The Shifting Storm (Book 4)

by Jeff Hale

  A lazy smile crossed Aerick’s face. “So tell me, Henry. Those dozen. Were they one at a time or all at once?”

  I sighed a little in relief. Aerick had caught on and wasn’t letting Henry’s bragging goad him.

  “Took on three of them at one time. More than enough to take you out,” Henry said cockily, then dove at Aerick.

  Aerick stepped to the right and brought both his blades out horizontally to the left, slicing upwards into Henry’s lunge, catching him in the stomach. I gasped as the weapons nearly cut Henry in half. Aerick brought the blades around, dropping to a kneel, then leapt up and brought them around again, right into Henry’s back, the momentum from the swing shoving a shocked Henry into the floor face first. But I’d seen Darien fight Henry; it would take a lot more than that to kill him.

  “Kat, oh my god, I don’t know what to do!” Nina cried out softly, pulling my attention away from the fight. I was glad for her words; I could feel the cat inside me, pacing urgently under my skin, wanting out, wanting to join the fray, revel in the feel of rending flesh and snapping bones. From the howls and screams of the other watching shifters, the sounds of hands pounding wood and metal, the occasional yipe as one took a swing at another, some of them were having the same problem I was.

  I took a breath, calming myself as best I could, looking down at Dave, at Nina’s hands as they fluttered about him. I reached out gingerly, not wanting to move him, felt at his wrist for a pulse, cringing as I heard a loud crash nearby and hoping that it wasn’t Aerick.

  The pulse was there, strong if a bit fast, at least to my senses, and as I laid the back of my hand against Dave’s cheek, I realized that he wasn’t hurt as badly as we had thought. I wasn’t sure how I knew, but I did. Oh, he’d need to go to the hospital, but he was in no danger of dying, at least not at the moment.

  “Is this a good time to let you know that I am not a sorcerer?” Aerick’s voice rang out through the room. “Or to tell you that I eliminated two of MAGE’s top squads. At the same time. Or how about the fact that I’ve fought and defeated a demon. Oh yeah, and I’ve killed fae.”

  Fae? That was news to me, but then again, I hadn’t seen him in almost a year so who knew what he’d been up to. Regardless, it made him sound tough, dangerous, capable of taking out an old and crafty shifter, and maybe Henry would back down.

  I took a quick glance over my shoulder at them. Aerick had one foot on Henry’s back, his fire blade hovering over Henry’s neck. With a sudden movement, Henry pushed Aerick off of him, causing him to stumble, as he started to shift, the wounds Aerick had dealt him closing.

  I shivered in apprehension for Aerick. If Henry was huge in human form, in Aspected form he was even bigger, towering at nearly twelve feet and weighing in at close to a ton. I’d seen Darien almost crushed under that massive body.

  Aerick took a couple of steps back, preparing himself for Henry’s attack, a laugh breaking from his throat that made my Aspect try to assert her will even stronger. She wanted to sink her teeth into warm flesh, wanted to feel her prey struggle underneath her. I wrapped my arms around myself, rocking as I tried to keep control, but I couldn’t drag my eyes from the violence occurring before me.

  Aerick barley ducked the lunging swipe that Henry took at him with his right paw. Aerick stood, then had to roll immediately to avoid Henry’s other paw and fangs as Henry tried to close on him with a bite. Aerick used the momentum from the roll to spring into a flip over Henry as Henry dropped to all fours, but Henry backstepped, rearing up and snapping both massive paws up in a swipe that caught Aerick mid-air.

  I felt my blood run cold as the force of the blow from the big shifter sent Aerick slamming into the ceiling. As gravity pulled Aerick back down, Henry swung out with his left paw, batting Aerick across the room and into a wall, where he landed right next to Takeo and Sayuri, the latter of which reached out a hand to help steady him.

  I saw Aerick turn to swing on her, not able to differentiate between friend and foe, and I acted before I could even think about it, dropping some of my control over the cat and shifting to Aspect.

  There was a distance between me and them, but I was a cat, and if nothing else, I was freaking fast. I launched myself across the room, ignoring Henry as I sailed over his head, hitting Aerick from the side and knocking him away from Sayuri, putting myself between him and the two tigers, snarling and growling at him to keep him away and hoping he didn’t turn on me as well. I was having a hard enough time keeping the cat from running wild, and hurting Aerick was the last thing I wanted.

  I saw recognition in Aerick’s eyes when he saw me, but unfortunately it was enough to distract him. Henry took advantage of the situation to lunge at Aerick again, his roar reverberating off the walls, knocking Aerick back to the floor with several swift attacks. I started to move forward myself, but felt Takeo lay a hand on my arm.

  Aerick got to his feet on shaky legs, suddenly dismissing the icy blade from his right hand. He lifted his hand, palm outward, and a massive blast of ice shot forward, encasing Henry and freezing him in mid-lunge. The ice covered werebear slid to a stop just inches from Aerick, who briefly looked as though he were having a hard time staying upright.

  I slipped back over to where Nina and Dave were, Sayuri and Takeo following me, as Aerick made a slow circuit around the huge ice chunk that imprisoned Henry. Some of the other shifters made as though to move against him, but he kept them back with deadly glances.

  “I have your leader at my mercy,” Aerick announced loudly, wreathing his hand in flames, much like Bianca had in class. “All I have to do is blast that ice block with my fire, and Henry there is going to have to be picked up with a sponge and identified through DNA analysis. Now, does anyone else have delusions that they can beat me?” He paced the room, stopping at each little cluster of shifters to see if he would get a response.

  They were all silent, but with some of what I had seen Aerick do, with the look on his face that almost dared someone to step up, just so he could lay into them, I wasn’t sure that he would let it go. Other than Nina, who was still focused on Dave, I was about the only face here he might trust. I shifted back to human to seem as safe as possible, ignoring the cat’s mental yowl as I did so; she still wanted a fight.

  “No. No one else will threaten you, Rick. Just let Henry go, I know you have the power to do it,” I said softly, my tone pleading. I stood but didn’t move any closer to him. I was trying to appeal to reason, but I just didn’t know how much of that he had left right now. “I know you were just protecting Dave, but Henry was defending himself. He didn’t know.” Oh god, now I was making excuses for Henry? “Not that he didn’t deserve this,” I added spitefully.

  “I heard Nina scream,” Aerick protested, eyes resting on Nina.

  He always did have a white knight complex.

  “In pleasure,” I told him quietly. “I’d guess that she’s probably going to be changing pretty soon.” A brief flash of Nina and Henry went through my mind, chipping at my control again and I shivered. I only hoped that I could calm down soon, before I either hurt someone or fucked someone; the cat would be happy with either.

  “Change? What are you saying, Kat?” Aerick took a few steps toward me, concern on his face.

  I held up a hand to stop him. “No. Rick. Don’t come any closer. I don’t… I don’t know how I feel about you right now.” I did; I wanted to let the cat have its way, wanted to hurt him for leaving me, wanted him to fuck me until I screamed his possession of me.

  I shoved the thoughts as far into the back of my mind as I could. I was with Darien, even if we weren’t on the best of terms at the moment, and acting on my impulses would only make it worse. I thought he could handle me sleeping with just about anyone… except Aerick.

  “It’s hard just to see you as is,” I continued, pausing a moment to redirect myself and add more force to my words. “You just came in here and involved yourself in things that you had no business involving yourself with. This is shifte
r business. This is shifter territory. You attacked their leader, and you attacked my friend.” I made a motion towards Sayuri.

  “Okay, so back to my question…”

  “Nina’s a wilder. Like I was. I think that’s why we were drawn towards each other. That’s why I felt all… weird when I caught her in the bathroom at school that time.” Keeping myself under control was making me shake now and angry tears spilled down my cheeks.

  “It’s okay, Kat. I only defended myself,” he said, and I thought I almost heard an apologetic note in his voice. Almost. “You know that. You saw. He would have killed me if I hadn’t done anything to defend myself.”

  “You didn’t have to attack Henry!” I was trying not to yell, because if I did I wasn’t sure what else might happen. “You didn’t have to try and kill Sayuri! Is violence a way of life for you or something? Do I even know you anymore? You could have just talked to him!”

  “Kat, it’s still me, but you saw what he did to Dave.” Aerick’s expression darkened again. “No way I was letting that slide. Then he had the audacity of challenging me without even knowing who or what I was, he just assumed he would kill me easily, without consequence. He needs to learn, same as any other shifter. He’s lucky he isn’t dead. Besides he didn’t exactly look interested in talking.”

  He was right, Henry hadn’t been interested in talking, but Aerick could have just turned and walked away. I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him back down from any excuse to fight. My anger finally boiled over.

  “Any other shifter? And me? Would you have killed me without a thought if I had attacked you?” I asked, yelling now, my voice shrill. I covered the distance between us, placing my hands against his chest and shoving with all my might once I reached him. It barely moved him. “Huh? Would you have?” I shoved him again, repeatedly, only letting my wrath have that much, and Aerick just stood there and let me do it. “What gives you the right to come in here and attack us? This is Darien’s territory, in a manner of speaking. You had no right! You should have taken the diplomatic route! But, no. Instead you had to attack him!”

  “Wrong! I had every right! This city is mine,” he screamed at me, done with humoring me. “Any Aetheric creature that decides to harm humans in my city will answer to me! I will not allow it! Those Aetherics that have yet to fall in line with what MAGE has decreed, will. And that includes you, Kat. If you refuse, then so be it, you’ll fucking deal with me! You and your little wolf fuck buddy!”

  I could have sworn I saw real hate in his eyes and that knowledge bled most of my fury, leaving an ache I never thought I’d feel.

  “Whatever. I guess we’ll see,” I said, my voice hollow even to my own ears. “I just never thought that the next time I saw you that you would see me as an enemy. Maybe Darien and my da were right about you, and about MAGE. See you around, Rick.” I turned my back on him, not wanting him to see the pain I was feeling, walked back over to Dave and Nina and knelt beside Nina on the floor. A thought occurred to me. “What about Henry?”

  “Is Dave alive?” Aerick asked, and I could feel his eyes boring into my back.

  I didn’t even bother to look at Aerick, couldn’t. “Yeah. He’ll be fine. Concussed at worst, maybe some broken ribs, but he’ll be okay,” I said, knowing I was right, but still not knowing how I knew.

  “Then Henry lives, as long as this pack does nothing to hunt me down or harm anyone who I hold dear,” he said, and I muttered ‘witnessed’ along with Sayuri and Takeo and a few others. “Good,” he went on, and I heard the crackle of the ice as he released Henry. “By the way, I mean that. If any of you think to come after me, or anyone that I call friend, you will not only deal with myself, but you will also deal with my partner, who, by the way, is fae royalty. I swear we will wipe you out, to a person, as well as any others that come after us.”

  I heard footsteps behind me, but Nina and I were already leaving. Aerick would make sure Dave got the care he needed, and I wasn’t all that sure about leaving Nina to Aerick’s mercies now that he knew what she was, would be.

  I led us to our cars, mine parked right next to Nina’s where I’d found hers when I got here, hoping that no one would notice, or care, that Nina was naked. It was Vegas, so I doubted anyone would.

  “You got clothes in there?” I asked her, not knowing why I cared. I kept telling myself that she was my friend, that she needed me to watch out for her, but that line of friendship had been stretched incredibly thin by how she had taken advantage of Darien.

  “Yeah,” she said, opening the door and reaching into the back for a canvas bag. She unzipped it and pulled out a scrap of silver material that somehow managed to turn itself into a minidress once she had it on her. She ran fingers through her teal and pink hair, combing it into a semblance of order, then began to wipe at the skin of her thighs with a baby wipe from a container in the same bag.

  “Always come prepared?” I couldn’t help but have a sarcastic tone to my voice.

  “Never hurts.” She threw the red stained wipes into a little garbage bag on the floor of the car. “You think he’ll be okay?”

  “Who?” I asked, still feeling my nerves twang from the adrenaline that was working its way out of my system.

  “Dave.” She actually looked like she cared. Huh.

  “Yeah, he will… physically at least.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked defensively.

  “I don’t know, you tell me.” I sighed. “Look, I’m still spoiling for a fight, so let’s not even get into this, okay? If you care so much, why don’t you go to the hospital and check in on him? I’m gonna go home, let Darien know what happened.”

  “I’ll do that. Tell Darien hi for me,” she said, laughing, as she got in her car and drove off.

  Like hell I will.

  A little while later I sighed in frustration as I pulled into the apartment complex and didn’t see Darien’s Mustang. Alex’s new Miata was there, but that didn’t mean anything, he could have gone with Darien. I entered the apartment, threw my keys and purse down on the end table and went in to take a shower, leaning against the stall wall as the hot water coursed over me.

  He’s back.

  Tears mingled with the water as I wrapped my arms around my stomach, sobbing. He was back and he hadn’t even bothered to try and contact me. For all I knew, he could have been back for weeks and I just hadn’t run into him.

  “That bad, huh?” a familiar voice in my head asked, making me cough as I inhaled water.

  I slid the shower door open, uncaring of the water that sprayed out onto the floor, to see Talon sitting just on the other side of the bathmat, his glowing blues eyes averted politely.

  “What do you want?” I knew it sounded rude, but I was upset, I was crying, and I was naked. There was no room for polite.

  “It looked like you could use some company, maybe a shoulder to cry on. I know it’s a furry shoulder, but I kinda get the idea that you like wolves.” His eyes met mine briefly, then snapped back to the side.

  “How would you know that?” I gave up and turned the water off, leaning out of the stall to yank my towel off the counter, not really giving a shit if a ghostly wolf ogled me. I was surprised when I saw him close his eyes entirely.

  “I can be a gentleman, you know,” he said, as though he’d read my mind.

  I gathered up my clothes and headed out across the living room toward the bedroom, Talon following me silently. Angel hissed from her spot in the middle of the dining room table before darting into the kitchen.

  “I don’t think your cat is ever going to like me,” he commented, his back to me as I finished toweling off and got dressed.

  “She’s particular,” I said. “You didn’t answer my question.”

  He hopped up onto my bed, got comfortable on the blankets. “Just because you haven’t seen me, doesn’t mean I haven’t been around.” He glanced pointedly at Darien’s second set of boots, set neatly by the closet door.

  “Yeah, and you pic
k now to show yourself. Why?”

  “You saw Aerick finally. I figured it might be a bit of a shock and you sometimes do… odd… things when you’re under a lot of stress.” He gave me a contemplative look.

  “Finally? What do you mean, finally? How fucking long has he been back?” I demanded, scooting up onto the window seat.

  “About a week,” Talon admitted.

  “A week?” I felt that squeeze on my heart again. “He didn’t even try to call me.”

  “He knew you were with your Darien, maybe he thought it was best if he didn’t cause potential problems,” Talon suggested.

  “I told you not to tell him anything!”

  “Whoa, there, kitten! I didn’t say anything to him. I’m not sure where he got his information from, only that he knew. You still love him?”

  I blew a breath of air up past my eyes, rearranging my bangs. “What do you think?”

  “What about your wolf?” Talon pawed at the pillow that Darien favored.

  “Love him too.”

  “You need to make a choice.”

  “Can’t. Can’t pick one over the other, can’t have them both, can’t live with neither.”

  “You sure about that last part?”

  I thought about it, imagined what it would be like for both Darien and Aerick to be gone from my life now. I knew that I had been in that place before, but at that point I hadn’t realized my feelings for Darien and I was still clinging to the hope that Aerick was coming back. The feelings the thoughts conjured were not pleasant ones, and I closed my eyes, fighting back the despair that almost overwhelmed me.

  “Hey, you might want to tone it down a notch there, red,” Talon warned suddenly.

  I felt my hair whip across my face and I opened my eyes to see the papers that had been stacked neatly on my desk flying madly around the room as the air currents carried them along. The bedroom door was rattling on its hinges, the ceiling fan was spinning wildly, and the posters on the wall threatened to come loose from their staples.