The glowing whip tightens—and yanks him clean off the branch.

But my attacker is fast. While falling, he produces an aether blade in one hand and slices the whip through.

Selwyn is fast, too. He’s on the other boy before he even hits the ground. In a millisecond, the newcomer is flat on his back with Selwyn towering over him, whip now lengthened into a jagged blade pointed at his throat. Sel’s chest heaves; he’s winded, or furious, or both. Yellow-green dust and globs of ichor run in streaks down his face and cheek, onto his shoulders. Bits of dead demon drape around his shoulders like a mantle. There was a dozen in that legion… did he kill them all?

Selwyn may not like me right now, but he is here to protect me. Even if my mind doesn’t quite process that fact, my magic does. My root flames dampen, then fade. I sway a bit but hold steady. Small bursts of root don’t drain me like they used to, thank goodness.

“I should kill you for touching her.” I know Sel means me, but after our fight, the angry, possessive tone that reaches me up in the trees seems out of place. Like he’s talking about someone else. The Crown Scion, not Bree. “I should…,” he murmurs, “and I think I might.”

“Kane!” The newcomer tears his hood off, revealing tousled, dark auburn hair, long on the top and shorn on the sides—and a pair of glowing golden eyes. A young white man, not more than twenty.

Sel blinks. “Douglas?”

My captor is a Merlin. Not a Morgaine at all. A wave of confusion and embarrassment passes through me. Why would a Merlin try to… kidnap me?

“Long time no see.” Douglas’s soft Scottish brogue wraps its way around his speech.

“A very long time.” Sel’s stony expression sends a trickle of apprehension down my spine. I’m not the only one who notices that he doesn’t lower his blade.

“Drop your weapon, Kingsmage,” Douglas commands.

Sel’s lip curls upward. “When I feel like it.”

“Selwyn!” I hear William’s voice and running footsteps. He pushes through the bramble and appears beneath my tree. “Where’s Bree?”

“I’m here!” I call out. William’s head tilts back to find me overhead, and his glowing green eyes widen.

Sel glances up at me for the first time. “She’s safe.”

“Thanks to me.” Douglas takes the opportunity of Sel’s distraction to elbow Sel’s blade aside and jump to his feet.

“Why should I thank you for your services”—Sel smirks and points at Douglas’s right hand with his blade—“when it looks like Briana herself already did the honors?”