Chapter 40

We decide to rest for the night, using our packs as pillows.

All of my men are gradually healing, though it’s been slow going due to their dwindling powers and strength. Still, when I pull the bandages away from Bronson’s arms, I’m relieved to see the diminutive cuts have become nothing but pink, puckered skin.

I sit next to Kai on one of the few sections of cement that isn’t covered in puddles. His arm is positioned behind my back, providing me with a makeshift backrest.

Less than an hour ago, Damien pushed back his sleeves, revealing his impressive forearms, and squeezed his eyelids shut, his hands drifting over the kindling we collected. But instead of a roaring heat, the fire fizzled once, twice, three times as his blue magic sparked from his fingertips. Even now, the fire is nothing but embers gradually sputtering out.

I can tell how much it’s bothering my mage, who sits opposite us around the fire. Through Kai’s eyes, I can see how hard he’s attempting to school his expression, to keep it placid and ineffably calm. But does anyone notice the way his right eye twitches as he stares at the diminishing flames? The way he obsessively brushes at his suit coat with haughty indifference? The way his eyes flicker from the fire to my face?

“I wonder how long it’s going to be before you start showing,” Kai muses conversationally, looking pointedly at my stomach. I instinctively cover it with my hands, a slow smile spreading across my face. It’s a lazy sort of smile, one brimming with contentment and joy for what the future will hold for me. Kai’s eyes flicker across my face, and my smile widens, a delicate blush erupting on both of my cheeks.

“I wonder if it’s going to be a girl or a boy,” I whisper, attempting to keep my voice down so I won’t disturb the others as they sleep. Cain and Abel are cuddled together against the far wall, while Rion is quite literally hanging upside down from a pipeline, his face serene with sleep. Bronson is standing guard a short distance away, while Logan lies beside Damien. I can’t tell if the cupid is sleeping, but his breathing appears even.

“We better hope it’s a boy,” Damien cuts in from across the fire. The blue flames flicker across his face, making his strong features appear even more arresting and prominent.

“Why?” I ask, feeling slightly indignant. I level him with a frosty eyed glare, though I can no longer see his expression since Kai turns his gaze back towards me. “You don’t want a daughter?”

“I would kill anyone who so much as looks at my daughter,” Damien deadpans, and I honestly can’t tell if he’s joking or not.

“I definitely think it’s going to be a boy,” Kai interjects, placing his hand over mine on my belly. There’s no mistaking the male smugness radiating from his voice. “A proud, fierce dragon.”

Damien snorts. “You fucking wish. No, our little man is going to be a mage. A powerful one, for that matter. Maybe he’ll even be able to surpass his daddy.”

Rion’s kinkiness must be rubbing off on me. I totally get flustered hearing Damien refer to himself as “daddy.”

“I think it’s a little girl,” I throw in, smiling softly. “I don’t know what species, but I definitely think this little nugget is a girl.”

“A girl,” Kai breathes, wonderment lacing his tone. “What would we name her?”

“We can’t pick out names already,” Damien says with a scoff. “Especially if we don’t know the gender or species.”

“A girl…” I tap a finger against my chin. “Juliet? Holly?”

“No.” Kai’s vision wavers as he shakes his head. “Brittney?”

This time, it’s Damien who vehemently declares, “No.”

“I still think it’s a boy,” Kai says, and he almost sounds petulant. I visualize the scary dragon stomping his foot on the ground as he throws a tantrum, and my smile broadens.

“Do you want to make a bet, Malakai?” I taunt, resting my head on his shoulder.

“Hmmm. I could get behind that.” His voice is a rumbly purr that reverberates through me.

“A wager? I would like to join in on that as well,” Damien says, forcing Kai’s gaze back to him. The tall mage stands, straightening out his suit coat, and regards us stoically. “What, exactly, are we betting on? The mere gender of the baby or which one of us fathered it?”

“Does it matter?” I’m suddenly nervous. Terrified, even, as I await their answers with bated breath. My heart hammers a daunting tune in my chest as I chew on my thumbnail. “I mean, would you guys think less of?—”

“No.” Kai cups my cheeks with both of his hands, his callouses a rough contrast against my smooth skin. “It doesn’t matter to any of us who the biological father is. That baby is ours.”

“Agreed,” Damien says curtly, though there’s something soft in his tone that wasn’t there prior. Something vulnerable. “That baby will be the most protected offspring of all time.”

“Now, about the bet—” Kai’s words cut off abruptly when a low growl rumbles from directly behind us. My muscles tense as my men jump to their feet, calling out to my other mates and jerking them awake.

In less than a second, I’m surrounded by seven warm, masculine bodies.

“What’s going on?” I whisper as the first growl is joined by a second, and those are joined by a third and fourth. Soon, there are over a dozen low hisses, growls, and roars that fill the tiny halls of the Labyrinth.

“Another one of the prison’s traps,” Cain bites out bitterly, just as the first monster ventures around the corner.

And yes, it’s a monster. There’s no other word that’s even close to encapsulating the creature crawling towards us. Bile fills my throat as I use Kai’s eyes to stare into its sunken face, his head canted precariously to the side.

It appears to be a male—or at least it was a male at one point in time. His body is thin and wiry, the torso longer than both his arms and legs combined. His limbs appear to be miniscule extensions of his rectangular shape, jutting out at odd, ninety-degree angles. Coarse brown fur covers his face and neck, disappearing down his nude back and to his legs. The underside of him is nothing but mottled, red and pink skin that’s peeling away. And his face…

He has no eyes. Nothing but empty sockets remain in his distorted face. His bloody lips pull away, revealing three rows of razor-sharp teeth.

He crawls forward. Not walks. Not runs. Just crawls, like some sort of human-centipede monster.

No, it’s not a he. It’s an it.

“Oh, wow,” Rion muses as he twirls a blade in his hand. “He looks just like my mom.”

And then the creature pounces.

Well, creatures.

They materialize from every corner, every hallway, every nook and cranny that they could’ve been hiding in. Dozens of them, some male and some female, but all with disproportionate bodies, hideously disfigured faces, and dark fur.

My guys immediately split off, fighting with weapons and claws and magic.

Damien—and Logan, surprisingly—remain in front of me, shielding me from any monster who dares to get too close. I watch through Kai’s eyes as he expertly rips the head off of one of the gruesome creatures with his bare hands and then tosses it to the side. When a second one arrives, crawling out of a hole in the wall, he bares down on it with a low, threatening growl.

I pull out of his eyes to check in on my twins, currently standing back-to-back. Cain raises his dagger and stabs it through the heart of one of the monsters pouncing on him. When a second one arrives, he ducks just in time for Abel to send a clawed hand across its neck, causing black blood to spurt.

Bronson is in his shadow wolf form, fighting far away from the flickering, subdued blue flames of the fire. He jumps on a creature and pulls out its neck with his sharp, canine teeth. He bucks suddenly, a low, pained whine escaping his throat, and turns rapidly, attempting to dispel the creature clinging to his back, its nails digging into his flesh.

But then Rion is there, a cheerful grin on his face as he stabs at the creature with a sword of his own.

“Damien!” Logan screams, and I drop into Damien’s head just in time to see him throw up his dagger, fending off two of the creatures. Two more arrive, circling him until he’s surrounded. But Damien isn’t perturbed. He simply steps farther away from me, slicing at one creature and then stomping on another’s head when it gets in range.

I feel someone’s hand wrap around my wrist, and I startle, attempting to free myself.

“Shh! It’s just me! Nina, it’s me!” Logan cajoles, pulling me behind him and protecting me from the fight.

“We need to get her out of here!” That’s Kai, and though he sounds out of breath, he doesn’t appear to be in any pain. I easily slide out of Damien’s mind and into Kai’s, allowing him to lead me farther and farther away from the others. I want to protest and scream, but I know I’ll only be a liability. I’ll endanger my men instead of protect them. I’ve been training to fight every day with Damien, but my skills are subpar at best. And my men are too protective of me to allow me to fight. No, if I stay, they’ll get sloppy by focusing on me.

The shouts and grunts and growls begin to fade as we hurry through the tunnel. I worry that we’ll lose sight of my mates, that they won’t be able to find their way back to us, that the Labyrinth will change its pathways before they can catch up to us, but I don’t voice this out loud. Internally, however, my panic ricochets through me like a pinball.

“We need to—Gah!” Kai falls to the ground with a pained noise, spinning onto his back just in time to see a monster fall on top of him.

“Shit!” Logan releases my hand, prepared to go to him, but Kai lets out a strangled noise.

“No! Get her out of here! Logan, get her out—” A second creature appears, opening its huge jaw and clamping down on his arm. He bucks, his skin taking on a reptilian-quality…

Before his power sputters out.

“Shit. Shit. Shit,” he curses, and I detect something in his voice I’ve never heard from him before. Panic.

“Kai!” I lunge forward blindly, only knowing that I need to get to him. That I need to save him. But before I can make it more than a step, Logan bands his arms around me, holding me close.

A third monster slithers towards Kai and takes his other arm, pulling it between its teeth and shaking its head back and forth like the limb is a chew toy for a dog. And then another monster arrives. And another. And another?—

“Don’t let her look!” Kai screams. “Logan, don’t let her—” He roars in agony as a monster tears at the skin of his chest, slicing through his shirt and skin and causing blood to bubble.

“Kai!” My voice breaks, even as Logan continues to pull me backwards, continues to pull me away from my fallen lover. “Logan, we need to?—”

Logan places both hands on my cheeks and presses his forehead to mine. And then I can feel his presence inside of me, cocooning me in warmth, and I’m yanked abruptly out of Kai’s head. Logan’s hands turn sweaty on my skin as he uses the last bit of his power to pull me out of Kai’s mind and forces me into darkness.

“Logan, please—” I sob, struggling to free myself.

He keeps his forehead against mine, his own tears mingling with mine on my face. “You can’t look. God, Nina, you can’t look.”

Kai’s screams reach me. Muffled, at first, as if he’s trying to be quiet for my benefit. And then louder.

I don’t even realize that my screams have joined his until Logan continues moving us away, his head still connected to mine.

“Kai!” I sob, another scream catching in my throat. “Oh my god. Kai!” I wail, pounding my fists against Logan’s chest. The growls from the monsters get louder and louder, accompanied by the sound of flesh being ripped apart. Kai’s screams of anguish gurgle with blood.

And despite how hard I struggle, despite my attempts to call on my powers, Logan forces his will into my mind, making it impossible for me to see through my dragon’s eyes. So I scream. I cry. I plead with whoever is listening.

When Kai’s screams finally go silent and all I hear is the sound of monsters eating his corpse, I realize that there’s no one listening.

“No!” I sob hysterically, snot and tears cascading down my face. “No!”

“Nina…” Logan’s voice is choked, nearly inarticulate, as he cries too.

But whatever he’s about to say is interrupted by a low, creaking noise. Logan curses, pulling me closer towards him, just as the growls of the monsters, the screams of my other men…

It all goes silent.