Chapter 35

If she could have made herself invisible, if she could have willed her soul away, she would have. Because the devil was roaring for it, and the cracks in the glass were growing.

Men fell upon him, men in vermilion armor and men in leather alike. It took an entire swarm to pull the bellowing beast away, even more to quell the growing rumble between the two groups. She saw him dragged from the room, saw the veins and muscles standing up in his neck, his snapping teeth, and the way his eyes were locked only on her.

What he shouted in his ugly tongue, whether they were curses or threats, Dianne did not know. She’d pressed her hands over her ears, still screaming even as Sergeant David entered to gather her up.

The mangled scents of the room hit her, the stink of furious musk, and a cacophony of men, of sweat, of agitation, of fear… of hunger.