Jade's grip tightened on my elbow, and I could feel the prickle of her gaze sliding over my face, feel her unasked questions storming in her mind.
"If you shoot me and you're a good shot, then maybe I'll die, but if I shoot you"—I forced a smile at the room—"there is no maybe. That goes for anyone who tries to stop us."
Thick silence suffocated the room. No one moved. I sure hoped I'd gotten my point across, because I was sick of hearing myself speak.
Jade's grip on my elbow loosened as she turned. A creak sounded, and a blast of winter air hit me in the back. We were almost out. And then we'd need to run.
I stumbled over the uneven boards in the entryway as I backed outside, my arrow like a constant, steady dare for those inside.
Then we were outside the town hall and free.
"Jade!" I hissed and turned in the direction of the church, my free arm and bow wheeling about me for her. But there was no one there.
Panic stuck my breaths to my freezing lungs. "Jade!"
A whimper. That was all I heard from her. The rest was stolen by the unmistakable slam of the town hall door.
I stepped toward it, or started to, but a force wrenched my quiver from my back. I stumbled off the porch, my bow flying. An arm looped around Sasha and me from behind, and a cold hand slapped over my mouth.
I screamed and fought to get away. Harnessed against me, Sasha did too. I lashed out with everything I had in order to work my hand under my coat to free her. As a distraction while I did, I bit down hard on several fingers. Sasha tumbled out the bottom of my coat, landed on my boots, and ran toward the town hall underneath the porch. She’d be fine. She had to be.
“What was that?” The grip on me loosened for an instant.
Only enough for me to shout, "Jade! Thomas!"
Something banged against the inside of the door. Jade. Was that her trying to get out?
But whoever held me strengthened their hold and choked off any more screams or bites with the crook of their elbow locked around my neck.
I couldn't— I couldn't breathe. I flailed weakly, but my winter-burdened lungs had nothing left to give.
I fought to keep my eyes open, and slowly, gradually, vision clicked into place between the straining buttons of my coat. A figure wearing a heavy coat and woolen hat pulled low emerged through the snowy void, coming toward the town hall. Blue eyes pierced my fading consciousness, and a whistly chuckle coiled through the wind and clenched around my heart.
Lager.
At the same time I realized it, a gunshot cracked behind the town hall door.
Chapter Six
No. No.
I refused to die now when I'd come so close to saving Jade. I refused to let her die behind the closed door of the town hall. But that gunshot… My nerves trembled, and worry chewed through my gut, for her and myself.
Another man strode out of the whiteout and stopped several feet away next to a tree heavy with snow.
Lager stopped in front of me and shouted over the wind, "You have no idea how long I've waited for this day."
I squirmed in the other man's grasp, but I didn't have enough air to tell Lager to go to hell—or to tease him with details about his missing family. If he knew about them, he might not be so quick to kill me if he thought I could supply more details. If he tried, though, if I got my chance, I'd have to kill him first, my promise to Shay be damned.
He stepped closer so we were nose to nose, a victorious grin stretching his mouth. His sickly sweet honey scent choked down my throat with the tiny sliver of air the man who held me allowed.
"I thought that was you in there. I could sell you for a pretty penny like your friend." He nodded toward the closed door. "Let them break you as a slave and force you to learn your place before I shoot off parts of your body. See how you like it."
My blood simmered as I stared him down. I would never show fear in front of him. In fact, a small part of me wanted him to haul me back in there just so I could see what had happened. See that my half-sister was okay. The other part screamed and cursed at Shay. She was too good for this man, whether she knew this version of him or not.
"Or…" He pulled a gun out from under his coat and pointed it at my head. "I could kill you now."
I didn't even flinch. Inside, though, my blood iced over because I didn't doubt he'd pull the trigger. He hated me, maybe even as much as I hated him.
A buzzing, an almost growl, sounded from underneath the porch, a noise I prayed the other two men wouldn't notice or identify. Sasha’s gaze remained on Lager.
His grin sparked to his eyes with a malicious glimmer. "There's something I want you to…know first though. I was about to say I want you to see,”—a humorless chuckle—“but well, you know.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Erick, to the jail next door and come right back."
Erick, dressed in all black, strode around the corner of the town hall. The man behind me held firm.
My mind spun over itself. Lager had nothing I wanted to see. Ever. Still, from Sasha's view, my face flickered. Whatever was about to happen cleaved apart any hope I'd had that I would walk away from this unhurt. But one thing worked to my advantage—he didn't know I could see.
The two of us stayed unmoving, my eyes trained on him, while in my periphery, two figures emerged from around the corner, one in front of the other. One was Lager's man Erick. The other…
Lager stepped aside as the two came upon us. When they were about four feet away, the figure in front tripped over his long coat and stumbled to his knees—and then glanced up.
My heart fractured into a thousand, forever unhealable pieces.
"No one wanted this one. Couldn't get a single penny for him," Lager said. "Should’ve sold him with his sister in a two-for-one deal."
It was Lee. Bruises mottled his swollen face, but he looked up at me with such innocence and love, I didn't think he even noticed them. He was shivering badly.
"But…" Blood dribbled from his split lip over his chin. "But…Aika. I found you. I did it all by myself."
I hissed out a broken sob while tears burned down my frozen cheeks. No one wanted this one, Lager had said. How could that be when Lee was one of the sweetest people I'd ever known? His disability had saved him, and now I needed to save him too.
Somehow.
I worked my mouth in an effort to speak, but only a pained rasp escaped my throat.
"Let her speak," Lager ordered.
The grip loosened enough for me to squeak, "I'll buy him."
Lager shook his head. "That's not the way this works. I'll decide what to do with the both of you." He leaned in, his honey-sweet breath billowing into my face. "Besides, I know for a fact you have nothing to buy him with."
Because he'd taken everything I had. Every single thing in my life, gone, all because of him and Faust.
"Now, you can do something for me. Or, if you decide not to, I'll kill you both. Your choice." He grinned, his blue eyes shining with victory. "All you have to do is tell me what slaughtered close to twenty wolves in Slipjoint Forest with your arrows sticking out of them. It’s all everyone is talking about, and I, for one, know it’s not wolfsbane mixed with moonshine."
One man had already backed me into a corner to play his game. Now Lager too? They were practically one and the same, except instead of wolf territory in the Crimson Forest, Lager played for poison territory. What I had, he wanted to sell. Always.
"I can tell you know exactly what I'm talking about,” he prodded. “Tell me. The arrows were dipped in something other than wolfsbane, weren't they?"
I blanked my face of everything but hatred. I'd give him what he damn well deserved—a lie and nothing else. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Of course you do. Wolfsbane doesn't kill; it slows. And those were your arrows in those wolves."
"Every arrow you see is mine?" I fired back. "Every dead wolf is my fault? You’re the one with the poison trade now. I think you did it.”
Something s
hifted across his face, a storm of winter’s rage. And then he snapped.
With a roar, he drew back the butt of his gun and smashed it into the side of Lee's head.
Blood spattered. Lee slid sideways to the snow. Limp. Unmoving.
It all unfolded through Sasha under the porch as my knees went slack. Bile rode up from my stomach but dead-ended as the chokehold around my neck grew tighter.
"Lee!" I tried to shout, but all I heard were two consecutive loud noises that made no sense at first.
Then suddenly I could breathe again. The tight grip around me vanished. I slumped to the snow next to Lee as I sucked in all the air I could.
"Leave. Now." That was Thomas, but the wind scattered his voice so that it came from everywhere in a loud, thunderous boom.
"I don't want any trouble here." Lager backed off a step, his gun aimed down.
Loud thuds came from the direction of the town hall and then a heartbreaking cry from Jade. "What did you do? What did you do to him?"
A wisp of a girl wrapped in a green floral-patterned blanket flew off the steps toward Lager, kicking and screaming and cursing, but Thomas’s thick forearm hooked around her middle and caught her midair.
I shook my head into the snow, Jade’s wretched cries blistering my soul, and then found Lee's wide, tearful eyes open and watching. His mouth was open wide and caught on a sob.
Alive. He was alive. Relief sweetened the air funneling into my lungs.
"Turn tail and go," Thomas shouted.
I crawled toward Lee and blocked Sasha's view with my body as I took his face in my hands.
He immediately did the same, his hands shaking violently, and pressed his forehead to mine. "Aika, my head. But…Jade? Why? Why Jade mad? Why?"
All I could do was bite back my sobs and hold my palms to his ears to keep him from hearing Jade screaming at the top of her lungs at Lager. Lee hated loud noises, hated high emotions even worse, and all I wanted to do was not upset him further, ease his pain, and hold him to me.
"I'll remember this," Lager shouted. "I'll remember that you killed two of my men in cold blood."
"I will fucking destroy you, do you hear me?" Jade screamed. “I will fucking rip you apart for hurting him.”
"Better put a leash on that one," Lager shot back, his boots retreating a few steps more.
Coward. The day his dead body withered away until he was nothing but a useless pile of bones couldn't come soon enough.
Finally, Jade's threats on his life faded away, and Thomas must've released her because she collapsed on the other side of Lee, sobbing.
I released him into her arms and then just lay there, relieved tears streaming down my cheeks and freezing to my skin. I was too stunned to move. I'd gotten them both back, somehow, impossibly, and I knew we needed to move in order for us to stay together like we were supposed to be. My body was done, though, the emotional turmoil of today too much to handle.
"Aika." A warm touch grazed my fingers and lifted my hand out of the snow and onto my coat. "Are you hurt? We can’t stay here."
I shook my head, the sounds of Jade and Lee's reunion pressing in on my chest. The three of us had been inseparable growing up, and their affectionate brother/sister bond with each other had been one of the most important things I'd learned from them. That there was such a thing as love outside my family. That it could happen around me—and with me. That deep down, I knew I deserved the same kind of love. They'd opened my eyes to it, and I was both envious and fascinated by it. Now, I couldn't stop crying with relief that they—and we—were together.
Thomas curled his fingers around mine and said gently, "We need to go. Can you stand? Where's Sasha?"
His acknowledgement of the wolf pup leaped the blood through my veins faster. He knew as well as I did that I would never willingly part with her.
I heaved a breath and turned my head, watching myself as I did so. "Th-there," I choked. "Under the porch…the bravest, smartest wolf pup who knew exactly what to do like a good girl."
Thomas gazed over at her for a split second, the first time since I'd met him, then stalked toward her, clenching and unclenching his fists. He crouched low and scooped her up into his arms, and she went willingly. Her eyes widened as she took his face in, from the ends of his windblown hair to his beard and the firm line of his full lips. His dark eyes connected with hers for an instant, and a flash of turmoil and sorrow darkened his gaze before he looked away again, his face blanking.
Progress, though. We'd all made progress today even if it had almost killed us.
Jade sniffed and released a shuddery breath as she pulled gently on Lee's arm. "Come on, big brother. You're too big for me to carry."
Lee laughed, the full-belly one that always warmed my heart. When he shoved to his feet and swayed, Thomas was there to scoop him up too.
I hauled myself to my hands and knees and then stopped, letting the wind whip the frozen tears from my face as I stared in the direction Lager had gone.
I could do it now, just get it over with so I never had to hear his threats against my life or my family's lives, or let him get away with destroying every goddamn thing. Screw my promise to Shay. She should’ve never trusted me anyway, a blind, illiterate, desperate girl. I skated my hands over the snow, searching for my bow and arrows, and when I found them a few feet away, I immediately nocked one and aimed.
Seething rage blistered my veins as I stood. He wouldn't hurt me again. Today had been the last time—the glee when he'd counted his money after selling Jade, the crush of the gun against Lee's head. I needed to end him right now.
"Aika." Thomas's voice cracked the air apart around me with its force and soothed it back together with a tinge of understanding.
"Give me Sasha," I told him through gritted teeth. "I'll go find him. I'll end him right now."
"No."
"Thomas—"
"Death is too easy for him. Let him suffer first. He headed in the direction of the tavern. Let him nurse his pride for a few days. Then let him wonder if that's really your dead body in his burned-down, empty cabin. He loves his family. You saw how good he takes care of them. See what he does when you strip it all away, just as he did to you."
"You mean torture him," I said through gritted teeth, my voice tight with menace.
"That was the plan all along. Time to sit back and watch it all unfold. Killing him now lets him off too easy."
Thomas was right. He was terrifying, a devil lurking in the dark when he talked like that, but he was right. I couldn't kill Lager when he deserved so much more.
So much more punishment.
As much as it pained me, I lowered my bow. "Does the same apply to Faust and Gabriel?"
"Gabriel wishes he were dead already."
"And Faust?"
"Faust should’ve killed me a long time ago." Thomas put his hand on my shoulder and guided me toward him. “Give Lager a head start, and he’ll eventually lead us right to my brother.”
Finally, I lowered my bow. “And we’ll paint the Crimson Forest with their blood.”
Chapter Seven
"You can see…through them? The wolves who are…who shift? How is any of this possible?"
Jade and Lee lay together on a spare bed in the church, while I sat in a chair next to them as a watchful guardian, much like Archer had done to me a little more than a month ago in the cabin. Lee snored softly with his head cradled in his sister's lap, his head wrapped in bandages that were probably due for a change soon. Jade rested her back against the wall while I glided a brush through her damp hair. She'd bathed with one hand clinging to me all the while, and she hadn't yet released me. Not that I minded. Not in the least.
Sasha had fallen asleep on my bed in the room next door. I didn’t have the heart to wake her. Baba rested down the hall, and when he’d set his sights on Jade and Lee, he began to weep. It had hurt, but I’d tried not to let it show. I was glad they were back too.
"The wolves were poisoned with what Baba sold
in Old Man's Den,” I answered. “It was poured in the ponds and rivers in the Crimson Forest."
"Moonshine?"
"Moonshine mixed with wolfsbane. It slowed them down, made them sick, and then they died."
"Poisoned…" She released a shaky breath. "Like you."
My stomach squirmed, and a cold, sticky sweat clung to my skin. She was too smart not to know everything about me, even the parts I'd never had the guts to tell her. "You know."
"I guessed, but I… I hoped I was wrong. Your ama was so awful to you."
So useless and broken. Ama’s words had carved themselves into my soul, but they hurt a little less now. If she could see me now, knew all I'd been through since Baba had been shot, would she think any differently? I tried to imagine her and the sound of her voice, but her face blurred in my memories. Her anger morphed into a buzz drowned out by my worried thoughts. I couldn't remember her clearly, or maybe I didn't feel the need to.
"Yeah. She was." The brush in my hands snagged on a knot, and I gently coaxed it loose. Now wasn't the time to tell Jade that my baba was hers and Lee’s, too, not after all she'd been through today. Soon, though, when the time was right, and I'd be there for them, no matter what. Being her half-blood sister made me love her even more.
"And these wolves you can see through… They're also human. Thomas is a wolf. I guess that explains why he scares me."
I paused with the brush midair. "He does?"
"He doesn't you?"
"No. I feel…like he's another version of myself, if that makes sense."
She sighed. "It doesn't. Not even close. You're not a wolf, Aika."
"No, that's… We have the same goals. We even have the same pasts in a way." I clamped my mouth shut because that wasn't for me to tell, so I left it at that, knowing Jade could fill in those blanks herself.
"He's very comfortable shooting people. I saw that in the town hall. I know you trust him, and don’t take this the wrong way, but I have to wonder what makes him so different than Lager and Faust."
Winter's Rage (The Crimson Winter Reverse Harem Series Book 3) Page 6