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Willow approached Hunter with trepidation now that they were in the Titan’s skull. She’d been meaning to thank him for what he said back at Hexside and thought she’d finally found the right moment to now that Camila was snuggling with everyone’s palismen.
And as soon as she had tiptoed over to him and opened her mouth to speak, a voice that wasn’t hers filled the room.
“Hey.”
Her blood ran cold and she watched Hunter’s face drop. That was his voice.
But it wasn’t coming from his mouth.
The ragtag group of survivors all turned to the source of the noise. They recognized the blonde forelock first and foremost, but the thing that stood out the most to them was the skin that edged just way too gray and sickly to have been their beloved Hunter.
“Oh, no,” Hunter whimpered, his brows knitting and hands wrapping around a staff that just wouldn’t come to him.
“I was hoping you would have stayed in the ground,” the tall, lanky, not-Hunter said, his eyes glowing a piercing blue and voice droning with a stomach-churning cadence. “I’m not a fan of having more than one out at once.”
Belos’ newest Grimwalker had flesh dripping right off of the bone, exposing ligament and cold blood vessels that glistened with green goo and smelled of such rot and decay that it made everyone nauseous. Camila nearly fainted just looking at the monstrosity that Belos had dug up from the same hole Hunter was born in.
“You leave him out of this!” Luz said, zipping over on her brand-new palisman.
Belos’ eyes lit right up when he saw the pretty new serpent atop Luz’s staff. “How long have you had that little thing?” He asked, shambling forward on legs that wanted to crumble beneath him and melt back into the earth they came from.
Hunter noticed the shimmer of drool in the corner of Belos’ new body’s blue lips. He stepped forward and pulled Luz back as he did. “He needs palismen right now,” he whispered in her ear. He was shaking and hardly able to control the magic crackling against her skin like static. “Be careful?”
Luz smiled at him from the corner of her eye. “Am I known for being sloppy?” She asked, giggling softly.
It didn’t defuse the tense worry in Hunter’s gentle brown eyes. “Luz.” He looked so much more alive in comparison to the living-living dead Belos had commandeered.
Somehow, the circles under Belos’ eyes were darker than Hunter’s and the hollows of his cheeks were so pronounced that it looked like you could feel his teeth through them. The skin was so fragile that you probably could.
“I’ll handle this,” Luz whispered.
Hunter squeezed her shoulder tighter. “I won’t let you.”
He was ready to give every ounce of fight he had in him until Willow’s pinkie wrapped around his so tenderly.
The very sight of it made Belos’ pupils constrict.
“You’re going to have backup,” Willow assured him. “Because you mean a lot to me, too.”