by Lucy Lyons
I coughed and tried to laugh, too weak to open my eyes or move my lips. Water sloshed into my mouth, and I tried again, shuddering as the fire in my body raged on despite the shade and the cool water being poured over me.
“He’s not a Cetan, Ash. He’s a Naga, or a dragon, which honestly is splitting hairs anyway,” I babbled, fighting to think around the mush in my head. “Fire-breathing, poisonous Fae. Man, I wish I’d never applied at the dojo and started us down this path. I’m so sorry, Ash.”
“Oh, shut up. You’ve got this. We’ve got this. But we have to get Somayo down the mountain, and that means you have to get the hell up and move,” she commanded me, and I was lifted to my feet. I smelled Ashlynn’s shampoo and almost immediately, her hair was pushed into my face by the breeze as she wiped my face with a soft cloth. I forced my eyes open and managed to peer around as I blinked rapidly, trying to clear the murky edges of my vision.
“What’s the difference between a Naga and a dragon?” she asked as I hung my arm over her shoulder and nodded my thanks to Jasiri, who had helped me to my feet.
“Where’s Somayo?” I cast around us, but we were alone just inside the city wall between the kapu tree and the crumbling stone of the outer wall.
“We got him outside the wall, but he got clawed by that thing. It tore right into his abdomen.” Ashlynn’s words were matter of fact, but I could feel the stress and pain vibrating off her as we limped through the rubble together.
My legs were getting stronger with each step, and by the time we crawled over the last of the rocks, I could stand on my own, but I didn’t know how I was going be any help getting Somayo down the mountain path.
I glanced at the sun, shocked by how much later in the day it was. I tried to reach Onyxis mentally, but whatever Vash had poisoned me with had shut down every bit of power I had, from my psychic abilities to the beast inside me. Realizing I couldn’t call my wolf, I panicked. If he stolen my wild magic, I wouldn’t be a werewolf anymore, and Ashlynn would have no need of me as her mate.
But if he’d done all that damage to me, what had he done to Somayo? I staggered to where Simi held him in her arms, staring wide-eyed at me as she held gauze to his stomach and tried to stop the bleeding.
“How long ago was he hit?” I managed to ask her, satisfied that at least I wasn’t drooling on myself.
“It’s been over an hour. He’s been poisoned, and he’s burning up, Clay. What do we do?”
“We have to get him to Maria and Onyxis. I was treated for a similar poison, but I can’t access my power. He stole my wild magic, and I can’t call the other Fae.”
“Fortunately, we’re not completely averse to technology, and you don’t have to,” quipped Portia from behind me. She pushed past me to Somayo’s side and hissed, covering her nose when she got close to his wound. “My brother always was the deadlier of the two of us,” she muttered. “Always father’s favorite.” She pulled the gauze away from the putrefaction that had already started to form around the tear in his gut. “I’ll get him to camp. You take Clay.” As she directed us, she lifted the 200-pound man into her arms without any apparent effort and turned away. In a blink, she’d disappeared, leaving two terrified trackers muttering in Portuguese about devils and magic.
“What the hell just happened, Clay?” Simi gasped, still staring in the direction Portia had started walking before she blinked out of sight.
“I think Portia just wasted glamour on us so we’d be impressed with her power,” Ashlynn broke in before I could answer. I jerked my thumb in my mate’s direction and nodded.
“What she said. I don’t care if she sprouted real wings and flew down like an archangel, as long as she saves him,” I added, and Simi and Ashlynn both nodded.
“But what about the Quetzalcoatl?” Jasiri reminded us. “If he’s truly freed, he could bathe the entire world in blood and we couldn’t stop him.”
“I don’t know what to do, Jasiri. I’m sorry,” I stammered. I glanced over my shoulder at the crumbling city behind me. “Why isn’t he attacking us now?”
“Because he’s still wounded,” Jasiri replied, “or because he gets satisfaction from making us suffer the agony of anticipating our own deaths,” he suggested.
“Yeah, or he didn’t really break his chains and you’ve been playing us,” offered Ashlynn with a growl.
“No, Ash. Don’t. I was there, remember? I saw him trying to complete the ritual, and I watched it fail. This is my fault, and I don’t want to point fingers at anyone else for my failure.” Stabbing pain in my gut bent me in half, and I clenched my teeth to avoid groaning aloud.
“She has a point though, Clay,” Jasiri broke in as he threw my arm over his back and lifted me to an upright position. “He should be leveling the valley right now, and he’s not. Why would that be, unless something more powerful than you or I have his leash?”
“We have to get back to camp and see to Somayo. Just pray that whatever’s holding him back continues to do so for a few more hours. We need reinforcements.” I glanced at Ashlynn, and she nodded her agreement.
We’d tried to leave Nick and his clan out of the Fae politics, and kept our pack from danger since the attack on Rae and her baby. But safety and distance were a luxury we could no longer afford. Even if Vash stayed in Brazil, that clearing of charred bodies at the base of the cliffs and the ones at the morgue were enough to keep us from walking away. But there was no reason to believe he’d ever stop killing now that he was free. If he was full-blooded Fae, he could use whatever magical highways we’d seen Maria and the other Fae use to travel instantly from one place to another.
I tried again to shift into wolf form, but my beast lay inert inside me, completely suppressed by the poison my body was fighting. If I could’ve shifted, I would have an easier time fighting the slow creep of fire through my sludge-filled veins, but without that ability, I was afraid I wouldn’t make it back to camp in time to see my friend before he died, let alone help to save him.
Ashlynn stripped out of her clothing and, ignoring an appreciative glance from the werejaguar, shifted into her half-wolf form. She lifted me over her shoulder in a fireman carry and jostled me into place as I groaned in pain. I felt an apology from her, but my mind wasn’t strong enough yet to comprehend.
“I forgive you, unless you were telling me to man up, in which case I’ll make sure to pay you back later,” I joked feebly as I hung with my head just over her feathered tail. I hadn’t ever paid attention to the details of her coloring and the softness of her fur in that form before and made a mental note to take more time away from Fae business, or vampire business, to spend time with my pack, drawing closer to one another and learning those small details. It was the little things that could make a difference in battle, and I wanted my people to have every advantage.
Ashlynn chose speed over my comfort, which I knew I’d be grateful for after I’d healed, but cursed in the moment as the path bounced by under me, loose stones skipping over the edge and clacking against larger boulders below. I was forced to finally close my eyes to avoid the motion sickness the jostling was giving me and focused on the pain in my chest and abdomen with each bounce.
Ashlynn reached the bottom in record time, but Jasiri and Simi weren’t far behind, and Simi leapt into the Humvee behind the driver’s seat as Ashlynn placed me under the canvas canopy that covered the back and scooted in next to me, using the clothes that Simi tossed her as a pillow to brace my head and neck from the rough terrain we were driving over.
Jasiri waited until we were all in the vehicle, then he finally shifted, black, glossy fur flowing over him until he stood in his full jaguar form. He glanced back at us then shot back of the path, presumably to keep watch and try to prevent Vash from doing anything rash and hurting more people before we could get him back to Fairy.
Despite my wounds, part of me hurt for the werejaguar who’d lost his family because he wasn’t a murderer. Now he stood to be possibly the last of his kind, and according
to the lore he’d shared with us, only magic that no longer existed in the world could give him jaguar companions.
Somehow Ashlynn was following my thinking even though I couldn’t feel her presence. She gripped my hand and spoke aloud with difficulty through her elongated teeth and the short muzzle of her “wolfman” form.
“At least he can’t create more jaguars accidentally, like wolves can. That makes him more Fae than we are, I think,” she pondered, and I sighed, unsure of anything other than the complications that magic brought to an already dangerous and unpredictable world. “Thankfully, jaguars aren’t pack animals, so he isn’t likely to lose his sanity form being the only one.”
“I dunno, Ash,” I muttered. “Jaguars might not be, but humans are herd animals. I saw the pain in his eyes over Somayo’s injuries. If he feels he failed us, who knows what he’ll do to make amends? He was raised to be a guardian. If he can’t find another path, he’ll just be lost.”
“You found your way,” she reminded me. It had taken me a long time to come to terms with being one of the monsters after so many years of hunting them. What I’d found was a world far more complex and beautiful than anything I’d been taught as a Venatores. I’d found loyalty and sacrifice and selflessness among the so-called monsters that I’d rarely seen in the human hunters I’d been raised with, and once my beast had recognized Ashlynn’s, I could never have gone back, even if they would’ve taken me.
Somayo was the best the Venatores had to offer, both in skill and in logic and sound judgment. If we couldn’t save him, it meant one less rational mind less on the other side, to prevent an all-out war between our people. Mentally, I urged Simi to drive faster despite the painful rollicking of the Humvee. I didn’t expect her to hear me, but even so, the engine roared louder as she accelerated out of the jungle and raced down the narrow dirt road toward camp, and the man she loved.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Simi braked hard, and I heard the door slam before I’d finished choking on the dirt the tires kicked up as we slid to a stop. Ashlynn had shifted back, and I handed her the clothes as I slowly sat up and slid myself to the edge of the bumper and shakily stood. I was already feeling a little stronger than I had been, and when a hand appeared in my view I waved it off, only to have Caroline pull me into a hug anyway.
“How did you get here?” I asked, so shocked that it didn’t occur to me to be polite.
“Onyxis summoned us last night. We got the jet ready, loaded some coffins for the sun-allergic, and came straight down.” She released me and winced at my wounds. “Why aren’t you healing?”
“The same reason I can’t seem to hear anyone else in my head, I guess,” I offered. “I made myself immune to the venom in Portia’s talons, but her brother is a whole other kettle of fish.”
“Yeah, the Night Mother’s been filling us in for the las ten minutes. Somayo is in with your Fae and Nick.” She paused and touched my shoulder. “They’re doing everything they can, but I don’t know if they can save Somayo, Clay.”
“I don’t even know if changing him into one of us would make a difference, Caroline. The Quetzalcoatl wasn’t anything like I expected.”
“It was supposed to be like old times, the best of the Venatores hunting a murderous creature. What changed?” she asked and I shrugged as I tried to find the words.
“The bad guy turned out to be someone else’s victim, and even if we did want to kill him, he’s more powerful than anything we’ve ever encountered,” Ashlynn answered for me. “We can’t take on full-blooded Fae, Caroline,” she added. “If they ever come for us, we’re dead.”
I nodded and took Ashlynn’s hand, heartened when I felt a groggy, wounded, beast rouse at her touch. Without another word, I headed toward the tent I’d seen Simi run to, hoping that between Vash’s family and Onyxis, they’d found a cure for the venom in his system. There weren’t any humans left in the campsite, and when I asked Caroline if they’d been scared off, she replied that they’d gone for the priest at Somayo’s request for last rites.
I still couldn’t shift, but as my pain decreased and my limbs started to function normally again, I wasn’t as worried that the Quetzalcoatl had broken me. I didn’t want to tell Ashlynn or Caroline how scared I’d been to think I was going to wake up a normal human being. I’d prayed for it for months after my change, but I would never trade the life I had for all the commemorations and promotions the Venatores had to offer.
Hopefully, Somayo felt the same, and he’d let me share my blood with him with the intent to give him not only my stronger immunity to the poison but my fast healing as well. The only risk was that he’d end up a wolf, like us.
The tent was dimly lit by wisps conjured by one of the Fae women, and all three were gathered around the head of the gurney with Nick by Somayo’s side holding his hand and speaking softly to him while the women pied their magic and tried to keep him whole. Nick glanced at me when I slipped through the tent flaps, and Ashlynn and Caroline followed me. It took a moment for my now human eyes to adjust to the low light, but soon I found Simi, her back to the wall of the tent, rocking slightly on the balls of her feet as she mouthed words I knew belonged to a prayer. Her fingers moved over her the rosary in her hands, and she didn’t stop praying even when Ashlynn and Caroline went to her side.
“Nick,” I murmured in a low voice as I approached him, “I was hurt too, but I’m fighting the poison. A blood transfusion might give him the same chance.”
“A blood transfusion might give him a fur coat, Clay. He’s out cold. We can’t make that choice for him. You know that,” he replied. “I thought about it too. I’m almost a hundred percent sure I could save him if I made him like me. But would he ever forgive me? Would the human hunters use it as the ignitor to start the war we’ve been trying so hard to avoid?’
“We can’t just let him die, Nick,” I hissed, glancing back at Simi. “I can’t do that to Simi.”
“You think because she’s helped us that she’s ready to turn her back on the Venatores?” he scoffed. “Your friend helps because she is that. Your friend. She doesn’t care about my people. She cares about you and Caroline and Professor Eldritch and even Dominique. Because to her, you’re all Venatores.”
“We’re not Venatores, Nick.” I placed my hand next to his on Somayo’s arm. “She loves him. If anyone could hold onto love in spite of what we’re suggesting, it’s her.”
Somayo’s arm tensed under my hand and Nick blinked, shock flitting over his carefully neutral face then disappearing behind his cool gaze. He turned his head and motioned at Caroline, who brought Simi with her to the table. Ashlynn joined me, her hand rubbing my back in slow circles, the touch calming her nerves and mine.
“Somayo, are you with us?” Caroline asked, and I felt her energy cascading over him as she tried to strengthen him with magic I wished we’d had on the mountain plateau. I simply held on to him, with Ashlynn at my back, trying to find the wild magic in me to help him, coax him to join us, the way wild magic has a habit of doing. Portia was mixing herbs and applying a fresh batch to his wounds, and Maria lifted his head and poured a shimmering liquid down his throat, then massaged it to force him to swallow.
“It’s awful stuff,” she confessed to the group, “but it counters the venom and will ease his suffering. Be grateful that our good doctor let you have it in your butt cheek instead of having to drink it,” she reminded me, and I managed a weak smile despite how hopeless her voice seemed to me.
“We need him conscious, Night Mother,” Nick interjected. “He needs to know he has a choice. You know we can save him.”
“So can we, creature,” Portia spat, “if his woman would just let us take him to Fairy.”
“No!” Ashlynn, Caroline and I blurted in unison. Simi was silent, her bottom lip between her teeth as she tried to hold back tears.
“We know the old stories too, Portia,” I reminded her. “The ones where humans go to Fairy but fail to be returned . . . promptly. We don’t w
ant you healing him to make him a slave to the Fae.” The Cetan bristled, and her feathers trembled, whispering against each other as she shook with rage.
“We would not keep him, Clay,” Maria chided me. “Surely you know that.”
“I believe you wouldn’t, Master Shedu,” I agreed. “But I know there are others who will not be so honorable.” I glanced at Simi and she nodded. “Including the one who drove your son insane and left him here to eradicate humankind.”
I felt Nick stiffen next to me, and Caroline gasped. I squeezed Somayo’s arm and begged whatever God existed to let me into his mind so I could speak to him while he was in his semi-conscious state. We all stood vigil over him until his breathing slowed, and I felt his pulse fading under my fingers. None of us spoke, but Simi realized what was happening and a sob wrenched from her throat as she flung herself across his body, apologizing and babbling as she wept.
“Take him, Nicholas. Make him one of yours. Or you, Clay, take him to your sacred place. He may never forgive me, but I can’t just let him die. Please don’t let the fairies take him.” She let Caroline lift her off his body, and we exchanged a look over our friends.
“Do what you have to do, Clay. Simi is the closest thing to permission we’re going to get. He may hate us all, but what if he doesn’t? What if letting him go is the wrong choice?”
I didn’t have a response for my friend. My choice had been taken away, and the rage had turned me into a monster until Caroline had saved me. If we did the same to Somayo, could we bring him back?
