Shaun drew in a slow breath, then let it out again, searching my face. His expression softened.
“You’re not even qualified yet. Get down to the shifting lab with Dean. I’ll do this on my own.”
“Yeah, right.” I screwed my face up in a scowl. “I said I was scared, not a coward. I’m doing this.”
I made it two steps before I stopped again. Shaun was still where he’d been standing. He raised an eyebrow at me.
“Shifting lab?”
I shook my head sharply and pressed a finger to my lips. Abruptly, his stance changed, coiling ready to attack, and his nostrils flared. He narrowed his eyes and nodded. He smelled it, too. We weren’t alone.
I crept forward, placing each foot with care, until the scent grew stronger. I knew that scent… but I couldn’t quite place it. I could smell Shaun following behind me, but he didn’t make a sound. Even his breathing was too low for me to hear.
I paused as we reached the edge of the hallway, where it intersected with the next, and glanced back at Shaun over my shoulder. She – and the scent was definitely female – was round this next corner, and, near as I could tell, alone. He made to move past me, and I lifted an arm, warning him back with narrowed eyes. I’d meant what I said. I was the expendable one on this mission. Not that I planned to get expended. I was pretty sure I could handle one shifter.
I reached out with my scenes, letting them build me a picture of the single female shifter round the corner, moving slowly herself. She was close to the wall – I could hear it from the way her footsteps echoed. She wasn’t as good at creeping as Shaun. But then, who was?
I took one last steadying breath, then flung myself round the corner. I grabbed hold of the woman, slapping my hand over her mouth to stop her calling for help, and used my momentum to slam her into the wall. She hit it hard and the breath exploded from her lungs.
I took in the wide eyes on her freckled face, framed with red hair as heat seared my forearm. I gaped at her and stumbled back a step as Shaun flung himself round the corner and leapt at her, fist drawn back.
“Stop,” I shouted, and threw myself at him, barging him aside before he could land his punch. The force threw him sideways and he hit the ground, rolled, and came back up on his feet, giving me a puzzled look.
“I know her,” I said, breathless. “It’s Kelsey.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Shaun straightened, staring at the redhead, then sliced his gaze to me.
“Kelsey?”
“Yes.”
“The same Kelsey who bit you?”
The druid blushed deep red and averted her eyes to the ground. There was a time I’d wanted her blood for what she’d done to me. A hell of a lot had changed since then.
“The same Kelsey who was cursed by Raphael, yes.”
She lifted her eyes a fraction at my protective tone and gave me what might have been a tiny hopeful smile. Or a twitch – it was so small and brief it was hard to tell. Shaun put a hand on my shoulder and led me a few steps away, still keeping her in his line of sight.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“I’m fine. I told you before, it wasn’t her fault. She was as much a victim as I was. Only–” I tried to put it into words. “I’m not a victim anymore. But look at her. She’s never stopped being one. She’s paying a much higher price for what happened than I am.”
Shaun searched my face, then shook his head slowly.
“What?” I asked.
“You’re something else.” He sounded impressed, so I figured I’d take that as a compliment. I forced a cocky smile.
“Are you only just noticing? You’re a little slow on the uptake.”
“Funny. What’s she doing here?”
Now that was a damned good question. I turned back to her, and she cringed away from our attention for a split second before straightening. I pretended not to notice.
“So, uh, what brings you to our corner of the world?” I asked her. “Not that you’re not welcome and all, but we’ve got a little situation going on.”
“I know,” she said, her eyes scanning the shadows up and down the corridor. “That’s why I came. Someone warned the Grand Council that Alpha Blake was about to lose control of the academy.”
“Who?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. But Councilman Cauldwell is going to send a team of enforcers.”
“That sounds… helpful,” I ventured, turning it into a question. Kelsey shook her head again, sending her red locks bouncing around her face.
“No, you don’t understand. They won’t discriminate – they’ll hold Alpha Blake and Alpha Draeven just as accountable as they will the Bittens. Alpha Draeven gave the council his personal assurance that he had the Bitten situation under control, but this proves him wrong. When they come, they’ll take control of the academy, and deal with any shifter who stands in their way.”
“Shit.” War. She was talking about war – and one that we couldn’t possibly win. “Wait, why are you here?”
“I had to warn you.” She was silent for a beat, looking away again. “And Leo.”
Ah. Yeah, that made sense.
“Well, you’re lucky you came when you did,” Shaun said. “If you’d waited much longer, the wards would be back up – you’d have been trapped here.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“You’ve delivered your message. You’re a ha– a hybrid, and you haven’t had any real training. You’re in danger.”
She set her jaw and glared at him. “I’m staying. And I’m better in a fight than you know.”
Shaun looked to me for support and I shrugged, smothering a smile. I could get to like Kelsey. And I barely felt any of the rage seeing her last time had triggered. Maybe exposure was the key. Or maybe it was that I’d decided not to take the cure and embraced a lifetime of resisting the curse. Either way, it struck me that now probably wasn’t the time to dwell.
“I’m not about to turn away any help,” I said. “Besides, she knows more about how the druids work than either of us. But… Kelsey, won’t this put your position with the council in jeopardy?”
“I don’t care,” she said, surprising me with the ferocity in her tone. “If they can’t see that what I’m doing is the best chance we have of peace, then I don’t want to be one of them.”
“In that case,” Shaun said, “we’re glad to have you. Let’s get moving. It’s a long way to the med wing.”
“Better plan,” I said, a slow smile spreading on my face. “There are two magic users now. Kelsey, how strong is your earth power?”
“Fairly strong.”
“Strong enough to drop a couple of shifters?”
She nodded. I turned to Shaun, sounding out my plan.
“We portal into the med wing – the wards don’t work until they’re all up, right? – and come up behind them. Me and Kelsey will go through first and use our magic to take down anyone who’s there. That way we can take them out of action first and ask questions later. Less chance of you getting injured.”
“I’m not some damsel who needs protecting,” Shaun protested. I grinned.
“Suck it up, princess. And make with the portal.”
He sighed, but stretched a hand out in front of him.
“Eachlais!”
I nodded to Kelsey, sucked in a deep breath, and dived through. I rolled to the right as I hit the ground on the far side, clearing the path for the druid, and came up in a crouch. I threw my hands up, ready to blast the cluster of figures in front of me. My eyes sharpened into focus as Kelsey threw her hands up beside me.
“Kelsey, stop!”
I straightened from my crouch and took in the cluster of cowering people – and the three shifters standing in front of them. Mei, Leo, and Cam.
Kelsey rushed over and threw her arms around Leo, who winced and eased her round to one side of him, while I eyed the rest of the room, and Shaun emerged behind me.
“Jade, lass, yer okay.” Cam’s voic
e was heavy with relief.
“I’m fine,” I said. “What’s going on?”
“This delicate wee flower got himself broke in combat class.” He gestured to Leo, who had one arm wrapped around Kelsey, and the other tucked against his side. “We were heading here tae get him patched up so we could–”
He broke off and shot a look at Shaun, “We were no’ planning on breaking the lass out, honest.” Shaun rolled his eyes and shook his head, then went back to feeling around the door frame for the ward. Cam pressed on. “Anyways, we were on our way here and we heard all the trouble. Dean’s wee sister–”
“Yeah,” I said quickly. “We know.” I might be happy enough having Kelsey putting herself in the line of fire with me, but that didn’t mean I trusted her not to go running back to the council with Tara’s name.
“Aye, well, we missed the fight and got in here tae clean up the mess. We need to get the others out of here,” he gestured to the other Bittens, still huddled together in the corner, “but some of them got a little beat up in the fight.”
“You’ve got a bigger problem than that,” I said, running an eye over the eleven newly turned shifters. “We’ve got no way of knowing if any of them are plants.”
Cam cussed, but Leo looked unconcerned.
“No problem,” he said. “We assume everyone is guilty – we can sort out who’s innocent later.”
If any of the Bittens had an objection to this, they didn’t voice it. They all seemed pretty shaken up. No surprise, really. Five weeks ago, they’d all been living normal lives, enjoying a night on the town. Then they get caught up in someone else’s fight, get bitten, discover werewolves are real and that’s what they are now. And if that wasn’t enough, a bunch of other shifters show up and try to start a war. Who could blame them for feeling overwhelmed? Mostly, they all looked like they’d rather be anywhere but here – which seemed like a good idea to me.
“Anywhere we take them, we’re likely to run into the Bittens,” Mei said. “Uh, the feral Bittens, I mean. Maybe we’re better off keeping them here. At least we can hold the med wing.”
“No need,” I told her. “Dean’s down in the shifting lab, portalling out as many students as he can. We can send them to him.”
Relief flooded her face at Dean’s name.
“He’s okay?”
“He’s… alive.”
Her brow furrowed at my word choice, but I didn’t give her time to dwell. Ribs would heal, which was more than could be said for us if Brad’s men burst in here.
“Listen. You and Cam can portal them to Dean and help him evacuate the rest of the students who want to go. Leo, you and Kelsey need to buy us some time with the druid council.”
“Druid council?”
“She’ll explain everything.”
“Wait,” Cam said, catching my arm as I turned away. “Where will ye be?”
“Me and Shaun need to get the rest of the wards up, to stop Brad bringing anyone else in. And, I guess, the druids, too.”
Because that was exactly what we needed – to be fighting a war on two fronts. I glanced at Shaun, who was already in a trance and chanting softly. Just this one, and then two more.
“That’s dangerous, lass.”
“He needs someone to watch his back while he’s in that trance.”
“No.” Cam shook his head, and I opened my mouth to argue, but he cut me off. “He needs two people. We’ll watch him together.”
My shoulders sagged, and the knot in my stomach eased. I didn’t have to do this alone. I reached out and squeezed his hand and swallowed hard before I did anything unforgivably girlie – like crying in the middle of a room full of shifters.
“Alright,” I said to the others, once I had myself back under control. “Change of plan. Leo, Kelsey, help Mei get everyone down to the shifting labs, then go to the druids from there.”
“Okay,” Mei said, and raised a hand.
“Wait!”
We all turned to Leo. He was staring at the cluster of Bittens.
“You can’t let them go through like that. If any of them are working with Brad…”
He didn’t have to finish. If any of them were fully trained shifters in Brad’s army, they’d be able to injure dozens of students before anyone could stop them. I nodded, and toed a discarded suppressor cuff on the floor by one of the beds.
“How many of these do we have?”
Leo scooped up a couple of the cuffs, abandoned where they lay after Tara freed the Bittens.
“Enough, I hope. Alright, all of you,” he said to the Bittens. “Wrists out.”
At that, some of the Bittens started muttering and looking between themselves warily.
“You’ll be okay,” I promised them. “We’re going to get you out of here to someplace safe. We just have to do this first.”
One of them – a guy with close-cropped dark hair, maybe a couple of years older than me – cast a look back over his shoulder, then dipped his chin in a curt nod and stepped forward.
“Okay. Do what you have to.”
He pulled up his sleeve and held his exposed wrist out to me. I nodded my thanks and took a cuff from Leo.
“I’m sorry,” I told him. “It’s just for now.”
I flicked a look over his face, searching for, I don’t know, permission, I guess, then took hold of his wrist. It was no small thing, the trust he was placing in me. I knew we were here to help him, but he didn’t. Ever since the night he’d been bitten, he’d been locked up here with a cuff on, with no say over his own fate, and no freedom. I knew what that felt like. And in his position, I didn’t think I’d be taking a return to that state half so well as he was.
I lifted the cuff, then he twisted his wrist in my hand, reversing my grip. His free hand wrested the cuff from my grip, and before I could react, slapped it shut around my wrist. Immediately it was like I was blind and deaf, with only weak human senses to rely on. I yanked back, away from him, but it wasn’t just my senses that were muted by the cuff. He was too strong for me to break his grip.
He swung his free hand at my face. I twisted as much as I could with my wrist caught, but I was too slow, too weak, and his fist caught a glancing blow to the side of my head. He released me and I staggered back, the room spinning around me.
Cam and Leo surged forward, but a commotion broke out in the midst of the Bittens. Two more – one male, one female – barged their way to the front, shoving the stunned Bittens from their path, and made for my friends. Cam glanced my way, his indecision easy to see.
“I’m fine,” I grunted through clenched teeth, and the Bitten in front of me barked a mirthless laugh.
“Not for long,” he said, his lips curving into a smile. Yeah, it was hard to disagree with him on that. But shifter strength or no shifter strength, I’d been trained by the best. Fletcher might be a bastard, but he was a bastard with at least five decades’ experience teaching unarmed combat, and a whole lot more field experience besides. I shoved my guard hand up and met the Bitten’s eye. Then I twisted one hand round and beckoned him towards me, allowing a complacent smile to accompany the mocking gesture.
His jaw clenched and a snarl ripped from his throat. He launched himself at me and I stepped back, and again, and his blows fell short. He launched a haymaker at my head, but the hook was so wide I had plenty of time to see it coming. I ducked beneath his arm and drove my fist into his solar plexus. And nothing happened.
Oh, shit.
He stared down at me, I stared up at him, then he swung his hand into my face. The backhander sent me tumbling across the room and I hit the ground hard. Searing pain burned along my jawline, but I didn’t even have time to assess the damage before the Bitten was throwing himself across the room at me, his face twisted in a snarl.
I rolled rapidly, spinning myself off to one side and his foot stomped on empty ground with enough force that I knew he wasn’t playing around. His fury exploded from him in a growl as he realised he’d missed me again. His nostr
ils flared and he peeled back his lips, exposing his human teeth. His whole body seemed to shake and blur around the edges. He was going to shift, and anyone in this room who was still human was going to be turned to confetti in seconds.
Starting with me.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I flung myself at him, smashing my full weight into his knee. I heard a sharp crack as it snapped, and his snarl of rage became a howl of pain. The force sent a jolt of agony through my shoulder, but I ignored it, rolling aside again before one of his huge fists could find a home in my stomach. He lumbered forward, dragging his injured leg behind him as he advanced on me. What the hell was it going to take to stop him?
I shuffled back on the floor, gripping my injured shoulder with one hand, ready to dive aside again, or duck in low and take out the other leg if I got the chance. The Bitten’s grimace twisted into a smile again, sensing my weakness, and his eyes shifted between human and wolf with each uneven step.
My hands skimmed across the ground behind me, hunting for a weapon, anything that might even the odds, but we were in a hospital wing and weapons were in short supply. Then my fingers brushed against something cold and metallic. Circular. A cuff. I closed my hand over it and kept it hidden behind my back. If there was a faster way to even the odds, I couldn’t think of it.
Just one problem with my plan. I was down here, and he was up there. And last time I tried to put a cuff on him, it didn’t end so well.
“Come on then,” I said, forcing my lips into a smirk to match his own. “Can’t even finish off one little girl? No wonder Brad gave you this shitty assignment.”
“Bitch!”
“Sticks and stones… He must really think you’re a joke. Making you spend a whole month in here, and then not even letting you join in the assault? What did you do, piss in his cornflakes?”
He lunged forward and as he did, I threw myself sideways into a roll. Pain seared along my shoulder, but I ignored it and let the momentum of my roll carry me into a crouch. I threw myself up towards his wrist, cuff out and ready to snap shut around him. I was inches from my goal when he realised what I was doing. He lashed out with his foot, smashing into my wrist. The metal shackle around my wrist took the brunt of his blow, but the sheer force of it flung my arm wide and sent the cuff spiralling from my grasp and across the room.
Feral Bitten (Fur 'n' Fang Academy Book 3): A Shifter Academy Novel Page 18