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Chapter 39

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

T he air rushes out of my chest as the male assassin smacks my spine right between my shoulder blades.

It isn't a terribly hard hit.

My bones don't break this time.

And I'm surprised when he jumps away from me so fast that I've barely registered the contact of his hand before he's several paces away from me again.

A second later, pain rips across my shoulders, and then I'm screaming. Even the pain of my jaw shattering didn't hurt this much.

My wings shoot out far faster than I can tolerate, extending the full five paces to each side of me, every long, jagged feather raking across the ground, some of them ramming into it.

My scream of pain is a mangled sound.

My jawbone is healing, but not fast enough.

Oh, please.

I struggle to push myself up to my knees, all the while trying to retract my wings because they're even heavier lying flat on the ground than they are when I'm standing up.

I spent the last month trying to increase the strength of the muscles in my back to be able to hold them up—let alone use them, but I've never had to try to stand with them fully extended.

Tears of pain fall down my cheeks and I can only imagine how they're mixing with my blood right now. So much of it dripping to the ground as I heave my arms and legs, groaning with effort.

I'm beyond vulnerable lying on the ground like this.

Heave, Veda! Fucking get up!

At the edges of my vision, I'm aware of everyone else in this clearing having come to an abrupt halt, but I'm certain it's only a matter of time before they'll burst into action once more.

I remind myself of what Rebella said to me.

I've gotten so good at getting back up after I fall, I've learned to survive without the ability to fly.

Well, now I need to get up again.

With that, I finally manage to push myself up onto my knees, blood dripping down my chin and neck while my heavy wings drag at my sides, their nightmarish feathers all clumped together.

I find myself the subject of stares.

Of course, James has never seen my wings. Rebella certainly sensed them because she asked me why I didn't use them when I fought her.

But the two assassins appear shell-shocked, their eyes wide and their faces pale.

"The other kind," Mommy Assassin whispers.

She mentioned three kinds of supernatural that can see through her invisibility and it seems I am ‘the other', whatever that is.

Again, I remind myself that this quiet won't last.

I have to make decisions now about whether or not I'm going to continue defending or start attacking—assuming I can even get up.

But, damn, no wonder my mother told me to avoid these assassins.

There is a part of me that understands and respects Daddy Assassin's reaction. Hell, if only my own father were so protective.

But there is another part of me that's angry.

I didn't start this fight. I didn't even throw a hit. Mommy Assassin stumbled into my claws while I was trying to avoid her.

I zero in on her wounds. They've sealed up again. No more bleeding. She's healed.

Baby Assassin will be just fine. I guess that's something.

Even so, I square my shoulders as best I can and stare the assassins down as if I'm not crumpled on the ground and weighed down by heavy wings.

"If you want me dead, come at me," I say, convincing myself that every word I'm speaking will be true. "But do it now—because I won't give you another chance."

Mommy Assassin turns paler than I was expecting her to. "Your wings, they're?—"

She doesn't have the chance to finish whatever she was going to say.

Out of nowhere, a freezing rush of misty air blasts into me, catching my feathers and nearly knocking me backward.

So much for the illusion of strength.

My eyes widen when the keeper appears in front of me, positioned between me and the assassins.

"Keeper," I gasp.

He's standing side-on to me, no doubt so he can keep both me and them in his sights, but it also allows me to see how deathly pale he is.

He's still wearing his angry face with the Einherjar eyes. So much angrier than he looked in the Underworld.

His lips draw back from his teeth in a snarl while a glisten of dragon scales appears across his skin.

"You can't have her," he rasps at the assassins. "She does not belong to you."

Both of the assassins are now pale, but the look they give each other…

I don't understand what it means, the way they appear so stricken as they stare at the keeper, the way they focus on his eyes, then the way they look at me and my wings…

As if something has shaken their foundations.

I don't have the chance to understand it because in the next moment, another blast of mist sweeps around me, a tumult of power, before the keeper throws himself toward me, hoisting me up into his arms.

Then the mist envelops me, the keeper's power compresses my chest so hard, I can't breathe, and I'm spiraling sickeningly through space.

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