“Time to leave, you pompous prick.”
“I am happy to leave.” Magnus offered a mocking bow, his gaze never leaving Fallon’s pale face. “Your father will no doubt wish to speak to you once he learns of your reckless disregard for his position. If nothing else, he will need you at his side when he publicly shuns you.”
Without warning, Styx had reached out to grab Magnus’s arm.
“Sariel isn’t going to know about this,” he warned, his expression grim. “At least not yet.”
Magnus gave a low hiss, his honey tinted skin glowing as he allowed his power to flow through his body.
“This is not your concern.”
“Tough,” Styx snarled, pointing a finger directly into the prince’s handsome face. “This is what’s going to happen. You’re taking me back to my lair and then you’re staying there with your mouth shut until the Oracles get their shit together and I can either kick you out or kill you.”
Magnus narrowed his gaze, but shockingly he kept his power firmly leashed. He didn’t even fight against the vampire’s grip.
Weird. Very weird.
“You are not my king,” he muttered.
“No, but I can promise you that Sariel won’t be pleased to discover you’ve made an enemy of the Commission,” Styx said. “Now let’s go.”
“This will not be forgotten.” Magnus lifted his hand, but instead of sending a bolt of energy toward the Anasso as Fallon dreaded, he instead formed a portal and led Styx into the opening.
“You owe me, amigo,” Styx warned Cyn before he abruptly disappeared with Magnus.
Cyn remained silent as Fallon took an instinctive step toward the spot where her fiancé had just disappeared.
Rage ripped through him.
He wanted to yank her into his arms. To kiss her until her pale cheeks were flushed and he’d replaced the scent of the damned fairy prince with his own. Territorial? Hell, yes.
Unfortunately he couldn’t risk touching her. Not when he continued to vibrate with the savage need to tear apart the male who had dared to try to take her away.
Instead he was forced to watch her stand in the center of the hallway, her golden hair tumbled around her shoulders and her amber eyes wide with a distress that sliced through his heart.
She looked like a lost waif.
It was . . . unbearable.
He stepped to stand close enough to feel her intoxicating heat wrap around him, easing the frigid fury that had nearly sent him over the edge.
“Fallon?”
“He’s playing his own game,” she said, her voice distracted.
Cyn didn’t know what he’d expected, but it wasn’t that.
“Who’s playing a game?” he demanded.
“My ex-fiancé.” She gave a slow shake of her head. “Styx is powerful, but Magnus possesses the magic of royals.”
Belatedly Cyn recalled Roke telling him about Sariel’s ability to fry the Nebule demon to a gooey tar. He’d said that it’d destroyed everything in its path. He’d also admitted that it was a talent that his mate, Sally, had inherited.
It’d never occurred to him that Fallon might have the same dangerous power.
Bloody hell, he was lucky not to be a smudge on the floor.
“The burst of light?” he asked.
“Yes.” Her expression remained absent, as if she was pondering some deep thought. “It’s lethal to most demons.”
“He’s not stupid.” Cyn shrugged. Magnus might have all sorts of fairy magic, but it wouldn’t protect him if he harmed Styx. “If he’d killed the Anasso there would be nowhere he could hide from us. We would destroy him.”
She continued to study that empty spot where Magnus had disappeared. “Still, he could have used his magic to disable Styx long enough for him to escape. So why would he have let himself be forced back to the king’s lair?” The question wasn’t directed at him. Hell, he wasn’t sure she was even aware he was around. “And why didn’t he try to force me home? It was almost as if he was hoping I would break our engagement.”
A rational part of him knew that Fallon was right to be concerned if her prick of an ex-fiancé was acting out of character. But he wasn’t in the mood to hear another word about the glorious, fucking golden prince.
He’d been to the edge of death, and before he could fully recover, he’d been driven into a berserker frenzy. Who could blame him for being a little twitchy?
“Is he a threat?” was the only thing he wanted to know.
“No.”
Satisfied, he crowded her against the wall, using his larger size to keep her trapped. “Then forget about him.”
He heard her breath catch in her throat, her heart thundering, but her expression remained troubled.
“Easy for you to say,” she muttered.
His fingers tangled in her hair, his voice coming out as a rough growl. “You told me that you didn’t love him.”
“I don’t.”
Something dangerous eased in his chest as he allowed his fingers to lightly stroke through the satin strands.
“Then why are you upset?”