“There is no getting out of here,” a voice dripping with venom says. “You are mine now, witchling, and I cannot wait to spill your blood on the earth during the Blood Moon ritual and bring the power back to my pack where it belongs.”
Nathaniel steps out from the shadows and sneers at me, “We’ve been weakened ever since the Dama de Noches betrayed us and left, but with your blood, we can take back the mantle of power.”
He’s talking like a deranged supervillain.
“What would make you think killing me would give you any power back? The ritual needs sex and blood, Nathaniel.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I know exactly how the ritual is performed, and no one said anything about the sex needing to be consensual for it to work,” he says, laughing at my expression. “Yes, that’s right, you little abomination. I will fuck you until I’ve had my fill, and then I will slit your throat. And when the last of your blood soaks into the earth, we will rise. ”
We will rise … where have I heard that before?
The phrase is stuck in my head, but I can’t think of who I heard saying that recently.
“My idiot son lost the key to your cell, or I’d be playing with you right now, my queen,” he says in a mocking tone. “But once I have it, I’ll be sure to give you a proper welcome.” He grabs his crotch, and I can see all this talk of rape and blood had gotten him going.
I avert my eyes from his disgusting erection as a gagging sensation overwhelms me at the thought of this man touching me. I swallow down the urge to vomit; I need to know more, so I try to keep him talking.
“So, you’re going to take me and not your son? I thought he was going to be the next Death Claw alpha.”
“My son,” he spits, “is not fit to lead. He is a disgrace and even more of an abomination than yourself. I have given him so many chances to prove his worth—to prove that he is the type of leader who can bring our pack back from the brink. But he lacks the balls to do what needs to be done.” He cups his crotch again, “ I cannot wait to show you this.”
“Carter, Brad, get over here.” he bellows. “Carter, I want you to find my son and bring him to me, and Brad, I apologize that you can’t play with your new toy,” he stares at Chey, and she stifles a whimper, “but soon we’ll get these bars open, and you can have your fun. For now, why don’t you go play with their little traitor. I’m sure she’s healed enough for another round.”
His face splits into a wide grin, and I see him leave. Carter glances back at me and gives me a look I don’t understand before leaving the dungeon. Nathaniel grabs one of the bars surrounding us and hisses “I can’t get in yet, but I will, and I will have you many times before I have your blood,” he says, his voice underlining his intention. He holds up his palm, showing me the red welt. “And remember, I can’t get in, but also you can’t get out,” he says while smiling maliciously. “Adieu, my little pet.”
He retreats, and I hear his footsteps echo on the stairs as he leaves the basement. I hold my breath until I hear the door close with a soft snick, and then I begin to tremble. I’m convulsing with anger and fear, and I want to shriek with rage.
Suddenly, a wail pierces the air, “What was that?” I ask. The noise was like that of a wounded animal, full of pain and fury all at once.
Chey looks at me. The tears that had been threatening before now slide down her cheeks.
“That’s Ronnie,” she says, her voice breaking.
“I don’t know what they’ve been doing to her, but she screams like that over and over again until she gives out, and then they let her heal and start again.”
A shudder rocks my body “Ronnie is a fast healer. It’s her gift,” I say, voicing what we’re both thinking.
“She is, and they love it, the pigs! I may hate her for betraying us, but I would never wish torture on any of my sisters,” her voice cracks again.
“How did they get her out of there if Kevin has the key?”
“They got her first; she walked in here trying to call the whole thing off.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“Bradley has been regaling me with tales of his exploits, and when he gets on a roll, he just runs his stupid mouth. They were busy with her when Kevin brought us in and threw us in this shitty dungeon.”
“I cannot believe she’d be so stupid, and she shouldn’t have even left the den alone.”
“Yeah, well they lied to her and said they could come to an arrangement, so she agreed to come here and talk.”
“How do you know all of this?” I ask.
“Bradley filled me in on anything I couldn’t see. And when he told me what happened to you and the guys, he wasn’t nice about it either.” She shudders. “You don’t want to know what else he said.”
At another scream, Chey stops talking and looks at me with horror.
“I know, Chey, I know. You are goodness and happiness, and this is really difficult for you. It’s going to be fine.” I don’t know who I’m trying to reassure, but as the sounds of Ronnie’s blood-wrenching screams fill the air, I know I’m lying. It’s not going to be ok, not at all. When she goes silent, I send a silent thank you to the goddess.
Each scream cuts deep and deeper, and by the end of her torturous session, the handcuffs are burning so hot that I can smell my flesh cooking. I can’t stop my magic from trying to burst out of me as I hear her cries.
No, it is not going to be okay, but somehow, I need to survive this for my guys, my mother, and my pack.
I swallow down my fear and anxiety and push through. I need to find a way to save two packmates and get out of here before Nathaniel rapes me and tries to sacrifice me to the Elders. Just another day in the life of a future alpha.
Fuck my life.
Chapter Seventeen
Shaun
I watch Marcus and Abby speed off on his bike and can’t help but chuckle. It’s nice to see them getting along, and I admire her tenacity. Marcus tries so hard to resist, but it is never going to work. I remember his face when we walked into the Claiming ceremony, and he saw her for the first time. Our connection to one another was wide open. There was a fear that our coven might break up if our dragons didn’t choose the same wolf or if the wolf in question didn’t return our favor. But Marcus was smitten. When she shook his hand, and his dragon Claimed her, I could hear him trying to reason with it. There are times when our animals are wrong, but not often. It knew what it was doing, and once Marcus stops fighting, he’ll be the better for it.
I hop in the driver’s seat and try to catch up with them, hoping that he’ll keep her safe. I know he’ll do his best to watch over her, but I’m confident they are going to take every corner as fast as possible on the way to town. I can imagine her clinging tightly to him, her hair whipping in the wind as she spurs him onward and urging him to go faster. Surprisingly, no jealousy fills me, only joy that Marcus is slowly letting down his defenses a little and letting our Abby in. If anyone can show him he is worthy of love and so much more, it is her.
As I reach the crest of the large hill, bile rises in my throat. Everything changes at that moment, and the breath leaves my lungs in one long exhale. I press the gas pedal to the floor, watching helplessly as Abby is being beaten and thrown into a black van. Marcus is motionless on the ground, covered in a copious amount of blood. The vehicle speeds off before I can reach them. As the dust begins to cloud my vision, I see the face of her best friend Cheyenne, barely visible in the back.
Fuck!
“Justin, call Daniel, Pierce, and Michael. They’re going to need to know their mate is gone if they don’t know already.” I stop the SUV, torn between wanting to go after Abby but also needing to know if Marcus is okay. Knowing Abby, I decide to check on Marcus first. She’ll kill me if anything happens to him.
Watching Abby getting thrown into the back of a van was literally the worst thing that has ever happened to me—having to choose whether to save my brother in arms or go after her instead was a close second. I swerve
the car to the side of the road, so I won’t run over Marcus, and yell at everyone to get out. As soon as they are out of the SUV, I speed after her. I follow for as long as I can, but between the head start they already have, and the few moments it took to send aid to Marcus, it’s enough. I tap into our mental connection but hit a wall. Nothing is getting through. I just lost the van carrying my mate, and I have no way of contacting her.
Rage infuses every molecule in my body, and my power pushes its way out of me. The winds rise with my anger, and I try to calm myself down. It will do nobody any good if I lose it and cause a tornado to whip across the Arizona desert.
I turn the car around and head back to where the twins and Justin are. Justin’s face mirrors my own, etched with worry and fury. Abby has infiltrated our defenses and snugly situated herself in our hearts already. It’s our job to show her that and to get her to accept it. I straighten myself up to my full height and square my shoulders. Without Abby here, it’s my job to lead. I am now alpha of our coven in her stead.
It’s funny how weeks ago I’d have been itching for this opportunity, but now it leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Now, all I want is Abby back.
Be careful what you wish for.
Before, when this Claiming ceremony was just an idea, I wanted my future mate all to myself. Sharing, especially as an alpha, was a difficult concept, even if the practice was exceedingly common with descending birth rates. With anyone else, I might have still been struggling, but these men are my brothers.
Plus, when we found out we were a coven, it went a long way towards easing some of the competitiveness. Knowing that the five of us each shares an affinity for the different types of magic, and that we only need one more to make us powerful enough to make a difference for our people, goes a long way towards smoothing some edges. But not all; I still want to punch Justin in the face … a lot. My mother was a shifter witch, and she explained it wasn’t uncommon for witches to share themselves with several warlocks. Even though we grew up together, I was still terrified that a woman would cause tension. But then we met Abby. At first, it was all hormones and lust for both us guys and Abby. But over the past few months, she has taken modern conventions and burned them to the ground with her personality, sweet spirit, and unwavering desire to ensure the continued livelihood of her pack.
The fact that even Marcus is softening up to her in his own way is genuinely awe-inspiring. As for myself, well it’s a work in progress, but Abby helps. It’s easier because I can see just how vital she is already becoming to my friends. I wanted to fight her with all that I had, and I did. Giving up my alpha status nearly wrecked me, but she’s in the right position, and I’m becoming stronger by learning how to follow.
I pick up the guys and Marcus, who thankfully looks less dire than before. It will be a while before he’s at full strength, but the healing has begun. It seems that the massive amount of blood covering him makes his injuries look far worse than they are. Those fucking cowards were far more worried about getting Abby away from us, so they didn’t have time to work him over too hard. I sigh and order Justin and Kaden to lay him down. I’ll have to get him to Sacha to get checked out then I will make a plan to get our mate back. I watch as Marcus struggles into a sitting position and he demands that we head to the Death Claw bar. I want to argue but decide against it. A mere second of imagining what I would do if our positions were reversed has me speeding towards the assholes’ shitty excuse for a bar.
We arrive in what feels like an agonizing amount of time and burst through the entrance. It’s noon, and the bar is already packed. I guess if I were a member of this pack, I’d probably want to be drunk all the time too, but I have no sympathy for any one of the members of this group of lowlifes. When Justin tears into the room and starts busting heads, I’m torn between letting him continue or joining in, but wisdom prevails.
“Justin, stop. We can’t beat the shit out of everyone, regardless of how much we may want to. We need to find Abby. That’s our main priority.”
He turns his eyes towards me, blazing with his dragon’s fury and unimaginable pain.
I watch him advance on another Death Claw pack member then turn and grab a chair, hurling it across the room with far more strength than is necessary. It hits the walls and splinters, pieces flying with incredible force around the room. I hear a few grunts, and some of the shards of wood hit their marks.
“Justin,” I warn, “let’s try to handle this rationally.”
“Fuck being rational, Shaun!” Kaden growls, and the tethers keeping my own temper under control begin to strain.
“Guys,” Marcus interrupts, and his grounding Earth magic washes over me. “ Let’s just make the higher-ups stay and let the rest go.”
Without waiting for instruction, Kaleb begins to bark out orders, “Gammas and betas stay. Everyone else, get the fuck out of here. Oh, and you should know that your disgusting fuckwad of an alpha allowed our mate to be kidnapped after a Claiming ceremony.”
Murmurs of skepticism and disbelief filter through the crowd as most make their way towards the exit, and I can’t help but roll my eyes.
How in the fuck can these idiots still be surprised by anything Alpha Nathaniel does?
“Justin, you have to stop destroying things,” I scold, as another chair whizzes by my face and shatters against the wall again. “We’re all upset right now, but we will find her,” I say, even though I barely believe the words myself. “We will find her, and we will bring her home.”
“Shaun, I can’t think. I am so angry,” he says and heaves another chair.
Marcus comes up behind me, “Out of all of us, I never thought he’d be the one to totally lose his shit,” he says, and then inches toward Justin.
“We know you can’t think, so we need you to calm down, so you can use your brain to find Abby. You’re the only one who can bring our girl home to us,” he says, now close enough to touch him. He pulls Justin in for a rough hug and winces slightly. I watch as he pulls away, choosing instead to grab him roughly on either side of his face,
“Help us find her, Justin,” Marcus pleads. I can only guess that Marcus is infusing him with his power, and bringing Justin back to us. With a barely perceptible nod, Justin agrees and begins to wind down. Thankfully, Marcus was able to stop him before the room became a tidal wave, and I am exceedingly grateful.
“The calm, quiet ones are always the ones to watch, right?” Kaden’s laugh cuts the tension—something he usually delights in doing if Kaleb doesn’t beat him to it.
“I guess now we know the one we need to keep an eye on,” I agree.
The truth is Justin is legitimately the most lethal of us all. Despite his short stature, when he shifts into that massive black Wyvern with iridescent blue scales like racing stripes up each of his sides, only Marcus outweighs him. In dragon form, he could level cities, but even in human form he is the best formal fighter I know, and the one who is responsible for training all of us.
Justin knows it all. Swords, bows, archery, guns; you name it, and he has learned and mastered it. His only downfall is hand-to-hand. He’s plentiful in technique, but as the dominance ceremony proved, technique can only take you so far. If he had a bit more sheer power, he would beat me. In fact, knowing we’re so closely matched ensures that I never slip off my game. One misstep and I’d find myself out of beta status.
“Right,” Justin says, clearing his throat and ignoring that he just decimated the Death Claw’s bar. Granted it wasn’t much to look at before, but now it is nothing but piles of broken wood, twisted metal, and dust from pool balls he crushed with his hands. He tugs down his heather gray t-shirt and pulls his faded denim jeans over his hips.
As his breathing evens out, Justin begins to come back to himself and suggests, “I think we can find her using our fledgling Bond. If we all try to find her at once, it should generate enough of a magical power surge to locate her. Or we could just threaten to kill one of the Death Claws and see if they give up the loc
ation,” he says as he walks out the door which is balancing awkwardly on its hinges. We follow leaving Kaden behind to guard the rest. He conjures a massive fireball in his hand and smirks. Clearly ready for anyone to come at him.
“Where the fuck are we going, Justin? We have a group of Death Claws in there waiting to be questioned.”
“Yeah, I think it’s best if I don’t participate in that actually. I’m going to stay out here, so I don’t drown someone on purpose.” He turns to look at me, his eyes still shining brightly with the power of his dragon.
“Alright, you stay here with Marcus, he could use your medical skills anyway.”
Taking care of Marcus is a perfect distraction for him, and I can see his eyes slowly receding from cobalt to sky as he inspects Marcus.
“Of course, how selfish of me. Go on, Shaun. I’ve got this part covered. Just get the location of their den out of them, and we can do the rest,” he says and turns to Marcus.
“You’ve said an awful lot just now, but I have no idea what we’re actually doing,” Kaleb interrupts, sounding extremely annoyed, and I can’t help but laugh.
As smart as he is, Justin tends to charge head first into things without considering the consequences of his actions or fully explaining them. I respect his mind, but it’s another reason he’s not beta. Abby doesn’t realize it yet, but as time goes on, she will see where he shines and where he falls flat, just as I have with each of these men. Thinking of her at the hands of those rapists renews my fervor. I storm back into the bar with Kaleb on my heels and snarl at the nearest sniveling member of this woebegone pack.
“Where is your den home location?”
“I’d answer,” Kaden sneers, holding a ball of fire in his hand. He tosses white-hot orb back and forth, its heat filling the section we’re in. He smiles menacingly at the man we’ve cornered.
“Did you know dragon fire burns hotter than regular flames? So hot, in fact, that it will liquify your flesh, and char your bones into dust. If you want to keep all your limbs, I suggest you start talking.”
Blood Moon Magic Page 19
