Page 50 of Ravenous

“How long will you keep him imprisoned?”

Thane’s slow, grave nod said,Forever.But he clearly took no pleasure in it, not like she might have.

He suddenly stiffened. “Do you hear that?”

She shook her head. Despite Ditch’s demon half, her physical senses might as well have been in a cocoon compared to a Lykae’s.

“Something’s coming. Fast.” He reached for his absent sword and bit out a Gaelic curse.

A shadow dropped across the clearing. Wind hammered. Somewhere, a cow lowed in panic.

Thane leapt in front of her as a griffin hit the ground on the far side, pinning a big dun cow beneath talons the size of her forearm.

“Hecate’s breath,” Ditch whispered, peering around the king’s shoulder.

The creature was a living cryptid: lion’s body thick with muscle, eagle’shead broad as a spell circle, wings flaring to twenty feet and throwing snow-cold air over them.

“He’s incredible,” she breathed.

“Aye.” But Thane remained on guard.

And you, wolf? Why shield your enemy?Chivalry—or something more? A suspicion sprouted in the fertile medium of her imagination, outrageous and thrilling.

No, no, that wasn’t possible. Fate couldn’t despise him that much. “What a spellbinding creature,” she mused. “I rarely have tail envy, but I admire his.”

Thane glanced back with raised brows.

“What? Akelarre has no griffins.” The sight softened her voice. “I think this Skein might be a little wondrous.” Magic here felt like braidwork—give and take—rather than the brittle scaffolding of her birth world. So what was making it ebb?

“Wondrous,” Thane murmured. “Aye. Until we run out of food. Then wonder would turn to horror in a blink. No lifeboats from this place. No rescue.”

He kept circling back to food.Is it truly that grim?She would check their stores and projections. “The king has many worries to accompany his crown.” And she would prove his greatest. Once she whipped her witchly army into shape—

The griffin pressed the cow down and used a massive talon to rip open the animal. Blood steamed; entrails slithered. Yet the griffin didn’t feed.

Ditch looked on dispassionately. “Is this its nest?”

“I’ve no’ scented it before. I see no signs of other kills.”

“Perhaps your cattle rustler was never a witch.” She put a hand to her heart. “And here you blamed us poor, humble Wiccae.”

“Heh.”

The eagle head swiveled; golden eyes fixed on them with predatory intent.

“Could you take it without a sword?” she murmured.

“Aye,” he said. “Doona want to though.”

“The wolf is merciful.”

“To the deserving,” he returned. “Are you?”

“Am I what? Merciful? Or deserving?”

A huff that was almost a laugh.

Surprising male. If so much wasn’t on the line, she’d consider a little light fucking before they warred. The way he went through females meant he wasless likely to get obsessed with her. Her bedmates often did, even when she tried to dull herself down to fifty percent effect.