With a Feral war cry that rang throughout the dome with an animal ferocity, Kougar stabbed and slashed, heedless of the damage he caused, focused on only one thing. One person. One unimposing bastard of a Mage.
Dismembered hands and arms flew this way and that in a rain of blood that splattered his face and clothes, the metallic scent igniting a hunger inside him. In his cat form, he enjoyed the warm rush of blood in his mouth. But the only blood he craved now was Hookeye's.
The floor grew slick beneath his feet, but he pressed ahead, the sentinels unable to stop his forward charge and the Ilinas no challenge at all.
But as the Mage troops between him and his quarry thinned, something caught his eye on the floor in front of him--a shiny black substance that was beginning to bubble up with a sound like popping corn and a smell like rotting eggs. The hair rose on the back of his neck with the certainty this was another of Hookeye's plagues--one Kougar wasn't going to like at all.
Within seconds, the black ooze covered his boots and slid onto his bare calves beneath his pants like a cool, sticky goo. A goo that hardened within seconds of contact even as it continued to climb.
He stomped his feet, hearing the crack of the hardening tar. But more climbed his boots to take its place.
All around him, movement slowed as the vile tar attacked all equally--him, Ilina, the Mage.
"Goddess!" Ariana cried behind him, and he glanced at one of the Mage he'd sent sprawling to watch the black ooze slide over the man's head and cover his face. "Is this some kind of poison?"
The downed sentinel clawed at his face but couldn't seem to break the goo's deadly hold.
"Keep moving!" Kougar called to Ariana. "Don't let it harden."
As the dozen Mage between Kougar and his quarry yelled their own frustration, Hookeye continued to chant, his expression one of cool satisfaction. At any moment, the spell would be complete, the wormhole would open, and his friends would be gone.
Kougar struggled forward, every step more difficult as the tar crept over his knees and slid up his thighs. Sweating with effort, he broke through the constricting ooze over and over, forcing his legs to move, swinging his blade against the Mage still in his path, still trying to stop him.
The air shifted suddenly, a charge of electricity making the hair on his arms stand on end. The air pressure dropped, the light in the temple dimming.
They were out of time.
If only Ariana could turn to mist! But if she tried, she'd almost certainly become trapped in the floor as Melisande had.
A thought pierced his despair, an idea blooming with a burst of adrenaline.
"Ariana, turn to mist!"
"I'll sink into the floor."
"You'll sink where you land."
The clang of his own blade drowned out her response, if there was one. A moment later, the shimmer of mist high above Hookeye's head caught his attention, and he knew she'd caught his meaning.
The temple grew darker as Hookeye's magic sucked the very light from the room. The sorcerer stood with his hands straight in front of him, his eyes closed as he fought to pull open the gates to the Feral's personal hell. He didn't sense the Ilina hovering above him until it was too late.
As the bottom of Ariana's feet grazed the top of the sorcerer's head, she turned solid. Hookeye jerked, trying to duck away, but it was too late. His own magic had the now-corporeal Ilina sinking into the surface where she stood.
Sinking down into Hookeye's skull.
The sorcerer screamed and flailed, grabbing her ankles and trying to pull her loose. But the magic was too strong. Her feet slowly disappeared inside his head.
Hookeye collapsed, unconscious, Ariana falling with him. She crashed into two half-frozen Mage, knocking them down even as they broke her fall.
Kougar struggled forward, the black ooze reaching his waist. The air in the temple began to blow in a spinning wildness as the vortex prepared to open. The spell had been completed, the magic engaged.
He reached Hookeye just as the bottoms of Ariana's bloody feet emerged below the Mage's jaw. Ariana struggled to sit up as the black ooze climbed her shoulders. But the fire in her eyes as she met his gaze was pure bloodthirsty triumph.
"End it, my beast."
With a roar that melded with the wild wind's, Kougar sliced through the bastard's throat, through windpipe and spine, and cut off Hookeye's head.
At once, the black ooze fell away, sinking back into the floor, leaving only the acrid smell of sulfur behind. Murmurs of confusion and cries of fear rose with the din as the Ilinas emerged from their enthrallment and the Mage sentinels, no longer bound by their leader's poison, turned toward Kougar, raising their knives to renew their attack.
"Roar!" Kougar yelled as he took on four Mage at once, standing over Ariana, who was unable to stand herself.
"We're free!" Lyon's voice carried to him on the roar of the wind.
A quick glance over the balustrade told him what he needed to know. The bubble was gone, the floor glowing, but not yet open. He caught sight of Ilinas stumbling free of the circle, while Ferals snatched others, slung them over their shoulders, and ran.
An unnatural, earsplitting scream nearly blew out his eardrums as a red glow erupted inside the temple, and the wind blew gale force, piping hot.
He didn't have to look to know what he'd find--a spinning vortex in the middle of the floor. A wormhole straight into the spirit trap.
"To battle," Ariana cried, her voice a command ringing over the vortex's howl. A command to her maidens. "Fight the Mage!"
The few Ilinas on the gallery walk shook off their confusion and turned on the sentinels they'd fought beside moments before. As two Ilinas dove in to draw off Kougar's attackers, he scooped Ariana into his arms, Hookeye's bleeding head still dangling heavily from her feet.
She slung her arm around his neck. "Get me to the door so I can save your friends."
"Wouldn't diving into the vortex be quicker?"
She looked at him askance. "Hookeye's vortex? No thanks. I'm going in the way that won't get me killed."
"The way he wanted you to go."
Her eyes narrowed. "He's dead. And your friends will be, too, if we don't hurry."
"True enough." Kougar turned and pressed through what was left of the battle, four of Ariana's maidens taking up guard positions around him.
"The poison?" he asked. "I can't feel it any longer."
"It's gone." Ariana's voice rang with a relief as deep as her eyes. "It's over."
That part was over. His own life no longer hung in the balance, and neither did Ariana's maidens'. But Hawke and Tighe were another matter. As, he feared, was Ariana herself. Not until he saw her emerge from the spirit trap would he breathe freely.
As he neared the second alcove where Ariana had said the door was located, Lyon and Wulfe barreled up the stairs.
Lyon eyed Ariana's feet with a lift of a brow.
"We're going after Hawke and Tighe," Kougar told his chief. Ariana was, at least. He'd help her as far as he could.
Lyon's gaze swung to Ariana, but words seemed to elude him.
Ariana reached out and touched Lyon's arm. "I'll bring them back to you."
Lyon dipped his head. "And I'll be forever in your debt. We all will."
Kougar ducked inside the alcove, nearly bumping his head. Ariana reached deeper, around the statue. As she pressed her palm against the back wall, she began to sing, her soft, musical tones calling a curling trickle of magic. Moments later, the wall beneath her hand began to shimmer.
"Let's go," she urged.
Kougar eyed the wall skeptically. "The statue?" There was no way in hell he could squeeze past it.
"Walk right through her."
Right through stone. Damn Ilina magic.
Taking a deep breath and forcing himself to let go of logic, he stepped forward, pressing through a statue and wall as if they weren't even there.
One moment they were being buffeted by the hot tempest of the temple, the next, a frigid wind whipped at his face, sending Ariana's unbound hair flying. They stood on the temple's celestial roof, looking out over the rugged, snowcapped peaks of the mountains. Surrounded by the sudden silence and stillness, but for the biting wind, the battle that raged within the temple might as well have been a world away.
"Up there." Ariana pointed to the small spiral tower rising from the top of the dome like a crystal stair to the heavens.
"We need to free your feet." He started up the stair. "Can you turn to mist, yet?"
"No, Hookeye's magic is dissipating, but too slowly. I'll open the wormhole, then once I do, I'll need you to throw me inside. I'll turn to mist in there and free myself from these macabre shackles."
Kougar continued up, the crystal stairs ending in a small, open platform.
"This is it," Ariana breathed. "The spot where Queen Rayas used to stand to call the magic that opened the passage into the spirit trap. Set me down, Kougar."
"Even you can't balance on a head."
Their gazes met, a shared moment of amused disbelief that they were having such a conversation. "Help me to my knees."
He helped her kneel, then stood beside her as she lifted her hands above her head, closed her eyes, and began chanting the musical magic of the heavens, the cold wind blowing her hair in a tangle around her head.
Kougar could feel the magic gathering, riding his skin, until finally it leaped at Ariana in the form of a slim bolt of lightning, diving into the crystal that hung between her breasts. The Crystal of Rayas. The force of the blast knocked Ariana back against his knees. He reached out and steadied her, then released her as she continued to chant. If the blast had hurt her, she made no indication.
Moments later, a prism of colors erupted around her, flowing and twisting with power. The air parted to reveal a seething, pulsating mouth of dark crystal.
His heart began to pound as he stared at the death trap that held Hawke and Tighe, a path Ariana intended to travel.
Goddess, if only I could go myself and leave her safely behind.
"Now, Kougar." Ariana reached for his hand. "Throw me in. You can't touch it, or it'll pull you in, too."
The blood pounded in his temples. The last thing he wanted to do was toss her in there. She'll be fine, he told himself. She's the Ilina queen, the only one who can do this. The only one who can save Hawke and Tighe.
But as he swung her up and into his arms, his hands clasped tight around her, and he didn't think he could let her go.
Ariana cupped his face with her hands and placed a gentle kiss on his mouth, then pulled back to meet his gaze. "Trust me," she said simply. And he did.
It was the damned Mage still attached to her feet that he didn't trust.
But there was no choice, was there? She was willing to risk her life to save his friends. His heart melted beneath the weight of that gift.
The least he could do was let her try.
With immense effort, he returned her kiss, then pulled back. "Be safe."
Love warmed her eyes as she released him and tucked her arms against her chest. "Do it."
With a deep breath for courage, he did as she demanded and heaved her into the yawning maw. She didn't fall, as he might have expected, nor did she turn to mist midflight, as he'd counted on. She landed as one might in a pool of water, sinking down a short way before bobbing back to the center.
He caught his breath, waiting for her to move, to turn to mist.
Nothing happened. She just lay there.
His heart stopped beating.
Slowly, she began to spin in a slow corkscrew and he saw her face. Her eyes were closed, her expression lax as if she slept.
As if the act of entering the wormhole had rendered her unconscious. She was still corporeal!
His heart turned to dust.
"Ariana!"
This was what Hookeye had intended to happen all along. He'd set this trap, ensuring that Ariana wouldn't turn to mist. And the moment she hit that spirit trap corporeal, her soul would flee. She'd die. With the Queen of the Ilinas dead, there would be no one to free the Ferals.
His heart jackhammered in his chest, his head pounding, No, no, no!
The breath tore into his lungs like broken glass, ripping him to shreds from the inside out. She was gone. Into the wormhole, floating toward the spirit trap.
His precious Ariana, back in his life for only a handful of days.
Gone.
While his cat shrieked its rage in his mind, Kougar threw back his head and shouted at the heavens, "You're not taking my heart!"
In an act of pure insanity, with a roar of desperate grief, Kougar dove into the wormhole after her.
Chapter Twenty-three
The wormhole was like some kind of freak-show thrill ride, the dark crystal walls lighting every few seconds, breaking the pitch-blackness, as the force of the energy within spun Kougar in a slow spiral, pulling him inexorably to his death.
The cat inside him growled with approval, sharing the fierce need to protect his mate that consumed him. He wasn't letting Ariana go again. Ever.
Ever.
If by some miracle they got out of this alive, he would offer her everything he could and take whatever she was willing to give him in return; but he would not live without her again.
If they got out of this alive.
The energy pricked at his skin, stinging like ice crystals. And maybe that was what they were, because damn it was cold in there. Even half-frozen, perspiration broke out on his brow, his heart beating against his ribs as he searched the weaving tunnel ahead for Ariana and got no glimpse of her. If he couldn't reach her, and wake her, and get her to turn to mist before they fell into the spirit trap, they were all dead. Ariana, Hawke, Tighe, their three spirit animals. And him.
