by Mikayla Lane
“Doesn’t he know the place was raided?” Quinn didn’t understand how Fiona expected this plan to work.
She rubbed her temples for a moment trying to ease the sudden pain she felt throbbing in her head.
“No,” Fiona said. “Satalis thinks only some of the locations have been raided. He’s been watching looped tapes we recorded. Being this close to the portal means he can’t tell where we actually are; it screws with the signal in the disc.”
Quinn grimaced at the room’s suddenly bright lights and looked down at the table, trying to fight through the pain that was now swamping her head. Her vision blurred as she looked down at the cup of tea in front of her and looked accusingly at Ainsley.
“What did you do?” she asked, her words slurring a little.
“We’re not doing this,” Ainsley quickly replied. “This is normal. Try not to fight it.”
Quinn felt her nose begin to run and reached up a clumsy hand to wipe it. Her eyes tried to focus on the bright red smears on her hands when she pulled them from her face.
“What are you doing to me?” she whispered.
Quinn struggled to keep her head up and her eyes open, scared to death for her son kicking wildly in her stomach. She swayed as she tried to stand, desperate to get to the door and away from Ainsley and Fiona.
Fiona caught her before she fell and Ainsley came to her other side to hold her up. Quinn had no ability to move and slumped between the two women as they dragged her through the kitchen and down the hallway.
They gently laid Quinn on a soft bed and stood over her. Quinn’s blurry vision was playing tricks on her because she could have sworn she saw concern on their faces as they sat on either side of her and each held one of her hands.
“Don’t fight it,” Ainsley said, tears shimmering in her eyes.
“We’ve been through this before,” Fiona added. “You aren’t the first human. You can’t fight it. If you fight it, things will go badly for you and your son. This is why we brought you here. We’re trying to protect you.”
Quinn’s mind reeled with their words, trying to understand what they meant, but the pain in her head was so intense she screamed out in agony.
She felt a cool hand on her burning brow and sighed before another wave of pain shot through her skull, and she screamed again.
“Don’t fight it,” Ainsley whispered as her tears fell. “Don’t fight it, or they’ll have to kill you too.”
Chapter Thirteen
Chris paced the hallways of the estate as the sun began to rise. He hadn’t been able to sleep when it was his turn and had remained in constant communication with those searching for Quinn and his son.
The longer they went without finding her, the more his fear overwhelmed him to the point that he’d had to stay in the older section of the estate for most of the night so he wouldn’t blow all the electronics they’d brought in when they took over the place.
He hadn’t minded though. Chris could still feel the residual energy Quinn and his son had left behind, and he reveled in the feel of her after so many months apart. He knew he’d missed her terribly, but he hadn’t realized just how much of his heart had stayed with her when he’d walked away.
He moved from the doorway of the room they’d kept her in to the bed he knew she’d slept in, and he sat down. His hand moved along the comforter as his mind conjured an image of the last time he’d seen her smile, and his fist clenched in the fabric as he berated himself for being so stupid.
I should have known, he thought.
Looking back now, he could see the signs that he’d missed so clearly: his overwhelming need to be with her and protect her from the moment his eyes had met hers behind the bar that first night, the way her smile brightened his darkest days. Even when he thought Koda was lost to them, he’d look at her picture and feel comfort in knowing she was there.
Chris ran his hands over his head and blew out a frustrated breath. He had to find her and make it right. He wouldn’t accept losing her before he had a chance to truly be a mate and father.
Panic suddenly erupted through the shengari’, and Chris ran to the door and flew down the hallways to the kitchen area just as Lara and Trick came through the basement door and slammed it shut behind them.
“It’s opening!” Trick warned again, repeating what he and Lara had told everyone through the shengari’.
“Who’s coming through?” Chris demanded.
“We can’t tell because the portal is disrupting the energy signatures!” Lara said as she checked the clip on her rifle. “Get ready!”
“Battle stations!” Chris ordered through the shengari’ as everyone scattered around the floors to their predetermined locations.
Chris ran with the rest of his siblings to the main entryway of the estate. It was the best location for any confrontation since it was open to all three floors and enabled his team to keep a tactical advantage.
He hid behind a hall door on the first floor, just on the other side of the front door. Chris felt the shift in his energy and knew his siblings felt it as well when they began to warn each other through the shengari’ that anomalous hybrids were close.
They could hear the basement door creak open before it banged into the kitchen wall, and several sets of footsteps crossed the floor as Chris motioned to his siblings on the upper floors to remain alert.
“Fiona!”
The roaring voice was unmistakable, and Chris and the others tensed as they waited for the dark prime and his hybrids to move into the entryway.
“I got eight affected hybrids, four humans, and the dark bastard coming through the kitchen now,” Siggy warned through the shengari’ as he watched the progress of the dark prime on the cameras he’d installed during the night. “They’re armed, but no weapons are drawn yet.”
“Fiona!” Satalis roared again.
“Team two, take their rear!” Chris ordered, making sure they couldn’t escape back through the portal.
“On it!” Gun replied as he came in from outside and moved into the kitchen.
When Gun was sure the area was clear, he motioned to his team, who began entering and taking up positions near the door to the portal to ensure Satalis couldn’t escape and no one could come through to his aid.
“Bitch, if you’re playing games . . .” Satalis roared and suddenly let the sentence hang.
The silence was heavy until Chris and the others heard scrambling and ammunition being chambered and knew they’d been found only seconds before Siggy warned them.
“He knows! They’re taking up defensive positions in the hall between the kitchen and the entryway! Weapons are drawn! I repeat, weapons are drawn!” Siggy warned.
Chris peered around the corner and narrowed his eyes at the long wall that led to the kitchen that they were hiding behind. It also led underneath the stairs. He had a mate to find and didn’t have time to play nice, especially not with Satalis. The only thing the bastard respected was power.
I can show him power, Chris thought with a hateful sneer.
“Fuck this,” he muttered as he moved out into the open entryway, raised his rifle and began emptying the clip in the wall that Satalis was hiding behind.
Screams and shouting erupted from behind the wall, and drywall dust filled the air as Chris stalked towards the hallway, emptying his clip. He pulled out the empty and grinned as his teams on the upper floors pummeled the wall with fire while he reloaded. It was the whole reason he’d chosen the open entryway to engage the bastard.
With Gun’s team blocking Satalis and his entourage from the portal, Chris wasn’t surprised when three hybrids poured from the hall. One threw up a green shield while one fired an automatic rifle, and another threw glowing blue balls at them. Chris didn’t know what the balls did, but he knew it couldn’t be good and dodged them as he ran towards the hallway to confront Satalis.
Gunfire and the sound of energy weapons exploded around Chris as his siblings scrambled to provide their brazen brother with
more cover fire. He slid to his knees to avoid one of the blue balls before passing underneath the green shield and shooting one hybrid in the head.
Chris dodged another blue ball of energy just as Mikal appeared behind the hybrid and slit her throat. The green shield dropped when Lara’s bullet ended up in the eye of the remaining hybrid.
“They’re trying to retreat! Gun’s taking heavy fire!” Chris warned as his teams tried to converge on the small area.
The hallway was lit up with the strobe lights of energy weapons firing, and Lara took the lead as she leaped over three bodies and ran into the kitchen. There Satalis, the remaining hybrids, and three humans were hiding behind a dark energy shield.
Lara smirked at the flicker of fear in Satalis’ eyes as she moved towards him.
Satalis growled at Lara as several of the Dranovians began chanting the ritual words of expulsion, hoping the power would penetrate the dark shield and kill the anomalous beasts in the hybrids surrounding Satalis.
“You bitch! You think you won? You think by taking the women and their babies that you’ve won? You’ve barely reached the tip of what I’m capable of and what I’m doing! You will never stop me!” Satalis roared in rage at Lara as he tried desperately to think of a way out.
“Where is she?” Chris roared back as he pushed past his siblings into the kitchen, his fists clenched in rage around his weapons.
Satalis narrowed his eyes at Chris for a moment, making Lara suspicious.
“If you don’t let me out of here, she’ll be dead before you can take your next breath,” Satalis warned.
“He’s lying,” Lara breathed out. “He doesn’t have her!”
Lara began shooting golden energy at the dark barrier, and Satalis fired back, his dark, inky black bolt missing Lara completely and blowing out the kitchen wall. The Dranovians ducked as stone and cabinets exploded around them.
Undaunted, the Dranovians and Tezarians continued to fire energy and conventional weapons at the dark barrier, weakening it as Satalis and his people made a run for the hole in the wall.
Chris stood in front of them, blocking their exit through the hole. His body pulsed with blue energy, lifting him several inches off the ground as he flicked his palms out to his sides and allowed his power to consume him.
He ignored the warnings from his family as he increased his energy until everyone had to shield their eyes from the brightness before Satalis crashed into him. Blue sparks arced through the barrier’s inky darkness as the two energies clashed so fiercely it caused a secondary explosion in the wall.
The Dranovians took cover, and Satalis roared in pain and rage as his barrier flashed from smoky colored to clear and back to smoky again. Chris glowed brighter as his siblings recovered quickly and continued their relentless assault on Satalis’ weakening shield.
Moments later, Lara called out a warning just before there was another explosion of energy. Chris was blasted through the hole in the kitchen wall and thrown onto the lawn, his glowing energy gone as he tumbled a few times before laying immobile.
Satalis and his team bowled out of the kitchen and ran past Chris towards a strand of trees. The Dranovians and Tezarians quickly ran across the lawn to intercept them as Chris sat up and slowly began to stand.
“We got a cloaked ship coming in fast, guys! It’s probably the bastard’s escape plan!” Deacon called out from the ship hovering cloaked above them.
“He’s trying to get away!” Chris roared in rage as he gathered his remaining energy and took off after Satalis. He began stripping more energy from the earth with each step he took.
Deacon de-cloaked above them and began firing at the unseen craft in the air above the estate. Chris looked up and could see the weaponry pinging off of the ship heading right toward Satalis.
Chris began firing volley after volley of electrical energy bolts at Satalis, watching with satisfaction as his dark barrier wavered and shimmered with each hit from Chris and his teams.
The other craft de-cloaked above them, and the battle between Deacon and Satalis’ craft became heated as each blasted the other with weaponry and Deacon chased it across the sky above the estate.
Satalis looked around him at the three humans and three hybrids he was protecting, and he pushed one of the human males outside of his barrier.
The human stood in stunned amazement as he looked at the powerful Dranovians before he turned back to Satalis and tried to penetrate the now-stronger barrier. Satalis pushed the human female into the man, knocking them both to the ground outside of the barrier.
Both were quickly hog tied with zip ties and left on the grass as the Dranovians continued their advance on the retreating Satalis. Even the remaining human male knew that it was only a matter of time before Satalis pushed him from the barrier and finally stepped out of it on his own, his hands raised above his head.
This apparent act of betrayal infuriated Satalis, who pulled out a gun and shot the man in the head. Satalis sneered at Chris who was now only inches from the barrier.
“You will die,” Satalis ground out.
“Death doesn’t scare me,” Chris growled at the same time his body lit up with arcing blue energy. “But it scares you.”
Satalis stumbled back, his barrier wavering as he stared wide-eyed at Chris, who pulsed and hummed with renewed power as his anger overwhelmed his senses.
“Chris!” Lara called out a warning as she rushed to erect a protective barrier between Chris and Satalis in order to give Chris some protection from the dark energy.
Chris stared with cold eyes at the man who’d taken his mate and child, who’d come after his family and destroyed his people, and he felt no emotions as he allowed his power to control him. He barely registered the heat he was generating around himself and the winds as he raised his arms, intent on delivering an explosive blow to the dark shield.
“Chris! Pull back!” Mikal screamed out, trying to be heard over the maelstrom of power.
Chris couldn’t hear anything; he was too intent on building his energy to notice that his siblings and the Tezarians were now retreating from him and Satalis.
“Chris! It’s too much! You’re going to ignite!” Lara called out to him through the shengari’ trying to direct as much energy as she could between Chris and Satalis.
Grai and Blade had headed back from the border of Scotland the moment they heard through the shengari’ that the dark prime had come through the portal. Grai dropped from the transport and hit the ground running towards Chris.
Mikal and the others watched in horror as the blue bolts of power coming from Chris began intertwining with the hazy, dark mass around Satalis. Everywhere Chris’s energy moved it set off showers of sparks within the dark energy, and both energies changed to a fiery orange.
“Are you insane?” Satalis screamed in fear. “You’ll kill us all!”
“Chris!” Grai yelled out as he continued running towards his son through the swirling wind of energy.
Mikal suddenly appeared in front of Grai, and with the help of Dread and several brothers, they pulled him away from Chris and the energy that was beginning to pop and snap loudly as the orange colored energy grew between Satalis and Chris.
“Let me go! I can stop him!” Grai screamed as he fought to get back to his son.
Lara shook her head sadly as she changed tactics and moved her shield in front of the Dranovians and Tezarians instead of Chris. Even with her abilities, she couldn’t stop the explosion of power getting ready to incinerate Chris, the dark prime, and anything within a hundred feet of them.
Several of the Dranovians prayed aloud to whatever gods they believed in for Chris while others screamed at their brother through the shengari’, trying desperately to reach his power-consumed mind. Nothing appeared to be working, and the orange color brightened and swelled as it spread.
“Chris!” Grai roared in pain and fear for his son. “Please, son . . . roll it back!”
Suddenly a girl appeared next to Chris. Her
blond hair whipped violently around her face as she peered up at him with troubled blue eyes. She raised her hands and the wind stopped completely, leaving a deafening silence.
“Get me out of here!” Satalis screamed at the girl.
The Dranovians immediately drew their weapons and prepared to fire at the girl, believing her to be one of Satalis’ when Grai called out, “No!”
The girl ignored Satalis and everyone behind Lara’s shield as she looked up at Chris with pleading eyes.
“You can’t do this. You can’t sacrifice yourself. Christopher needs you,” the girl whispered.
Chris was far too immersed in the circuit of power he’d made between himself and the natural power of the earth to even notice that the girl was there.
“Bitch, you better get me the fuck out of here!” Satalis screamed from behind the glowing orange barrier.
The girl turned to Satalis and moved her hair away from her neck, displaying it to him.
“I’ve been unleashed. If they don’t kill you, the next time we meet, I will,” the girl said as she stepped close to the orange glowing barrier and trailed her hand through it like water. “And you know I can. Next time, you’ll play my games.”
Satalis reeled back from the girl, and his face paled dramatically as the girl stepped away from him and turned back to Chris.
“This one is forever off limits to you, Satalis. If you ever come near him again, you will never hide from me. I will tear the planet apart piece by piece to find you,” she warned before she laid a gentle hand on Chris’s now fiery arm.
The moment the girl touched Chris, they both disappeared. With Chris’s power no longer consuming and changing Satalis’ energy, he quickly recovered and increased his shield.
Grai roared with rage, threw off his sons, and charged at Satalis.
“Where’s my son!?”
Grai attacked the barrier with stunning ferocity, wishing he’d allowed his sons to shoot the girl. His energy sparked and crackled when it clashed with the dark barrier as Grai fought with his power and his weapons to get to the man who’d somehow taken his son.
