by C. R. Jane
The trip back to Wilder's house seemed to take forever, but finally we were there. The hunter was just starting to stir as we walked up to the front door. Daxon made sure to bash the guy's head against the side of the front door as he went through it, knocking the hunter out cold once again.
I was a little doubtful that this guy was going to be able to do anything for us with all the shots to the brain he'd taken.
Wilder led us to the kitchen and pulled out a wooden chair from around his dining table, pushing it into the center of the room away from everything else. He left the room as Daxon tossed the hunter on to the chair, returning a moment later with some rope.
The hunter's head lolled backwards at an awkward angle, and he remained passed out as Wilder tied his feet to the bottom posts of the chair and then bound his arms tightly behind him.
"He'll be able to escape those," Daxon commented, and Wilder disappeared out of the room again without a word, reappearing moments later with a bottle of silvery liquid.
"Liquid silver? Nice," Daxon remarked, and my eyes widened as Wilder promptly dumped half the bottle over the rope binding the hunter's wrists.
A scream ripped through the air as the hunter woke up. There was a sizzling sound, and then I saw a tendril of smoke followed by the smell of burning flesh. That was an even more intense reaction than what happened to wolves when they touched silver. Ouch.
The hunter held in the rest of his screams, his teeth grinding together in pain as he tried to keep his face as blank as possible. He stared at Wilder and Daxon, hatred etched into his gaze. I shivered despite the warmth of the room as I watched him plot their death.
"You're going to regret this," he snarled, and Daxon snorted.
"A little big for your britches considering I can see your bone peeking out from under that rope where all your skin has burned away."
The hunter roared and tried to break away from the chair, but the rope held tight. The liquid silver had sunk into the fibers of the rope and somehow hardened already, making it close to impossible to break. He wasn't going anywhere.
Daxon pulled his knife from his waist and dragged the tip of it across the hunter's throat, leaving a thin red line of blood. A few drops seeped from the wound. He then slashed down the front of his shirt, revealing the hunter's chiseled chest. It was littered with scars, like he'd been through hell and back before.
I couldn't find it in myself to feel bad for the guy, though.
"Why are you after her?" Daxon purred. I studied him as he walked around the chair making small slashes all over the hunter's skin. He looked like...he was enjoying himself. Daxon paid extra attention to the hybrid's chest, his slashes covering the entire thing until it was a bloody mess.
The hunter pursed his lips, not uttering a single word in response to Daxon's question.
"Tut, tut, tut," Daxon said with a grin. "Maybe let's try something simpler. How about you tell us your name?"
The hunter remained steadfastly silent, and Daxon didn't like that.
He pulled a small bottle of what looked like metallic glitter out of his pocket and unscrewed the lid.
He emptied a bit of it in his hand, laughing a little for some reason as he then blew the glittery substance onto the hunter. The hunter immediately started to scream, thrashing back and forth violently as the powder settled onto his skin. I realized what it was then. Silver powder. He'd blown the powder all over the hunter's cuts so that the powder seeped into his bloodstream.
Blood vessels burst in the guy's eyeballs as he continued to shriek in agony. I felt a little sick watching, but my wolf was pleased with Daxon's actions. I could feel her sitting at attention inside of me, savoring all the pain.
Daxon walked to one of the cabinets as if he wasn't torturing anyone and grabbed a glass. He filled it with water from the sink and took a long drink. I heard Wilder snort in annoyance but Daxon pretended not to hear him. After his drink, Daxon walked to the hunter and held the half full glass in front of the hunter's face.
"Want any of this?" he asked innocently.
The hunter eyed the water desperately, the powder most likely making him feel like he was being burned alive from the inside out. The prisoner's breaths came out in gasps as he eyed the water.
"Please," he croaked. The word burst out of him and he closed his eyes as he uttered it, a look of shame filling his features.
"Your name," Daxon responded.
The hunter let out another shuddering breath.
"Malik," he finally whispered, his shame growing so strong that it filled the whole room, combining with the scent of his burning flesh and making me want to throw up.
"Very good," Daxon praised. He gave the man a sip of water so small that I imagined it was almost worse than not having any at all.
Malik groaned, his entire body shaking as the silver continued to pass through his veins. A wolf would eventually die without an antidote, but I wasn't sure about a hybrid. He certainly looked like he was dying. There was a fine sheen of sweat all over his skin and his color grew paler by the minute.
"Let's try another one," Daxon said with a grin like he was a teacher praising his pupil. The pleasant facade abruptly dropped and a psycho was suddenly staring out from Daxon's features. "Why are you after her?" he growled, pointing his hand at me.
Malik's shaking was increasing as he turned his head to look at me.
"Uh, uh, uh. I didn't give you permission to look at her." Daxon's dagger suddenly cut across one of Malik's eyes, and I yelped as blood splattered the room.
"For fuck's sake," yelled Wilder, wrenching the knife away from Daxon. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"
Daxon ignored him, grabbing the front of Malik's shirt and tipping him and the chair towards him. "Tell me," he roared, shaking him as Malik groaned. "Tell me!" Malik's head snapped as Daxon shook the chair violently once again.
"Jack and Jill went up the hill," Malik began to sing nonsensically, his one good eye rolling around the room. "To get a glass of waterrrrr. The queen fell down, and broke her crown. And the king came tumbling after." His laughter grew manic and loud, spilling out of his mouth as a dribble of blood fell from his mouth. Malik turned his attention to me. "I found you," he told me in a squeaky voice.
"That's it," said Daxon, and a second later Malik's head was rolling on the ground.
There was a beat of heavy silence and then Wilder roared. "You fucking idiot. He could have led us to the other hunters. We could have gotten something from him at least. Now we're back to fucking square one!"
He leveled a punch that Daxon took with a laugh, blood dripping from his lips as he just stood there.
"We weren't going to get anything from him. He'd already cracked."
"Yeah, because you poisoned him with fucking silver powder."
My head began to hurt as I listened to their bickering.
"Guys-" I began.
"Do you care about yourself so much that you couldn't do this one thing to help out Rune?"
The levity on Daxon's face disappeared, and the look he gave Wilder was so deadly...so cold that I took a step away from him.
"Don't you ever accuse me of not caring about Rune again. I would tear worlds apart for her, kill anyone who stood in my way. We both know you can't say the same."
With those cryptic words he turned and walked past me, out into the night, leaving me with a still enraged looking Wilder.
"I feel like I'm missing something," I finally, carefully, said, as I wondered how we were going to clean up the carnage Daxon had left.
"I would do anything for you," Wilder suddenly announced, leaving my question unanswered. "You know that, right?"
"Yes-ss," I stuttered out. He gave me a longing glance and then picked up the hunter's head off the ground and threw it in a trash bag before striding out of the room, leaving me alone with Malik's body.
I collapsed into a nearby chair not knowing what to think. I surveyed the room. It was the epitome of a crime scene, blood everywhere.
Death and blood had become a far too frequent specter in my life.
The dread in my gut told me that somehow, this was just the beginning.
11
Rune
Night cloaked the streets of Amarok, curling around the homes, the street lights, and the cars. Even Wilder and Daxon on either side of me were coated in shadows. I strolled alongside them, somehow feeling untouchable having these two powerful alphas by my side. I also realized how much shorter I was compared to them when wearing flats.
I scanned their faces, each looking at me with a smile, but their thoughts were miles away. Most likely with the hunter they just tortured and Daxon killed.
You see, we were headed to the town meeting that I’d been invited to, and both my alphas insisted that we needed to make a statement with us walking into the hall together. A scene that showed everyone Wilder and Daxon were no longer enemies, but working in harmony, and that I was the glue that brought them together. I wasn’t sure if I thought that was the truth, especially after the whole hunter killing debacle, but I wanted it to be the truth.
Maybe we could at least call it a work in progress.
“Is it strange that I’m nervous?” I admitted. “Last time I attended the town hall meeting, chaos broke out, and I’m sure some people still blame me for the fight that happened.”
“That’s why we’re coming to them as a team,” Wilder explained, always the logical one.
“And if they don’t all agree,” Daxon added. “I’m not babysitting anyone. This is one of those cases where we come down hard.”
“I’ll do the talking,” Wilder replied, and I found myself agreeing on that point. Daxon was having more and more trouble putting on his “sunshine face,” as I called it in my head, and I didn’t think the townspeople would appreciate any heads rolling at the meeting.
Might be effective though.
I counted down quietly, trying to quell my nerves as we crossed the road and the town hall came into view. It was a dark building with a pointy roof covered in green lichen. The long arched windows always reminded me of a human church.
“Who built the town hall, anyway? It could double for a haunted church,” I joked.
“Probably the cult who lived in it before us,” Daxon said casually.
I cut him a glare. “You’re making that up.”
He arched his brow. “Would I lie about that? I wish it wasn’t the case, but stories from the elders say the building was here when the first settlement of wolves moved onto the land.”
I was stuck for words at his confession.
“Don’t scare her,” Wilder reprimanded Daxon.
“If she’s living here, she should know the history. Plus, it wasn’t us who killed those humans.”
I gasped. “There were remains found?”
“Bones,” Wilder corrected. “Brittle, dusty bones from a long time ago.”
I kept imagining a place covered in the bones from all the followers in the cult, and it made me sad to know that people were so easily corruptible and led with lies to follow a cult leader. Or maybe it had everything to do with fear. Scare someone enough that they begin to believe and do anything they were told. Maybe if someone had helped me see what Alistair was doing to me was wrong, I would have fought harder against him earlier. But I didn’t know better, and I accepted the ugliest side of people because they told me I deserved it.
I swore under my breath for the millionth time that I would never find myself in that situation again, that I’d fight to the end.
At the entrance of the town hall, we stepped up to the closed double doors, and I couldn’t shake away the fear that everyone would hate me even more once they learned of the danger lurking on their doorsteps.
I had a few friends in town, I reminded myself, and I wasn’t this strange girl stumbling into their territory any longer.
Daxon flung open the doors, and the explosion of voices we heard chatting died instantly. Everyone in their seats turned to look our way, so many eyes judging, scanning me. They weren’t even looking at Wilder and Daxon, just me. They’d been called to an impromptu meeting by their alphas, and I could just imagine the thoughts going through their minds at seeing me walking down the middle aisle between the mass gathering.
People were glaring at me as I passed them.
Wilder and Daxon stood tall in front of their pack members. Bitten and Lycan wolves mixed together, and no one had torn each other to shreds yet, so I figured the alphas’ plan had worked by appearing they had joined together. The air grew thick with the scent of musk thanks to so many wolves gathered in one place together.
I remained between them just as they’d asked me to. No sitting down or hiding, Daxon had insisted.
I couldn’t stop myself from scanning the crowd in search of familiar faces, someone to focus on rather than strangers. My gaze landed on Jim and Carrie, the most generous people I’d ever met. The older couple accepted me into their motel the moment I stumbled into town, and have been nothing but angels to me ever since. They sat in the second row from the front, and both smiled at me with reassurance.
Miyu sat a couple of rows behind them with her husband, who seemed to be twitching in his seat, shifting, and keeping his head low. Miyu was trying to help him, saying something. She’d mentioned to me that something was up with him, and I frowned as I watched the strange way he was acting.
“Thank you for your prompt attendance,” Daxon began, drawing my attention. He had no intention of sitting back and letting Wilder lead this. I didn’t expect anything less from him. “It is urgent that we bring the town up to speed on a new development.”
Wilder cleared his throat, his chin high. The room fell into dead silence like everyone was holding their breaths in anticipation of the news. So he pushed forward and said, “There’s no reason for alarm. Daxon and I are working as a team to ensure your safety is our priority.”
“Just tell us what’s going on?” a man yelled from the back of the hall.
“We need to be ready,” Daxon continued. “Prepared as a unified front.”
“On a recent outing, we encountered wolf hunters,” Wilder stated, his voice full of steel, but it made no difference.
Instantly, the rise of panicked voices spread like wildfire across the hall. An older woman was crying out in terror, and those around her had to quickly fan her and try to calm her. Only when someone moved out of my direct line of sight, did I notice it was Daniel’s mother. The town gossip, from what I could tell. But it was Daniel who glared at me. He still blamed me for Eve’s death, and now I’d look even more guilty of bringing death to their town.
My stomach tightened, and I stared at the flailing arms of the crowd as they tried to stand up and push past others, many of them wearing panic-stricken expressions. They must know all too well how dangerous these monsters were. I had nightmares remembering the chase away from those bastards on the freeway. The way just a hint of my scent caused them to shoot at us without hesitation was a massive problem.
“How close are they to our town?” one person asked.
“You want us to fight them?” another cried out.
“Settle down,” Daxon said, bringing everyone to silence. “Like Wilder said, this is not the time for panic. We are safe for now, but the time for complacency is gone and—”
“How did they find you?” Daniel’s mother asked, clutching a hand to her chest. She looked horrified, and how could I blame them. Those hybrids scared the hell out of me too.
“It’s her!” a man with bushy eyebrows and bent nose shouted accusingly, pointing directly at me. “Isn’t it obvious? The smell in the air in town the past few days had changed. She’s been in heat and it’s drawing the hunters to our doorsteps.”
Yes, it’s her,” Daniel called out.
Shit! I sucked in a strangled breath, but my inhales came too fast, and I blinked back the angry tears. So much rage, and it burned through me.
The explosion of voices was instant,
and I shuddered in my shoes. Coming here was a mistake.
I was going to be sick, and I curled my shoulders forward, wanting to vanish.
“Enough!” Wilder bellowed, his voice heavy and reverberating across the room, a growl slowly following his words. The kind of sound he’d make to remind his pack members of their place. He was an alpha and they listened, but it didn’t change the cold hard facts that some of the audience were glaring at me with death in their eyes.
“We have addressed Rune’s scent and it’s no longer an issue,” he continued. “But hunters could have been drawn to our town, closer than we ever wanted, so we need to all be aware of the potential danger and of anyone new coming into town.”
Several people were already on their feet, yelling at the risk I put them in, and I hated standing in front of them, hated their anger, hated that I had no choice in this happening to me.
The same man protested. “She needs to leave our town tonight in case they can still smell it...or we just give her to them!”
Those around him were nodding, their voices climbing with their fury.
On the inside, I was trembling. Their anger swallowed me, but I didn’t blame them for how they were feeling. Maybe I should just be given to the hunters. I brought harm to everyone I was around.
Ok...stop with the pity party, I told myself harshly.
Rampage spread quickly in the hall, as more people were arguing, their shouting deafening. I tried to imagine that I was wearing a suit of armor, and their words couldn’t sink in.
“She needs to go! You’re putting all of us in danger for her!” More voices joined the chanting for my eviction.
“Shut the hell up,” Miyu finally shouted from across the room, getting to her feet. “The only ones we should fear are those of you who forgot what a pack means.”
Others turned their attention to the haters in the back, and the arguments blew out of control, with yelling and finger pointing. It all became too much, and my head was spinning. Except, as I listened closer, I realized that the majority were suddenly fighting for me, taking my side. I’d never had anyone stand up for me in Alistair’s house, so it was strange to have my men, Miyu, and so many others support me.