I was terrified and desperate with no idea how to use my powers against him. The only form of attack I had used previously was pushing darkness into the Red Cap and I had done that inadvertently. If I could repeat the trick, maybe I could get us out of there alive, but it would require me to get close enough to touch him. A spark of hope flared to life in my chest as I dropped my hands. “Maybe you can get it off, use your magic. I don’t know how to do it.” I turned my back to him and lifted my hair to reveal my neck. I hoped that the vulnerable position I had offered would set him at ease and minimize his suspicions.
He yelled out in frustration and when I whipped around in surprise I watched in horror as he took the hand holding the knife and slammed it into Ashley’s temple. The impact made a sickening crunch before her body fell limply to the ground.
I cried out and made to lunge for Ashley but Ronan yelled for me to stay where I was and turn back around. Too stunned and horrified to argue with him, I slowly turned back around. Ashley had just been knocked out, that was all, she’ll be okay. Hopefully that would keep her out of further danger. I tried to reassure myself as I listened to his footsteps draw closer.
It wasn’t easy to remain still as he walked toward me, but I reminded myself that letting him near me was the only way I knew how to stop him. Ashley desperately needed my help and it was my fault to begin with that she was in this situation.
As he approached I could smell the same cologne he had worn the night he tricked me into having sex with him and my stomach instantly seized up with disgust, causing me to dry heave. To help hide the movement, I raised my arms and lifted the hair from my neck.
His hands softly touched my arms and slowly slid in toward my shoulders and finally to my neck. Flashes from that night assaulted me and my tears returned as I sobbed uncontrollably. I tried desperately to gather my wits and calm myself down but the intensity of the situation had me running on pure emotion.
“Quiet, I can’t very well do this with you shaking all over the place.” He chided softly in my ear. Knowing he couldn’t see me, I cringed from his nearness and at the sheer insanity emanating off this man that I thought I had known.
He may have been hoping to calm me down, but his words were just what I needed to rekindle my anger. What an asshole! This whole situation was his fault—he attacked us, he was the crazy one, and he wanted me to calm down so it would be easier for him? Oh, hell no.
I took in several deep breaths and attempted to quiet my shaking body. He grunted with frustration behind me as he worked at the clasp, entirely focused on his task. I could do this, I had to do it. I had no doubt he would kill me if I didn’t kill him first.
I spun around with lightning speed I hadn’t known I possessed and slapped both of my hands onto his face. For a split second he stood stunned, his brown eyes looked startled into an innocence that hinted at the sweet boy-next-door I had initially believed him to be.
Almost immediately the telltale tendrils of darkness extended under his skin before he screamed out in pain and flung me with his magic. My back slammed into the brick wall and instantly my arms and legs were immobilized with invisible bindings into a prone position.
He bent over gasping for breath, holding his face where the black veins were still visible but slowly fading. “Fucking bitch! You have no idea who you’re up against. Morgan of the Lake has been plotting her uprising for centuries—do you really think she’s going to let Merlin and a pathetic human get in her way? The necklace may be spelled to stay on you, but once your head is removed it should come off quite nicely," he spat viciously at me.
As his breathing calmed and he stood tall, his eyes were drawn to my purse that had been dropped on the wet pavers. Ronan turned over the carry-all purse, scattering the multitude of contents across the ground. He paused, head tilting to the side, and terror ran through me. Innocuously piled with my hair brush, gum and lipstick was the black blade that Lochlan had given me. Ronan gently picked up the knife and as he turned in my direction his lips widened into a sickening grin.
“This will do nicely, he’s nothing if not predictable. Lochlan ever tell you that I was the one who gave him that pretty scar on his eyebrow? I’ve always had an affinity for a good blade and thinking of him finding you sliced open with his own blade…I think I’m getting a hard-on.”
“Was any of this ever about me, or has it always just been about Lochlan?” I asked, hoping to give myself time to come up with a way out of that alley. His words and my vulnerable position terrified me, but every time I started to panic I reminded myself that crying and begging wasn’t going to help me.
“Of course it had nothing to do with you, at least not in the beginning. Lochlan told us there was a part-Fae woman in Belfast and I was intrigued. I learned what I could about you and passed it on to Morgan, she wanted me to get close to you.” He spoke matter-of-factly as he stepped slowly toward me. “When I saw how Lochlan looked at you, I knew I had to turn you from him. I would have preferred you fall for me and we could have set out on our campaign together, but killing you will also achieve my goal.”
“You seem to think Lochlan cares for me far more than he actually does—doing this isn’t going to mean anything to him.” I argued with Ronan as he came to stand directly in front of me.
His only response was a smile as he lifted the knife and sliced into my exposed wrists, eyes on my face the entire time to absorb the emotions crossing my face.
I cried out in pain—I would have preferred to not give him the satisfaction, but that shit hurt. Seeing blood pour from my opened wrists and drip onto the pavement made my head feel like I had just stepped off an amusement park ride. I attempted to remind myself that I healed quickly, and his cuts across my wrist were less damaging than if he’d cut the length of my forearm, but my rational mind did little to calm the chaos of my emotions. My head swam with dizziness and I tried to swallow down the bile rising in my throat.
“Please don’t do this. Just take the necklace, you don’t have to kill me.” I pleaded with him in a voice hoarse from my previous crying.
“I’m afraid I do. We can’t have Merlin getting in our way and once Morgan has this necklace, she’ll be unstoppable.” His eyes danced with excitement as they dropped to my necklace, drunk on the possibility of possessing its power.
He brought the knife up between us and tilted his head as if examining the blood on the blade like a child fascinated by watching salt shrivel up a slug. His eyes dropped again to my throat and I couldn’t get enough air—shallow breaths puffed from my lips as my heart pounded in my chest.
How was this happening? Why couldn’t I use magic and get myself free? I tried to concentrate enough to feel the warm swell of power but when he brought the knife to my pulsing neck, terror seized me and all I could do was struggle in vain against the invisible binds holding me to the wall. The cold blade sliced into my flesh and pulled across the front of my neck. I opened my mouth on a silent scream as dizziness threatened to take me under.
Suddenly Ronan dropped the blade and screamed, gripping his head in both hands. With a grimace he lowered himself to his knees and as soon as he folded over, my magical bindings disappeared and I fell forward, stumbling away from him as far as I could manage. Pounding footsteps caught the attention of my fuzzy mind as Lochlan came charging down the alley with a murderous expression on his face.
Just as Lochlan was about to lay into him, Ronan swung out his arm and a magical blast flung Lochlan fifteen feet backwards where he hit the ground with a thud that made me shudder. Recovering quickly, Lochlan jumped to his feet but Ronan traced in behind him and wrapped his arms around Lochlan’s neck. Ronan gritted his teeth and positioned his hands as if to try to snap Lochlan’s neck while Lochlan slammed a vicious elbow to Ronan’s stomach.
Lochlan had a good forty pounds on Ronan and was able to fling Ronan over his back in order to remove Ronan from his neck. Ronan traced back up instantly and they began circling each other like wild animals, periodically striking out
and pounding each other with merciless aggression.
“You should keep a better watch on your pet. As soon as she took off that necklace, she couldn’t even see through a simple glamour.” He grinned a blood-streaked smile as he and Lochlan squared off. “It was so precious, watching her realize that she had fucked me instead of you.”
No! No, no, no, no … My eyes closed, but no tears fell and I had no energy to cry.
Lochlan had gone motionless and in the brief instant that his eyes cut over to me, Ronan made his move. He lunged at Lochlan, taking him to the ground and pouncing on top of him, landing blow after blow to Lochlan’s face until Lochlan caught his fists and the men grappled for control.
Despite the horror of the scene unfolding before me, I couldn’t seem to summon the appropriate fear and urgency. From my hands and knees, I rolled myself onto my side to lean on my elbow, laying myself on the filthy ground, which was no longer cold to the touch. I wasn’t sure if my skin had cooled to the temperature of the pavement, or if I simply couldn’t process the sensation of cold any longer. My head began to feel excruciatingly heavy and darkness threatened my vision.
As my head hung lower, one thing permeated the fog in my brain—the knife. Just a foot or so to my side was my knife. Using all the energy I had left, I rolled myself over toward the knife and only once it was in my numb fingers did I sit back on my knees.
Lochlan flipped Ronan over his body with a kick from his strong legs and Ronan flew into the wall where he landed in a heap. He was too disoriented to trace but quickly began to regain his bearings.
I rasped Lochlan’s name and his eyes flew to mine. Without another word I slid the knife across the pavement to him and in one motion he grabbed the handle and swept the blade up into the middle of Ronan’s chest.
Ronan had not yet made it to his feet and he staggered backward. His face contorted in shock and horror, eyes cast down at the hilt of the knife protruding from the center of his chest. He fell back to sit against the brick wall, his head leaned back and when his eyes rose to Lochlan’s his bloody lips rose in a smirk. “Morgan is going to kill you all.”
Lochlan lifted his booted foot and slammed his heel onto the knife, sending it even deeper into Ronan’s chest. His head lolled forward as Ronan slipped into unconsciousness.
Lochlan pulled out his phone as he hurried over to me.
“I need you and as many of the men as you can gather in the alley next to Murphy’s, now!” He dropped the phone and sank to his knees where I lay on the ground.
I hadn’t remembered lying down, but as he neared me I gazed up from the ground at his battered face. Even beaten and bloody he was gorgeous and if I was going to die, I was pleased his face would be the last thing I would see. Dying, I was dying, and Ashley was hurt.
“Ashley…” It left my lips more as an exhale than a sound and I listened as my heart rhythm slowed to a broken beat.
“No! No you don’t, stay with me—fuck!” I could tell he was yelling, but his words sounded far away.
Lochlan swept me up into his arms and as he began to run from the alley I lost the fight and let the darkness take me.
10
I drifted in a place where there was no time or space, experiencing periods of vague consciousness followed by nothingness. During my brief moments of awareness, regardless of how hard I tried to lift my eyelids, nothing moved. I swam in a thick ocean of sticky lethargy and as much as I tried to move forward, it held me in place, suspended like a fly in a web.
When I finally managed to open my eyes, I was met with more darkness. Blinking away the cobwebs, my eyes slowly focused and I scanned my foreign surroundings. I was tucked beneath the blankets of a large bed in a spacious, modern bedroom. There was minimal furniture and the few pieces I could see were smooth with contemporary lines.
“It’s good to see you awake.”
I startled at the gravelly voice to my right but quickly calmed as recognition dawned. Lochlan sat in a chair by a window covered with heavy drapes, his elbows resting on his knees and head lifted just enough to see me. His face showed recent signs of a struggle and images from the fight flashed in my mind. He and Ronan, fists pounding each other mercilessly.
“Ashley.” I croaked and then coughed uncontrollably from the discomfort and dryness in my heavily bandaged throat. As the fit subsided, I pulled myself up to a sitting position and looked at Lochlan, who had dropped his head back down to hang between his shoulders.
“Becca, I’m so sorry…” His deep voice trailed off, leaving me in confusion.
“What are you sorry for? What happened to Ashley?” My pulse pounded in my ears as panic set in.
He sat taller and met my eyes, the profound sadness in their depths stole the air from my lungs. “She’s alive, but she’s not doing well. We took her to the hospital with a bad head injury, the doctors don’t think she’s going to make it.” He spoke the words softly, but nothing he could have done would have eased the blow.
Tears streamed down my cheeks.
How could this have happened? I tried so hard to keep her protected, safely hidden away from the Fae. Ronan had brought her back here and used her to get to me.
I did this.
I brought her into this ruthless Fae world and now she was going to die, because of me. My chest felt like it was being ripped open, but I couldn’t bring myself to sob or rage—I deserved the pain. My penance was to suffer her loss, and I would not do anything to assuage my bleeding heart.
“There’s nothing you can do to help heal her?” My voice was lifeless, eyes staring at the wall without seeing.
“As we’ve talked about before, our bodies heal themselves rapidly, we have no need for healing magic. There are some Fae who have studied that art, but there would not be enough time to locate those individuals in Faery and get them back here in time to help her. And that’s assuming there was anything they could do.”
“I need you to take me to her.” I threw back the covers and slid to the edge of the bed, my back to Lochlan.
“She’s in intensive care and her visiting hours are limited, I’ll take you over there as soon you’re allowed to see her.”
“I need to go now, something could happen while I’m not there,” I asserted with more conviction as I stood and searched for my clothes. I wore my standard tank and underwear pajamas, and I couldn’t care less that someone had changed me while I was unconscious. All I cared about was getting to Ashley.
“They have my number with instructions to call me at the slightest change. You’re also still recovering, unless you’ve forgotten. Sit for a few minutes and then we’ll head to the hospital for the afternoon visiting hours.” His voice sounded worn, and if I had to guess, I would say he hadn’t slept the entire time I was unconscious.
I wasn’t thrilled with waiting even for a few minutes, but if we weren’t allowed to see her yet, there was little I could do about it. I sat back down on the bed with a sigh and faced Lochlan. “How long was I out?” My neck was still sore but my wrists were nearly healed.
“It’s two o’clock on Tuesday, so about fifteen hours.”
“And Ronan, is he dead?”
“Not yet, but he’s contained in the basement. I have been rather occupied and haven’t had a chance to interrogate him. Plus, I wanted you to have the opportunity to confront him, if you wanted to.” His voice was laced with a fury that still simmered beneath the surface.
I nodded but couldn’t seem to muster anything more. My heart was a void of emotion other than pain—gratitude, relief, worry, fear—a mixture of all the things I should feel were absent. In their place was a lake of pain, its water seeping into my nose and filling my lungs as I watched the surface fall farther and farther from my reach. Cold numbness was all that was left.
“How did you find us?”
“You’re usually on time for training, so when seven came and went, I knew something was off. I checked our security cameras and saw your car parked on the street and went out to f
ind you.” He paused and his eyes dropped to his hands. “I’m sorry I didn’t get there sooner.”
I could hear the sincere remorse in his voice, but no words came out to assure him it wasn’t his fault. Nothing I said would change the fact that Ashley was dying. It didn’t matter if we felt guilty or sad or if we screamed until our vocal chords gave out. She was dying because I didn’t do enough to keep her safe.
I abhorred the overwhelming guilt and would do anything to keep more blood from coating my hands. Ronan may be contained, but this Morgan he had been working with would no doubt prove just as brutal and heartless. I couldn’t allow her to wage her war and bring about more death to the people around me. I would not let Ashley’s death be in vain. I would dedicate myself to becoming a weapon, and I would do whatever necessary to stop these evil people.
“I’ll move in with you.”
I managed to catch Lochlan off guard and he was still for a moment before he dropped his chin in acknowledgement. “What was Ronan talking about when he said you mistook him for me? That day when you came to my office smelling of him—was what happened between the two of you not voluntary?” His voice dropped even lower and his body became taut with tension.
I felt empty but a single tear rolling down my cheek. “It’s irrelevant.” I said as my voice cracked.
Lochlan rose from his chair with the grace of a panther and stalked around the bed to where I sat. “It’s very relevant to me—did you think it had been me?” He struggled to control the rage in his voice, but his demand had no effect on me.
The one and only thing that was important was finding Morgan and killing her. Work, dating, my hopes and fears—nothing else even registered. I would not answer him because what happened with Ronan changed absolutely nothing. Whether he agreed or not, it was irrelevant. It was in the past and it would stay that way.
After several minutes, he understood that I was not going to cave and with a frustrated growl he put his fist through the wall.
I didn’t even flinch.
Twilight Siege: A Dark Fantasy Novel (The Fae Games Book 2) Page 10
