by Annie Bellet
“No!” Helena burst from the cabin. Alek grabbed her and she struggled against him.
The woman in Ethan’s memory had been frail, clearly sick but still beautiful. The woman in Alek’s arm digging her fingers into his flesh was a shadow of that. Her grey-green eyes were sunken, buried by dark puffy circles. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, its red-gold color dull even in the sunlight. Her bones were like sticks beneath skin stretched and thin as tissue paper. Memory-Helena had looked like a doll. This Helena looked like a bad papier-mâché reconstruction of that doll.
“Let her go,” I said to Alek. She was a sick human and for all that Ethan was evil and she had probably been complicit in that, I had no intention of killing her. Life would do that soon enough.
I didn’t even look to where Harper hovered nearby. She was probably on the side of “kill everyone who might be an enemy” but I was tired.
“You killed him?” Helena said as she staggered toward.
“He was evil,” I said as I dropped the remains of his heart onto the ground. I could only imagine how I looked. Covered in grit and blood, my hair a ragged nest. I’m sure I sounded really convincing but I had no words to explain to her what I’d seen in Ethan’s mind. Likely she knew in her heart what he was, how he truly perceived her. This woman was going to need a lot of therapy. I suppressed the giggle that rose unbidden. I was definitely reaching my limits.
She fell to her knees beside him, blood soaking into her white dress as she grabbed at Ethan’s hand.
“I was going to be a vampire,” she said. She dropped his lifeless hand and stared at the blood pooling around her knees.
“You weren’t,” I said. “The vampire lied. He was using you both.”
Helena nodded slowly. She seemed strangely calm. I had expected tears or screaming. I mean, either or both would be rational responses to someone ripping out your lover’s heart, I imagined. I had a feeling that being with Ethan might have done terrible things to her psyche already. A memory threatened, not one of mine, and I quickly threw a silver circle around it in my head. I did not want to know. Nope.
“Are you going to kill me?” Her gaze rose from the blood to search my face.
“No,” I said as gently as I could manage. “He was the threat, not you.” I hoped. She didn’t look like she could manage to punch out a cricket, but I took a short step back anyway before motioning to Alek. “Let’s put her in a vehicle I guess. We’ll drop you somewhere,” I added for Helena’s sake.
She took advantage of my distraction and grabbed the gun beside Ethan. Alek lunged for her at the same time I did.
We were both too late. She turned the barrel toward her face and pulled the trigger even as my hands closed on her arms.
There was no plumbing in the cabins but Ethan’s people had been well supplied and Alek found enough water and a towel to clean the worst of the blood and grime from me. Aurelio’s pack had shifted to human to do the work of moving the bodies.
“Take her home,” he told Alek as I staggered to my feet. “We’ll bury them and clean all this up.”
I was surprised I was still conscious but there was more to do if we were not going to leave a murder field behind.
“Thank you,” Alek said.
“I would argue, but I won’t,” I said. “I’m sorry about your people.” I didn’t even know their names, I realized, but was too exhausted to ask.
“It would have been worse without you,” he said. “Bird, Snowdrop, and Always Singing would be dead. Or worse.”
Ethan had definitely intended worse, but I didn’t tell him that.
“You coming?” I said instead to Harper. She was hovering silently a few feet away.
“No,” she said. Then she burst forward and wrapped her arms around me.
It hurt like hell but I returned the hug and let her cling, leaning into her strong body and fighting the sudden tears that blurred my vision.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not mad anymore. I know you just want to protect us.”
“Hey, furball, it’s okay,” I murmured into her hair. I pulled back a little so I could look her in the eye. “You were right. I should have told you. When we get back, when Ezee is back, we’re going to talk. No more secrets. It’s not always easy for me to explain but I’m going to try, okay?”
Harper nodded. “I’m glad you aren’t dead.”
“Me, too.” I didn’t mention how much having her arms around my damaged ribs was killing me. Or that I was leaning on her partially because I was maybe minutes from passing the fuck out. “You coming? Alek found keys to the cars. We don’t have to hike back.”
“No,” Harper said, letting me go. I tried not to stagger, or sigh with relief. “I’m going to stay and help out, then go back with Softpaw’s pack. I could use the thinking time, you know?”
“Yeah, I know. See you tomorrow?” I wrapped a hand around my talisman, feeling Samir’s heart still there, a tiny reminder of the problems ahead of us.
Alek picked me up and I didn’t even have the energy to protest. I rested my head against his chest until he set me down in the passenger side of the old truck.
“Not a jeep? They look nicer,” I said.
“Leg room,” Alek replied as he buckled me in and then closed the door.
It was easy to forget sometimes that he was half a foot or more taller than most people. He always seemed to manage in my regular-people-sized car, though I usually did the driving.
“You know how to get out of here?” Alek asked me as he started the engine.
“Follow the logging path,” I said. I closed my eyes and found the route in Ethan’s memories, deftly dodging anything except the information I wanted. It was a sign of how many people I’d eaten I guess that I could do that even when exhausted. I pushed that grim thought away and pulled out my phone.
I’d left a message for Lara and for Levi before we’d come out here but I imagined they were worried. My phone turned on after an agonizing moment. The screen crack appeared superficial as I was able to swipe the unlock code. No bars, no service. “Hey we aren’t all dead” texts would have to wait.
The road was overgrown and the ride was a mess of bumps and bounces. It was full dark by the time we reached a real road and I’d added about twenty bruises to my collection. Alek guided the truck onto the proper asphalt and I sagged in the seat.
“Sleep, Jade,” he said, his teeth flashing white in the blue light from the dashboard. “I can take us home from here.”
There were only so many roads into Wylde that I knew he was right.
“I’m almost afraid to rest,” I said. “What’s waiting for us?” I wanted to strangle myself for confessing the fears aloud but they were rattling around in my head, fueled by my own tiredness.
“Whatever is waiting, we’ll face it.” Alek’s voice was soft, gentle. Confident.
“You do, you know,” I said, closing my eyes. I loosened my seat belt so I could lay across the bench seat and rest my aching cheek on his thigh. “Protect me, I mean. You keep me safe.”
“I will always keep you safe,” Alek said, his voice suspiciously rough. I felt him take a very deep breath.
“He asked me what I would do to save you,” I said. My body felt light, the pain fading back as unconsciousness crept over me like a familiar blanket. “Everything. He didn’t understand but I do. Because I did it for you.” I knew I wasn’t making sense but the fog in my mind refused to form better words.
I’d changed the world for the people I’d loved. I’d change it again if I had to. I hoped, as I drifted into the darkness, that my found family, my mate, that they understood.
“I know, kitten. I remember,” came the softly spoken words that sang me to sleep.
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Also by Annie Bellet:
The Gryphonpike Chronicles:
Witch Hunt
Twice Drowned Dragon
A Stone’s Throw
Dead of Knight
The Barrows (Omnibus Vol.1)
Brood Mother
Into the North
Chwedl Duology:
A Heart in Sun and Shadow
The Raven King (Winter 2020)
Pyrrh Considerable Crimes Division Series:
Avarice
Wrath (Fall 2019)
Short Story Collections:
Till Human Voices Wake Us
Dusk and Shiver
Forgotten Tigers and Other Stories
About the Author
Annie Bellet lives and writes in the Netherlands. She is the USA Today bestselling author of the Gryphonpike Chronicles and the Twenty-Sided Sorceress series. Follow her at her website at www.anniebellet.com
