“I’ll wear it because you’re mine. Oh, it fits. It fits.”
“Magick,” he said, drew her close, kissed her long.
“Okay, break it up. Let’s get a good look.” Riley snatched Sasha’s left hand. “That’s some rock. Nice,” she told Bran.
“How’s a guy supposed to follow that one?” Sawyer wondered, and gave Bran a light punch in the shoulder.
“I would like a ring from you. I’m so happy.” Tearfully, Annika embraced Bran and Sasha in turn. “I have so much happy.”
“It looks right on you.”
Sasha smiled at Doyle. “Feels even better.” Then she turned into Bran’s arms. “I have so much happy, too. And it makes me feel strong.” She drew away. “It makes me feel valiant. It makes me believe, more than ever, we’ll do what it says on our crest. We’ll seek the stars.”
“And serve the light,” Bran said.
“And guard the worlds,” the others said together.
Riley stepped back, picked up her drink. “To do those three things means fighting, surviving, and destroying Nerezza. Not just her minions and whatever the hell Malmon’s become.”
“Agreed. Since we’re all here now,” Bran began, “why don’t we sit down and talk about this last fight.”
“Do that, but give me five.” Sawyer pulled open a drawer for kitchen scissors. “I need some stuff out of the herb garden for this marinade. Didn’t realize when I decided on rack of lamb we’d be celebrating an official engagement. We’re going fancy tonight, boys and girls.”
As he went out, Riley moved into the lounge area to sit. Propped her feet on the coffee table.
“I’m always up for a celebratory meal,” she said, “but it seems particularly timely tonight.”
Sasha sat beside her. “Really?”
Catching the subtext, Riley laughed. “Yeah, we’re all having sex. Drop the confetti. What I mean was Sasha’s got a ring, we’ve got a coat of arms and a kick-ass motto. Best, we’re all alive.”
“Barely scratched,” Bran pointed out.
“They were slow and weak. Sawyer said—” Pausing, Annika glanced toward the door. “Should we wait to say—but he knows because he said. They were slow and weak.”
“I wouldn’t have thought so if it had been the first attack.” As she drank, Sasha curled up her legs. “There were so many this time, more than we’ve had before. But without the—without the same ferocity. Except toward Riley.”
“We should— Here he is,” Annika said as Sawyer came in with a basket of herbs.
“Keep it going. I’m multitasking.”
“All right. I want to say first, I didn’t sense, not initially, their focus on Riley. And when I did . . .” Sasha laid a hand on Riley’s outstretched leg, rubbed. “It was nearly too late.”
“They—or Nerezza—figured I was off my game.”
“You were,” Doyle responded, mercilessly.
She wanted to bristle, made herself shrug. “Marginally. I’d like to see you take on a few hundred mutant birds from hell all determined to slice and peck you to death.”
“He pretty much did.” As he spoke, Sawyer continued to chop herbs. “The rest of us were too spread out.”
“Okay, point, and again, thanks for the save.”
“I’m not looking for thanks. You were off your game,” Doyle repeated. “A soldier still fights. It’s more to the point we were spread out. Nerezza may be off her game as well, but she had the tactics here. She pulled us away from each other, or more accurately, pulled us away from Riley, in hopes of eliminating the one she believed was most vulnerable.”
“It came too close to working.” In his chair, Bran studied his beer. “We can’t forget to protect each other.”
“We did. Not arguing about how close she came to turning this around,” Sawyer continued. “But we did protect each other. And we won. She went for the shock and awe, right? Blocked out the freaking sun. And it worked—temporarily. Each one of us was so busy cutting them down we didn’t have each other’s backs. But then we did.”
“I saw you fly,” Annika murmured. “The wind, it was alive. It wrapped around you, and threw you.”
“Felt that way,” Riley admitted. “It was like—not that I’ve had the experience—being sucked into a tornado.”
“It threw you,” Annika said again, “even more away from us. I saw you fall, and I was afraid. But I was even more very, very angry.”
“I was a little pissed off myself. You came running. All of you. She doesn’t have that in her bag of tactics. That all-for-one deal. And I’m feeling a hell of a lot better.”
“She’ll be feeling better, too,” Sasha pointed out. “Whatever she sends next won’t be as slow or weak.”
“We work on positions.” Doyle nodded when Sawyer pulled another beer out of the refrigerator, waggled it. “No one gets cut off, separated, or pulled away. They may have been slower, weaker, but we weren’t sharp. Not sharp enough.”
“If I’d sensed the intent, even five seconds sooner—”
“It’s not all on you, Blondie,” Doyle said. “We got flanked.”
Since one of Sasha’s sketch pads sat on the table, he picked it up, took one of her pencils. He drew quickly.