“How many did we kill?” Larkin demanded as he collapsed on the floor. Blood ran down his leg to puddle on the wood.
“At least thirty—damn good ratio. You’ve got some speed, Golden Boy.” Blair looked straight into his eyes. “Winged you a little.”
“It’s not altogether too bad. It just—” He didn’t scream when she yanked the arrow out. He didn’t have the breath to scream. When he got it back, all he could manage was a stream of shaky curses.
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“You next,” she said to Cian, nodding at the broken arrow protruding from his thigh.
He simply reached down, yanked it out himself. “Thanks all the same.”
“I’ll get supplies. Your leg’s bleeding,” Glenna told Blair.
“We’re all banged up some. But we’re not dead. Well.” She sent Cian a cocky grin. “Most of us.”
“That never gets tired, does it?” Cian speculated and went for the brandy.
“They weren’t human. In the cages.” Moira held her shoulder where the tip of an arrow had grazed it.
“No. I couldn’t tell from in here. Too many of them to separate the scents. It was smart.” Blair nodded, a grim acknowledgment. “A good way to engage us and not waste any of their food supply. Bitch has a brain.”
“We didn’t get Lora.” With his breath still heaving out of his lungs, Hoyt eased down. He had a gash on his side, another on his arm. “I saw her when we were fighting our way back into the house. We didn’t get her.”
“She’s going to be mine. My very special friend.” Blair pursed her lips when Cian offered her a brandy. “Thanks.”
Standing in the center of them on shaky knees, Glenna took stock. “Blair, get Larkin’s tunic off. I need to see the wound. Moira, how bad is your wound?”
“More a scratch, really.”
“Then get some blankets from upstairs, some towels. Hoyt.” Glenna moved to him, knelt, then just took his hands and buried her face in them. However much she wanted to fall apart, it wasn’t time. Not time yet. “I felt you with me. I felt you with me every moment.”
“I know. You were with me. A ghrá.” He lifted her head, pressed his lips to hers.
“I wasn’t scared, not while it was happening. I couldn’t think to be scared. Then I reached that girl, that young girl, and saw what she was. I couldn’t even move.”
“It’s done. For tonight it’s done. And we proved a match for them.” He kissed her again, long, deep. “You were magnificent.”
She laid a hand over the wound on his side. “I’d say we all were. And we proved more than being able to hold our own. We’re a unit now.”
“The circle is cast.”
She let out a long sigh. “Well, it wasn’t the handfasting celebration I was looking for.” She struggled to smile. “But at least we…No, no, damn it, we didn’t. We didn’t finish. Just hold everything.” She shoved at her dripping hair. “I will not let those monsters ruin this for us.” She gripped his hand as Moira rushed down with arms loaded with towels and blankets. “Are you all listening? You’re still witnesses.”
“We got it,” Blair said as she cleansed Larkin’s wound.
“Your head’s bleeding.” Cian passed Moira a damp cloth. “Go right ahead,” he told Glenna.
“But Glenna, your dress.”
She only smiled at Moira. “It doesn’t matter. Only this matters.” She clasped hands with Hoyt, locked her eyes with his. “As the goddess and the god and the old ones…”
Hoyt’s voice joined hers. “Are witness to this rite. We now proclaim we’re husband and wife.”
He reached down, took her face in his hands. “I will love you beyond the end of days.”
Now, she thought, now, the circle was truly cast, strong and bright.
And the light glowed warmer, a wash of gold when their lips met, when their lips clung in hope and promise, and in love.