Married by Treachery Read online

  But Fates have mercy, Jake had never seen so many Depraved at once.

  It was getting worse. The curse was growing stronger.

  Jake and Rian were almost to the gate when Rian yelled, “Jake, your sword!”

  Jake cursed and skidded to a halt, and Rian stopped beside him. He couldn’t believe he’d forgotten to grab Lightbringer! That wasn’t like him at all. He’d been entirely distracted by that stubborn, idealistic, beautiful—

  “Should we go back?” Rian asked.

  Jake looked at the wall. More light flashed, Depraved shrieked, and Corval—one of Jake’s warriors—screamed as his body was pulled from the wall and into the mist, where it disappeared.

  Jake ripped one of Rian’s swords from its sheath.

  “Hey!” Rian exclaimed.

  “You never use this one anyway!” Jake sprinted on and ripped another sword right from the hands of a guard.

  “Give that back, you—!”

  “Thanks, Aimes!” Jake called over his shoulder.

  Aimes stopped, finally realizing who it was. “Happy to be of service, Your Grace!”

  “Open the gate!” Jake yelled at Marix, who stood at the gears.

  But Marix did not hear him. He was too busy hacking through the onslaught of Depraved, and Jake watched as another guard—Maribel—was plucked from the watchtower, screaming as guards tried—and failed—to pull her back.

  “MARIX! OPEN THE DAMNED GATE!”

  Marix looked back then, sweating and dripping in black Depraved blood. He shoved his way to the lever and started pulling it himself. Metal groaned as the gate swung inward, and Jake slipped through, into the mist.

  6

  To say that Raquel was annoyed was an understatement. She paced before the glowing hearth in Jake’s luxurious bedchamber while occasionally throwing what appeared to be precious artifacts against his welded door. How dare he order her around like a dog. Who did he think he was? The King of the Forest?

  Raquel stopped pacing, shut her eyes, and clenched her teeth. Yes, well, so he practically was.

  That arrogant, heartless, self-centered…

  All of a sudden, horrific shrieks blared through the night. Voices yelled, and the air rattled with an explosion.

  What in the world…?

  Raquel glanced about the room for the…window. Where was it? It had been there a moment ago. Yes, she distinctly remembered Jake striding for it immediately after they’d first heard the shrieking, but there was no window now. The walls were long and blank and stained in soot…

  Her eyes narrowed on the little brown cape hanging so innocently from its hook.

  Glamour.

  On a hunch, she strode to the far wall where she remembered the window. She pressed her palms to the wooden planks and their grooves, dragging her hands along the places she thought the window should be, until—ah! Her fingers rounded a lip of wood. She couldn’t see it—no—not with her eyes, but she definitely traced the firm symmetrical edge of what was undoubtedly a large windowsill. She slid her hands to the center, and her palms grazed cool glass.

  Her lips curled. “You tricky little prince.” Perhaps if she could just find the latch and open the window, she could break the spell…

  There.

  The latch clicked, she pushed the window out, and…

  “Saints in heaven…” Raquel whispered, now gaping at the scene beyond. Her bedchamber had given her a view of two structures and a street, but Jake’s room overlooked the main entry, wall, and gate, which was cracked open like the curtain over a stage, revealing the chaos of battle beyond.

  Raquel squinted, trying to make sense of what she was seeing, but the fight was all silhouettes and flying things much too large to be birds, obscured by mist and flashes of strange blue light. Figures moved along the wall, watchtower, and just inside the open gate, fighting against enormous winged creatures that were trying to claw their way through.

  And saints, there were so many of them!

  A kith man screamed as he was plucked from the gate’s opening and pulled into the mist, and more Forest kith rushed to plug the hole he left behind. She spotted Marix by his braided hair, spinning blades and knocking back vicious wings. Why didn’t they close the gate?

  Unless Jake was out there.

  If only she could see…

  As if the Almighty himself had answered her silent plea, the battlefront parted just enough, giving her a glimpse through the wall and to the battle beyond.

  Where an entire company of Forest kith was trying to get through to safety.

  Raquel tapped her finger upon the windowsill. This wasn’t her fight. Those winged demons were Jake’s enemy, and if they killed him, well, it might just solve a lot of her problems.

  Except that horde would probably come for her next.

  She wouldn’t stand a chance against so many, and then she’d never figure out how to save Harran.

  Another Forest kith was snatched from battle and dragged into the mist with his screams.

  That decided it.

  Raquel did not have magik, but she was generally good with a blade, and anyhow, she couldn’t in good conscience stand back and watch. She might die, but that was true on any given day, and—in her opinion—it was far better for a person to die on their own terms than spend their life hiding in a corner, hoping death would pass them by.

  Raquel spun away from the window, snagged Jake’s coat and put it on, and tucked her blond hair inside of it. Not because she thought the glamour would be effective for her, but to hide her long golden hair. She grabbed all of the blades she could find, including a very long and fancy curved sword with a hilt decorated in golden vines that looked exactly like the ones inked upon Jake’s biceps. Raquel smiled to herself as she secured it to her waist, then crawled through the window and dropped two stories to the ground.

  The battle was much louder outside, and Raquel wondered if sight wasn’t the only sensory detail that Jake had obscured from her.

  However, no one paid her any attention. Everyone was too busy looking toward the gate, where at least four of those ghastly winged creatures were trying to force their way through, and the horror of them up close made Raquel’s blood suddenly run cold.

  They had human heads, though their features were exaggerated and overgrown to the point of crudeness, and they had human-shaped torsos too, though their skin was leathery and covered in fine black hairs. But that was where the comparisons ended. Instead of arms, their shoulders morphed into thick black feathers and massive claw-tipped wings, which were currently clawing and raking at the Forest kith fighting them off.

  Raquel took quick inventory of the scene and started running for the watchtower, but a new gap in the gate diverted her feet, and she soon found herself running toward Marix.

  He whirled on one of the winged demons, cutting his blade across its wings, and it shrieked as it soared back into the mist. He looked over, caught sight of her, and froze. “What are you—”

  In his shock, he hadn’t noticed the winged demon descending upon him, but Raquel had, and she threw one of her many blades. Silver streaked sure and true, and it sank into the creature’s chest. Its cry was cut short as it died and dropped from the air, landing at Marix’s feet.

  He blinked at her.

  “Where’s Jake?” Raquel yelled.

  A smaller winged demon came down at Marix, but he noticed this one and punched it out of the way with hardly a glance. “Out there! Wait, where are you going?”

  Raquel pushed through the fighters, ignoring Marix, who yelled after her, and then she was outside.

  It took her a second to make sense of the chaos in the mist. Light flashed, and Raquel found herself momentarily stunned by the sheer number of winged creatures swarming above. There had to be at least a hundred! And below, working desperately to fend them off, were nearly three dozen kith. It took Raquel a split second more to spot the real issue.

  The Forest kith’s attentions were divided between the horde a
bove and the small kith seated upon agitated horses below.

  Children.

  Kith children.

  Raquel had never seen a kith child. She’d known they existed, of course, but what were they doing here?

  Raquel counted three children in total, all attempting to calm horses that were trying so desperately to flee, which was also where she spotted Jake, spinning in a maelstrom of steel and light. He fought alongside an impressive female kith to protect the small and terrified riders from this unending onslaught of claws and wings.

  Raquel stood momentarily mesmerized. Almighty in heaven! Watching him fight, she knew he had held everything back with her. No amount of training could have prepared her for the force that was Jake. He existed in his very own fighting class. His grace, his precision and efficiency. His speed. It wasn’t humanly possible to move that fast, but then again, he wasn’t human.

  Still, Raquel could help, in her way.

  She pushed on, blades in hand. Ducking and slashing as she dodged right into the melee, spinning and kicking, fighting her way toward Jake and those children and the frightened horses. Jake yelled, his swords arced down, and his gaze locked on Raquel.

  He froze.

  If Raquel had thought him furious before, he was positively livid now. Especially when he realized what she was wearing.

  “WHAT IN HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?” he shouted at her.

  “You forgot your sword, Highness.” She tossed the beautiful relic at him.

  He plucked it from the air, though his eyes never left hers. He appeared too stunned to respond. The fearsome kith woman he’d been fighting alongside glanced over at them as she withdrew her long sword from a demon’s belly. The demon’s wings flapped erratically, and it collapsed to the ground in a heap of feathers and black blood.

  “I’ll get the children inside! Cover me!” Raquel shouted and started for the nearest horse.

  Jake’s hand whipped out and wrapped around her arm like a vice, then he jerked her right back so that they were face-to-face. There was nothing friendly in his eyes. “Go back now.”

  “I will not sit in my room like a coward!”

  “Better a coward than a fool! This is madness!”

  “Madness is dressing up as a bear, abducting a young maiden, locking her up, and not expecting her to be upset about it.”

  More kith were looking over now.

  “Of all the—” Jake was starting to say when another winged demon shrieked and fell from the sky. Jake pulled her one step to the right, and the creature landed right where they’d been standing. “Get out of here!”

  “You need help!”

  “Not yours!” he snarled, then yelled over her shoulder, “Rian! Escort my beloved back to her chambers!”

  But before Rian could break away, one of those winged demons swooped low, and Jake yanked Raquel to the ground with him. Once clear, Jake started to rise, but Raquel spotted another shadow bearing down upon them, so she planted her feet on Jake’s torso and kicked him backward instead. Jake cried out in surprise as he stumbled back, and Raquel rolled to the side. The creature struck ground, which gave Jake enough time to gather himself, swing his beautiful sword—was it glowing?—and dislodge the creature’s head from its body. The head dropped, spraying black blood all over Raquel.

  Raquel shoved herself to her feet and wiped the blood off her face with Jake’s cape. “You did that on purpose!”

  “Absolutely.”

  Another creature came at him, and he swung but only managed to knock the creature off course. The creature regained balance, then adjusted its trajectory in an attempt to fly at him again.

  Suddenly, Jake’s sword flared as white as moonlight and vanished. One second it was there, glowing in his hand. The next—gone. And then it blinked into existence up above, soaring through the air like some errant bolt of lightning. The creature didn’t have time to change course, and it soared right into Jake’s glowing sword, impaling itself. The creature shrieked and dropped like a stone, and the sword vanished and reappeared in Jake’s fist, its light gone.

  And then a child screamed.

  Raquel glanced over to see the three horses holding children bolt into the trees, carrying their small riders off with them, while two—no, three winged demons altered course and flew after them.

  Raquel took quick inventory of her immediate surroundings and spotted a horse, braying and bucking near its master. Without a second thought, Raquel sprinted straight for it, pushed past its master, climbed into the saddle, and kicked it into a gallop.

  7

  Though Raquel had executed her share of terrible ideas throughout the course of her life, this might, in fact, have been her worst. But she was desperate, and desperation led a person to do any manner of things they might otherwise know to be…well, stupid.

  Like galloping into the mist full of winged demons in a land she did not know.

  But saints as her witness, she could not, in good conscience, abandon those children.

  She held fast to her horse as she galloped away from the battle, following the children’s cries, though without the light from the outpost and bursts of magik, the forest quickly became dark and impossible to see. Raquel slowed to a trot, eyes narrowed as she strained to make sense of the shadows.

  Where the devil had those demons gone? She knew she’d seen at least three take off after the children. Twice, she thought she caught a glimpse of movement, but there was nothing but mist.

  And then—finally—she spotted the children. They’d reached the dead end of a very tall, very wide embankment, their horses pacing and snorting, trying to find a way to escape. But Raquel was not watching the children. Her attention fixed on the three winged demons nearby, hovering just inches above the ground, snarling and gnashing their teeth, slowly closing in.

  One lunged.

  A child screamed.

  Raquel threw her blade.

  Right before the demonic creature snagged the child, the blade hit, but not in the place she’d intended. It sank in its lower back. Not a fatal strike, but a hindrance.

  The creature wailed a horrible predatory sound, rent with bloodlust and nightmare. Its back arched as its body flexed and wings twitched, and all three demons turned toward her.

  “That’s right,” she taunted, dismounting. “Come on…”

  The one she’d struck snarled and rushed her, but Raquel was ready for it. She spun out of the way, whirled, and used her momentum to plunge a blade into its wing as it rushed past.

  This time, it screamed.

  “Try flying away now, you oversized rat,” she murmured, and the other two came at her. She dropped, one zipped right over her, then she rolled and stabbed up, right into the reaching claws of the second. That one jerked back but didn’t fly away, instead whipping its massive black wings down upon her. Raquel cried out and covered her face as feathers beat and assaulted, and then she kicked firmly back, knocking it into a tree.

  To Raquel’s amazement and horror, the tree’s lower branches curled around the winged demon now thrashing and shrieking like a fly caught in a web. More and more branches wrapped around the demon, cocooning it completely as it drew the demon into its trunk. The demon’s shrieks cut short, the branches relaxed, and there was no longer any sign of the demon, but there was a very obvious bulge within the tree’s trunk.

  Raquel was so stunned by this carnivorous tree that she did not notice the other two winged demons were coming for her again. She managed to spin away from one, only to find herself face-to-face with the second.

  And her world stopped.

  Those eyes. They were black and soulless and terrifying, set in features so gruesomely overgrown, and yet…

  The creature stared at her as she stared at it.

  It blinked and tipped its head.

  And then pain.

  Fire seared in her gut as the third winged demon—the largest demon of all—withdrew its massive claws from her belly. Its bared black teeth filled her visio
n as she gasped and dropped to her knees while the enormous winged demon whipped around to strike her again.

  But the other demon—the smaller one that had stirred something within Raquel—beat its wings at the larger, knocking it back. The large one snarled, and the two gnashed their teeth, circling each other like predators fighting over a kill.

  Raquel tried to stand, tried to use their momentary distraction to slip away, but that fire flared through her limbs, her legs gave, and she collapsed just as the larger demon threw back the smaller with incredible force. The smaller crashed to the ground and did not get up again.

  And the large demon approached.

  Again, Raquel tried to rise, but her arms would not respond. The fire had faded to bitter cold, her body felt oddly numb, and her consciousness was quickly fading.

  The last demon towered over her, all snarls and nightmares and horror.

  And Raquel thought that maybe she wasn’t so ready to die after all.

  Suddenly, a bolt of light pierced the winged demon’s chest. The demon screamed and dropped as that sword of light reappeared in its master’s uniquely capable hand. Jake whirled once more and sliced the large winged demon clean through. The air reeked of burnt hair as its two halves dropped to the ground like heavy stones, and Raquel’s final view was of Jake. He heaved as he stared down at her, his white tunic drenched in black blood. But then her vision tunneled, and her world faded completely.

  8

  “How deep is it?” Rian asked as Jake laid an unconscious Raquel down upon his bed.

  “I don’t know. Help me with her clothes.”

  Rian was there the next instant, and together, they peeled Jake’s glamoured cape from Raquel’s arms.

  That damned corset.