Shaedes of Gray: A Shaede Assassin Novel

and measured in my new and heightened sense of time. I reached out, and my palms wrapped around the beast’s face. As I jumped to the side, avoiding its charge, I twisted with all my might, groaning under the tremendous force. Its strength was immense, more of stone than flesh. I jerked hard, and after hearing the snap of its neck, I released my hold. The Enphigmale continued in a skid across the clearing until its progress was stayed by a rather large tree. The great gray beast slammed into the trunk, twitched, and let a loud snort from its wide nostrils before becoming still. It did not move again.

I pulled my sword from the ground and charged another, leaping onto its expansive back. It turned circles, trying to throw me off, but the movement seemed so slow, I barely felt it. I raised the katana high and stabbed down through the flesh and bone, deep into the creature’s skull. I wrapped both hands around the hilt and twisted the katana. The gargoyle crumpled in a useless heap and jerked once, twice, and died.

The last of the gray hour melted into night. Screams echoed in the clearing, the sound of the injured and dying lingering on the wind. Raif turned his force’s attention to the Enphigmale, they joined my efforts to eradicate the ever-starving beasts before they could do any more damage.

Leaving the battle to skilled warriors, I turned my attention to Tyler. I gripped the wide collar in my hands and pulled with all my strength, forcing the heavy clasp until it broke under the pressure. I threw it to the side, and, within moments, the bear’s form shrunk and faded away. In its place lay a bleeding, naked man, his breath rasping in his chest.

“Ty, can you hear me?” I said close to his ear. “Hold on. Don’t leave me yet.” I threw off my coat, then ripped the sleeve from my shirt and wrapped it around the gaping wound in Tyler’s neck.

His eyes fluttered and my heart mimicked the act. Not dead. I sighed.

“Raif,” he said, barely a murmur. “Is he here?”

“Yes,” I breathed. “My wish is your command, right?”

He gave a wan smile. “Exactly.”

Around me the Enphigmale snarled, Lyhtans screamed, and Shaedes cheered. But in front of me, Tyler lay dying. I didn’t care about any of those other things if I couldn’t fix the only thing that mattered. “Tyler,” I said. “I wish—”

“No!” he said, forceful for the first time. “Don’t say it, Darian. You can’t.”

“Why not?” I asked, trying to keep the desperation from my voice. “If I can’t use my wishes to heal you, what good are they?”

“My life is yours, not the other way around. You can’t wish the dying back to life, remember? I love you, Darian. All that matters to me is you’re safe. If I have to die to make sure that happens, so be it. We have to follow the rules.”

“Fuck the rules,” I said through my emerging tears, “I don’t give a damn about your rules! I wish you were better. I wish you were healed.”

His eyes drifted shut, and I gave him a shake. “I wish you were healed! Damn it, Tyler. Don’t do this to me! I wish you were healed!”

A sudden wave of energy left me like air from a vacuum. I slumped over, my breathing heavy for the first time in this long and seemingly ceaseless day. The wet, slurping sound of Tyler’s breathing didn’t slacken despite my urgent wish. I retrieved my black duster and draped it over him, whispering the words over and over. Wishing, willing him to live. “Don’t leave me,” I whispered over his chest. “Please, Ty. Don’t leave me.”

In a gust of warm and fragrant air, Raif came to stand beside me, placing a reassuring hand on my shoulder. I wanted to shake him off, to refuse the comfort he offered as I allowed myself to deny the fact that there might soon be reason for me to grieve.

“One of the beasts ran,” Raif said, with a mixture of anger and regret. Blood stained his shirt from a cut to his forearm, and his face was beaded with sweat. “But the remaining three are dead.”

“What about the Lyhtans?” I asked, combing my fingers through Ty’s hair.

Raif laughed. “No contest there—almost a disappointment. Most of them are dead. The others fled.”

“And ours? How many gone?”

His voice became thick. “Eleven.”

“Anya?”

“Alive.”

Oh, well. You can’t win ’em all. Really, I could have cared less if she lived or died. The only thing I cared about was bleeding away on the grass.

“Azriel is gone. The Oracle as well.”

My shoulders slumped. Leave it to the snake to find the quickest way through the grass. He couldn’t hide forever, though. And when I found him, he’d pay in spades. “How did you find me?” And how do we get back? Could we get back?

“I just knew,” Raif said. “It was the strangest thing. One moment I was scouring maps, trying to pinpoint locations that they may have taken you, and the next moment, I knew where you were and exactly how to get here. I assume that was your Jinn’s doing. Very clever, Darian.”

Sounds drifted to my ears—the running of a great beast through the woods, the last, sighing breath of the dying, and solid pats on the back as comrades-in-arms congratulated one another. The night progressed and time marched on, the cadence of which had not left me and probably never would. For the umpteenth time, I tried to ignore the sensation that the world spun within me, outward.

“We should take him home,” Raif said, placing his other hand around my opposite arm to encourage me to stand. “We’ll do everything we can for him.”

Several branches were brought and bound together with vines. My duster was thrown over the makeshift cot. And though I insisted Tyler would be no burden for me to carry, Raif insisted just as sternly that he be transported with the least amount of jostling possible. I reluctantly agreed and followed behind, as the remaining members of Raif’s forces, led by Xander, made their way to the bower, and, one by one, stepped through the gaping black portal.

When we emerged on the other side, the blinding sunlight threw me for a loop. Raif shielded his eyes from the offending glare. “When we arrived here, it was the dead of night. Imagine our surprise to walk into that opening and come out in the light of day.”

I didn’t have to imagine anything; I was surprised enough. We loaded Tyler onto one of two large pontoon boats. I raised a questioning brow to Raif.

“What? They were the only vessels I could find. How else would you expect me to transport so many after daybreak?”

I allowed a subdued laugh. “No wonder it took you so long.”

“What do you mean so long? You’ve been gone for only twelve hours.”

My jaw dropped a little. Time had become a different thing entirely on the other side of the bowered portal. Hours had become days, and no one was the wiser. No one but me.

“Not that it would have mattered,” Raif continued. “You could have taken them all single-handedly. I’m impressed, Darian. You’re a true warrior.”

He inclined his head respectfully and left me at the bow of the sluggish boat that chugged us from the island to the mainland. Tyler remained unconscious, lying in the shade of the awning. I wanted to be at his side, but I needed to be alone, to feel the wind in my face, whipping my hair. My eyes stung as unshed tears came to the fore, finally spilling over my lids and down my cheeks. I swiped them away, swallowing against the grief that threatened to consume me. I didn’t think I could live without Tyler. I sure as hell knew I wouldn’t want to. I breathed in deeply, letting the cool air clean the stench of Lyhtans, death, and betrayal from my memory. If only it could erase the memory of change.

A warm body pressed against my back and I closed my eyes. Still on the edge of violence, I could easily lay my fist to the softer parts of his face. But despite everything that had passed between us, I knew somehow that Xander held an inexplicable magnetism. I was drawn to him, no matter how many times he’d burned me. He’d tried to protect me in his own way. And like a nagging child, starved for attention, he made sure his presence was known.

“You are different,” Xander said. The King of Obvious, among other things.

“Yes.”