Chapter Thirteen ~ The Queen's Gambit (Scarlet Moon)

⚠️ Content Warning:

This chapter contains graphic depictions of violence, torture, body horror, and supernatural gore. Reader discretion is advised.

**Copyright Material**

One moment, Maurisio stood before her on the garden walkway, a savage wind coiling around him. Then the air ripped open. A roaring wall of pressure erupted outward, flattening the flower beds in a perfect circle.

Petals exploded into the dark, then Maurisio disappeared.

The shockwave hit Rayne a breath later. A gasp climbed up her throat as she stumbled back, and then a fluctuating energy clamped tight around her.

What the hell?

The air itself had hardened into a cage. She couldn’t see it, but she could feel it, a force field humming against her scales, locking her wings against her back.

Did that crazy ass wolf trap me in a barrier?

“Oh, I know you fuckin’ lying,” she snarled, shoving both palms flat against the empty air. It didn’t budge. Hell, it didn’t even ripple under her touch. “Hey, asshole! You didn’t have to cage me like an animal to keep me here!”

Across the garden, he stepped from a curtain of wind like a magician. He stood at the edge of the hedge maze, where the estate’s outer wards glimmered under blood-red moonlight. He stood with his back to her as the breeze danced around him, stirring his golden hair.

He was waiting.

The demon signatures she’d felt earlier were closing in, moving hella fast. Now there were more of them. The scent of decay thickened.

“Maurisio! There’s more than two coming this way. Let me out of this thing.”

Two demons and a tracker had become a mass of dark energy bearing down on the estate. Shrieks and snarls traveled through the airwaves. She tried to count them. Five. No, wait…seven. More. The number kept growing. Shadows bled into one another, making it impossible to get an exact count.

Then a whoosh flooded over the area.

A vibration crawled up through the stone, sending a shudder coasting up her feet and into her knees. She turned toward the tree line in the distance just as the shimmering veil flickered. Then a section of it melted away, leaving a gap wide enough for a nightmarish army to pour through.

And that’s exactly what happened. Demons erupted from the opening in a snarling, chaotic mass.

Couldn’t tell how many. They moved too fast, too erratically, as they spilled across the garden. Their distorted bodies blurred together in a storm of shadows, claws, and fangs. They were smaller than the demons she had felt earlier. But small was relative when they moved like wild boars, tearing through the flower beds with their mindless, feral hunger driving the way.

Something happened in that moment. She could feel them. It wasn’t like her sensing ability reaching out. It was more like them reaching in. She could feel their demonic need, their desperate desire…

For my blood.