She almost made the whole thing look easy.
“There's an Ageless undead in here,” I tried to say as blood bubbled up and over my lips. I'd been hit in the lung, probably. “Silas …” I had to stop and swallow several times past the liquid in my throat.
“Shh, Zara, it's okay,” he said as I realized Nic, Tidus, Che and Anubis were missing. Silas tried to pull me into his lap, but I pushed away from him and stumbled to my feet, using the metal wall on my right to stay up. Facing the opposite direction, I squinted across the sea of prisoners who, even now in all this raucous weren't waking up.
There was another fight going on.
With one last glance over my shoulder, I saw that Aeron had joined in the fray and that Jax was actually struggling to his feet. He was alive; he was okay. But the commotion and the sounds from the opposite end of the building?
I started to run with Silas beside me, blood soaking my hoodie, dripping to the floor as I ran past silver chains and half-dead werewolves. I couldn't look at any of them right now. There'd be time for that later if we survived this.
If.
If, if, if.
Pain rippled through me, but I couldn't tell if it was mine … or one of my men.
'Zara, don't,' I heard Nic croak out in wolfspeak, but I was close enough now to see through the haze, to see Nic sliding down the metal wall, blood pooling underneath him at an alarming rate.
Too much blood, way too much blood.
Werewolves could heal a lot of things, but we weren't immortal. There was no such thing in this universe as far as I knew.
'Get the fuck out of here,' Nic gasped, his wolfspeak voice so weak it barely registered. He was literally dying, right in front of me, bleeding out on in the dirt while I just stood there and did nothing. 'Run. Get Nikolina and come back later. Go, please. Silas, get her out of here.'
Something hit the ground near my feet, but I didn't bother to look at it. The only thing I could see in that moment was Nic.
“The next alphas of Ebon Red?” a voice asked, and I turned to see a Blood woman in a white dress standing near another table. “More like a bunch of unruly pups, no?” She flicked her hand out and blood spattered the ground, drops of red that I could tell by smell alone belonged to Nicoli Hallett. That scent, the honeysuckle and pine of my pack meant home to me; it meant family.
The vampire woman moved forward on quiet, bare feet, her white dress nearly the same color as her pale skin. Her hair was pale too, a blonde so light it may as well have been white. And her eyes? I had no idea what'd happened to her before she died, but she had no irises, just pale, colorless orbs, as if she might be blind. The only color on her was the red from fingertips to wrist.
She lifted something up and twirled it around in a weak shaft of moonlight. Vampires had better night vision than wolves anyway—but this woman, I had a feeling she didn't need to see at all to know what she was doing.
Bone glinted, a piece of rib most likely. A piece of Nic's rib.
A sound escaped my throat as the moment registered in my brain, a slice of forever that I would not soon forget.
'That table,' Silas said, and I could feel him trembling beside me. Whether it was with rage or fear or just pure adrenaline, I wasn't sure. 'There's meat all over at that table.'
Dozens of smells competed for supremacy in my sensitive nostrils, but as soon as he said that, I registered the stink of meat. Of 'were' meat.
“What a joke,” the Ageless undead said, turning her sightless eyes in my direction. Before I could even really register her words, I was moving and so was she.
“Zara!” Silas screamed out, but it was too late. I wasn't a person anymore, just an animal. And I would fight to the death to protect my mates.
'Don't … Zara …' Nic tried to say, but he was fading and fading fast. All I was thinking in that moment was that I had to get through this vampire to get to Nic, that's it. She wasn't an enemy, just an obstacle, just a tribulation that needed to be overcome.
My body plowed into hers, still in human form, and the wooden knife was just suddenly in my hand, slashing away at her exposed flesh, cutting into her arms as she laughed. Someone was screaming, but it took me several seconds to register that it was me.
The vampire woman threw me off, right into Silas, and sent us both rolling across the floor and into the silver chains. I heard a whimper and realized we'd landed right on top of another werewolf.
I lifted my gaze up and found myself face-to-face with emerald eyes and shock white hair—one of Montgomery's missing family members. He looked to be about the same age as me, and I realized with surprise that he was probably a same-age brother from Monty's litter.
'Hang tight and we'll get you out of here,' I said, but I was already rising to my feet and yanking Silas up with me.
“Go find the others!” I screamed, because I could hear fighting happening in other parts of the building. But it was so dark in there, so fucking dark, even for a werewolf …
I took off running before Silas could stop me and found myself being flung against the back wall before I even registered the vampire woman moving toward me again. She climbed on top of me and pinned my wrists above my head, stinking of mint and apples, smelling like blood.
“Pup you might be,” she said with a wild grin, “but you've still got that beautiful blood running through your veins, don't you?” The undead nightmare leaned in and slid her tongue up the side of my racing pulse before pausing and sighing deeply. “I never get tired of that earthy smell,” she whispered, and then she was opening her mouth and carefully, seductively sinking her fangs into my skin.
I struggled underneath her, bucking and thrashing, fighting through the bright white rush of happy pheromones from her saliva, using all the strength I had to try and get her off of me. But she was old and she was undead and she was right—I was only eighteen. I wasn't Nikolina, an experienced powerhouse with all the strength of a pack behind me. I was just one werewolf. Just one person.
A gold-gray wolf appeared in my field of vision, just as I felt Nic starting to slip, violent panic arcing through me, making me sick inside. Nic was about to die. He had a minute at best. Seconds at most. I could feel him slipping away …
Tidus latched onto the vampire's left arm and wrenched hard enough to dislodge her grip, giving me just enough time to grab another wooden knife from my belt and stab it into her side. It wasn't a killing blow or even one strong enough to stop her, but it gave Tidus the opening he needed to grab her shoulder in his muzzle and rip her back and off of me, throwing her aside.
My neck screamed with pleasure from the bite, but I knew the skin was probably torn and ragged.
'Zara, I'm scared …' Nic gasped as I scrambled across the dirt floor and into the pool of blood around him, hot and wet and sticky. 'I'm not … I don't … I don't want to say goodbye to you yet …'
“Nic,” I sobbed, looking down at the hole in his shirt, at the gaping wound with the bits of broken rib showing. Even from here, I could see that the vampire had punctured his heart and left a silver pin in the side of it. Carefully, oh so carefully, I put my hand to his chest and reached inside of him to pull it out. “I love you, baby,” I whispered, shaking, knowing that even if I took the pin out, I was going to lose him.
This was it.
This was my last moment with Nicoli Hallett.
“I've always loved you,” I told him, tears streaming down my face as I slowly moved to take the pin. I didn't know why I was even trying at that point, knowing that he was destined to die, that this was our last moment together. “Being with you … it's made everything okay, no matter how bad it got. It was still okay because you were there.”
'I love …' he started to say, but his eyes were dimming and his wolfspeak voice was little more than a distant howl, an echo of the strong, proud Ebon Red male that I'd just promised my life to.
No.
No.
No.
My fingers closed around the silver pin and t
ugged it free, tossing it aside just as Nic's heart beat one, last time. One last pump. And then it stopped. Everything stopped, except for the slow careful touch of my bloody hands to his face, the slow press of my lips against his.
That was it.
Our last kiss.
The only one I'd get for the rest of forever.
My lips touched his quiet, still ones as I leaned my body into his …
And then … an explosion rocked the metal warehouse, blowing out the wall behind Nic's body, throwing us both across the yard and sending us tumbling in the grass as the pungent scent of earth and growing things surrounded us, husky and sweet and eternal.
I scrambled up and over to Nic, even though I knew he was dead. I knew it. I knew it.
My hands touched his face again as I held my breath and hoped and prayed for a miracle, a kiss of that old werewolf magic that'd been hiding in our veins for so long, crouching beneath silver and spells and waiting to be unleashed on the world. Wasn't it enough? Wasn't it?!
“NIC!” I screamed, because his heart still wasn't beating, and his eyes were looking up at the stars, glassy and unseeing. “NIC!” My voice echoed around the property and then went silent, as if I'd been cut off by a mystic hand, shushing me, silencing me.
I raised my head and found myself staring into the eyes of a white stag.
He looked at me for the longest moment, standing with his head down, near the entrance to the barn. I swear, when I met his gaze, I felt the infinite beauty of the universe wash over me, a peacefulness I'd never experienced before in my life.
It said that everything was going to be okay, that even death played a beautiful, high note in life's symphony. Nic might be gone, but a new pup would be born to take his place, and the spirit I'd known as Nicoli Hallett would find a home somewhere else, be reborn and start a new life.
“Please don't take him from me,” I begged, my whispered words the only sound in the world. There was nothing else. No more fighting, no more night whispers from crickets or owls, not even the squeak of a field mouse.
The stag moved over to us and touched his nose to my cheek, wiping away blood and tears with his snow-white nose. When he walked, he made no sound.
“Please,” I said again, knowing that I would do anything to save Nic, even if it meant giving my life to … the spirit of the forest? The horned god? Mother Earth's consort? I had no idea who or what this creature was, but I recognized the echo of his heart.
Mother Earth's Children, that archaic nickname for my people. It made sense to me all of a sudden.
With tears streaming down my face, I lifted a palm and the stag nudged it with his head. As I watched in silent disbelief, vines curled up from the base of his antlers and around them, twining around my wrist.
'Hush, my sweet child,' the forest spirit said, and then the vines fell away and a mark appeared on the underside of my wrist, a black rose that shimmered a rich, velvety emerald in the moonlight. 'Hush and don't cry.'
The stag moved his head over to Nic's still, quiet face, pushed his nostrils close to the boy's mouth … and exhaled with a long, slow, sweet sigh. His breath plumed in the cool air and Nic's body convulsed, a gasp tearing from his throat that was ragged and broken and disjointed.
With a groan and a bellow, the stag collapsed onto its side, dead.
“Nic?” I asked, trembling as I laid my fingers on his shoulders and he started to breath again, choking and coughing, bleeding everywhere. There was still a hole in his chest and a piece of rib missing, but as I watched, his flesh started to repair itself.
That's when it clicked.
The thing that had fallen at my feet … the silver bullet I'd been shot with. And my own wounds? They were gone—even the vampire bite was a rough, ragged patch of scar tissue when I put my hand to it.
“Nic,” I said again, laying my body against his, fat tears streaming down my face. When his strong arms curled around me … I knew I'd never regret a single other moment in my life, so long as he was with me. Just as long as he was here. “Oh, Nic, Nic, Nic,” I whispered, kissing his cheeks, his mouth, his forehead.
“Zara, what the fuck just happened to me?” he asked, his voice quivering with fear as he sat up, shaking all over, his face as white as a ghost. “I could see you and this … this …” We both looked over to find the stag's body covered in vines, blooming with black and red roses, and as we watched, it decayed into the ground with the sweet smell of rot. As quick as they'd come, the vines and flowers withered away until there was nothing there but a pile of dried and dead bramble. “I could see it all, everything.”
“You were dead, Nic,” I said, but all of a sudden, sound came crashing back to us and I heard a scream, a ripple of fear and pain.
My other mates.
I had seven men to protect.
“Zara,” Nic said, grabbing my arm, his flesh knitted mostly back together, enough to stop him from bleeding. But he still cringed when he tried to get up.
“Love of my life,” I told him, licking blood from my lips, and putting my hands on either side of his face. “As your alpha female, I order you to stay put. Do you understand me? Unless it's life or death, you don't move from this spot.”
I released him and took off running, back through the hole in the metal building, and into a much brighter den of shadows and pain. The meat table was overturned, chunks of werewolf flesh scattered across the floor, some of it wrapped in plastic, other parts sitting raw and dirty in the middle of a horrific fight scene.
I knew right away where the pain and fear was coming from.
Anubis was on his side in wolf form, the undead vampire on top of him, her teeth sunk deep into a bloody wound on the side of his neck. There was no fur left there, no skin either. She was sucking blood from the muscles in his neck.
Chucking my badass tool kit aside, I shifted, shedding my clothes as I threw myself at her. Just before my body made contact, she lifted up her left hand and a wave of heat and electricity hit me like a freight train.
My body flew backward and slammed into the wall, bones breaking as I crumpled to the floor.
Magic.
I'd just been tossed aside by a vampire using the magic of my own people.
I guess Harlem had been right about an alpha's blood …
With a groan of pain, I forced myself to my feet and found the undead woman staring at me with her sightless white eyes. She gave me a bloody grin and then lunged, leaving Anubis' comatose form to come after me.
She didn't get a chance at me a second time.
Silas' gray and brown form exploded between us, knocking her off course and into the sea of chained wolves in the center of the room. Che was right behind him, locking his jaws on her throat and cracking her neck with a violent shake of his shadowed head. In the darkness, he was nothing but a pair of violet eyes and bloodied teeth.
Montgomery finished the vampire off with a single swing of his wooden sword, severing her head and preventing her from ever getting up again.
'Tell me he's okay?' I asked as Tidus nuzzled his bloody pack mate … and magic bloomed between them, fragrant and musky, leaves swirling into the room and settling around the ashy blue-black wolf. Even as I was stumbling over to them, I felt it, my bones knitting together inside of me.
'He's okay,' Tidus said, sounding as shocked as I felt. Well, okay, maybe not that shocked. I'd just seen the love of my life come back from the dead. I don't think there was anyone in the world as shocked as me in that moment—except for maybe Nic himself. 'Dude, get up.'
'Trying,' Anubis groaned as he struggled to stand, blood dripping down his fur, his crimson eyes looking up at me. 'Alpha.'
“What the hell happened out there?” Montgomery asked, panting as he knelt down and used a key to unlock the silver chains around his brother's—I just assumed that was his brother—ankles. “I felt … I felt a death in the pack.”
“Nic was dead,” Che said, shifting back into human form and shoving over another vampire corps
e, searching his pockets. I assumed he was checking for more keys. “I saw it; I felt it. He was fucking dead.”
“I'll explain later,” I said, shifting too, and stumbling over to the hole in the wall. “Nic!” I called out and found him rising to his feet, looking stiff and sore and uneasy. He ambled over to me and joined us inside the building, his face a mask of concentration but his hands trembling. But I knew Nicoli Hallett—he'd get the job done first and freak out later. “Is everyone okay?”
Okay was a relative term for our situation, but my mates knew what I meant as we stood there naked and quivering with adrenaline and pain, fear and relief, anger and disgust.
'We're all still alive if that's what you're asking,' Silas said, moving over to stand beside me and sitting at my feet.
“And we have keys.”
I heard Harlem's voice as she jogged through the shadows toward us.
But the faerie princess … was nowhere to be seen.
“Where's Aeron?” I asked as Harlem handed the keys to me and I knelt down, unlocking ankles and wrists and necks. I could barely look at the bloodied, quiet bodies they belonged to. My people were going to need a long time to heal from this, their flesh marked with bite wounds, pockmarked with missing chunks of flesh.
A long, long time.
Just laying my hands on their flesh didn't heal them the way it healed my boys. I didn't know if was because of the magic of the Bonding Ritual—because clearly there had been magic in it—or because I'd used it all up. I just didn't know. I was hoping Majka might be able to tell me more tomorrow.
“I don't know,” Harlem said as I glanced over my shoulder at Silas. “Nic, take Silas and go get the SUV. Bring it over here to so we can start loading people up. And call Lana, let her know the situation here, and have your parents bring over the delivery van. Have her alert Nikolina, but no one else. Nobody else.”
“Yes, Alpha,” Silas said, but Nic was strangely quiet. I didn't blame him. He'd died and come back to life today. He'd done the impossible and neither of us knew a goddamn thing about how or why.
“Zara!” Montgomery called out as I handed the keys off to Jax, his body melting into human form with a fluidity that found Harlem gazing with rapturous need. I ignored it all, my fingers brushing against the palm of the Azure Frost Alpha-Son, giving me a much needed boost of comfort.
Pack Violet Shadow Page 27