As much as Echo wanted to watch Ivy’s retreat, to make sure she reached the door and descended into the relative safety of the library—if any place in all of Manhattan could be said to be safe—she didn’t. She kept her eyes on Tanith. But still, she made her promise to Ivy. “She won’t. She’ll have to kill me first.”
Echo realized what a poor choice of words it had been the second they escaped her lips. Caius shot her a look that his dragon seemed to mirror.
“Oh, my sweet firebird,” said Tanith, her voice oozing across the rooftop like an oil slick. “That can be arranged.”
And then she and her shadow beasts attacked.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Jasper was good in a fight. Better than most people expected. He had spent years carefully cultivating an air of languid indolence, projecting an ease that said to all who looked his way that he was more of a lover, not a fighter. That he preferred to keep his hands clean no matter how dirty his task. It was a ruse. A shadow of a lie that had served him well. Being underestimated was a weapon all its own, and one Jasper knew how to wield with skill.
But this was no fight.
This was chaos. This was the slam of one body into another, the sound of cloth and metal and flesh tearing, the fever pitch of shouts and wails and pleas. Smoke clogged the air, battling for dominance with the electric ozone scent of the in-between hovering above it all. Somewhere, gas was leaking, painting the atmosphere with its thick, sickly stench. Jasper thought that if he struck a match, the air itself would catch fire, burning them all in an orgiastic frenzy of violence and blood and death.
Metal screeched as a body landed atop the car behind which Jasper crouched. Shattered glass rained down from the ruined windows, scattering to the ground like chunks of hail. Dorian knelt to one side of Jasper, sword drawn, while Ivy huddled by the wheel on his other side, her already-pale skin even paler, her black eyes wide. Jasper had spotted her white feathers as she’d come running out of the library. Luck had drawn her eyes to them, and Jasper hoped that luck held on a little longer.
He peeked over the now-concave roof of the car. It was the body of an Avicen warrior—the bloodstained feathers protruding from its head confirmed that much—but whoever it was had parted with their face and what looked like half of their internal organs. Bile rose, quick and sour, in Jasper’s throat as he ducked back down. Something dark and sinuous weaved between the nearby vehicles before disappearing from view.
“This is bad.” Jasper usually tried to avoid stating the obvious, but the situation was so very bad it seemed worth mentioning. “They’re being slaughtered, if our new friend here is anything to go by.”
“Stay here,” Dorian said, already leaning around the trunk of the van to gauge his next move. The sword sat so naturally in his hand that it might as well have been an extension of his arm. “Take care of Ivy.”
Jasper seized hold of Dorian’s sleeve before the other man could escape to throw himself boldly into the fray.
Dorian glanced down at Jasper’s hand, then darted his gaze up, his expression more than a little forlorn, dusted with a hint of desperation. “Jasper, I—”
Jasper stole the rest of Dorian’s sentence with a kiss. There was no grace to it. Just a hard press of lips and teeth. It was over far too quickly. “I love you,” Jasper said.
Dorian blinked, startled. “I love you, too.” He said it reflexively, as if it wasn’t something he needed to think about. Something deep inside Jasper lurched with glee.
“And if you think,” Jasper continued, “that I’m going to let you die in a blaze of glory, you are sorely mistaken.”
Jasper unsheathed the twin set of knives he’d strapped to his forearms before they’d left the keep in a whirlwind of steel and magic; then he reached into Dorian’s pocket for the small vial of bloodweed elixir he’d seen Caius toss to Dorian before running after Echo toward the library. He slicked a coating of it over the two blades before Dorian had a chance to protest. Oh, the protest was coming. Jasper could see it forming on those perfectly plump, kiss-bruised lips. But Ivy—patron saint of perfect timing—swooped in with the save.
“I’m not staying here,” she said. Her eyes were a hair too wide and her skin a touch too pale, but there was a determination in the set of her jaw that Jasper knew was reflected in his own expression. “I’m a healer, and there are people out there who need my help.” Dorian frowned, and Jasper saw another protest trying to break free before Ivy cut him off. “I can help. And I will.”
A scream cut through the air, accompanied by what sounded like bones cracking. Another screech—this one distinctly monstrous—rose above the cacophony. Jasper fought an involuntary shiver. Dorian’s head twitched toward the source of the noise.
He closed his eye briefly. “There’s nothing I can say to convince the two of you to find a nice, safe place to hide, is there?”
“No,” said Jasper and Ivy at the same time.
“Fine,” Dorian said through gritted teeth. He pulled Jasper in for another kiss, this one as vicious as the last.
Behind him, Jasper heard Ivy mumble, “Time and a place, guys.” He flipped his middle finger at her, then immediately regretted it, as there was a very real possibility it would be the last thing he ever communicated to her.
Dorian pulled away just far enough to rest his forehead against Jasper’s. “No unnecessary risks.”
“Like getting run through by a sword meant for you?”
“Just like that, yes.”
Jasper afforded Dorian a small smile and nodded. They both knew it was bullshit, but Dorian needed that promise, no matter how flimsy, and there was nothing Jasper would deny him. Besides, being impaled once was more than enough. No one needed a repeat of that. Especially Jasper.
“Stay close,” Dorian said to them both.
The next instant, he was on his feet, rounding the corner and delving into the chaos, Jasper and Ivy one step behind.
Dorian’s penchant for heroics might have been one of the things Jasper loved about him, but if Dorian got himself killed, Jasper was going to follow him to the afterlife and smack the pretty right out of him.
Jasper gripped his knives tighter and plunged into the fight, praying to gods he wasn’t sure he’d ever believed in that they would all make it out of this mess alive.
—
Dorian’s sword sank into the beast’s hide with startling ease. The dark flesh moved and bunched as if there were muscles flexing beneath the skin, but there was little resistance as it parted beneath Dorian’s blade. No catch of bone or gristle, no spill of blood across naked steel. A piercing cry sliced through the air, loud enough to make Dorian want to drop the sword and clap his hands over his ears. He didn’t. But gods, it was loud.