I’d had enough.
Fuck this bitch.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “You thought it’d be that easy, didn’t you?”
She cocked her head. “That easy?”
“You thought I was what… young? Stupid? Naïve, I think you said.” I took a step toward her. She stood her ground. “I have seen things in this life that defy logic. I have stretched the boundaries of my magic more than you can possibly imagine. I have done things in the name of the people I love and would do so again without regret. And even if the dark man comes for me, even if he tries to take from me, I will have my family at my side fighting with me, for me, every step of the way. And there is nothing you or Ruv or your people can say that would change my mind. Ryan Foxheart is my godsdamned cornerstone. I won’t let anything happen to him. You say you’ve seen the paths I will walk? Fuck you. Because I’m about to blaze my own fucking path, and you won’t even see me coming.”
“Insolence,” she breathed as the throne room began to crack around us. The runes on my skin began to itch and burn, but I didn’t look away from her. “You would risk everything?”
“For them? For him?” I didn’t even have to
think about it. “Yes. Because they would do the same for me. We are better together than we ever will be apart. We are bound to each other. And nothing, nothing, will change that. Not you. Not the Dark. Not anything.”
The roof cracked overhead as she said, “It would seem I have underestimated you.”
I snorted. “No shit. Maybe next time, don’t come in here pimping a half-naked guy when I already have someone’s junk to play with. Not cool, Grandma. Not fucking cool.”
She nodded. “I see that now,” she said slowly, and her skin began to sag and wrinkle as she aged right in front of me. The walls were shaking. “I wish there could be another way.”
“There doesn’t need to be,” I said, attempting a rakish grin that I didn’t quite feel. “In case you didn’t know, I’m Sam of Wilds. I can take whatever’s coming our way.”
“I hope you remember that,” she said. “When the time comes.”
The roof caved in and I—
Chapter 10: The We-Hate-Sam-A-Lots
I OPENED my eyes.
Only to find myself lying on the ground, squinting up toward the sky. And since everyone I know couldn’t be normal, I had Mom, Dad, Tiggy, Gary, the King, Justin, Randall, Morgan, Kevin, and Ryan all staring down at me with the same weird look on their faces.
“You’re all a bunch of creepy-ass motherfuckers,” I said. “Sorry, Mom.”
“Your little towel thing fell off,” Gary said. “During your stoned dream quest vision gypsy thing.”
Gods, I felt like shit. Like we’d spent the night drinking apple wine and I didn’t understand the meaning of the word moderation. “Oh?”
“Yeah.” Gary nodded solemnly. “Your bits and bobs were just flopping all over the place.”
“That sounds about right.” I scrubbed my hand over my face. “So of course you all are staring down at me now.”
“I just had to make sure your testicles were all right,” Kevin rumbled. “Because I care.”
I groaned as I pushed myself up, trying to breathe past the shooting pain in my head. The runes on my skin were dead, the magic depleted, but they still itched. I saw someone had had the decency to cover me up. Probably Ryan, as he tended to get uncomfortable if anyone else saw me naked. (“It’s weird, Sam, you don’t just forget to put on pants!” Uh, yeah, smartass, sometimes I did.) Ryan knelt beside me, running a hand up my back, a worried look on his face.
“I’m okay,” I said, giving him a weak smile.
“Really,” he said in that tone that meant bullshit.
“Well, reasonably okay. As okay as one can be when one has seen the destruction of Verania, a star dragon that predicted my birth, and a bad guy who denied he monologued, but then monologued anyway about how he was going to destroy me. Oh, and he might have been covered in shadows and then tried to mind suck me a little bit. Or something. I don’t even know. I feel slightly vomity right now.”
They all stared at me some more.
“Freaking weirdos,” I mumbled, “with your staring and your faces.”
Randall groaned. “Nothing is ever easy with you, is it?”