The day dragged on.

And the sun never made an appearance. Without it, the swirling colors of Scott MacRae's tunnel were muted against the backdrop of rain and thick gray clouds.

Joe maintained an uncharacteristic silence, and Cassie occasionally let out a muffled sob. When at last Chris met the barrier of their exit, Cassie wiped away some lingering tears and followed him to the outside.

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Immediately, Cassie sensed the air was heavily laced with danger.

She gasped.

The trees and vines above her were spinning, collapsing. Still, she walked on, following Chris, but every step felt like a mistake.

Then she saw them flitting between the branches. She could barely mutter, "Chris," before the first Crown Champion landed in front of him.

Chris stepped back and drew two swords. Joe and Cassie backed against him.

Soldiers rained down on them. Their mercenaries, Modified to human size, marched in as well, forming an impassable outer circle.

Without taking his eyes off the enemy, Chris grabbed Joe around the neck and whispered, "Run with her. Get help."

As soon as she overheard the words, Cassie ducked below a soldier's sword arm and dodged the Gray Coat's giant feet that stomped down to block her.

Under a log, through a tuft of grass, and then she checked over her shoulder. Joe was the only one following her and she reached a speed she'd never used before, never needed before.

When she arrived at the stream, she stopped and looked back. "Joe?"

He was no longer with her.

Cassie hesitated, just a moment, knowing her priority was to escape even if it meant leaving Joe behind.

Her instincts told her she was a little west of the tunnel's opening, so she followed the water the way she knew was east. Soon, she spotted a familiar boulder; she was in the right place.

Shuffling toward it, with the password on the tip of her tongue, there came a hard strike to her back. She fell on all fours. As she tried to rise, she skidded in the mud and landed back on her knees.

There was a break in the rain and the dreary daylight fell to shadow as something with a massive wingspan coasted over her.

Crux Chevalier, the Brute, landed before her as she stood. He had swords, weapons, metal dangling all over him, but from his belt he pulled a blood-caked hunting knife.

"Cassiopeia . . . darling! Oh, how I've missed you!" he bellowed while grabbing for her hands.

He caught one of her hands but missed the other one. She swung her palm up and smacked him across the cheekbone.

His face contorted with ugly amusement. He squeezed her trapped wrist until she buckled from the pain. With his free hand, he slapped her back, hitting her across the ear and eye, the whole side of her head.

Stars danced through her cloudy vision. All she could hear was rushing water.

She couldn't help it. She began to crumble. He punched her head again with a closed fist on her decent, making sure the lights were out before she hit the ground.

When her eyes fluttered open, moments or minutes later, perhaps longer—she wasn't certain—she was on her back. Crux's face was in hers. Her body was trapped underneath the full weight of his. She tried to squirm her hands free, but they were pinned over her head in his unmovable, left-handed grip. The more she struggled, the harder he pressed his bulk against her.

With his dominant hand, Crux brought his blade into view. Before her eyes, he showed her both sides of the knife. How big, how sharp, how dirty.

He lightly traced her eyebrows with the tip. "Oh, don't you worry about that," he hissed when her effort to stay still resulted in an uncontrollable, full-body tremble. "You know I like pretty things."

Pretty and helpless. She was his perfect conquest.

His blade moved on. If he intended to scar her for life, any worse than he already had, it wasn't going to be on her face. He dragged it around her left ear and down her neck.

Cassie winced when her skin broke.

There was a growl of pleasure low in his throat. His foul breath was wet in her ear. Then, with his long, forked tongue, he caressed the blood oozing from the wound on her collarbone.

His tongue worked its way down her chest, while his blade dragged down her left side. It scratched her thigh and then he dug the point into the side of her knee. And there it waited, the pressure and the sting increasing while his carnal appetite gained momentum . . . biting, licking, and panting like a crazed animal.

Then he drew his blade upward in a hard, quick slash.

The pain was too much. Her mind broke free from her trembling, earthbound body. She was at the lagoon with Chris, her lips on his. The love she drew from his kiss was stronger than any sword, more powerful than any enchantment.

She almost believed she was dead. The moment was too perfect, too vivid, too romantic to be invented by a mind still attached to a body about to endure such unthinkable torment.

"Crux! That is quite enough!"

The familiar voice whisked her back to the present.

Crux's head turned away, but her agony did not ease. The serrated edge was now digging into her skin well below the neckline of her dress. And then his lips fell to her ear. "Now I'll always be close to your heart." He dragged the blade up her chest, the motion slow and deliberate. "And the heinous MacRae you long for will never know . . . because he'll be dead."

At that, Crux yanked Cassie to her feet.

"Hello, sister. . ." Canis Major landed beside them. "The MacRae brothers have been subdued," he said to no one in particular. Then he looked to Crux. "Lieutenant-General Chevalier, after you bring her back on site, you will lead the mission to find Scott MacRae and his allies. I'll send word if I get any information out of the MacRae brothers that might help you. Unless, perhaps, Cassiopeia can enlighten us now in exchange for some preferential treatment?"

She kept her eyes down and watched the blood run down her leg, on and over her foot. Tiny red puddles seeped into the damp earth.

Then Crux's arms sprang on her like a trap and flung her body against his. He put his blade to her throat. "We can make her talk now!"

More blood. She felt wet and sticky all over.

"I don't think that is necessary," Canis replied in a tone of haughty command. "She requires a softer hand, I assure you. She'll talk when she's ready. Now take her away!"

Crux nodded, then trapped her around her rib cage. With one powerful thrust of the legs, he launched them into flight.

While her feet dangled, she slipped off one of her sandals. It was her one last, desperate effort to secure help.

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Joe glanced over his shoulder.

"Keep walking!" one of his captors grunted immediately.

After a blow to the back of the head and a harsh tug forward by his bound wrists, Joe stumbled to keep his footing, but the glance was worth it. He saw only red and blue breastplates and giant black boots, and that meant there was still hope. 

Maybe she got away.

Cassie was moving fast and seemed to get past the whirlwind of falling fairy soldiers. Joe couldn't keep up with her, and while he ran out of options, hopelessly surrounded, she slipped beneath the leaves and disappeared like a breeze. 

The rain suddenly paused, and a darkness drifted over the whole area. Joe's chin lifted to the side. He had to crouch as the fairy over him swooped past his head.

He landed a few paces ahead and began to march at the front of Joe's convoy. The massive beast of a fairy was half carrying, half pushing a tiny fairy in a gray dress.

Joe's heart sank. 

"Shall we call you General Crux Chevalier?" the soldier beside the large fairy asked.

A bunch of the surrounding soldiers snickered.

"Any day now," boomed the voice of the fairy named Crux. "We will all receive many accolades once I have my say."

Suddenly, he swung Cassie to the side and pressed her against a rotted tree trunk. Even as Joe was being roughly handled, he noticed the blood on her dress. There was a stain over her heart, dabbles and smears across her skirt and down the side of her leg.

Once the other soldiers took their gawking positions behind Crux—Joe forced to watch as well—Crux pulled out a bloody knife. He lifted the point to Cassie's eye. Then his arm retracted and muscles tensed. His hand swung fast, and the knife stopped just shy of her eyeball.

More snickers erupted.

When he had the full attention of his cronies once again, Crux delicately, sensually, lifted a tear from Cassie's cheek with the tip of his knife. Then he tasted the symbol of her anguish with the tip of his forked tongue.

"I think now is the perfect time to convey how lucky you are, Miss Cassiopeia. Lucky your brother was around to intervene. Because I was just getting started. Next time . . . I'll finish." Crux swung her back into his clutches and resumed walking.

As he came closer, his smug glare met Joe's gaze. There was a hint of red in his wild eyes. Next, he slicked his serpentine tongue over his bloody teeth and lips, and made sure to throw an elbow into Joe's mouth when he passed by.

Joe didn't hunch or cower, even though the pain told him to. He spit the blood on the ground and fought against his restraints as hard as he could, but he was no match for the shackles or for the dozens of pushing and pulling fairy soldiers.

For his newfound magical powers to have the biggest impact, he had to keep surprise in his favor and choose a battle he knew he could win.

Before long, Cassie slipped from view, but she was all he could think about. He tried to process everything he had seen and heard, and what he already knew about her, which wasn't much.

And one word kept coming back to haunt him.

Brother? Cassie's not an only child? How come she never mentioned that?

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