Chapter 100: Nobody Needed Naked Tavian

His face was rotting. Actively. Not a metaphor. Grey-green flesh was dangling off the bone.

One cheek was caved in with a hole. The eye above it sat in a socket that had no business holding it anymore. The other eye was milky white.

"Like what you see?" he asked.

This was not a man. This was something that had been in the ground and was no longer in the ground and was looking at her with an eye that should have stopped seeing years ago.

He moved at her again at inhuman speed.

WHOOSH.

A column of red fire launched from the fireplace and wrapped around his torso, his arms, his legs, climbing his body like it was following a blueprint, covering every inch of rot and decay with fire that burned red and hot and personal.

The shrieks started. It was the sound of something that was already dead being killed again, wet and guttural and wrong in a way that bypassed Nova’s ears and went straight to her spine.

The fire was on him but he was still standing.

Nova spun back around and threw herself against the door. She tried pulling the handle again, like maybe it would unlock now. The metal was hot, radiating heat from the fire behind her. Nothing. The lock held.

She kicked it. The wood didn’t budge.

The man’s screams didn’t stop. They got closer. Too close. Her legs moved before he reached her. His flaming body hit the door where she had just been.

He turned and moved towards her again.

She ran.

The fire spread. The drapes caught. The rug caught. The desk went up like it had been soaked in accelerant.

Flame, red and regular, consumed the room, floor to ceiling, wall to wall. The heat hit her in waves. Each wave was hotter than the last. The smoke was descending, the breathable air shrinking.

Nova’s eyes went to the window. She was four floors up. There was zero chance she could do that drop.

✦✦✦

THUNDERFANG KEEP - THE BETA’S QUARTERS

"WHAT."

Maria answered. A holo-projection of her brother stood next to her, looking up at her like a man who had just been summoned to the underworld and found his sister there.

"Maria, I need—"

"It is midnight, Maverick."

"I’m aware of the time. I need you to—"

Tavian walked through the frame. Fully naked. He glanced over at the hologram of the Emberclaw Alpha.

Then he screamed, pure soprano, that had no business coming out of a man his size. The kind of frequency that shatters crystal and dignity simultaneously.

Maria’s body answered it before her brain could, both of them screaming at the same pitch, in perfect harmony, at midnight, in their bedroom, at a hologram.

Maverick’s hologram held up his hand, blocking the naked Beta from view.

He thought the screaming would stop after Tavian remembered he was a man among men, and the Beta of the largest pack in Helix.

It did not.

The Beta continued screaming while looking confused on why he was screaming, only stopping when Maria stopped.

"Are you two finished?" Maverick asked after five full seconds.

"Yes," Maria answered.

"I need you to mindlink security to the fourth floor, east wing, room 412 of your keep. Nova is in there and the room is on fire. There is a man in there that’s trying to hurt her and not burning," Maverick said.

"A fire? Shit."

Maria was out of the bed, moving to her slippers.

"Maria. I said security. Not you," Maverick said.

"Maria, he said security. Not you," Tavian said at the exact same moment.

BLAM-BLAM-BLAM.

The fire alarm erupted. Every rune speaker in the keep. Full volume. The kind of sound designed to wake the dead and evacuate the living.

Tavian screamed. Maria screamed. Their matebond had opinions about synchronized panic.

"THAT’S THE FIRE ALARM," Maria yelled once the scream got out.

"No shit," Maverick snapped.

Maria was out of the bed before Tavian finished processing the sentence.

She grabbed her holo-band off the nightstand mid-sprint, strapping it to her wrist without breaking stride. A miniature Maverick materialized on her forearm, six inches tall, arms crossed, looking up at her from her wrist like the world’s angriest tiny Alpha.

"TAVIAN. MINDLINK SECURITY. ROOM 412. NOW," she yelled over her shoulder, rounding the corner in slippers and a robe.

"Maria, Sweetheart, already did that. There’s a fire now. So we need to evacuate," Tavian yelled back, one leg in his pants, hopping after her.

"Fire doesn’t burn me, Tavian."

She said it without slowing down. Without turning around. The sentence was fact, delivered at full speed, by a woman whose wolf was made of flame and whose best friend was in a room that was currently on fire and whoever was responsible for that was about to meet her bitch side.

Tavian got the second leg in and bolted after her. Full Beta speed. The speed that had carried him through training drills and combat exercises.

He reached out to hook her around the waist, fully planning on carrying her out of this keep kicking and screaming if he had to, only to completely miss her, because she felt him coming through their matebond and picked up her speed.

Maria Emberclaw, in slippers, in a robe, in human form, was outrunning the Beta of the largest pack in Helix. She was pulling away with every stride. The gap was widening.

Her wolf form shouldn’t be able to move this fast, let alone her human side.

Tavian was the third fastest man in Thunderfang behind Derek and Landon.

Tavian’s wolf did not approve. It surged. Hard. The beast wanted out because the beast’s mate was running and the human side couldn’t catch her and the beast found this personally offensive.

"Don’t worry. I’ll meet you outside, Tav," Maria called without looking back.

On Maria’s wrist, miniature Maverick had also been telling her to go outside.

"Maverick, if you say one more word, your hologram is getting hung up on," she snapped.