Passion Untamed (Feral Warriors #3)(80)

Skye went to him.

"He loves you," she said quietly. Desperately. "He risked everything to come back here to save you."

"He's a fool," Vhyper said coldly. But something flickered in his eyes. "There's nothing I can do." His voice was different, warmer, filled with pain. The good man.

Risking everything, she gripped his arm. "You're the only one who can save him, Vhyper. Ancreta made you what you are. She caused the injury inside you that let the Mage get their claws into you. Now they're going to destroy Paenther."

Vhyper's gaze looked elsewhere, but the fact he hadn't shaken her off or hit her gave her hope he was listening. But listening wasn't enough.

"Vincent!"

His gaze snapped to hers, a look of terrible struggle in his eyes.

"Don't let Ancreta win, Vincent!"

Skye saw the moment the cold rushed back into Vhyper's eyes, dousing the humanity. With a casual flick of his wrist, he backhanded her, sending her slamming against the wall. She slid to the floor, her head pounding, her body aching. But she felt the creature inside Vhyper rear up, hissing and spitting. Not at her. At something within him. An invisible foe. A battle between good and evil in its purest form raged inside the viper shape-shifter, each seeking possession of his body. His mind. His soul.

She tried to rise, but her head spun dizzily, and she sank back to the floor and crawled close to him, trying to murmur the words to give him power, but they wouldn't come!

Paenther! But Paenther was no longer in his animal form and couldn't hear her telepathically. If she called to him out loud, she'd only attract Birik's attention to herself and possibly to the battle going on inside Vhyper.

Her head and body aching, she struggled to her feet, where Paenther could see her. Where she might be able to catch his eye and beg his help.

But when his gaze turned toward her, his eyes held no warmth, no love. Only pain.

And the cold emptiness of the soulless.

Chapter Twenty-five

The cold that rushed through Paenther as the evil spread over his heart was sharp and biting, but wondrous. A frigid cleansing that rid him of doubts and worry, of guilt and sorrow and conscience.

His body bled with pain at the transformation, but it was the pain of rebirth, and he exulted in it.

Behind Birik, Skye rose, her gaze clinging to him, boring into him. In a voice so soft, only a Feral would hear, she whispered to him.

"Paenther, I need the words. Help me save Vhyper! Help me save you!"

Why would he want to be saved?

"Paenther, give me the words!"

She needed the chant. But the chant gave her power.

"I love you, Paenther."

What difference did it make how she felt about him? The old Paenther was gone. The reborn Paenther had no need for love.

But deep inside his slowly hardening heart, a fire flared. A desperate love. A fierce need to help her. The fire battled back the cold that tried to encase his heart. And suddenly he was saying the words, his voice ringing through the cavern.

Birik shouted. "Cease! Stop him."

Skye grabbed Vhyper's arm, her mouth moving to the words as she whispered them along with him. Her face contorted with pain, her pain fueling the battle inside him, strengthening his resolve to hold on, to fight for her. For Vhyper. For his own soul. Discord rippled through the evil, as he felt the battle raging inside Vhyper even as he was consumed by a battle of his own with Skye's power struggling to save them both.

"Stop him!" Birik yelled a second time.

"He'll stop on his own," one of the sorcerers said. "Once we have his soul."

Birik whirled on Skye instead. He grabbed her from behind, slamming her jaw closed as he pulled her away from Vhyper.

Paenther felt the cold surge inside him, the evil pulling at him, tearing him apart at the most fundamental level. Darkness swirled around his head, but he continued to chant, clinging tenaciously to Skye. She was all that kept him tethered. All that gave him the might he needed to hold on.

But he was losing. The chanting went silent as the words would no longer come.

Through the dark fog, he saw lights flash and sparkle. Where Vhyper had stood, now sat a great snake, growing by the second until it was the width of a man and five times as long.

The snake slithered across the floor, coiling and rising beside the sorcerers. As the darkness closed in on him, the snake rose, his eyes pinning Paenther. And in those eyes, he saw pain and joy, grief and love. He saw his friend.

The snake struck lightning fast, tearing off the heads of two of the sorcerers before they could move. The third ran.

For one searing moment, Panther thought it was too late, then warmth rushed in, dispelling the cold as the invisible bonds disappeared. In a rush of dizziness, he fell to one knee. And felt his soul tumble back into place.

Vhyper's voice, warm and rich with the deep bond of brotherhood, whispered in his mind. The head or the heart, B.P.? Birik is going down.

Paenther looked up with a fierce grin. The heart. Welcome back, Vhype.

He called on the power within him and shifted into his cat's form in a burst of pain and furious joy, then leaped to Vhyper's side.

The snake let out a hissing sound Paenther knew well. A viper's battle cry. We're getting out of this together, B.P. Now, let's do it!

"Capture them!" Birik yelled.