Blythe clutched the girl close as a huge sand cloud swept through town. Her vision blurred. Her nostrils stung, and she coughed. A strange current electrified the air. Intense.Wrong.Instincts spiking to high alert, she palmed a dagger of her own.
“What’s happening?” Laban demanded at the same time Isla cried, “Momma?”
“I don’t—” A horn blared, three long blasts. The Stop What You’re Doing and Battle For Your Life horn. A sound Blythe hadn’t heard since an invasion of vampires six hundred years ago. Aggression rippled through her wings.
Shouts and stomping footsteps told her fellow warriors were mobilizing. Preparing.
The sand cloud thinned, the world clearing up in seconds... Blythe inhaled hard, the scent of cedarwood and spiced oranges filling her head. A soft, rich fragrance utterly at odds with the massive black wall now blocking the end of the street. A giant of a male stood in front of it.
Enemy!Her wings rippled with more force. Old habits flared. Tensing to defend, she catalogued the invader’s details as swiftly as possible. An enormous helmet made from the skull of some kind of mythical beast covered his face. He was shirtless. Muscular. Beyond muscular. Tattoos decorated every inch of his torso—movingtattoos. The plethora of images pranced over tanned skin. Leather pants hugged tree trunk–like thighs. Metal tipped his boots.
Something about him was familiar to her. But what? She knew she’d never met anyone so...big. One did not forget a male like him. What even was his species? Definitely nothing she’d fought before. A shock, considering she’d lived thousands of years and encountered hundreds of different immortals.
He stood in place, as still as a statue, with his chin tipped back, his shoulders and spine straight, and his legs braced apart. His arms hung at his sides. He held no weapons, but then, it wasn’t like he needed them. Long, sharp claws extended from his nail beds.
“If you wish to live,” a rough voice boomed across the land, “you will stand down. If you wish to hurt, you will attack. The choice is yours. At the moment, I seek only a conversation with your General.”
The voice didn’t come from the direction of the giant. Meaning, there were more invaders.
Blythe’s stomach flipped. How many others assembled nearby? And to what end?
“There’s been some kind of mistake,” another voice boomed, this one smug and recognizable. Nissa, the current harpy General. “I ordered strippers fornextTuesday.”
Snickers and laughter rose, blending together.
“By the way,” Nissa continued, “you’re as good as dead. I’ll be seeing to your demise myself.”
Blythe heard only a slight clink of metal before a round of horrified gasps blended with cries of shock. She knew. The General had fought the speaker and lost. That quickly.
Trepidation pricked her nape. There’d be no stopping a war now.
“No mercy!” someone shouted.
Harpies hastened toward the giant. Finally, he moved. With inhuman speed matched by no one, he cut down anyone who neared him. Blood sprayed in arcs. Harpies collapsed. Severed hands and feet flew here and there, stacking up around him.
Blythe’s jaw slackened. Such savagery.
“Run! Hide! Protect our daughter,” Laban shouted over a symphony of shrieks. “Please, love. I’ll find you.” He sped toward the other male.
She almost teleported to his side, an ability few knew she possessed. Her consort seriously expected her to run and hide while intruders maimed her kinsmen? Never!
Blythe descended from a long line of warriors. Before she died over a decade ago, her mother had killed more enemies than anyone in Harpina’s history. Her fathers were Erebus Phantom, creator of phantoms, and Asclepius Serpentes, creator of snakeshifters and gorgons. Three dominant species flowed through Blythe’s veins. So, she would fight at her consort’s side whether he liked it or not. Together, they would ensure this brute with moving tattoos experienced agonies too vast to comprehend. She had only to—Protect our daughter.
The most important words Laban had spoken echoed inside her head. Blythe cursed.Run and hide Isla it is.Then she would return to the battlefield.
Tiny wings flapping, she swooped the trembling girl into her arms and cast one last look at her consort as he reached the giant. Blink. Laban collapsed like the harpies—only his head went flying.
Shock pummeled Blythe, nearly drilling her to her knees. What...how...what?No. No! She hadn’t just seen what she thought she’d seen. But as his severed head hit the cobblestone and continued to roll, reality pummeled her.
“Laban!” she screamed. Her beloved, headless. Immortals like him could recover from many things,mostthings, but not that.
He was dead.
Gone.
There’d be no bringing him back.
Isla must have witnessed the assassination, too. “Daddy,” she cried, hurling herself from Blythe. The little girl ran as fast as her legs would carry her—straight toward the giant.