Filed To Story: Cursed Legacies Series Free PDF by Morgan B Lee
The damn shifter is going to get himself killed.
At least, that’s what I think until I hear the unmistakable, ear-splitting roar of Baelfire’s dragon. I wince when my ears start to ring. Any stragglers asleep in all of Baltimore are wide awake now if their eardrums didn’t just fucking burst.
Getting to my feet, I lean against the brick alley wall, wiping my bloodied hand on my now-ruined coat.
Crypt? Do you have eyes on what’s happening? I check.
All the lackeys once at Everbound are here for a party. They also appear to have a Void on the way. Still no sign of the immortal blood-guzzling bitch.
Damn it.
Everyone knows about Voids. They’re rare and don’t fit into a House. They absorb magic, their presence nulling any existing enchantment—meaning the talismans Silas spelled will be useless once the Void gets close enough.
Maven?
I press, anxious as I peek around the corner in time to see Baelfire’s massive golden beast step on a group of screaming legacies in the dim light of early dawn.
Silas is almost done, she answers finally.
I hear the rustle of fabric behind me and turn in time to impale a knife-wielding siren through the chest with a saber of ice. He falls. I summon another blade as I slip out of the alley, still clutching my stomach where the bullet burns under the soothing frost.
Luckily for me, Baelfire makes one hell of an ally now that he and his dragon aren’t playing tug-of-war with his brain. He snarls and bends his neck down to snap a leopard shifter in half, flinging the other half into a trio of casters launching spells at him.
A few of their spells bounce off his golden scales, but a summoned magical weapon lodges under one of Bael’s wings. He hisses and opens his mouth, his long neck glowing with molten royal blue light from the inside out as he prepares to burn them to ash.
But we’re not here to burn down Baltimore. I lift my hand to send a wave of ice spikes into the casters before they see me coming, leaving them impaled high above the ground before I turn to freeze another.
And another.
The threats keep coming as legacies pour out of massive vans that screech to a stop down the street. Others arrive in bright flashes of transportation magic, while more come running from gods know where, armed to the teeth for this obvious ambush.
I only realize Crypt is helping with the fight when I turn to defend myself against two vampires and see that they’re both ripping into each other’s skin, hissing and cackling like killing each other is the most fun they’ve ever had while blood starts to drip out of their ears.
Some other legacies are turning on each other, but as I look around, I realize just how fucking outnumbered we are now.
Maven was right. Natalya prepared for us. All of these well-trained legacies were lying in wait—and now bounty hunters are joining the fray, their hellhounds at their sides as they take aim.
I lift my hands to raise an ice shield against a spray of bullets before sending another solid wave of ice and freezing a nearby siren just as she begins to sing. Baelfire snarls at some other attack and sweeps his tail through the growing sea of enemies. Crypt continues to send maniacal, homicidal chaos throughout the crowd.
But it still seems like we’ll be lucky to make it out of this with all our limbs attached.
Amid the flashes of magic, snarling shifters, deafening gunshots, and howls of hellhounds, a dark cold sweeps through the street, which has become a battlefield. I tense until I see Maven stalking out of the ruined, smoking rowhouse with daggers in both hands, her hair tied up, looking every bit as deadly as she did in that photo on the news.
Especially because she’s smirking like she actually stumbled across a party and not an oversized attack.
“The telum!” a nearby vampire shouts. “Atta”
One of her daggers plants itself in his throat. I grimace as his head falls back at an unnatural angle.
As soon as they know my keeper is here, all forces target her. She deflects several blasts of magic, rolls away from a shifter, rips out an elemental’s heart, and kills off a hellhound within a matter of seconds.
It’s impossible not to watch as the woman who owns my heart and soul steps into the slaughter like she owns the damn place. The way she moves with lethal agility and kills as naturally as breathing is both spellbinding and fucking terrifying.
Or maybe the terrifying part is her smile…except I really like watching Maven enjoy herself.
“Arati, bless my beautiful maniac,” I breathe.
EVERETT
On your right,
Silas warns just in time for me to turn and freeze a hellhound.
The fight continues, but with Maven and Silas now in the mix, it starts to lean in our favor—until I hear Silas swear nearby over the loud fight.
A necromantic spell he’s casting fizzles out as he tries to dodge a coyote shifter. Its claws still slice shallowly through his chest. He falls back, rolling away from the shifter until I stab it with my ice saber and kick it aside.
“Two types of magic, and you’re still useless,” I huff.
He glares at me, red irises blazing. “Only with a Void nearby.”
Shit. I almost forgot about the Void.
I help him stand, and we turn to watch a tall, thin woman with completely whited-out eyes walk into the street. All magic dies within a few yards of her. She’s getting closer to where Maven is gleefully slaughtering our enemies with crackling explosions of dark magic—but before we can warn our keeper, Crypt blurs into existence behind the Void and snaps her neck.
Okay, then. That problem was solved way easier than I thought.
Except then, Crypt’s voice comes urgently through the bond.
Our pretty berserker has come out to play.
As soon as he points it out, I can see it, too. The way Maven is tearing through the decreasing enemies has changed completely. Her movements are just as brutal but far less calculated and precise. She still sweeps through the legacies and hellhounds like death itself—only now she’s completely wild, flinging herself into each new threat with a deranged, breathtaking bloodlust evident in every movement.
She’s too far gone to notice when two bullets hit her.
Or when a hellhound clamps its jaw around her thigh, tearing at her flesh.
Fuck, Baelfire swears through the bond.
She’s going to get herself killed.
Baelfire’s dragon slices through the hellhound latched onto our keeper with one massive claw. The dragon’s tail wraps around the berserker, trying to prevent her from diving back into the fight. But he roars in shock and pain when more dark magic explodes from her body, crackling over his tail and sending the massive beast staggering in agony.
Our berserking keeper immediately darts back into the massacre. Silas and I race after her, using magic and ice to blast enemies away from our out-of-control keeper before they can harm her. She rips out hearts, tears hellhounds to pieces with her magic, and sends crackling waves of her uniquely unholy ability through anything living that she sees, leaving a path of blood and excessive gore in her wake.
Unstoppable and fueled by death. The perfect weapon.
Except if we’re not careful, she can be killed permanently.
We cannot let her expire here, Silas grits through the bond as he takes down a powerful caster. Blood is dripping from his nose, but he ignores it.
Natalya knows the ways to kill a revenant and will have passed those methods on to her army. If
Maven expires, she will be vulnerable to being ripped to shreds or burned to ash while unconscious.
I swear when another bullet grazes my right arm. Turning around, I send a blast of ice into any enemies racing after us to make sure no one attacks from behind.
Baelfire’s dragon roars and crushes more legacies before he speaks telepathically.
During training, she said the only way to snap her out of this is by expiring, but I’m not fucking hurting her.
I’ve got a better idea, Crypt says.
New Book: Returned To Make Them Pay
On her wedding anniversary, Alicia is drugged and stumbles into the wrong room—straight into the arms of the powerful Caden Ward, a man rumored never to touch women. Their night of passion shocks even him, especially when he discovers she’s still a virgin after two years of marriage to Joshua Yates.