Read Never More for Free Online Page B

as the force of the returning air broke every single bone in his body.
    The redcap on the ground watched as the car lumbered to a halt on the side of the road, the tic-tic-tic of the cooling engine the only sound for miles.
    Raven slipped out of the deathtrap he’d devised, flowing together in a flutter of wings until he stood over the redcap. “Hello, Boneass.”
    “Bone arse ,” the redcap grumbled. He slowly picked himself off the ground, shaking as he faced Raven. “Lord MacSweeney.”
    Raven’s brows rose. “Ah, I see you didn’t get the memo.” He grinned, allowing the flash of Goodfellow green to show in his gaze. “At my father’s request, I’ve changed my last name.”
    The redcap blanched at the mention of the Hob, but surprisingly he stood his ground. “You betrayed our queen.” The redcap clenched his fists, but Raven could scent the sweat that began to pour off of him. “You need to die.”
    “Not today, Boneass.” Raven swept his arms wide. “Think you can take me?”
    Probably for the first time in his life the redcap did something smart. He stood still.
    “No?” Raven sighed, lowering his arms. “I’m almost disappointed.”
    The redcap growled. “We aren’t the only ones she sent.”
    Raven chuckled softly. “I know that. You’re the cannon fodder. The real attack will come from someone whose brain cells don’t squeak when they rub together.”
    Bonearse took a step back. “We don’t take traitors lightly.”
    Raven took a step forward. “And I’m not as nice as my father.” Before the redcap could react, Raven struck. His talons sank into the soft belly of the redcap, pumping him full of the black ooze all of the Hob’s children held inside them.
    The redcap screamed, falling to the ground in unspeakable agony.
    Raven crouched next to him. “You should have stayed in the car.” He stroked the redcap’s hair back from his face as his body twisted and writhed. “You would have died more quickly.”
    Raven smiled sweetly as the redcap sputtered. Black-tinted blood foamed over the redcap’s lips, tinting them charcoal. “I can make this stop.” He crooned nonsense sounds, the chirruping sounds of his ravens coming easily to his lips. “Do you want it to stop, Boneass?”
    The redcap nodded, not even wincing at the way Raven mangled his name. “Pl-please.”
    “Aw.” Raven focused on the poison, slowing its course through the redcap’s body. Unless he willed it, the redcap would still die, but it would be a gentler death than the one he’d originally planned. Maybe he was getting soft, but if the redcap gave him what he wanted he’d let him die quickly. “Now, tell me who else she sent.”
    The redcap gulped. “If I do…”
    “You’re dead anyway, Boney. But you could die sweet, or you can die hard. Your choice.”
    The redcap pondered long enough that Raven was ready to send the poison boiling through his system once more. Before he could, however, the redcap caved, and the name sent a shiver down Raven’s spine. While Raven had never gotten along with his half brother, the two had been coldly polite to one another the few times they’d met.
    Sayyid Bapep was half Hob, half Djinn, and so feared in the Black Court his name was heard in whispers and only spoken when no shadows were present. Only Raven had as dark a reputation as Sayyid, and Sayyid’s was less than his only because Raven had taken on assignments no other dark fae would touch.
    Little did they know he’d been desperately trying to find a way to free both himself and his mother from the grasp of the Dark Queen. Taking those missions, while risky, had given him a chance to get away, to research ways he might be able to escape her grasp. It wasn’t until he’d met his father that Raven finally found the freedom he’d sought, but it had cost him dearly. In punishment, the Dark Queen had his mother killed and her remains shipped to him in pieces.
    And that was only the start of it.
    She was