“We’ll be leaving?”

“Uh-huh.”

“And you know this . . . how?”

“I’ve been part of a military Clan since hatching. All me aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings . . . almost all of them in the military. And my father, the peacemaker . . . ? Well, you can’t have peace without war and you can’t make truces and alliances without understanding war. I spent the first years of my life attached to his tail while he plotted and planned with the brilliant elders of the Southlands. So, I’ll admit it’s a guess.” She finally looked at him. “But I’d be shocked if I was wrong.”

“But we still have tonight.”

“No one would be foolish enough to enter these territories at night. All the warrior witches I’ve known are like cats. They look for prey when the suns go down. I doubt the Destroyers are any different. We’ll be safe until the morning.”

“Good.” Aidan moved into a crouch, reaching down to grab Brannie under the arms and lifting her up as he stood.

He tossed her over his shoulder and Brannie laughed, slapping at his ass.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Looking for somewhere we haven’t already fucked.” He turned in a complete circle. “I don’t see anything. Everything in this room has been defiled.”

“We haven’t used the bed . . . except to sleep.”

“You’re right!” He pulled her off his shoulder and casually tossed her onto the bed. Branwen bounced once and flipped onto the floor.

“Brannie!” Horrified, Aidan scrambled over the bed to the other side. Brannie was curled into a ball, laughing so hard, she could barely breathe.

“Are you all right?”

But she was laughing too hard to even answer.

“By the gods, female.” He reached down and pulled her onto the bed. “You are ridiculous.”

He checked to make sure nothing was broken or, at the very least, knocked out of an important socket. But he should have known better. This was Branwen the Awful. She’d survived a mountain crumbling around her with barely a scratch and a lightning bolt to the back. So surviving a flip off a bed . . . ?

Aidan sat on the mattress and waited for Brannie to stop laughing, which she did eventually. But then she became fascinated with the actual bed.

“What are you doing?” he finally asked when he got tired of watching her crawl around the bed and press her hands into it.

“Wondering why it’s so bouncy. None of our beds at home are bouncy. You’d think Annwyl would have bouncy beds.”

“Seriously?”

She stopped, gazed at him. “What?”

“We’re both here, naked, on our last night of what may be freedom or possibly our lives . . . and you’re worried about a bouncy bed?”

Brannie nodded. “Yes.”

Aidan grabbed Brannie’s arm and pulled her close. “Kiss me, Brannie.”

“All right, but if we make it back home alive . . . I want you to get me a bouncy bed.”

* * *

Aidan stared at her for so long, she thought maybe she’d crossed a line. Not about suggesting that they might not get back to the Southlands alive, but by suggesting they’d still be involved somehow. Enough, anyway, to insist on a gift.

Uncomfortable, she asked, “Why are you staring?”

He never answered, but he kissed her. A sweet kiss that confused her even more.

“What is happening?” she asked when he pulled back.

“I like you, Branwen.”

She smiled and replied, “Awwwww, Aidan . . . I like me, too.”

Rolling his eyes, Aidan pushed her back on the bed and settled between her thighs.

“Why do I bother?” he asked her.

And, laughing, Brannie admitted, “I have no idea!”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Meihui was meditating. She got up early, hours before the two suns rose, to meditate. It healed her mind and body and helped her maintain the strength she’d built over the centuries. Although she was born to human parents—farmers—she’d been sent to Heaven’s Destroyers before she’d reached her thirteenth year. That had been about fifteen hundred years ago, give or take a few stray years she might have forgotten. And in that time, she’d honed her skills until they were absolutely razor-sharp.

So what she heard moving outside her temple wasn’t footsteps. It was breathing. Very controlled breathing by very controlled killers.

Brazen ones if they were trying to sneak into a Heaven’s Destroyers’ temple.

No. These killers wouldn’t be here for one of her sisters or for Meihui. They were here for Keita.

Reaching under her bed, she pulled out her seax, a fighting knife, given to her by her training mistress a long time ago, and quickly slipped out of her room. She knew she didn’t have to warn her sisters. They were already aware of what was happening. But Keita and her friends . . .

Meihui ran up the stairs to the guest rooms and to Keita’s door. She eased inside and went straight to the bed, but before she could shake Keita awake, a blade was pressed to her throat.

“Come to kill me, old friend?”

Meihui smiled. “No, you idiot. I’m here to rescue the damsel.”

The blade pulled away from her throat and Meihui faced her friend. “And you, my dearest Keita . . . better run.”

* * *

Brannie’s mother used to warn her that sometimes good sex could be a distraction. She used to roll her eyes at her mother’s speech and then beg her to stop talking because it was so embarrassing having this conversation with her mum.

But when she felt the air around her move, Brannie had to grudgingly admit her mother was right. Because she should have realized something was wrong long before her attackers were in the room.

Brannie jerked back and the head of an ax landed on her pillow. She struck out with her fist, knocking her assailant back.

By the time she got to her feet, Aidan was up as well. He grabbed his weapon and tossed her the special weapon Rhona had given her. It quickly extended into a spear and Brannie blocked another blow from her attacker.

It was a male, dressed all in black with no armor or chain mail.

She twisted her spear in an attempt to get the blade from him, but he moved with her weapon and kept his grip. He struck again. Fast. Brannie blocked the strike with her forearm, shortened her spear to fit in the small room, and drove it up through his chin and into his head.

She yanked it out, turned, and cut the throat of the man behind her.

Aidan had three bodies at his feet and was moving across the room to grab their things.

“Get Keita and the others,” she ordered him.

He tossed her chain mail to her. “What are you going to do?”

Brannie quickly tugged on the leggings and carried the rest to the balcony. A small group of witches were surrounded by at least twenty of the killers dressed in black.

Without answering Aidan, she jumped over the railing and landed in the middle of the fight.

“Help my friends,” she told the witches. “Including the Riders.”

“And you, Captain?” one of the witches asked.

Brannie lowered her head and the spear in her hand thickened, extended to twice its length with a pointed blade on each end.

She swung the weapon, cutting across several throats.

The killers attacked and the witches ran, leaving Brannie on her own.

* * *

Aidan kicked open the doors to his friends’ rooms.

“Move!” he bellowed.

And they did, jumping from their beds and grabbing their weapons and travel bags.

They were both already dressed, having dropped on their beds fully clothed.

They came out of their rooms, weapons raised. They were awake and alert. Ready for battle. Just as they’d been trained.

“Keita.”

They went down the hall to Keita’s room but it was empty. There were, however, a number of assassin bodies littering her floor.

“Outside,” Aidan barked, and they moved.

They passed enemies along the way and executed them quickly and cleanly. Not wasting time with anything fancy or fun.

When they arrived on the first floor, they went out the front door—and froze on the top step.