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Jag’s voice slid into his head. I’m glad to see you and the misses made it, Foxy-woxy.
Fox grinned. Damn am I glad to see your sorry furry face, boyo.
In his mind he heard the sound of Jag’s laughter. Then Lyon’s stern command. Protect her.
Aye. Fox shifted backward, placing Kara between his front legs, where she fit easily. Anyone coming for her was going to have to get past his teeth.
The moment Lyon caught sight of his mate, his beloved Kara, sitting weakly on the ground between the giant fox’s forelegs, his control shattered. His logical mind urged him to keep quiet for fear of alerting the rest of the Mage. To attack rationally with cool self-control.
Fuck. That.
The deep, massive roar barreled out of his lion’s chest and throat as he leaped for the nearest Mage, the fury and frustration and anguish of the past hours, the past days, fueling his actions until he was caught in a berserker’s rage, ripping apart his enemies.
Limbs flew, heads rolled. A blade slashed through his fur and flesh, but he couldn’t feel it through the righteous wrath blazing through his mind and muscles. The bastards had taken his Kara!
Thunder crashed around them, hail pelted them from the skies, but still he fought and clawed and destroyed his enemies. With a single swipe of his paw, he tore off the head of his opponent, then turned to attack the next. But there were no more. It was over, the Ferals standing, the Mage all dead.
His gaze flew to Kara, where she stared at him, loving him, tears running down her cheeks. Desperation to feel her in his arms fueled his muscles as he lunged for her, shifting into human form even as Fox stepped back. And then he was sweeping her into his arms, feeling her slender arms tight around his neck, her tear-streaked cheek pressed to his as he held her against him so tightly, he feared he was crushing her.
His arms shook, his eyes burned as he inhaled her sweet scent, as he felt her beloved heart beat fast and strong against his.
“I love you, Lyon. ” Her words thickened with tears. “I’ve missed you so much. ”
“I’ve been lost without you, little one. They took my heart when they stole you from me. ” He pulled away, studying her, touching her face, her hair. “You’re pale. ” He growled. “They hurt you. ”
Her mouth tipped up in the sweetest of smiles, the tears still running down her cheeks. “You’re here. I’m perfect, now. ”
Her sweet words fell like healing rain onto his parched soul.
The battle was over.
As Lyon swept Kara into his arms, Fox shifted back into a man and swept Melisande into his. Holding her tight, he kissed her soundly, then tucked her against his side as he turned toward the others. Wulfe’s arm was bleeding, he noticed. And bleeding. With a frown, he looked at the others and found a cut on Lyon’s shoulder that didn’t appear to be healing, and another on Kougar’s thigh. So it wasn’t just him. And what did that mean?
As Jag sauntered over to them, Melisande grinned at him. “Hello, Jag. ”
Jag stopped abruptly. “What did you do with Miss . . . ah . . . ?”
“Miss Bitch?” she asked saucily. “You’ll be happy to know, she’s gone. I think. Unless you start making Fox genuinely angry, then you’ll see her again in all her bitchy glory. ”
A smile began to curl at the edges of Jag’s mouth. “Well, I’ll be damned. ”
“Let’s go. ” Lyon’s voice carried to them, low and urgent.
“We going after Inir?” Wulfe asked.
Lyon shook his head. “Feral House. Priority number one is getting our Radiant safe and secure. If we get ambushed before we escape this mountain, it could take every one of us to protect her. We’re not splitting up. Besides . . . ” He glanced at his shoulder. “We’re not healing, and I want to know why. The Shaman should be able to tell us. ”
“There are hundreds of sentinels within that fortress,” Kara said softly.
Lyon continued, “I’m aware that we may have trouble reaching the stronghold a second time. Inir may move his forces altogether though I think that’s unlikely. But we have an advantage they may not be aware of. Wulfe. ”
At Fox’s curious expression, Jag elaborated. “The Wulfe-man has Daemon blood. He can see the warding. ”
Holy shite.
“Roar, I’d be happy to . . . ” Kougar began.
Lyon shook his head. “No discussion. We’re returning to Feral House to regroup. All of us. We will keep Inir and his evil army from freeing Satanan and his Daemon horde. But not today. Now let’s find that warding and get out of here. ”
Wulfe motioned with his head. “The warding is closest this way. ” He turned and started running up the hill, veering from their original path on a forty-five-degree angle.
Fox grabbed Melisande’s hand, and together they ran after him, the warriors surrounding their chief and their Radiant as the rain and hail pummeled them and lightning tore across the sky.
Fox squeezed Melisande’s hand. “You fought brilliantly, pet. ”
She looked up at him with eyes shining with battle lust, and love. “I had no trouble,” she said wonderingly. “It helped that they were soulless, Daemon-raising scum. But inside, I’m all right, I think. The Ceraph and the warrior are coming to terms. It’s still going to take some time to process all that’s happened and to work through the guilt issues. But I feel . . . good. ” Her eyes softened. “Better than good. ” But a second later, she bit her lip, worry creasing her brow. “Or I will once we get through that warding. ”
Feck. The warding. He squeezed her hand tightly. “I’ve gotten you through it twice, now. I’ll do it again. I won’t let anything happen to you, Mel. I swear it. ”
She smiled. “I believe you. ”
“Fox?” Lyon called.
Fox steered Melisande to Lyon’s side. As they ran abreast with the Chief of the Ferals, Lyon gave them both a nod, his gaze meeting Fox’s and holding. “I have no words to express my gratitude. To both of you. You honor all of us by being one of us, Fox. The animal spirit chose well. ”
Lyon’s gaze shifted to Melisande. “Did I hear you say you’re a Ceraph, Melisande?”
“You’re an angel?” Jag crowed. There was no speaking too low for Feral hearing, not in this tight group.
But Melisande only smiled, a serene smile flashing with steel. “I was, millennia ago. Soon after the Sacrifice, I was captured by shifters trying to get their animals back. I lost that part of me and everything soft in the months they tortured me. I lost my heart. But Fox has helped me to reclaim it. ”
Lyon nodded. “A mated pair?”
Fox looked at her, meeting her gaze, and realized he had no doubt it was what he wanted. None. “Yes. If she’ll have me. ”
A sweet, loving smile crossed her lovely face. “There’s nothing I want more. ”
Fox grinned, then let out a laugh, his joy uncontainable. Melisande’s sweet laughter melded with his.
“The transformative power of love never ceases to amaze me. ” Lyon smiled. “Welcome, Melisande. I have to admit, I much prefer calling you friend than enemy. ”
Kara cocked her head. “I’m thinking ‘sister’ fits you better. The Feral sisterhood always has room for one more if you don’t have too many sisters already. ”
Fox felt Melisande’s hand tighten in his. Tears began to shine in her eyes. “I happen to be missing some sisters, as a matter of fact. I would be honored to be considered one of yours, Kara. ”
Kara grinned. “Done. ”
They’d traveled another mile when Wulfe said, “There it is. ”
For once, Fox’s gut kicked in when he needed it with a rise of goose bumps on his arms and Wulfe’s name in his head.
He turned to Melisande, meeting her worried eyes. “Wulfe can help you through safely. ”
A short distance away, Wulfe pulled up, turned to Melisande, and held out his hand. “You’ll come through w
ith me. ” His gaze met Fox’s. “Shift, but stay close just in case. ”
“You can count on it. ”
Fox pulled on the power of his animal and followed close behind Wulfe and Melisande. He felt the power slipping along his fur and watched with relief as Melisande walked beside Wulfe without being affected by the warding at all. Daemon blood. Unbelievable.
When they’d fully cleared the warding and put some distance between it and them, Fox shifted back into human form and pulled Melisande tight against him. In the distance, he saw Ilinas materializing. Kougar must have called his mate for transport within seconds of their freedom.
“I can mist again,” Melisande said, bone-deep relief in her voice. “I can feel it. Are you ready?”
“Wait a minute. ” As the small band went to join the newly-arrived Ilinas, Fox turned to Melisande, stroking her precious cheek.
Sapphire eyes turned to his, soft as a summer rain.
“Lyon put you on the spot back there, I’m afraid, but I meant what I said, Mel. I love you. Completely, utterly, madly. I want you to be my mate. But if you need time, or simply want to be lovers, that’s all right, too. I will take as much or as little as you’ll give me. ”
Her smile bloomed slowly, stealing his breath. So beautiful. Her eyes overflowed with love. “You were always meant to be mine, Feral. I felt it the first time I saw you. The most beautiful male ever to walk this Earth. And the sweetest. I adore you. I love you. And there is nothing I want more than to be yours, and for you to be mine, for all eternity. ”
“Aye?” Relief weakened his knees, and he gave a shout, unable to contain his euphoria. He picked her up, swinging her around, loving the sound of her laughter. Loving everything about her.
He’d fallen in love with an angel.
Epilogue
In the cavelike ritual room deep beneath Feral House, firelight flickering over the dark-paneled room, Fox drove into his mate high atop the altar, sealing their mating bond. Nearby, Kougar intoned the ancient rite, dribbling the combined blood of the Ferals on the floor around them. The ritual was as primitive as any Fox had witnessed, dating back far into the mists of time, and somehow incredibly fitting for a man who was half-animal and a woman who’d been alive since the days of the cavemen.
Though all of his Feral brothers circled the altar, Melisande’s Ilina sisters stood closest, their backs to the mating couple, acting as a living privacy curtain. Not that either Melisande or he cared. Modesty was not a word in either the Ilinas’ or shifters’ lexicon.
Fox stared into the beautiful sapphire eyes of his mate as they joined in this most primal of ways, slowly, lovingly, opening hearts, souls, and minds to the power that would bind them for eternity.
The chanting ended. Out of the corner of his eye, between the heads of two Ilina maidens, Fox saw Kougar pour the last of the blood into one of the ritual fires. Power roared through him without warning. He and Melisande came as one in a burst of fireworks and pure joy as the mating bond inside him—inside them both—formed, brilliant in color and strong as steel. Nothing would ever separate them again.
As they stared into one another’s eyes, breathless with passion and love, Melisande’s eyes grew thoughtful. Perhaps a little sad.
“What is it?” he asked, slain.
“I’d thought the power of the mating bond might make me the Ceraph again. ”
“And you want that. ”
She smiled softly. “I want you. Just that. ”
“You’re perfect the way you are, Mel. Everything I’ve been looking for, even if I didn’t know it. And so much more. ”
She lifted her hands and pressed them to his cheeks, startling him with the sudden blast of healing heat. Deep in his mind, he heard a snarl, then another, a vicious battle erupting inside him. An animal battle. His fox against the darkness?
“What are you doing, pet?” His mate. Goddess, his mate. He loved the sound of that.
Her eyes shone with joy. “Healing you as you healed me. My gift is strong through the mating bond, Fox. Give me a minute. ”
He pressed his hips up, driving himself even deeper inside of her. If they stayed here much longer, he was going to be ready to take her again. “You can have all the minutes of my life, luv. ”
As his animal brushed his mind, a hazy image appeared in his head of smoke in the form of a fox. The darkness. Battling it was another fox, a red one, smaller and bloody and injured. At first, the smaller fox’s attacks made no impact, the smoke re-formed, the darkness remaining whole.
Fox tensed. This was real.
All of a sudden, warm energy began to flow through his body, similar to radiance, but different. Softer. Love. He felt so much love. Deep inside, his animal responded, leaping with joy and gratitude, growing larger, stronger.
“Help him, Fox,” Melisande urged. “Concentrate. Between the three of us, we’ll destroy that darkness in your spirit right now. I can do this. ”
Fox did as she asked, focusing on the smoke’s demise as Melisande’s heat rushed into him, as the red fox grew larger, and larger, until he towered over the smoke fox. And then he attacked, ripping away chunks of darkness that no longer re-formed, again and again until the darkness was no more.
The red fox turned to him, grinning, love and gratitude in his eyes. Then turned to Melisande with a look of utter adoration.
Inside, he felt whole, his animal’s tension draining away. Fox blinked. “It’s done. ”
Melisande laughed. “It’s done. ”
With a sound kiss, he pulled out of her. When they’d straightened their clothing, he swung his new bride, in her diaphanous ruby mating gown, off the altar.