"Old forest," Maia replied thickly. "Scary silence."
"I'm scarier than anything in these trees," Azrail said with a smirk, watching her shudder.
"Whatever dirty plans you're making, Knight—" She cut off and froze between one step and the next, her body going as straight as an arrow and her breathing suddenly choppy.
They moved towards her as one, Ark reaching her first and framing her face with his hands, searching her eyes.
"What's wrong?" Jaro demanded, a thread of his jaguar's growl in his voice and his freckled face as fierce as Az had ever seen it. A tremor of unease went down his spine and he scanned the trees around them, on hyper-alert mode.
"I don't know," Maia replied with obvious confusion. A deep furrow formed between her brows, her eyes clearing. "I just felt—rage. Boiling hot and flowing like a river in here." She thumped her breastbone with a coiled fist. "I don't know what the hell that was."
"Whatever it is, let's not stick around to find out," Ark said gravely, sweeping their path with a focused stare when they resumed walking.
It took them five minutes to realise Bryon wasn't waiting nearby. He'd abandoned them entirely, probably disgusted by their tactile kisses.
"I knew we couldn't trust that prick," Maia hissed. "But I thought he'd take us to Calvo before fucking off at least. What are we supposed to do now?"
"Follow the maps in here and hope against hope that we find a thin scent," Azrail replied, tapping his own bag. It would take them far longer; the maps were old and not entirely accurate. He was glad he'd brought them anyway. "It won't be as quick as—"
His fae hearing caught a roar of a scream, and primal rage tightened his body in response to it, the urge to protect and defend howling through Azrail’s blood. Thick smoke pooled at his feet, and rippled from his shoulders.
"Was that...?" Kheir asked.
"Bryon," Maia said in a truly terrifying voice. A voice of shadows and violence.
As ifshewas the reincarnated saint of the dead instead of Azrail.
Without another word, she took off through the trees, a silver shimmer clinging to her body. Power unlike anything they'd seen from her before.
Her mates had no choice but to follow her into the darkest part of the forest.