’d been back, which was a terrible omen. Ria’s people always went silent in the days before one of their attacks.

She would be looking for us, and she’d see my bond with Laeli as a sign that I was fragile. On top of that, she’d expect it to mean my warriors and I were siding with the mated couples in the city below.

That alone would make us a target.

“They don’t usually kill unmated fae, and you’re technically not mated,” Coarse said.

“This situation is not usual or technical. They will kill as many of us as they can. I—” The words died in my throat as I watched Laeli’s magic burst to life.

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