were holding their own but Caid didn’t know how much longer they could.
Although, he had to admit, his brother was enjoying the melee.
Dragging two soldiers off their steeds, Quinn threw them to the ground. He used his front hooves to batter one to mush while he bashed his sword into the other’s head, bellowing like a madman as he did.
“Pull back!” Caid ordered again, hoping this time his brother would hear him. Maybe even obey.
A hand pressed against his hindquarter and he recognized Keeley’s touch.
“Is it done?” he asked.
“It’s done. Quinn!”
Quinn stopped bellowing and looked at Keeley. “Yes, my lady?” he asked calmly.
“Your brother said to pull back.”
“But he’s not my queen.”
“Do it anyway. I have a greeting for those reinforcements.”
Quinn moved quickly, joining the others, and Keeley stepped in front of them. The lead mercenaries came to a stop and stared down from horseback at Keeley.
“Turn back,” she called out. “It’s over. Straton is dead and the town is ours.”
One of them moved his horse closer to Keeley. “So what? It’s a nice town.” He glanced at a few of the buildings. “Maybe we’d like to stay a bit. Have some fun.”
Keeley glanced at Caid and the others over her shoulder. “We like fun. Don’t we, lads? Don’t we all like fun?”
Caid thought she was talking to him and their team . . . but no. She was talking to her demon wolves.
The wolves appeared beside them, around them, and above them. Standing on the tops of buildings and growling down at the men. Growling with their bloody drool pooling in the dirt.
And there were more of them. Not a few more. An army more. An army of angry demon wolves with eyes of flame and drool made of blood.
“Come on, my beauties!” Keeley called out to her “friends,” raising her arms in the air. “Go have some fun!”
The demon wolves had the first half of the reinforcements torn off their mounts and dying in the dirt within seconds. Then they chased the soldiers who made a mad run for it.
Keeley faced Caid and the others, smiling. “That went well, yeah?”
Laila pointed down. “What happened to its head?”
Keeley looked down at the now-scarred lead wolf standing beside her, with Prince Straton’s head hanging from his mouth.
“What do you think happened?” Keeley asked, confused. “It got cuff off.”
CHAPTER 29
Keeley sat next to Gemma on the stoop that led into the longhouse.
“I can’t believe how tired I am,” she said, watching as the bodies of the mercenaries were dragged off to a burning pit outside town. The local men had happily taken on the duty, offering Keeley their services for nothing.
“I didn’t think one could be this tired without being dead.”
“Hhhm.”
“Where’s Keran?”
“After she got the girls from the brothel to safety, she took Samuel to the pub.”
“That, Sister, might be a plan.”
Keeley heard the startled screams of the locals and she knew the demon wolves were returning to her. When they arrived, they had a dark-haired woman with them.
“Are you Keeley Smythe, the Blacksmith Queen?”
Despite her exhaustion, Keeley couldn’t help but smile a little at the title. “I guess I am.”
“You returned our sister to us. She was a captive of Prince Straton and I wanted to thank you myself.”
Keeley combed her hair off her face. “Does she need anything? We don’t have much right now, but the women . . . who were . . . I mean . . .”
“Me, my sisters . . . we’re witches. It wasn’t sex that Straton wanted from my sister, but her magicks to advance his cause. She refused simply because she didn’t have the skill, but she could have done little things. Little things to appease him, to give a bit of help in his war. But my sister wasn’t blind to the kind of leader he would be. That he was not a leader she could allow in the world. So he beat her, every day. And we were unable to rescue her because we lacked the power to do so.” She shrugged. “Perhaps we should have joined an order, but it’s too late for that now.”
“I have some healing skills—”
“No, thank you, War Monk.” The woman cut off Gemma not only with her words but a brutal look.
Gemma flicked her hands. “As you like.”
“Are you two sisters?”
Keeley nodded. “Yes.”
“You fight together then?”
“We do.”
“That’s nice.” She gestured at the longhouse. “And you will stay here?”
“Once we get the stench of Prince Straton and his men from this place,” Gemma said.