Chapter 92

• Rose's POV
• Kavian glanced at me as if he could read the panic carved on my face. For a second there was something soft in his eyes—an almost-smile, small and private—and I felt something like steadiness settle under my ribs. He didn’t have to say anything. He didn’t need to. The look told me he had more control than he let show.
• Then, suddenly, he moved that control into action. He stepped off the line of a blade that had forgotten his throat and, in the same breath, his elbow came up in a motion that looked too small to mean anything. It wasn’t flashy. It was a single, clean arc of bone against bone. The sound it made was not dramatic—the soft impact of bone on ribs—but the effect was immediate and catastrophic. Damian’s knees folded as if someone had cut the supports from under him. He dropped toward one knee, a hiss of wind and pain escaping him, eyes wide and uncomprehending.