by Rachel Jonas
“I’m not sure what he could possibly do with the info, but for what it’s worth … I have a hunch Sebastian knows exactly what Nick is,” was Ben’s next statement. “I think he knows and the bodies had something to do with that. I mean, why else would he choose him? It can’t just be because he was there that day we went with Evie. We were all there,” he reasoned. “I think he knows and it’s not lost on him that something changes in Nick every time he kills.”
Before now, none of us had acknowledged this as a fact, but I couldn’t have agreed with Ben more.
“I’ve seen it with my own eyes,” he added. “First with the mutts, again when we trekked to the U.P. Each time, he drifts a little deeper into the darkness. So, what better way to taunt the killer within him than to bring death, literally, right to his doorstep?”
A booming voice rang out from the front and my gaze shifted right to Richie when he scolded his brother.
“Choose a better word,” he demanded, clarifying what he meant right away. “Don’t ever refer to him as a killer.”
Ben tensed and immediately jumped to defend himself. “I didn’t say he was a killer,” he reasoned. “I said ‘the killer within him’. I’m aware there’s a difference.”
The rest of us were silent, waiting for Richie’s reaction. Even from where I sat I saw his jaw working, his grip tightening on the steering wheel when he spoke again.
“Choose … a better … word,” he seethed, repeating himself.
Ben scoffed. Having been put in place by his brother clearly didn’t sit well, but he had no choice but to obey his alpha.
“You’re right,” he conceded, clearly only saying more out of obligation. “Next time, I’ll … be more careful with what I say, I guess.”
He went quiet after that, turning to watch the endless woods fly past as the miles between us and Seaton Falls climbed.
“Long story short,” Kyle said, taking over the conversation, “we don’t think Evie’s in any more danger today than she was yesterday. If that message truly was just for Nick, with the increased security and sigils on your property, we believe she’s safe,” he concluded.
While I appreciated his take on things, I wouldn’t buy into his ideas so easily.
Again, I imagined the relief I would’ve felt if Evangeline had just … given in. If she’d just taken pity on me and let me hide her away somewhere no one, including Sebastian, could find her.
But she wouldn’t even consider it.
“So, this is another vote for there being a mole among us,” Dallas chimed in, referencing Ben’s theory. “If someone told them about our plan for the falls, that same someone could have let the cat out of the bag about Nick.”
The others nodded in agreement.
“Are we positive our intel for tonight’s mission wasn’t courtesy of this traitor? A set up?” Tobias asked.
Dallas shook his head and spoke with confidence. “Nope. Not a chance. Apparently, we’ve got our own secret weapon, some kid from the east coast. An old friend recruited him right after they were all released from the Damascus Facility. They talked him into joining Sebastian’s ranks, posing as a supporter.”
“What kid?” My brow tensed with the question, trying to imagine even one I thought capable of a task that big, that important. None came to mind.
Dallas shrugged. “Beats me. He didn’t give a name. Not even the Elders know about this,” he added. “I suppose you could say my source has trust issues when it comes to depending on the higher-ups.”
I didn’t like it—that there were still so many secrets, so many factors we weren’t aware of.
“Why there?” Kyle asked. “Why set up camp in Ridge Borough of all places?”
Turning, I spotted beads of sweat forming on his brow.
Dallas noticed, too and asked, “Scared, pal?” He was still sporting a wide grin.
Instead of denying that there might have been truth to Dallas’ accusation, Kyle owned his feelings.
“Just seems like with all this talk of traitors and secret plans, one of us needed to say it out loud.”
Dallas, shaking his head, decided to ease Kyle’s mind. “As a military man myself, Ridge Borough is exactly where I’d set up camp if I was Sebastian,” he explained. “It’s both close enough and far enough away from Seaton Falls to carry out whatever plans he might have. Plus, it’s nestled right up against the Canadian border, which puts him at an advantage if any refugees fleeing their clans try to align with the Council to fight for the other side.”
Dallas’ rationale seemed to set Kyle’s mind at ease.
“Am I the only one thinking we should do more than just spectate tonight?” Ivan asked. His stiff posture oozed discontentment. His expression, too.
“What would you have us do?” Declan asked with a sigh. “Rush in like brutes and sabotage our one opportunity to understand the Sovereign’s plan?”
Ivan never answered, probably because he already knew why jumping the gun was a bad idea.
“We must be smart about this,” Declan reasoned. “Yes, one day soon, Sebastian will get what he deserves, but we have to accept that that day has yet to arrive.”
I sympathized with Ivan, but with so much riding on our success … this plan couldn’t be rushed. Now more than ever, with so much uncertainty, we had to proceed with caution.
The lives of our loved ones depended on it.
Chapter Four
Liam
Our drive came to an end and we trekked the rest of the way on foot. We couldn’t risk the sound of Richie’s engine tipping off the soldiers. With Ridge Borough being relatively small, and completely abandoned, it wasn’t hard to spot activity from a good distance away.
Light coming from a rundown warehouse was the first sign of life, and then the unmarked trucks parked outside it.
This was definitely the right place, but what went on in this one building seemed to be it. None of the others were lit. No sign of an army. No sign of Sebastian, Blaise. This looked more like a skeleton crew.
We stayed low, keeping our eyes focused on the few bodies that filed in and out of the building, each hauling material back inside like an assembly line—large metal rods, huge panes of glass framed in steel, clear hoses, vats of thick, silver liquid sloshing inside transparent cylinders. Dallas passed a questioning glance my way when we spotted the first. And even now, after they’d taken in fifty or more, we were still no closer to figuring out what the substance was.
I did, however, know the name of the stones they lugged in next. They were large, so large the soldiers could only carry one at a time. Their dark blue color and iridescent outer layer made them easy to classify—Biremede stones.
They were used by witches for a number of spells, which made it hard to narrow down what Sebastian had in mind, but it was worth notating. Maybe Hilda would have answers.
We stared on as more clear barrels were hauled inside. Only three this time, but the liquid inside wasn’t silver. It was red.
“Blood,” Ivan sighed.
“Think it’s for the witches?” Kyle asked. “We’re not sure how many he has and without the lycan blood, they’ll die, right?”
“Yeah, but that doesn’t make sense,” Richie chimed in. “The soldiers are likely providing the witches with more than enough to live off of.”
“Being honest,” Ben added, “none of this looks right.”
I couldn’t have agreed more.
Dallas crouched a bit lower. “Yeah, something’s definitely off,” he grumbled.
“And am I the only one who thought there’d be more of them?” Kyle asked, prompting several others to agree, including me. Things were far too quiet. It didn’t seem like we’d been given bad info, but maybe our timing was off.
“They’re clearly up to something, but there’s no way Sebastian’s here.” Richie’s tone mirrored the concern in his expression as he scanned the same scene we all did.
“What could they be planning to do with all these materials?”
Ethan asked, seeming to speak for each of his brothers.
They may have been the most confused of all. I was certain they expected to see Sebastian behaving as irrationally as he had in the past. However, they missed the many centuries he spent honing his resources, training his army to behave like a hive, functioning with one mind.
A killing machine.
Ivan breathed a deep, frustrated sigh. “Should we come back in a day or two? Would we see more?”
I stared on as I thought, eventually responding.
“No. The more often we come back, the more likely we are to get caught. Already, as it stands, if they scan these woods soon after we’re gone, they’ll still pick up on our scent. Coming back a second time would only mean they’d be ready for us,” I replied.
Richie nodded when our thoughts aligned. “So, our only option is to get the evidence we can now,” he suggested.
Usually, he seemed to be one of the more levelheaded alphas I’d come across. However, when I turned to see why he’d gone quiet, there was a look behind his eyes that let me know something in him might be changing, might be growing tired of always taking the high road.
This, too, we had in common.
“We need to get in there,” he blurted. “I counted about twenty or so lycans. We’re eleven strong—three lycans, six hybrids, and two dragons.” He paused to glance at all of us, before adding, “I think we can take them.”
“Take them?” The question came from Ben, wearing a look of disbelief following his brother’s statement. “For what purpose, exactly?”
Richie didn’t hesitate to explain himself, staring his brother in the eyes.
“We didn’t come here just to report back that we have no idea where the Sovereign is, that we saw a few soldiers carrying in a strange liquid we can’t identify, barrels of blood for a purpose we’re unsure of, for an attack going down who-knows-when.”
There was no missing his exasperated tone. I’d been right about him. He was tired of our side, the good side, always coming up short. It was time we got a win.
“I’m with him,” I stepped up, knowing everyone might not agree, but I was certain there would be at least six who did.
“We’re with you.” Declan spoke for himself and the rest of his brothers. This thought was only confirmed when they stood as well, abandoning the position where we once hid out of sight.
Richie gave a nod and the other three stood—those of our group who weren’t nearly as sure as the rest of us.
“Then, I guess we’re doing this,” Dallas groaned, his heavy, Southern drawl elongating the syllables. The sound of which made his disdain for this leg of our plan abundantly clear.
Richie sprang right into action once everyone was on board. “Good, so half of us will come in from the east, the other half from the west. We’ll surround the building and close in on them. Once we have eyes on the soldiers, we take them out one by one, as silently as possible to avoid making ourselves anymore obvious than we need to.”
“And what, pray tell, do you suggest we do next?” Dallas inquired, doing little to hide the irritation in his tone. “Tie ‘em up and interrogate ‘em?”
I shook my head, answering for Richie. “Nope. They’ll never talk. All we need are samples to get to Hilda. If anyone knows what this stuff is for, it’s her.”
With the grin that spread across Caleb’s face, I guessed he liked where this plan was headed, liked that we didn’t need to be careful to spare any lives. We may have all been a bit eager to get our hands dirty for a change.
“We’ll go east,” he volunteered, pointing at himself and his brothers.
“Then, west it is,” Richie countered, just before we split into our own group—him, Ben, Kyle, Dallas, and me.
These woods were dark. Darker than those surrounding Seaton Falls. With this town practically being dead, there was no residual light illuminating the sky. Only the striking contrast between the void of space and the intense glow of its stars.
The closer we got to our mark, the more my body pulsed with anticipation. My fists filled with heat and faint, red light pulsed through them.
Red.
It was new, very different from the usual pale orange I was used to from my dragon. And this wasn’t the only change. The day I forced Elise’s hand, made certain she had no choice but to reanimate me, I was … different. I felt it.
Felt the power beneath my wings that now spanned nearly twice their normal width, moving air in powerful gusts.
Felt it in my entire body that was now unmistakably larger when in my shifted form.
Felt it in the white-hot rage that swelled within me.
The change left me feeling as though I no longer knew myself, my dragon. It was still part of me, only now, it was a part of me I wasn’t quite familiar with yet.
One of Elise’s main concerns was that, by me already having genetic dragon DNA within my cells, when she turned me I’d change in ways none of us could predict. I suppose she’d been right about that part. While I still had a lot to understand, I was certain of one thing.
I was better off this way.
And I’d do it all over again if it came down to it.
“Something’s up ahead,” Dallas whispered.
Our steps halted at his words. I scanned until I spotted it, too—two figures beside a window on the first floor of the warehouse. Not too far from where they stood, an open door to a second loading bay provided us with a point of entry.
“That’s our way in,” Richie decided, speaking my thoughts aloud. “I’ll lure them out and—”
“And I’ll take it from there,” I interjected.
More heat surged through my forearms and fists, as I anticipated the opportunity to give Sebastian’s men exactly what they deserved.
Richie didn’t argue. As soon as we reached an understanding, we filed out. He made quick work of moving toward the entrance and, tossing a small stone against the aluminum siding of the warehouse, the two lycans we had our sights on showed themselves.
They assessed Richie, scanned to gage whether he was alone. I knew the instant they caught my scent from around the corner. One pivoted on his heel, but I was on them both in an instant, cinching their throats as my forearms forced out their last breath. I left them no time to call out to the other soldiers, no time to shift, or react at all for that matter. We had to make this quick and clean.
The last sputters of air left the guards’ mouths. They seemed so frail. Both bodies slumped to the ground and gashes in my skin slowly healed where their nails had torn into it. They did their best to claw their way out of my grasp, but it simply wasn’t enough.
“The others should be moving in on the other side by now,” Dallas whispered, keeping his back flush against the siding. We still had to maintain a low profile until we brought their numbers down to match ours.
“Three at the top of the stairs,” Kyle breathed, settling his head back again after the brief glimpse inside.
“We’ll wait for them to come down, then strike,” Ben whispered back.
A nod confirmed this as our plan and we waited, listening as soft-soled shoes thudded against the metal steps.
“Sounds like all three,” Dallas confirmed. “Two heading this way, one toward the east entrance.”
“I’ve got one this time,” Kyle volunteered, not bothering to hide how much he looked forward to it.
“I’ll take the other,” Ben offered, sounding far less enthusiastic than his brother a moment before.
Luckily, they were heading out toward us without being coaxed. It meant we didn’t have to give away our positions to lure them. No one breathed. We stood like statues against the building as the pair of shadows came closer. When it was time to act, Kyle nodded to Ben and the two made quick work of wrangling the soldiers to the ground.
Kyle had choked his mark out cold within seconds, but Ben hadn’t gotten as good a grip. The lycan he chose dragged his feet through the dirt and gravel, making more noise than any of us
wanted. Things would have been so much easier if we were able to sneak in undetected.
…Would have been.
“They’ve got us surrounded,” a voice called out, alerting fifteen or more of our presence.
With the notion of coming in quietly now out the window, we stormed in.
The strange, red flames burst from within when my dragon broke free. My senses had always been sharp, but were even more so now. It was as if I heard and saw things half a second before they actually happened.
A lycan rushed me from the left. I not only saw him, but felt a shift in the air currents that moved over my skin as he barreled forward. I was completely aware of him, but never directed an ounce of attention his way. My eyes stayed trained on the situation unfolding around me as my hand shot toward the soldier’s neck, coiling his body toward mine like a serpent.
The swift motion seemed to catch him off guard. Needing to end him so I could move on to the next. My chosen method was to rip his head from his shoulders.
His screams rang out through the warehouse as my fingers locked firm beneath his jaw. The feel of it ripping free from his face—soft flesh tearing, bone separating from bone—it only fed the beast within me.
Only made me hungry for more.
Writhing in pain, he hit the ground. There was no time to watch him bleed out, so I silenced his groans a moment later, crushing his skull beneath my boot. Blood sprayed up, covering my neck and face, but another charged toward me before a breath could even leave my mouth. However, to his surprise, I was ready for him. His full sprint came to a sudden halt, and after being slammed to the ground, his gaze was now locked on the ceiling. He could hardly get a breath of air into his lungs, but that was to be expected seeing as how his heart was no longer inside his chest.
He stared at my fist as I held it above him, possibly reflecting on how things played out. Intent on ending my life, the tables had quickly turned.
Streams of blood rushed toward my elbow and I made certain the image that carried him into death was that of his life source beating in the palm of my hand. When his eyes went vacant, I dropped the hunk of meat back inside his chest and moved on.