by Ivy Asher
“Oh, fuck did I kill him? Is he okay? I felt like I was killing him.”
I’m terrified of the answer, but I have to know. Ryker joins Becket, Nash, and Kallan who are bending over and kneeling around Enoch.
“He’s awake and breathing, Squeaks. It’s okay!”
Relief floods me, and I stare down at my hands feeling betrayed. I have no idea what just happened. I’ve never felt anything like that before.
“Fuck, that hurt!” Enoch announces.
I watch him try to sit up, and Nash helps him lean forward and into a sitting position. Enoch pats himself down like he’s making sure everything that’s supposed to be there is still there. His blue eyes search around him until they land on me.
“I’m so fucking sorry; I have no idea what just happened,” I say, guilt flooding my body.
“Are you okay?” he asks me.
I nod that I am, and watch as Nash runs his hands over his coven mate, checking for any areas that might need healing.
“I don’t feel any injuries. Anything going on inside that would tell you differently?”
Enoch stares down at his arms, torso and then his legs. “I’m good, just have a fuck ton of adrenaline pumping through me right now. Nothing hurts or feels different.”
Knox steps into my line of sight, blocking Enoch from my view.
“Did you just mark him?”
His question shocks the fuck out of me, and it takes me a second to answer.
“No, it didn’t feel like what happened with you guys. When I give you Sentinel magic, it feels good to you, and to me. That’s not what just happened.”
The fury that fills Knox’s face at my words takes me aback. He whirls on Enoch just as his coven helps him up off the ground.
“Did you just try to force her to mark you? What the fuck did you do, Cleary?” Knox accuses, stepping toward Enoch.
Bastien and Sabin grab onto Knox keeping him from advancing too far.
“What the fuck? I would never do something like that, even if it were possible, which I don’t think it is!”
“We all felt what she felt; it was like someone was taking the magic and she couldn’t stop it. So I will ask you again, and if I find out you’re lying, I will fucking kill you! Did you, or your dad, do something to make this happen, to try and force her?”
Enoch’s features darken with rage, and he tries to square off with Knox, his coven holds him back just like Sabin and Bastien hold Knox back.
“I already fucking told you that I wouldn’t do that to her. If you question me one more time, we’re going to have a serious fucking problem, Howell.”
I step out of Valen’s hold and move in between Knox and Enoch. I’m not sure what to say. Knox’s accusation has stunned me silent. Before he said anything, I would have just chalked this up to another episode of spazzy magic, but I can’t get the taint of Knox’s words out of my head. Could they have done that to me? I try to shake off my doubt. If it were possible to force a marking, wouldn’t Adriel have figured that out when he was trying to get magic from my mother?
I turn to Enoch. Whatever look I’m wearing turns his anger to alarm.
“Vinna, I wouldn’t do that. My dad is a lot of things, but he wouldn’t do that. You have to believe me.”
“I believe you.”
“Vinna, you can’t…”
I cut Knox’s argument off when I turn to him and reach up to cup his face. His eyes lock on mine, and I hate the desperate and worried look that I see there.
“My magic has done weirder things. I had Sentinel magic pouring out of me during my Awakening, and it didn’t mark any of them. Okay?”
I nod my head up and down, and Knox mirrors the move.
I pull his face down to mine and place a soft kiss to his lips, lacing it with all the reassurance I can. I pull away, and his gray eyes flick between mine, looking for any hint of doubt in my gaze. He relaxes in my hands and claims another kiss before stepping back and away from Enoch and his coven. Bastien gives me a small smile as our eyes meet before I turn back to Enoch and the others.
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah, it hurt at the moment, but I feel fine now.”
I look past him and scan the trees and house around us. I search for answers in our surroundings that I know aren’t there, but I can’t seem to help myself. Is Pebble’s coven out there watching us right now? I know Enoch believes that his dad wouldn't do what Knox is accusing, but I’m not convinced.
The trill of a ringtone breaks up the heavy silence and doubt that’s pressing down on me. I turn to watch Bastien pull his phone out of his pocket and bring it up to his ear, a curious look on his face.
“Hey, what’s up?” he greets whoever is on the other line.
Everyone watches the phone call, and Valen takes a step towards his brother just before Bastien’s face is touched by alarm.
“What do you mean; what happened?”
I walk over to him just as he tells the caller that we’re on our way right now. The phone drops from his ear, and before anyone can even ask, he looks at us. “That was Aydin, something’s happened, and we need to get back to the house.”
“What..” Ryker starts.
“He didn’t want to say over the phone, but it has to do with Silva.” Bastien’s eyes land on his twin, and he communicates something silently before both twins turn to me. “And Lachlan.”
41
Everyone is silent all the way home, lost in thought or running through all the possible scenarios of what could be going on. Did they find a lead, something solid, and Aydin’s about to fill us in on what they’ve been up to? My heart rate speeds up. What if they found Vaughn? That would definitely be something you wouldn’t reveal over the phone. I push back against the hope that tries to roost in my soul. Don’t get your hopes up, Vinna. Don’t set yourself up for the crash if you’re wrong.
Ryker reaches over and takes my hand. He offers me a sweet smile and laces his fingers with mine. He turns onto the road that leads home, and my adrenaline spikes. I squeeze Ryker’s hand unable to help myself, and we pull up to the front of the house, not bothering with the garage as we’re all too eager to find out what’s going on. We pile out of the car and into the house calling out for Aydin. He comes out of the kitchen and waves us in. I round the corner and screech to a stop when I find the sisters there dabbing at red, tear-filled eyes. I look to Aydin and his haggard, worried face.
“Silva called,” he pauses, clearly struggling with what he’s going to say next.
My heart drops in my chest.
“Lachlan and Keegan were taken. Adriel has them.”
My brain stutters for a moment, recalibrating from thoughts of my father and processing what Aydin just said.
“How did they find him? Does Silva know where they are?” I ask rapid-fire, trying to sort through this development.
“They found a lead,” he holds up his hand stalling the questions that sit on the tips of everyone’s tongues. “I don’t know what it was or how they ended up in Belarus, but that’s where they are. Silva needs help and supplies and we need to pack, and get over there as quickly as possible.”
“Did you charter something, or do we need to book tickets still?” Valen asks, falling into the battle plan mode I discovered he had, when we hatched out our training plan.
“I’ve chartered a plane. The pilot and crew should get there about the same time we do if we leave in the next hour.”
Aydin starts assigning tasks and supplies to everyone, and I step back out of the chaos and work through what the best plan of action here is. We’re about to go up against a monster who has taken out covens of paladin and covets all things Sentinel. We’re going to do that with three paladin, who just split ways with each other, and not on good terms from the sound of it, and a group of paladin conscripts, three of which have new runes and magic they don’t know how to use yet.
This is a really fucking bad idea!
“Wait!” I shou
t out, as everyone bustles around me, making plans and lists of supplies they need to get before we leave.
“We can’t go in there magic blazing, thinking that it’s going to get us anywhere. Look at all the evidence there is that shows doing that isn’t effective. We need to be smart about this. Smarter than the others that never came back, and smarter than fucking stupid ass Lachlan who thought he could do it all on his own.”
“What do you suggest then?” Aydin asks.
“I don’t know, but we need time or more help, maybe both.”
Evrin steps forward, shaking his head. “We don’t have time. We don’t know what he’ll do with them.”
“He’ll use them to his best advantage, either that, or they’re already dead either way.” I point to the guys. “They can’t go into this fumbling with their magic and abilities. That’s a fucking death sentence.” I pause trying to figure out the most delicate way to say what I need to say next. “Fuck it; there’s no nice way to say that Lachlan isn’t worth their lives.”
The room fills with the weight of the arguments I know are mounting in all of their minds. I get that Lachlan holds a different place in their hearts than he does mine, but I’m not about to throw my Chosen to the lamia for him.
“Bruiser, we have to do this. We can’t leave him to the same fate that our parents and your parents had. It’s not right. You told us that we can’t stop you from fighting the battles that you need to fight, and now the same applies to us.”
“I’m not trying to stop you. I’m just trying to make you see that you need to train more and be ready. This fucker is no joke, and we can’t come at him the way every missing paladin and caster has.”
“Fine, let’s get there and then work out a plan of attack. Hopefully, Silva will have more information for us then. If Adriel is going to use them as bargaining chips, then we may have time to train and get ready.”
I nod my head, conceding to the fact that as much as I hate this, I have to trust the guys when they choose their battles. If that’s what I expect, then that’s what I have to give, no matter how much it sends my instincts screaming and my heart begging me to come up with a better way.
Sabin sidles up next to me and traces the line of my jaw with the back of his hand.
“I need to go to my family’s warehouse to pick up some shifter saliva, do you want to come with? It might be good to step out of the chaos for a moment, and take a breather?”
I give him a hollow smile and a nod. He takes my hand and leads me away from all of the noise, planning and scrambling around, and as the door that leads out into the garage shuts behind me, I’m instantly enveloped in silence. We climb into his Bronco, and I try to snap myself out of this numb state I’m currently floating in.
“Sabin, you have to see that everything about this is a horrible idea.”
I turn to watch him as he drives to wherever it is that we’re going.
“Yeah, nothing about it is ideal, but what choice do we have? As long as Lachlan and Keegan are alive, we have to fight for them. Just like they did for your dad, and the twins’ parents, and family coven. This is what we’re about, what we’ve been training most of our lives to do, kick ass and bring supes who break the laws to justice.”
He gives me a cheeky smile that I’m more accustomed to seeing on Knox’s face or Bastien’s, and it lifts some of the weight of worry that’s pressing down on me. I can’t help but give him an answering grin. I sigh and lay my head back against the headrest. The sun is starting to sink closer towards the horizon, and this day suddenly feels way too long. The threat of many more days to come, endless in all the worst ways, looms in the air.
It’s getting colder at night, and it seems summer is finally relinquishing its hold as autumn forces its way in. I try to think about mundane things like what the trees around here look like as their leaves change color, instead of focusing on the gnawing pit that was once my stomach. We pull off on to a small road that’s so obscured by trees, you’d miss it if you blinked. It takes us to an area cleared of trees where a small warehouse sits.
Sabin parks near a door, and I climb out of the car and follow him into the building that has rows and rows of shelves filled with inventory for his family’s shop. Fluorescent lights blink angrily above us; their irritated buzzing at being turned on, the only sound in the space. Sabin finds what he’s looking for and begins to put jars of shifter saliva in a box that he must have grabbed when I was too busy looking at other things.
I could probably spend all day here learning about all the items on the shelves. It’d be fun to come out here and learn as much as I can someday when things calm down. Sabin clicks off the lights, and I follow him out the door. I make sure that it clicks shut behind me and turn around and promptly slam right into Sabin’s back. He swears as he stumbles forward and my apology turns to vinegar in my mouth when I take in what had him freezing in place.
Between us and Sabin’s car are four fucking massive grizzly bears. They watch us as we watch them, and it doesn’t take long for me to piece together that there is nothing normal about this gathering of grizzlies. I quickly flip through my memory banks trying to remember if there are bear shifters that live here, but I only remember being told about wolves and pumas.
I slowly lift a hand to activate the runes behind my ear so I can talk to Sabin without whoever these shifters are knowing, but a deep growl from a bear makes me pause. A grizzly that’s way bigger than it would be if it were just a bear stands up on its hind legs, and the next thing I know the bear is gone and in its place is an average-sized man. I wait to see if he’s going to explain why they’re keeping us here when another grizzly stands up and blinks into a person.
Recognition sucker punches me in the face, and all thoughts that this bear hold up is going to end well vanishes. I step out from behind Sabin but don’t step in front of him like I want to, because one of the bears steps closer to us and I decide not to push it... yet.
“You better be here to say thank you, because if you’re here for what I think you are, you’re going to join your buddies,” I warn, and glare at the big, burly douchebag.
I rescued this fucker from Lachlan and his paladin the night I first met them, and now he’s back proving that no good deed goes unpunished. Fuck my conscience! He chuckles and takes a step towards me. I call on my short swords, and they flash solid in my hand.
“Watch it, Yogi, I gave you a shot to get away before, but there won’t be a repeat of my mercy if you come any closer.”
The other shifter that’s in man form chuckles, and it earns him a glare from the guy I saved.
“An old friend reached out me in hopes that I would help him procure something he’d spent a very long time searching for. Imagine my surprise when I get the description of the precious cargo, and I know exactly where to find her. So thank you, pet, you just made me a shit ton of money. I’d say fate handed your sweet ass right to me, but I don’t believe in that shit.”
The memory of Lachlan telling me that the shifters they were killing were traffickers flashes through my mind, and I’m ninety-five percent sure that I have Adriel to thank for the reappearance of this asshole in my life.
“Now put your pretty knives away, pet, and be nice and sweet with us, and we won’t slowly rip your friend into tiny little pieces.”
With that, the two shifters who are still bears move in towards Sabin and I, and we have to decide quickly if we fight or comply. I focus in my mind on the runes that represent each of the guys and feed magic into them activating the link in our heads. I’m so used to touching the runes to activate them, that I have to focus entirely too much on the process of doing it without touch and a bear gets within striking distance.
“Fuck, Sabin, do you think you can take a shifter? Or at least hold your own against one until help arrives?”
The bear steps even closer, and pink and orange magic flashes across my skin in warning.
“Be good, pet, if you fight, it will be all the more
painful.”
The Big, Burly Douche licks his lips, and his meaning isn’t lost on me.
Sabin’s voice is silent in my head, and I realize that he can’t activate the runes without touching them.
“Guys we’re in trouble. We’re at Sabin’s warehouse and surrounded by bear shifters. Tell Aydin it’s the grizzlies from our first fight together, he’ll know what I mean. We’re going to fight, so don’t start screaming in my head. Just get here!”
Sabin nods his head almost imperceptibly, and I call on my Elemental magic and throw up a wall of dirt in front of us. A growl vibrates through me as a grizzly the size of a car slams into the dirt wall clawing through it to get to us. Sabin is using his Elemental magic to defend us just behind me, but I can’t focus on what he’s doing as teeth and claws come at me. I trade my short swords out for a long sword. I clap my empty hand against the hilt to create two of the weapon.
The bear roars out its challenge, and I scream in answer as I run towards it. I push magic into my limbs and take two huge strides before I leap high into the air, just missing the claws aimed for my torso. I pivot midair and slam my swords into the back of the grizzly. They slide deeply into the shifter pulling me out of the air and onto his back. He snarls in pain, and I immediately call on new swords and get to work trying to cut this fucker’s head off.
I am barely able to avoid the claws as he reaches around his back trying to dislodge me, as I stab through the thick muscle and fur protecting his throat. His bellows turn to pained yowls and just when I think he’s going to collapse to the ground and accept death, I catch another bear coming straight for me.
I make one more last-ditch effort for a kill shot on the beast beneath me and prepare myself to go toe-to-toe with another elephant-sized grizzly. What have these assholes been eating, fucking mutagen? I tense, my body preparing for a bite that’s unavoidable, I just hope the promise of a big payday will keep it from ripping me in half.
42
Out of nowhere, a massive dark gray wolf barrels into the bear, knocking it off balance, and they both go down in a tangle of teeth, paws, and snarls.
