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“Gio! You’re supposed to be in the house!” Calder shouted suddenly

“We’re not leaving you three alone You need help!” he snapped “Baer has called in some animals”

Calder growled in frustration but relented quickly as a pestilent nearly sneaked past his wall of water “Keep watch for anyone who gets through Beat them back toward the water and I’ll snatch them up Send some people to watch Lucien too”

Gio nearly grinned at getting the chance to fight with his lanced over at Wiley, who nodded “I’ll stay here with Calder and split your fao check on Lucien Tell hi”

“Got it!” Gio darted off, the handle of the rolling pin clenched tightly in his fist As he reached the edge of the house, a ers nearly clawing off his face Gio dodged the swipe and swung the rolling pin at the pestilent’s head A sickening thud and crunch could be heard across the yard and the man went down

His heart pounded hard in his chest, but Gio refused to think about what he’d just done Theto kill him, kill his family and his lovers Fuck that

Spinning on the balls of his feet, Gio raced to the front yard, where Lucien was controlling the chaos there Fewer pestilents were attacking fro bodies lying about along with lots of burnt grass

“Gio—” Lucien started to argue, but Gio didn’t give him the chance

“My faht Calder is safe”

Lucien huffed, but Gio also noticed that he stopped the fireballs spinning around hih safely He jogged inside the circle and was iainst Lucien’s sweaty side before the fire surged about the talk later about the definition of safe”

“Only if we can have that talk in bed while naked”

Lucien made a noise in his throat “As if there is any other way of having that conversation”

“Thank you for protecting my family” Gio leaned his head on Lucien’s chest

“Your fa and deserves to be protected And even if they weren’t, we’d still protect them You love the because he also fricasséed three pestilents at the same time

Gio reluctantly slipped away fro back a coupleto sneak up on the Fire Weaver fro around a Tiki torch like a spear and shouting in broken Italian Everything about the fight had a very surreal feel to it, and Gio suspected he’d be having nightmares later with very similar scenes

With the help of a few quick and deadly wolves, the last of the pestilents were taken out, allowing them toto clear out the last of the pestilent horde