When Kershov’s long slick tongue reached to lick the ravaged side of his muzzle, he tasted the old rusty tang of dried blood. Not his blood, of course—these stains came from the faintly beating heart of a rabbit as it died between the King’s savage jaws. Serrated carnivore fangs had cleaved into the hare’s chest cavity until they popped its cardiac organ like a grape, arteries and veins tangled in Kershov’s teeth like yarn, soft fur wet in his mouth. Instead of preserving the outward appearance of his prey, as he would have done if he’d chosen to use this rabbit as an “art piece,” the alabaster gangster had dug into its meat voraciously. It was as if he hadn’t eaten in days. And, come to think of it . . . maybe he hadn’t. His mind had been struggling as of late, at constant war with a devil more merciless and more destructive than Kershov could ever allow to set free. Such an inner conflict had exhausted him almost completely . . . it would not have surprised the ivory dragon if the sudden gauntness of his skeleton was simply a result of that wretched monster eating him from the inside out.

Kershov’s searching tongue slid toward the other side of his maw, wiping away the savory blood there as his single obsidian eye glared into the shadows of the forest before him. Ice-white hackles prickled as a dreadfully familiar, hopelessly forbidden urge swarmed up from the pit of his tightening guts and spilled into his consciousness with the same sickening slippery darkness as an oil spill. So many sinister, bloody desires wished to consume him. He wanted to kill something, he wanted to rip something . . . someone . . . he wanted his mate. A thunderous growl throttled the cold Czar’s throat. Without thinking—driven by some mad reflex—he snapped at his own forelimb and clamped his jaws around his wrist, biting down until the pain of it forced some of the pollution back from his clouded thoughts. Scarlet Nights. He needed her. He wanted her. He wanted their violent games and sweet nothings and total trust in one another. But his Queen had taken her leave in order to heal, and Kershov knew not when her dangerously beautiful form would return to the kingdom. Without her to distract him from this sickness, Ker would be forced to take it out on one of his pawns.

They might not survive the encounter.

Just as the blizzard beast thought it, the perfume of one of Abendrot’s finest assassins reached his nares. Immediately his skull was erect, ears pointing toward the faraway sound of deadly soft pawsteps disturbing a lush carpet of leaves. Kershov knew the signature the moment he caught it, just as he knew the scents of each and every one of his soldiers: Aerten. The auburn she-killer. The growl clinging to his vocal chords withered away as Ker lurched to his feet. When had been the last time he’d spoken to her? It seemed like an eternity—and with a wolfess as secretive as Aerten, the femme fatale could have been up to anything.

A howl broke below the clouds: a hopeful recruit waiting by the fence. The white monster effortlessly picked up Aerten’s trail and followed her at some distance, realizing with a rush of pride that she was on her way to the border. Good girl. It had always been an odd little hobby of Kershov’s to hide behind his warriors as they greeted newcomers, if only to see how they handled it and in what way they presented Abendrot’s face. No warrior had ever disappointed him. As Aerten calmly addressed this stranger—an inky creature with interesting marks lining her proud face—Kershov grinned in approval from his spot obscured in the undergrowth mere yards away. Amazing how enough time lurking in a lush wood had allowed a creature made of blinding snow to conceal himself so effortlessly. Ker did not reveal his presence until the newcomer had introduced herself.

“Lady Halina: how delightful for you to offer your strengths to the army.” Kershov materialized from his cover like a ghost pulling its corporeal form from the mist, his banner waving like a flag of royalty high over his spine. Already the fae had won a positive light in Kershov’s midnight eye; her excellent manners and humble acknowledgement of Abendrot’s tremendous power would do her more good than she could understand. “Submit to your Alpha, and I shall be more than happy to escort you into the territory as an honored recruit.”