Time slowed down while I watched in slow motion how a large chunk of the ceiling broke off and was about to crush Michelle, who was standing right beneath it. A flash of silver ran past me as Rafe rushed to get to his mother. Weight pressed on my chest, robbing me of my breath while I saw everything roll out in front of me.

The whole ceiling collapsed at the same moment that Rafe reached his mum. All I could see seconds later were the swirling dust and the rubble left behind.

There was no sign of either one of them.

My heart skipped a beat- one of my mates was lying unconscious next to me, while the other was now buried under the remains of the caved-in ceiling. I trembled as I looked on, struggling to believe that I was about to lose either one of them or both of them.

Little by little, a dark shape emerged amongst the settling dust. As it stepped forward, it became clearer until I recognised Kai who was slowly pulling Michelle away from debris. She appeared to be unconscious and I couldn't figure out if she was injured.

Rafe, is she...?

She is alive but she hit her head when she fell, so it might take her some time to come around, he mind linked back as Kai pulled her to a nearby patch of soft grass and licked her hand.

"Michelle," Markolf called out, ready to rush towards Kai and Michelle's spot. But his movement only resulted in Kai's snarls as he stepped in front to protect her from the cambion.

The half-demon stopped in his tracks. His face did not give anything away and yet, I didn't fail to spot the subtle flinch when he was denied the possibility to rush to his assistant's side. Maybe he did care for her, after all.

I've had enough of this arsehole, Rafe exclaimed just before he lunged towards the cambion.

But as he was about to pounce on the cambion, Markolf took something out of his pocket and shot my mate with the oh-so-familiar energy blast which forced Rafe to shift mid-leap, causing him to tumble on the ground when he fell.

"Rafe!" A desperate cry left my lips but it was only met with silence.

Outside of the mansion, the intense noise from the battle raging out there was getting louder and closer, as the shifters were seemingly gaining ground and forcing Markolf's forces back. But here, with both of my mates lying injured on the floor, things were looking pretty bleak.

"Enough playing around- this ends now," Markolf commanded before he took the same small orb that he used on Cyrus and pointed it forwards. Two streams of bright light shot out of it and hit Rafe and Aiden. In the blink of an eye, the blasts attached themselves to the guys, lifting them both off the ground.

Neither of them said a thing or reacted, but I doubled in agony from the excruciating pain that reached me from my mates. Barely able to move from the anguish, all I could do was watch in horror as I saw Kai and Blaze slowly separate from Rafe and Aiden.

Panic spread across my body-- I couldn't let this happen to them. If their animals' extraction did not kill them, Markolf was certainly going to end them himself once they were defenceless. And even if we somehow, miraculously, made it out without their animals, I knew that the pain of losing their wolf and dragon would have been too much for them to bear.

I had to stop Markolf!

For my mates.

For Michelle.

For my family.

... For me.

I struggled to fight the pain that was crippling my body but then I remembered the Sun Goddess' words when I visited them. "We needed a bond that could withhold anything Markolf could throw its way, a bond that was stronger than anything we had ever seen."

I could do this.

We could do this.

We were one and we were destined to bring down this psychopath before he wiped out the supernatural world.

I'll be damned if I allow Markolf to take yet another family away from me.

The more resolved I became, the less I felt the pain. Somehow the trust and belief I had in our triad wiped all of it away and gave me the strength I needed to continue.

I got up to my feet and dusted myself off, my mind back to its normal senses. The cambion was so engrossed in stealing my mates' animal that he didn't even notice as I conjured two huge fireballs in my hands.

"No one harms the people I love and gets away with it, you son of a bitch."

I lifted my head and stood tall in front of Markolf as I blasted him, thanks to my dragon abilities. The impact was so strong that he dropped the orb and fell backwards, releasing my mates from its hold before they could be separated from Kai and Blaze.

The urge to rush to Aiden and Rafe's side to check on them pulled at me but I had to fight it.

Instead, I used my newly acquired super-speed to get as quickly as possible to the cambion. Azrael's instructions played on repeat in my head. I pulled the pin out of my hair and held it in my hand until it transformed back into the angel blade when the glamour wore off under my control.

Markolf's face was full of surprise when I stood over him. He hadn't even seen it coming—any of it.

"How did you do that?" He muttered, still half-out from the blast.

I contemplated whether to stab him in the heart and turn him into a human but I did not bid my time until now to fail at the final stretch.

My lips tipped into a devilish smirk. "I could tell you but then I would have to kill you," I whispered in his ear as I plunged the dagger into his shoulder enough to paralyse his demonic abilities, and then I pulled the blade out.

I wasn't sure how long I had until the effect of the angel blade wore off so I dashed over to my mates.

Relief washed over me when I found them both conscious, although they were trying to catch their breaths. When they saw me, their eyes flashed with those familiar flickers of possessiveness and protectiveness. I grabbed both of them and pulled them towards me. My mind eased just from their closeness and their warmth.

"Riley, are you okay?" Rafe exclaimed.

"We had missed you, love," my dragon mate added.

Their words and their voices were music to my ears but I couldn't let myself get distracted- things were still far from over.

I pulled away and both my two Alpha men grunted at the loss of contact. I couldn't blame them- every cell in my body was longing for their touch but this was not the place or the time to give in to my desires. I smiled though at the realisation that I was the one calling the shots in our triad.

"Do you trust me?" I looked from one to the other as I waited to hear their replies.

"Always and forever, mate."

Rafe's statement was so simple but it meant so much to me, knowing how our relationship had evolved since the time when he thought I was some weak human that was going to be a liability more than anything else. Aiden smiled at his best friend and nodded in agreement.

"Give me your hand then."

I stretched out my open palm in an invitation for them to do the same. There was only one way to release all the spirits that Markolf had trapped over the years and our blood was key for that.

Both of them followed my lead and placed their palms next to each other. I raised the bloody dagger and wiped it off in my shirt. It was not a classy move but I did not want the cambion's blood to mix with that of our triad, if I could help it.

Once I was satisfied that it was clean enough, I made a small cut on each palm. Small enough not to cause any unnecessary bleeding- even if the wounds were going to heal quickly with the shifter abilities- but big enough to get enough blood dripping to cover the angel blade. I watched as the thick red liquids mixed and trickled over the silver edges of the weapon. The dagger burst into a blue flame but it didn't burn or harm me as I held it. The energy that it gave off ran through my body like an electric current.

I was ready.

"You little bitch," I heard Markolf shout behind me, once again back to his feet. "And here I was ready to give you the world."

I turned around and glared at him, although I pitied him. He was delusional but it was his desperate need to feel loved and to fit in that drove his insanity. Still, he had a chance to achieve those without sowing destruction and death along the way, yet he chose the easy path instead- the one of hatred.

Reasoning with him was futile but I owed it to conscience to at least try. "This could have all gone so differently, Markolf. But you decided that if you could not make the world love you, you would make it fear you."

"Oh, Aurelie, you think that they will accept you, the broken shifter that you are? You are deceiving yourself, sweetheart."

I looked at my mates and I could my skin crackle under their gaze from the electric charge of our bond. Their smiles and the love that radiated from them told me everything that I needed to know.

"I don't have to wonder, Markolf-- I know." I gave him a pitiful smile but it only made him more bitter.

"Fine, you die with them then." He spat out the words with so much hate that it was difficult to believ he wanted me by his side moments earlier. He then looked up to the sky and began to mutter some strange an incantation that made the ground tremble.

My mates and I exchanged knowing glances-- it was now or never.

As if our minds were attuned, Aiden and I both shot Markolf with fireballs which interrupted whatever he was trying to do. I heard Rafe shift next to me and I knew he was going to provide me with the distraction that I needed for my final move.

The silver-grey wolf ran forward while Aiden continued to fire at the cambion. The dual attack proved difficult for the half-demon and he began to move backwards, looking for cover. Kai lunged at him and pushed him down to the ground, giving me the much-awaited opening.

I sprinted over in a flash and, without hesitation, I pierced Markolf's heart with the blood-soaked angel blade.

A stream of light suddenly burst out of the cambion's body which forced me to step back.

The light slowly disappeared and was replaced by thousands of glowing animal spirits that appeared from the source of the light. Wolves, dragons, bears, foxes, lions, jaguars- countless animals that were separated from their humans and had been imprisoned by Markolf to harness their powers. With each released animal, the cambion disintegrated slowly.

Little by little, all the spirits disappeared but I knew that they were free now, just like Azrael had told me.

I looked back on the ground where Markolf was lying but in his place, I found just a pile of clothes, our enemy having been defeated.

"You did it," someone whispered in my ear and I turned around to face Aiden. He brushed a strand of hair from my face and placed his healed palm on my cheek. I leaned into his touch, having missed my calm and my storm. "You saved us all, Riley."

I snapped my head to look for Rafe and saw him walk towards us with the unconscious Michelle in his arms.

I smiled at both of my mates before I gave each of them a kiss on the cheek. "No. We did it together- at the end of the day, we are stronger as one."

"Did I miss all the fun?" The familiar baritone voice startled me as my dad appeared out of nowhere.

"Dad, you are okay!"

He pulled me in for a hug before I could ask anything. "Of course I am, Auri. Your old man still has what it takes to do some serious damage."

"Caleb?"

His eyes landed on the spot where Markolf had disappeared moments earlier. "He met the same end as Markolf, I guess."

"What about mum and everyone else?" I asked, alarmed when I remembered that there were many more people involved in the fight than just those of us that were standing in the now destroyed courtyard.

"Everyone is fine, sweetie. We suffered a few casualties but, all in all, our losses were limited. We had a good plan, I guess." My dad smiled at my mates. I had a feeling that there was a whole story behind the glances they exchanged, but I was going to get it out of them another time. "What now, Auri?"

A smile warmed my lips as I finally felt lighter than I had in a while, like a burden had been lifted off my shoulders. The sense of calm that took over told me that everything was going to be alright now that those responsible for the suffering of my family and my mates were finally gone. It was finally time to move onto brighter things and to shape my own destiny.

"Now we go home."