by M L Briers
‘Alpha, we have a problem…’ Jethro held up his hand to silence Wendy. Jethro had left orders for the pack to monitor the perimeter of Wendy’s property and he could hear in Giles voice that things weren’t going well.
‘Talk to me, Giles…’
“We’ve got werewolves…’ Every Lycan male was on his feet with a growl or a curse.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“I thought you got rid of the werewolf problem?” Jethro demanded as he stepped up to Wendy and saw the confusion on her face.
“We did, we destroyed the amulet…” Wendy offered back. Her mind was racing.
“Not all of them, I’m guessing.” Jethro growled as he started towards the back door. “Put up your shields or whatever the hell you do…” He growled out over his shoulder as the mates spilled out from the house and closed the door behind them.
“Are the witches’ coven and the warlocks linked?” Caleb demanded but Wendy was already trying to figure that one out for herself.
“I don’t know.” Wendy admitted. “I need to speak to Tilly.” Wendy set off through the house with Caleb at her heels. The vampire desperately wanted to be outside if there was a fight to be had, but he knew that he needed to stay with the coven. They found Tilly sitting with Eloise in the living room.
“Tilly, tell me about the last coven. Were there any signs or symbols of Anubis that you saw?” Tilly looked confused.
“I…” She shook her head slowly. “Off the top of my head, no, maybe… I don’t know, Wendy.”
“That’s ok, I kind of put you on the spot.” Wendy waved a dismissive hand in her direction.
“What’s going on?” Eloise asked as she pushed forward in her chair.
“We have werewolves.” Caleb announced and both of the witches looked dumbfounded.
“Bit of a damn coincidence, no?” Eloise shot back.
“I prefer to air on the side of the conspiracy theorists.” Caleb announced without his usual glib nature. He looked strained to say the least and that didn’t fill Eloise with that warm and soft fuzzy feeling inside.
“Now what?” Tilly asked.
“Now we get our game on.” Annabeth announced from the doorway. She thumbed backwards over her shoulder. “Vamp’s all ready to go, ladies.” She offered and Wendy nodded.
“Let’s get the spell woven over Verity to keep her down and then we can worry about the damn werewolves.”
“Werewolves!” Annabeth screwed up her face. “What’d I miss?”
Jethro left Alex and Dexter at the witch’s house and took Dale and Luke with him back towards pack land. The men weren’t taking any chances and shifted into their wolves before they left the grounds. The sounds of battles already taking place called them onwards, and Jethro barked out orders as he went.
He wouldn’t allow the pack to come under threat from the Were’s while they defended their mates. He kept a contingency of Omega’s back to guard the community that were being ushered together, and the rest were sent to the front lines. He just wished to hell that he could be everywhere at once as the werewolves seemed to be coming from all directions in small packs that attacked at will and then took off, only to come again somewhere else.
It was a good tactic and one that Jethro himself might have employed in battle. Stretch the enemy as thinly as possible over as great a distance as you could manage, especially if you didn’t have the numbers to attack in one fail swoop. Jethro didn’t normally like to fight angry, but he was pissed at the thought of any of these werewolves getting through to go after the witches themselves. Jethro launched his body at the first werewolf that he came across and found a certain amount of stress relief in that first strike.
“Wendy…” Annabeth bit out into the relative silence of the room as the witches worked over Verity’s body to try to keep her suspended in her present docile state and out of the fight. It had been obvious that the entity had used the vampire’s body to attack Caleb, and Wendy wouldn’t let that happen again. They needed to keep this vampire down and out of the game for the foreseeable future.
“I feel it.” Wendy offered back. Annabeth had been referring to the outside push against their magic that now came in what felt like a two pronged attack, at least the magic felt different. “Keep working.”
It was damn hard to keep everyone’s mind on the problem at hand when they all had mates out there fighting a different battle. It was Wendy’s job to pull their magic together and channel it through Tilly, and she was determined to complete the binding spell on the Vampire before they moved onto other problems. Spell done, job completed, Wendy felt the witches break away from the collective.
“We’re not done here.” Wendy informed them. “We need to go back in and see if we can’t find where that magic is coming from…”
“Did it feel different to you, like two different kinds of magic?” Deborah asked and all the others nodded their agreement.
“Light magic and dark mixed together.” Wendy offered. “We’re being attacked by two different covens and we need to shut it down.”
“How?” Annabeth bit back the urge to chuckle in bewilderment at even the thought of such a task.
“Tilly has an opening with the witches. We should go that route first…”
“We should have killed those damn bitches the last time…” Annabeth snapped out.
“Well we didn’t and here we are, but we’ll damn well get them this time.” Wendy assured her.
“Their magic was pretty strong.” Samantha warned and Annabeth snorted her contempt for the other coven wannabees.
“Not as strong as ours though. We kicked the arse of their last spell…” Annabeth looked to Wendy for confirmation of what she was saying. Wendy had the distinct impression that Annabeth was just trying to rally the team.
“I agree. Tilly’s our backdoor into their magic…”
“I am?” Tilly scowled at the thought. “How’s that work?”
“Because you know them, and you’re still outside the realm of our coven.” Wendy offered back.
“Let’s give it a go.” Tilly offered. Glad that she hadn’t joined with the coven if her individual magic was the key to breech their wards and shields.
Wendy waited while the circle cleared their minds. Then she took control and joined the individual strands of their magic together and pushed it towards Tilly. The young woman opened herself up to the powerful surge that went through her body, and she once more became the conduit for the coven’s power as it joined with her own.
Jethro reared up on his back paws and swiped one set of claws across the throat of the werewolf that that been foolish enough to challenge him. A pissed off alpha was a monstrous beast to behold, and Jethro was more than pissed off, he was livid. His ultimate aim was to cut down every Werewolf that was there and move onto the damn coven that had sent them in to do their dirty work for them.
Having dispatched the wolf; his eyes flicked to his next target as his beta was battling two on one with a couple of jet back wolves. Jethro took the first one out with his jaws clamped around the animal’s neck and ripped his throat clean out, There was no coming back from that. Then he turned his attention to the next, but it already lay dead on the ground with Dale’s wolf eyeing the area for the next victim.
‘Alpha?’ Dale was itching for a fight.
‘Go. Run the perimeter and help out where needed. I’m going to go the other way and track back and forth onto witch land to see if any are getting through.’ Jethro was already off and running on fast paws. He was caught in two minds, one where- like his beta he itched to tear every werewolf apart and the one where he was guarding his mate.
Mating did come with its drawbacks…
Tilly’s magic was the perfect conduit for the coven to be able to channel all of their power into searching for the alternate witches’ coven. It held the remnants of knowing their magic along with having tasted both sides. Never having joined a coven gave Tilly the perfect starting point; like a clean slate to be abl
e to build on the connection.
Wendy saw the flash of something unexpected within her mind, an Anubis like creature, but the thing was not alive, instead it was as if it was worn by someone, like a mask or a homage. Perhaps they had followed the wrong path. Perhaps they were chasing the magic of the dark warlock coven…
“It’s them.” Tilly breathed out on a near whisper.
“Wait, somethings wrong…” Wendy warned the circle.
Eloise was the first to feel it, a darkness crouching within the magic, hidden within the finely woven fabric of the dark witches that were reaching back towards them. She felt the jolt to her womb. There was a stabbing pain that tore through her and she felt sick to her stomach.
“Eloise…” Wendy was more than ready to break away and try a different route but Eloise bit down on the pain.
“Not yet…” Eloise felt the spark within her, as if there was magic that was being born right inside of her womb. It warmed her as it spread throughout her body. Every inch of her skin tingled as if her mate had walked into the room. It was that part of her daughter that was her father’s wolf.
“Whoa.” Annabeth couldn’t help but comment at the rush of magic that went through the collective minds and bodies of all those present.
“Was that…?” Samantha questioned.
“Hush…” Wendy knew that they didn’t need distractions, they needed results. Something had sparked Eloise’s pup’s magic to awaken, and Wendy was distracted enough as she wondered if the spirit had anything to do with it. If it had then they needed to use that extra force wisely…
Each witch felt the connection with the child. The coven’s temporary sixth witch as she joined her powers with theirs. Tilly gasped at the rush of the extra power that flowed through her. The power of the five witches mixed with her own had been powerful enough but now that they had a sixth the coven was unstoppable.
Dexter and Dale had already shifted into their wolves. They formed a loose perimeter around the outside of the property. Constantly moving in erratic circles that took them close to each other as they crossed paths, but not close enough so that they could be attacked at the same time, and never in the same place twice. Dexter caught the first scent of the Werewolf on the air and yapped out a warning to his brother.
‘Jethro, the mutts have breached the line…’ Dexter offered up the warning before he was too damn busy ripping off heads to do it.
Dale dropped back towards the house, growling out a warning to the vampire within that the mutts had been scented, it was the last thing that Caleb wanted to hear, and yet he’d been expecting it. With his back to the only entrance into the witch’s inner sanctum, Caleb’s fangs were down and his claws were out. He heightened the bloodlust within him… He would protect the witches with his life or die trying…
‘Retreat towards the house. The perimeter’s fallen.’ Jethro growled out his orders as he ran the land on fast paws.
His body hit what felt like a brick wall in the middle of the field and he bounced back off it. Slamming down into the dirt and trying to shake off the haze of the impact. He growled out a warning to the rest of the pack…
‘Some kind of magical shield on my side of the property, go easy…’ He cursed out every damn word that he knew over and over again.
His mate and the others were on the other side of that shield and if he couldn’t get through it then he couldn’t protect anyone. He shifted into his human form and reached out to touch the invisible blockade that kept him at bay. His fingers stung from the contact with the magical barrier, and yet if he pushed through the pain then his hand could reach the other side.
He yanked his hand back as the pain travelled up to his shoulder and he cursed again. In his human form he could get through, of that he was certain, almost. Jethro bit down on his need to kill every last one of them.
‘The shield’s painful in human form, but I think I can get through.’
‘Alpha, let me…’ Alex was the first to protest, but Jethro was adamant.
‘Hold, damn it. If I make it through I’ll let you know.’ Jethro growled out as he took a few large steps back and ran at the barricade head on.
CHAPTER NINE
Jethro felt as if every atom in his body was on fire. He’d hit the ground hard on the other side and carried on rolling. He felt as if his body was nothing but a damn hot lava puddle in the dirt. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe… and then all at once he sucked in large gulp of air and coughed out what felt like a dragon’s breath.
Jethro forced his body to move. He rolled onto his side and growled with the effort that it took. His body was healing from the effect of the contact with the magical shield, more with every second that ticked by. He counted each and every damn second because it was another one that saw his mate still in danger from the mutts.
He pushed up onto his knees and roared with the effort that it took him. He was panting like a wild thing. Jethro bit down on his pain as he shifted back into his wolf. The shift jolted his body to heal faster…
‘Hurts like hell, weaker, but shifted and stronger now…’ Jethro informed his pack. He knew the mates wouldn’t wait a moment longer to breach the wall and he was right, by the time he was up on his paws and running towards the witch’s house every last one of his pack was following him through.
“Mutts are coming.” Caleb called out a warning to his mate through the door. He hoped to hell that she had a handle on what she was doing behind that thick bit of wood, because if they breached the house in force he didn’t know how many he could hold off. The first smash of glass grated his nerves and sent him wild for the kill… He only hoped he lived to see his mate again.
Wendy had heard Caleb’s warning shout. It was now or never. She knew that to be the case and yet she didn’t know which coven to attack first. Two children. One good and one evil… light and dark doing battle from within… a pure heart can… The spirits words echoed again in her mind. Win… a pure heart can win…Wendy was sure of it.
“Focus on the vampire baby.” Wendy rushed out and the others obeyed her call.
Each one of them felt the rush of the darkness that swept towards them as they turned their attention towards the entity. As the light of their combined magic shone on that blackened heart it had nowhere to hide, nowhere to go. It reared up spiritually and physically, manifesting above Verity’s body in a swirling pool of black obsidian that looked like a gateway straight to hell. Annabeth bit out an obscenity as her eyes took it in…
The mass started to take shape. A jackal’s head forming out of the swirling haze… Teeth bared it; snapped towards Eloise. She didn’t move, standing her ground against the obscenity of the magical realm…
“Now.” Wendy bit out. Each witch acted fast. In their hands they held a fistful of the ash from a burned Rowan tree. Tossing it up in the air towards the entity and drawing on the power of the sacred tree to enhance their magic…
For one long moment nothing happened as the cloud of ash rose up in the room, but as it descended over the entity it seemed to drape around the shape like a shroud… Then the entity let out a scream that was piercing… Jars rattled on the shelves and the witch’s resisted the urge to cover their ears from the brutality of the high pitched screeching.
Not one witch broke the circle as they chanted out the words to the binding spell, over and over, and the entity snapped with its jaws at them as it flayed back and forth… Jaws that were disappearing, being pulled apart as the Rowan ash worked to dissipate the mass… There was another piercing scream as the ash brought down the entity down towards the floor…
Jethro snapped his jaws around the first mutt that he came into contact with. He could see them breaching the windows of the house and he hoped that at least one of his men was in there with Caleb fighting them as they came through. He heard the loud impact as someone threw one of the mutts back out the window and downed a couple of werewolves along the way. He had a feeling that would be Caleb in one of his moods…
‘Alpha, the house.’ Dexter’s instinct was also to protect his mate and if he couldn’t be there to do it then he wanted his alpha there in his place.
Jethro turned on fast paws and headed towards the house. His heart was pounding within his ears as he raced towards the thick of the fight. He could hear the roar of the vampire within as he battled the mutts, and he took the broken window in one high jump that had him land on the back of a mutt that just happened to be in his way.
He snapped his jaws closed around the back of the mutt’s neck and his claws ripped into the beast’s neck; opening his flesh all the way down to the vein and beyond. He released his claws and jumped away just before the mutt fell. Jethro didn’t wait for the thing to die a slow death in front of him, he was already off after the next Were…
It was safe to say that the entity made a damn meal out of returning to whatever hell it had been summoned from. The moment the ash settled on the floor the coven turned their attention towards the dark coven’s that had brought it forth. Without the dark power that the entity had granted them they were easy pickings…
“No survivors this time…” Annabeth bit out. She wasn’t about to go through this again. Now that they had the witches and warlocks within their sights they needed to finish this. Binding them from magic wasn’t an option, they could pass on what they knew, and not one of the coven was prepared to allow that to happen.
