Vladya woke up to a mouthful of blood and a sensation like fire scorching down all four legs.

With a wrenching gasp the white warboy shuddered back into himself, pyrite eyes splitting wide open and yet somehow still not quite seeing the landscape around him, nerves electric with pain, hackles standing on end. He couldn’t remember where he was or what he’d been doing—he couldn’t even recognize this forest with its maddening tangle of scents and strange tapestry of branches. Terror clawed at his heart, and Vlad desperately tried to recall why. Why the feeling of insane, shredding, screaming horror churning hurricane-like in his guts? Why did his fever-hot gaze slice back and forth as if searching for escape? Why the river of scalding tears burning like acid down his cheekbones, or the tang of scarlet on his tongue? The tundra soldier carved trenches in the mud with his talons as he paced in expanding, meaningless circles, looking for all the world like a mad dog that needed to be put out of its misery or else wreak that misery on innocents. A single word dropped from his iron-stained lips as soon as he learned to speak again. “Kobato . . . Kobato . . . Kobato . . .”

The mantra clanged incessantly within the walls of his pounding skull, fear building with each sickening reverberation. It was night. Above the weeping wolf hung a tapestry of diamond-studded indigo. The moon had crept back into itself, swallowed whole by shadow, so that Vladya’s hollow eyes only picked out the very starkest of shapes. None of those silhouettes was the tiny soft-furred damsel who owned his worthless heart. Nowhere could he find the sumptuous caramel gleam of her lanterns. It was dark and Vladya was alone and Kobato wasn’t here and he was supposed to be saving her so what was he doing wandering around like a fucking IDIOT—

“Shit—!”

The sharp expletive momentarily stalled Vladya’s keening chant. He hadn’t been paying attention to where his paws were gauging a path into the mud; one foot caught gracelessly in a root and yanked the ivory warrior roughly to the ground. Agony lanced through his limbs with renewed flames. A pitiful yelp jumped from his maw. It was as if someone had peeled back every layer of skin to expose the raw ends of his nerves . . . and finally, finally Vlad was able to focus. A blade of ice chipped a minute incision into the fog swathing his brain. Even without light to lend lurid color to the violent wounds striping his legs, Vladya knew—felt acutely—the extent of damage. And he suddenly realized why gore was choking the back of his throat.

“KOBATO!” The scarred gangster shrieked his angel’s name as if he were a demon being dragged away from redemption. And then he was sprinting at full speed, instinctively following his own accursed trail of blood. Vladya obliterated anything that dared obstruct his path, shredding past tangled undergrowth and leaping deftly over fallen logs and icy streams. He could not allow a stumble—or a few—to slow his progress. Memory surged back with every hungry stride and twisted an invisible knife further into his writhing viscera. Kobato (his light his love his reason) had been stolen right from under the dragon’s gaze. Vladya had an appalling amount of experience with King Kershov’s brand of “hospitality” . . . he needed to rescues his princess at all costs before that heartless monster did anything to harm her.

If he hadn’t already.

A supernatural explosion of frantic strength powered Vladya miraculous back toward Abendrot’s hellish gates. Sobbing in anguish, roaring in rage, the snowy outlaw prepared to throw himself past the border, self-preservation be damned—only to be met by the Ice King himself. Vlad didn’t understand he’d practically collided with his adversary until Kershov’s fangs were hooked into his neck, the massive Czar using his body weight and strategic maneuvering to slam Vladya onto his back and expose his vital innards to the sky.

“Let her go,” the frost-breathing serpent gagged around the paw smashed into the base of his throat, exhausted forelimbs battering uselessly at Kershov’s broad chest. The black-eyed Pharaoh merely laughed into Vladya’s viciously snarling face.

“Oh please, Blood-eye. You know better. Or do I have to make you break your legs this time for the lesson to stick?” Kershov’s other huge forepaw pounded savagely over the bridge of Vladya’s snout, causing a torrent of fresh blood to pour down the front of the struggling ghost’s muzzle. “She doesn’t even know you’ve been here before. I’ve had my subjects erase all traces of your rotting, maggot-infested hide from my territory whenever you decide to drop by. I wonder what the poor dear is thinking, if her knight in rusted armor has taken this long to save her?” Chuckling without humor, in a voice cold enough to make ice crystals bloomed where it touched, Kershov leaned down to whisper those magic words that would erase Vladya’s sanity once more . . .