Born to Raise Hell
The Owl Shifter Chronicles Book Three
Qatarina Wanders
Copyright © 2019 by Qatarina Wanders. Wandering Words Media.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
To Ramy Vance, a kickass Urban Fantasy author and my first fiction writing coach. I hope to be as prolific as you someday soon.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
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Acknowledgments
About the Author
1
Even this far down on the ground, the thunderous rainstorm caused the safe house to shudder. It wasn’t a stretch of imagination to say that the Alfred seniors had awoken, and they were furious.
“Let me get this straight,” said Everet Winter, who was Michael’s father and the chief of the Vigilante Task Force of New Haven. “You’re saying there’s a supernatural siege on my town?” He didn’t look too surprised. In fact, he had the same calm look as when Michael had narrated all that had happened since Michael snuck into the Alfreds’ house, which was now a smoking heap of rubble and ash on Main Street—thanks to Emily and her fire demon.
“Yes, Mr. Winter,” Emily spoke up. She didn’t want this meeting to drag on for too long. She was of the opinion that the sooner they acted, the better their chances were of pulling off their plan to rid the town of the Alfreds.
They’d already recorded several successes. They had defeated the Alfreds at both the Alfred Manor and at the Russo Manor. They had also recovered Rina and Joanna, who were now in a magically induced coma so they could recuperate. Finally, they had broken the nexus, which was what held the entire town under the Alfreds’ spell.
It was a good thing Emily and Aunt Anastacia had gone after the nexus at a time when the Alfreds were decommissioned. It wouldn’t have been possible to sneak into the lion’s den and steal its prized possession without a fight. And with the thunderstorm Gregory and Marie Alfred had conjured over that time, Emily’s estimation of both Alfreds’ powers was broadening, and that was saying a lot, considering what she’d previously thought of them.
Not even Aunt Anastacia could conjure such magic. Or at least, Emily didn’t think so. But then again, Emily wasn’t the best judge of magic. A couple weeks earlier, she would have given an arm and a leg to be distanced from anything supernatural. In fact, she’d been struggling with the fact she was a shapeshifter and that she had the supernatural ability to shift into a massive owl. And not just any owl. She was The Owl. Which apparently had special significance she was still coming to understand.
Now, she’d accepted who she was, and she wasn’t afraid anymore. You’d think the cosmos would let her enjoy being a shifter in peace. But noooo. Turns out, accepting her nature was only the first step. Now she had to fight to stay alive. Because the Alfreds had come to town for only one reason. To use her and her brother, Michael, in a fatal ritual to raise hell. Literally.
That’s right. The Alfreds wanted to end the world and remake society in their own image. They intended to unleash a dark monster, which was prophesied to be the harbinger of doomsday. It was a creature specially tailored to destroy all supernatural threats and would be more than capable of ending all man-made threats as well, from nuclear to bio. Nothing to destroy it. Eventually, the whole world would bow to the monster.
The Alfreds believed they could control this creature of darkness, but Emily believed otherwise. She had seen the Alfreds—well, at least the three kids. With what she had been told of this creature they were fetching to release, Emily didn’t believe the Alfreds possessed evil enough hearts to control the monster—except for Alice, the forever-twelve-year-old-witch-turned-vampire. She was evil from the inside out.
Eventually, the monster would destroy the Alfreds and run wild in the world. There would be endless days of destruction and devastation. The monster wouldn’t stop until the world was literally a living hell. What else would it do? It was born to raise hell.
“Walk me through it again,” Everet insisted.
They were seated at the conference table in the safe house’s anteroom. The Russos were there, but they’d been quiet since Mr. Russo’s damning statement about them not knowing who they were dealing with.
“You’ve doomed us all,” Mr. Russo had said. He’d failed to elaborate ever since then, regardless of how hard Emily had tried to persuade him. It seemed as though they had a fundamental hatred for Emily’s overall existence.
Emily had wanted to tell them about Joanna—that they had rescued her, and she was okay—but Aunt Anastacia had told her not to. For some reason, her aunt wanted to observe the Russos before she informed them their daughter was alive and within the safe house.
Also seated at the table were Michael (warlock in training, former anti-supernatural buff, and illegitimate son of Everet Winter and Bernice Davies, Emily’s mother), John Davies (Emily’s father), and Kendrick “Dagger” Maverick (Everet’s right-hand man, trusted ally, and lead supernatural hunter for the town’s vigilante force). Aunt Anastacia was also in the anteroom, but she preferred to stand by the entryway, leaning on the wall and observing the discussion.
Emily sat among them as well. She took up position at the head of the table. The TV screen was just behind her, and it showed a bird’s-eye view of New Haven with major flash spots highlighted. These flash spots were locations they’d been to and where they had fought the Alfreds’ forces.
Highlighted spots included the Russos’ house, the castle on Main Street, and the cottage where the Alfred kids had laid siege for the better part of two days.
Emily took her time giving a rundown of the story again. She left nothing out. Under different circumstances, she couldn’t have told Everet and Kendrick—the two most dangerous men in New Haven to supernaturals—that she was The Owl. But these were desperate times.
New Haven was under siege. The end of the world was at hand. The vigilantes were obviously out of their league on this, because if it wasn’t for Emily and Aunt Anastacia, they would still be under a spell and doing the evil rove’s bidding. So there.
So, Emily told them everything that had happened. Right from when she was being stalked by the evil rove—who turned out to be Gregory Alfred—to when she discovered the plot to unleash the apocalypse. To explain the term used for the apocalypse, she had to use the phrase Nadarog Maragog once and therefore endured a shriek of pain from her owl consciousness, Selena. No, it hadn’t gotten better since Emily had heard the term first. Incidentally, she hadn’t had time to find out why Selena was so reactive to hearing the term.
Emily finished up with the events of the past few days. She told them how she and her friends rescued Michael and how Michael found out what had happened. She told them how they planned a r
escue mission for Rina and Joanna. At that point, Mrs. Russo became interested in their tale.
“Joanna?” Mrs. Russo chirped.
Emily nodded, and then went on about how they’d executed their plan flawlessly. The Alfreds had taken a huge hit, because they lost their prisoners and their house. On Emily’s advice, Aunt Anastacia and Emily decided to storm the Russos’ house to break the nexus. And it turned out, the nexus actually was the Russos. The evil rove had used them to harbor the spell.
They were successful in breaking the nexus from Mr. and Mrs. Russo’s bodies. Emily didn’t tell them the only reason they were successful was because Marion had let her go. At first, Marion seemed to have done it because he felt something for Emily. But that couldn’t be it.
Emily was sure she had feelings for Marion, but then again, she might be under an illusion spell. Marion was an evil rove. He was one of the Alfred kids. Emily had found it difficult to go on believing that Marion cared for her. It was just plain absurd.
Marion had come with his brother and sister to capture her for a ritual that would end up in her death. He couldn’t do that and love her. Not really.
But then, why did he let her go? Why did he break the nexus? In the end, it was Marion who broke the nexus. It was Marion who enchanted her and the Russos out of the Russos’ penthouse bedroom and onto the street outside the mansion, thereby saving them.
Emily was confused. Conflicted. Was this some sort of ploy, or did he really care about her that much?
In the heat of the disaster—they had shared a moment. She had really believed that he felt the same way she did. It was forbidden, yes. They were on different sides of the struggle, yes. But these facts have never stopped love before, and she couldn’t explain her pull to him. It was like he had lassoed her heart and continuously pulled it toward him. She had never felt anything like it before. Now that she was not jacked up on adrenaline—now that she’d had just a little time to process what happened—she was beginning to see all shades of possible motives.
It was never that simple.
“Tell me about Joanna,” Mrs. Russo pressed. “Is she alive?”
Emily looked up at Aunt Anastacia for permission to speak more about Joanna’s fate.
“Why would you think otherwise?” Aunt Anastacia curled her upper lip. “Did you make a deal with the devil?”
“That’s none of your business.” Mr. Russo was still indignant. His wife placed a calming hand on her husband's arm. They looked at each other. No words were exchanged, but they came to an understanding.
Mr. Russo heaved a deep sigh and bowed his head for a moment. It was obvious he had something grave to tell them. Even Everet and Kendrick, who were newcomers, knew something was up. They didn’t interrupt.
When Mr. Russo was done putting his thoughts together—or whatever he was doing with his head bowed—he looked up and said, “Yes. We made a deal with the devil.” A bitter smile spread across his lips.
2
“What kind of deal?” This was the first time Kendrick spoke since he arrived there with Everet, Dad, and Michael. The man was a bulky individual with defined abs visible through his shirt and powerful arms that could probably crush a man’s skull. His voice was not kind toward Mr. Russo; not even in the slightest.
The tone in Kendrick’s voice caught Mr. Russo’s attention. The man turned a glaring eye toward Kendrick. “Don’t use that tone with me, Boy!” the man screeched. “You don’t know what you’re up against.” He snickered. “You and your merry band of supernatural-hunter-wannabes.”
“Tell us, Mr. Russo,” Michael jumped in. “Tell us what we’re up against. Everyone here is willing to fight to save our people. Your people!”
Mr. Russo shook his head, his face sporting a pained expression. “You guys don’t understand.” The man snapped his head to Michael. “You’re nothing. All this you guys have going on . . . is nothing.”
The man pointed up at the ceiling. “That storm going on outside? That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Look, I made a deal with the Alfreds because I knew what—or rather who—they had backing them.”
Emily knew it before the man said it. In fact, the man didn’t need to say it before she knew he was referring to the mysterious figure known as The Man—the same one who had built the castle and had registered it under the alias, The Man. How he was able to do that without raising suspicions was still, well, a mystery.
“They came into town with only one mission,” Mr. Russo elaborated. “Lay this puny little town of ours to waste and take who they need.” He pointed at Emily and then Michael.
“You see, I might have you all believing I know nothing about the supernatural world, but I’d just be lying,” Mr. Russo elaborated. “I knew the power the Alfreds wielded was enough to level the entire town. I knew the vigilantes didn’t have enough muscle to stop the Alfreds. They couldn’t even stop the Alfred kids, let alone the parents! I had to protect this town.”
“So you sold us out?” Emily spouted. “Both Michael and me?” The fire demon was already stirring up inside her.
Mr. Russo flashed her another bitter smile. “No, I didn’t need to sell you out. You were already out. The moment you decided to accept your Owl form and merge with her, making you the ideal candidate for the Adoption, you sold yourself out. The moment Michael decided to accept his heritage, thereby prompting him to go seek out the Alfreds to arrange a truce, he sold himself out.
“Look, guys, the evil rove was under no obligation to help us. He was under no obligation to spare the town. After all, he is evil, and evil is what he does. So I went to that bargaining table shorthanded.”
“So, what, you gave yourself up for all of us?” Michael asked next. “We should give you a medal and bow to you now as our savior?”
Mr. Russo frowned. “It doesn’t matter now, does it? You’ve stirred the beast. You burned down the beast’s house, and now his emissary is angry. You don’t stand a chance.”
“What. Was. The. Deal?” This question came from Aunt Anastacia. Even though her voice was calm and measured, it carried with it a potent threat. This was her house, and everyone would respond to her exactly as she wanted.
Mr. Russo seemed to recognize this because he didn’t bitch about the question. He simply gave her a straight answer.
“I would act as a nexus to cast the spell to make the entire town docile,” said Mr. Russo. “In return, they would spare the town. They wouldn’t lay it to waste. The people would be safe. And that in the event of their rule, I and my family will be spared.”
“You self-serving bastard! You sold out the entire city to spare your own ass!” Kendrick screamed so loud he might have popped a vein on his face.
“Enough!” Everet boomed to his second-in-command. Like an obedient dog, the big man snapped out of his tantrum.
Everet turned to Aunt Anastacia. “What are we dealing with?”
Anastacia exhaled deeply. “So far, five powerful roves. Two adults and three younglings—one of the young ones happens to be a vampire also. The younglings tore through my barrier in less than two days. That means they’re trouble even for the vigilantes.”
“So frontal attack isn’t an option?” Everet asked.
Aunt Anastacia took her time to consider the question. “It would be ill advised. We have to employ tact in our approach.”
“You guys don’t get it, do you?” Mrs. Russo exclaimed. “We’re all doomed. The moment you broke the nexus, the deal was broken. The Alfreds don’t have to use a scalpel anymore. They don’t have to be surgical or meticulous with their plans. They’re going to tear this town apart until they have what they want. And when they’re done, they’ll make us suffer the most.”
The woman was obviously hysterical at this point. She had been through quite a bit, and she was experiencing a lot that made Emily’s heart go out to her. What had the woman really done wrong? What had they done wrong? They had done what every family would have. They had tried to protect their loved one: th
eir daughter.
Yeah, it was wrong. But Emily wasn’t going to be the one to cast the first stone—or any stone, for that matter. “You don’t expect us to do nothing, Mrs. Russo.” Emily bit her lip. “We can’t sit idly by and watch as everything gets torn apart.”
“And what will you do when the sun is hidden from the heavens for days?” asked Mrs. Russo. “What would you do when the evil rove wills you to stop breathing? What power do you have to stop the Alice kid from setting you on fire or from turning your innards to jelly?”
Emily fought hard against the heaviness that was trying to push into her gut. The answer was nothing. For all the questions Mrs. Russo had asked. Nothing. She could do nothing. But did she have to do anything? “I’m immune to all kinds of magic,” Emily spouted.
Mrs. Russo appeared surprised by that fact.
Even Mr. Russo, who had been bowing his head, snapped up to glance at her. “Say that again?”
“I’m immune to magic,” she repeated. “It’s one of the gifts I have. No magic works on me.”
Mr. Russo shared a glance with his wife.
“Is there something you care to share with the class?” Michael asked with a sarcastic lift of his eyebrows.
Mr. Russo nodded. “There’s a spell. Anastacia might know of it. It can transfer the immunity of one creature to another.”
“What spell is that?” Aunt Anastacia asked.
“The Symbian Translocative Process,” said Mr. Russo.
The moment Aunt Anastacia heard that, she shook her head. “Absolutely not! We’re not doing that.”
Born to Raise Hell: The Owl Shifter Chronicles Book Three Page 1
