by Bree Moore
Tyson groaned, breaking her train of thought. He needed her help. Harper managed to turn over onto hands and knees, shaking the spinning sensation out of her head. She reached a hand up to the table and used it to prop herself up in a kneeling position, legs still shaking.
The suits each slung a body over a shoulder. The woman woke up and beat at the suit holding her, shrieking.
All Harper could do was watch them leave. They didn’t even notice she was there as she gasped with the effort of keeping herself in a kneeling position, held up by the table. They disappeared into the hallway. Harper yelled in frustration, slamming a fist down on the table, enraged at the loss of Tyson’s companions, even though she still wasn’t sure who they were. The reaction seemed extreme. Maybe she wasn’t thinking right.
Harper’s yell woke Tyson, and he sat up, moaning. When he looked up, there was a bruise forming over his eye and half his cheek.
“You all right?” Harper called out. She dropped her grip on the table and let herself fall back to the floor. Given a moment longer, she would surely be able to stand. She’d have to. They needed to get out of there and make certain Lilith let Harper go as promised, now that the orb had done its work.
“Yeah. Man alive, that hurt.” He touched his cheekbone gingerly, prodding at his bruising skin, then stood. He crossed the room to Harper’s side.
“I can’t believe they didn’t take you.”
“They were here for me, weren’t they?”
“Yeah. But why did they take Quinn and Becca instead?” Tyson leaned his head to one side, as if it hurt. Then he looked at Harper strangely. “You seem to be doing really well for what just happened.”
What exactly happened? Harper wasn’t sure. She gestured to her legs. “Except for not being able to stand.”
Tyson frowned. “Yeah, that. But I meant…”
“Was that Becca? And…?” Harper trailed off, unable to think of the man’s name. Odd. She was sure Tyson had told her at some point.
“And Quinn. I’m so sorry, Harper.” He said the name like it should hold some significance for her.
Harper gave him a perplexed look. Maybe he was worried about his cousin. “Look, it’s all right. We can go after them.”
“We don’t know where they’re being taken.” Tyson spread his hands, then ran one through his hair. Some of the sweaty brown strands stood straight up from the sweat on his brow. He didn’t notice, putting his hands on his hips and glancing around the room. “Are you going to tell me what you just did here?”
“Just removed the undeserving from their position of power.”
“Violet and James?”
Harper looked to the orb. What had she done? She wouldn’t know until she got upstairs. Tyson’s mouth gaped open, and then he clamped it shut.
“We should go.” Harper reached a hand up toward Tyson. Shock stood out stark on his face, but he clasped her hand and pulled her up so fast their bodies met. Harper tried to move away, to test the strength of her legs, but he held tight, keeping her pressed close to him, her face inches away from his.
“What if you killed them?” His blue eyes searched Harper’s with an intensity she hadn’t seen in him before. It took her a moment to realize who he meant.
Harper broke the gaze and jerked her hand from his, stepping back. Her legs held, though shakily. She couldn’t look at him. Her face and hands both heated. She pushed her shoulders back and walked around the table, away from the orb, crossing the dulled pentagram drawn onto the floor.
Tyson followed after a moment, not speaking. Was he angry or relieved? Hell, Harper didn’t know what she was feeling either. Her emotions swirled beneath the surface, confusion and anger and curiosity and relief all rolled into one.
She stepped into the hall. The walls reverberated with a drawn-out howl. Claws scrabbled for purchase on the carpet around the corner, reminding Harper of the time Keith shifted to werewolf and attacked her. She didn’t have to see anything to know that a pack was on their trail. She swung her head toward Tyson.
“Run!”
“How did they find us?”
“I don’t know!” Harper stumbled into a clumsy sprint. She resisted looking back, afraid to see the black wolf that could be leading the pack. Zeke.
The wolf pack barked and howled. They had caught their scent. Harper pumped her arms and put on more speed. Tyson fell behind, unable to maintain the supernatural pace. A corner loomed. Harper rounded it with too much momentum and slammed into the wall. Her body twisted and her head rang.
A wolf entered the end of the hall. It wasn’t Zeke or any of the werewolves Harper recognized.
A dead end met them at the back of a long hall filled with doors, doors that led to nothing but empty rooms. Harper jiggled the handles as she passed anyway. They stopped against the far wall, looking up at a narrow window, a bit high off the ground.
Harper took a deep breath and set her gaze on the window.
“Are you going to break through?” Tyson stood behind her, panting.
Harper backed up to get a running start, taking a deep breath through her nose.
Tyson made a strangled sound, but Harper ignored him, launching toward the window at a full sprint. Her wings erupted from her back in a flurry of midnight feathers and filled the hall. She pumped them once and used them to flip her body so her legs struck the window first. The glass shattered.
Harper flared her wings out to catch herself as she dropped, landing in a crouch. She shifted back to human form faster than she’d ever done before. Wings gone, she jumped for the window ledge and dragged herself up, glass crunching beneath her hands as she wiggled through the narrow space. Hopefully Tyson’s shoulders could fit.
She reoriented to face the window and backed up. Tyson sprinted for the opening, arms and legs pumping. He halted and threw his backpack off his shoulders.
“Catch!” he yelled.
Harper leaned forward and grabbed the strap just before it fell. Tyson jumped and his fingers gripped the ledge. They slipped and he fell with a grunt. He had no room to get a running start; the wolves were ten feet away. Harper reached her hands out and he jumped straight up, grabbing her wrists. Her paranormal strength burned through her muscles and he landed on the damp grass beside her.
A wolf leapt up into the opening, snarling, eyes red-rimmed. Its paws scrabbled on the sill but found no purchase, and it fell to the floor below. Four of them prowled beneath the window, taking up a frustrated howl. Their wolf forms were too awkward to navigate the narrow space. Or so Harper hoped.
“We made it,” Tyson said, glancing down at his body. “Well, mostly.”
Harper looked and realized he had a shoe missing. “We’ll find you new ones. Come on.” She spread her wings and extended her hand.
“Where are we going?”
Harper pointed toward the sky. “Out of reach.”
Chapter Twenty
Harper
Harper’s hand hovered in the air, and for a heart-stopping moment she thought Tyson might not take it.
Her breath seized in her chest. It was okay. She was used to being alone.
He finally slapped his palm into hers. Harper yanked him closer and swept her arm under his knees. He gripped her neck reflexively, yelping at the sudden movement. Harper ran forward, flapping her wings, and lifted off. They rose above the cabin. Every stroke was harder than usual, and she breathed hard, focusing on coordinating her muscles to stay airborne.
The dueling field below was in chaos—rogues and camp residents engaged each other in snarling, bloody battles. Harper scanned the ground, searching for anyone she recognized, but it was impossible with how fast everyone moved.
A streak of silver shot across the field from a window in the lodge, hissing and smoking as it split and struck two dark-haired figures fighting back-to-back against the rogues.
The two living, fighting people became two bodies.
Harper’s heart fro
ze as she recognized them.
Violet and James Petrov lay in a black ring on the ground, silver fire sparking from the center.
Dead.
But who had killed them? Had the orb…?
I’ll take care of the rest. Lilith’s voice echoed in Harper’s head. She closed her eyes against the scene.
“Harper!” Tyson yelled, pointing up. She looked to the sky as the shimmering green wards became visible and collapsed towards the ground, making a sound like a knife slicing through the air. They had to get out of there. Harper tilted her wings, steering them away from the field.
James and Violet were dead. And Harper as good as killed them.
The thought repeated with every beat of her wings as she flew out over the forest, past the cliff where Fletcher kissed her, beyond the border of the camp. No wards rose to keep them in.
Harper’s arms ached—more from the position she held Tyson in than from fatigue. His weight made her top-heavy, and her wings strained to hold the odd position as she flew. She’d have to touch down soon, but she didn’t want to risk getting caught. If she could leave the camp, so could the rogues. So could everyone else. Would they take the opportunity and run to freedom?
Harper’s left wing faltered in the next downbeat, and she tipped dangerously to one side. Tyson gripped her neck tighter and let out a strained sound.
“I have to go down.” The wind carried Harper’s words behind her. Tyson’s arms tightened again and he nearly choked her. She angled her wings into a shallow dive, the extra weight making her fall faster than she would have liked. She could see a bit of a clearing in the forest below, and she aimed toward it. She had to dodge a few trees, getting whipped in the face by the branches they fell past.
Harper’s knees buckled as she crashed, rolling on top of Tyson. They scrambled to free themselves from the tangle of arms, legs, and the backpack, but eventually they got sorted out, sitting a few feet away from each other and panting.
Tyson wouldn’t make eye contact. Or maybe he was just in shock after everything he saw back there. Harper stared blankly forward, her mind struggling to process. He moved first, taking off his remaining shoe and tossing it to the ground.
“Do you have a knife on you?” Harper asked, coming out of her stupor. The look Tyson gave her was part terror, part suspicion. She rolled her eyes and reached out her hand. “It’s important.”
He hesitated, then swung his backpack to the ground, unzipped the bag, and dug around until he took out a large package. He unwrapped it to reveal a curved knife unlike anything she’d seen before. Harper’s eyes widened.
“What is that thing?”
“It’s an Inuit ulu knife. A gift from my grandmother.”
“I think I would like your grandmother,” Harper said. Tyson moved closer, holding the knife in a nervous grip that he kept adjusting like he’d never held it before. “You can give it to me, I know what I need to do.”
Tyson licked his lips. “I don’t think I can. It’s…it’s something from my ancestors. I can’t just give it to anyone.”
“Fine. Cut here.” Harper gestured toward the spot on the inside of her arm near the crook of her elbow where she felt the raised bump. “Just a shallow slice.”
Tyson looked at her like she’d grown a second head. “No way, Harper.”
“I’m not asking you to kill anyone, just cut me! Just a little. Unless you want an army to come down on us at any moment. There’s a tracker just beneath the skin. It’s small, and I think I can get it out and destroy it. If I don’t, we might as well sit here and wait until they find us.” Harper stared at Tyson, hoping her serious expression drove home the importance of what she said, and that he didn’t suddenly change his mind about helping her.
“Where do I need to cut?” he asked, coming closer and kneeling next to her arm.
Harper put her finger just above the hard bump in her arm. “Cut below here. Start small, I don’t have any bandages.”
His hand shook when he lifted the knife.
“Take a breath,” Harper reminded him. He set the tip of the ulu knife against her skin and cut in a swift, short motion. Blood welled up instantly and she pressed down hard on either side like popping a pimple. She bit her lip against the pain but couldn’t keep from yelling, startling birds from the trees. Something moved, and in a spurt of blood, a sleek metal object, like a rice grain-sized bullet, slid from her arm and fell into the dirt on the ground.
The blood continued seeping out of the cut. “Something to stop this, quick.”
“You didn’t think of that before?” Tyson said, voice pitched higher than normal. He crawled back to the backpack and produced a handkerchief from nowhere, like a magician. Harper snatched it and pressed the cloth against the wound.
“Tie it around,” Harper commanded. Tyson grabbed either end of the fabric and threaded it under her arm, pulling. “Tighter. Not tourniquet tight, just tighter.”
He did a decent job, but Harper held her opposite hand on it to apply extra pressure.
“You don’t happen to have a first aid kit, do you?”
“Not that prepared,” Tyson said. He stared at the drying blood where it streaked down Harper’s arm.
“We'll need to smash it.” Harper’s voice jarred Tyson from his trance, and he walked around the clearing until he returned with two rocks in hand. He set the flatter one down and picked up the bloody metal object between two fingers. It rolled down the rock a few times before he got it to balance.
“Do you want to?” He gestured at the tracking device.
Harper lifted her still-bleeding arm.
“Oh, right.” He picked up the other rock, adjusting his grip, then brought it down hard. The rocks clacked together and there was a promising crunch sound. Tyson lifted the top rock. It looked more like a squashed bug than a surveillance device.
Harper released her grip on her arm and held her uninjured hand out toward Tyson. He stared at it as if it was a snake that might bite him.
“We need to get away from this spot. Otherwise, they'll see the last transmitted location and come here.” Harper wasn’t entirely sure who “they” was. With James and Violet dead, Lilith would take over the camp, and she wouldn’t send anyone after them, would she? The wolf pack could still be hunting them. If Lilith withheld truth about what the orb would do, Harper wouldn’t put it past her to decide she needed Harper for something else.
“Oh, right.” He said again, clasping her hand and pulling her up. They locked eyes. Harper tried not to look away.
“Is that the result you wanted?” Tyson finally asked.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“You need to talk about it, and I need to know.” He jabbed a finger into his chest.
“Why do you need to know? Why is it so important that you know everything about the way everyone thinks? It didn’t help Fletcher, and I don’t believe for a second that you care that much about me. So, why?”
He looked stunned, his eyes wide, his breath heaving. His fingers flexed and he glanced around the clearing, avoiding Harper. She must have struck a nerve. The back of her throat started aching, and she swallowed repeatedly. She didn’t need anyone digging around in her feelings, least of all him.
He breathed in deeply, then blew the air out in a rush. “Okay. You don’t want to talk about it.” He paused, then cleared his throat. “We should figure out our next step. Aberration Management has Becca and Quinn. How can we get them back?”
“Who?” Harper asked, confused. She recognized the first name as his cousin. Was Becca with someone?
“Becca and Quinn. You know? The whole reason you busted out of camp.”
Harper had busted out of camp to find her parents. She gave Tyson an odd look, who stared right back until he gave up and knelt down to pick up the ulu knife on the ground next to his backpack. As soon as his fingers brushed the bone handle his eyes rolled back into his head and his body convulsed.
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“Tyson? Tyson!” Despite everything Harper just said about not caring, she ran to his side. Could she touch him? His limbs seemed locked up, and his eyelids flickered like he was asleep.
Harper nudged his shoulder, and he gasped. She shrieked, falling onto her backside. His eyes opened. Light faded from his irises as they returned to normal dilation.
“What the hell, Tyson?”
He looked from the knife to Harper. “I think I know where to find Becca and Quinn.”
That name again. It sent the strangest clenching sensation down Harper’s spine in a wave, and she shivered. “How?”
“The knife apparently gives me visions. Recent development.” One he wasn’t a fan of, based on his strained expression. He slid the curved blade into a velvety black pouch and zipped the pack. “I’ve had a few. Visions, I mean. Some of them are strange, like I’m another person in another land. I see the Northern Lights.”
“Is that what you saw? Becca and…Quinn? There?”
He clicked his tongue. “I saw a raven cawing on a rock, and a serpent coiled beneath it. I don’t know what that means. But I also saw mountains standing like an open gate to this wilderness… I have a strong feeling that north is the direction we need to go.”
Harper studied his face. “You don’t like it.”
He nodded, jaw tightening. “It’s new. Frightening.”
Harper couldn’t keep the stupid grin off her face. “That’s why you helped me! You’re one of us, now. They wouldn’t want you working for the camp, they would want you in the camp if you were found out! Hell. Do you have any witch blood?”
Tyson clenched his fists, then released them, flexing his fingers. “It’s strange that I never knew before. I mean, shouldn’t there have been a sign earlier, in my childhood?”
“There might have been. You just weren’t looking. Or maybe it’s something that was meant to wake up later when the right conditions were met. That knife is strange. Have you had it all this time?”
He considered, then shook his head. “Aberration Management is supposed to be based in an isolated, unknown location. Maybe Montana?”
