Jasper grabbed my arm, helping me up. My hands and clothes were covered in blood now, the liquid slick between our skin as he took my hand. He looked at me with urgency.
“You aren’t really having the baby now, are you?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No. It was a ruse, like you said.”
“All right, good, just making sure.” He glanced around, where a few of the men were struggling to their feet. “We need to get out of here. Which way do we go?”
“Well, I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?” His voice was low but tense. “You’ve been here for days.”
“They kept me upstairs the whole time.” I looked around the room. There were three different entrances, but the one across from the fireplace had familiar scenery through it. “I think we came from that way.”
The man I had considered killing struggled to his feet. He began to charge at us.
“That way it is, then,” Jasper said, and we sprinted toward the door. Had it been this dark when we came through? I could hardly see anything, and my eyes were taking a long time to adjust to the darkness.
Jasper stumbled to a stop, and I nearly ran into him. We had come to a fork in the hallway.
“Which way?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” None of this looked familiar; I suspected we had already crossed the doorway we had come through.
The man was still coming for us, but his injuries had slowed him and he was stumbling. Jasper pulled me to the left, which was probably the safest option if I was remembering the layout of the castle right. Of course, I might not be. The whole thing was a dark labyrinth. It seemed that the doorways all led to other hallways instead of other rooms.
Jasper had gotten far ahead of me, and the man was gaining. Jasper paused, as if realizing that I wasn’t right beside him. It was too late, though. By the time he turned around, the man had me in his grip, one arm around my waist and the other around my neck. The way he kept my neck locked in the crook of his arm, it would only take one flex of the muscle and my neck would snap.
“Christine!” Jasper called out. He started to run toward me.
“No,” I choked out, not wanting this man to kill me on reflex. I twisted my shoulder, hearing a pop before a shooting pain. No matter, I’d deal with that later. Now, my awkward positioning allowed me leverage. I rammed my knife into his side and twisted.
He released his grip almost instantly, stumbling backward, and I pulled the knife out. I rushed to Jasper, blood dripping from my hands. My breathing was heavy.
“I’m trying to keep up, but my ankle is sprained,” I gasped.
He didn’t even stop to consider. Instead, he scooped me up, skirts and all, and continued running, trying to find our way through the web of dark, musty stone hallways. I looped my arms around his neck, helping to hold myself up to allow him to use his energy elsewhere. The knife rested behind him, dripping blood and trailing droplets behind us.
We twisted around another corner. I was lost in the blackness, only bits of light seeping through the cracks in the stone, but Jasper navigated obstacles with ease. I pressed myself against his flushed body, trying to make myself as compact and easy to carry as possible. He wasn’t twisting and darting as effortlessly as he could have been had he not been holding me. I tried to push away the guilt nagging at me for slowing us down, but what could I do? There was no way I could convince Jasper to leave without me and save himself.
Jasper turned through an archway and the air turned cool and damp as we descended a narrow, umbrageous staircase. I prayed that Jasper wouldn’t trip. At the speed he was moving, I would have lost my footing even in the light, and he was plummeting through darkness. Once we reached the bottom I saw a thin, horizontal strip of light. Not the soft yellow light of a candle or a fire, but the cool gray light of an overcast winter sky.
“There!” I whispered, but he already had his sights on it. We came to a stop, and with the sliver of light I could tell we were in front of a door. Jasper tried the handle, but it held fast.
“Oh, come on,” he murmured. He set me down on the floor, my stocking feet soaking in the moisture of this cellar. All around me floated the stench of musk and decay. It was hard to breathe as Jasper shoved himself against the door. As my eyes adjusted, I saw that this door was like the one to my prison; reinforced with iron and with the hinges on the inside. Throwing himself at the door like he was would only serve to draw attention.
I reached my arm out, touching Jasper tentatively on the shoulder. “Jasper, we need to be quiet.”
He shook his head. “They know where we are already. It doesn’t matter.”
“We can at least try to stay hidden.”
“Christine, I need to get this door open.” He was looking at me, and had it not been so dark I would have been able to see the flecks of gold in his turquoise eyes. “Can you search around for something that could help with that?”
“I can try,” I said, “but my eyesight isn’t like yours is in the dark.”
“I know. Do your best.”
I had no idea what was down here. I might step on a spider and get bitten, or make a wrong turn and drop off into a pit of spikes. Perhaps I was being paranoid, but I had no idea what was waiting down here for me. Seth had said there was no dungeon to this place, so this must have been storage of some sort. I fumbled carefully along the wall, my hands hitting a block of wooden shelves. I moved my hands up, feeling about blindly. Jars, for canning, most likely. They were heavy, which meant they were full. I continued around the room, my hands pressing against the condensation on the walls, my feet scuffling along the dirt floor until I hit something. Rather, I nearly stepped on it. I bent down and felt cool flesh and rough cloth. A bit more prodding revealed a head.
“Oh God,” I moaned.
“What is it?”
“There’s a body down here.”
There was a stretch of silence. “Oh. Yes.”
“You knew?”
Jasper threw himself at the door again. “I could smell it. There’s actually a few of them.”
“You could have warned me!”
“A bit preoccupied at the moment, love.”
I struggled to stand up when I heard a familiar jangling sound.
“Was that—?”
“I think so,” I said, kneeling back down. I felt around the body until my fingers twisted around a ring of metal. I grabbed ahold of them and stumbled back across the room to where Jasper was waiting. I handed the keys over to him; it was too dark for me to see what I was doing.
An eternity passed as he tried key after key in the lock. I was about to give up; perhaps the man, who had most likely been the keeper of this place, had held two sets of keys, and Seth had the other. Or perhaps the man had nothing to do with this castle, in which case the keys were probably to a home or a shop or something. I had noticed the weight of the keys when I pulled them from the body. There must have been at least a dozen, probably twice that. Jasper continued trying at them until I finally heard the comforting click of the lock echo through the tomb.
“Always the last key you try,” he sighed.
“Well, of course it is,” I said, relief coursing through my veins. “Why would you keep trying after you found the one that works?”
He paused. “You can be quite maddening, do you know that?”
I grinned, though I wasn’t sure if he could see it in the dark. “You love me anyway.”
Jasper swooped down and kissed me on the forehead. “I do, so much.”
He pulled the door open, and the winter air came rushing at us. I gasped as the chill hit my lungs, my nails digging into Jasper’s skin. He pulled me toward him. We stepped outside, our clothes leaving smears of blood in the snow. The ice melted as it hit my skin, my socks soaking with cold water. Together we trudged through the snow and the wind. We were at the back of the castle, in what looked like it would be a lovely garden come springtime. Thick trees encircled the whole back of the lot, much li
ke Wolf’s Peak. How far were we from home? The foliage would suggest not too far. I couldn’t wait to get back, to be settled comfortably into my bed beside my husband.
I turned to look at Jasper, and his hand clenched mine tighter. His body had tensed, the hair on his neck standing up as he froze.
The sound of a door slamming rang through the winter sky. Our hands dropped as we whirled around to look. All around us men were coming out of the woods and from around the house. A few of them I hadn’t seen before. Some of them I had, and they looked worse for wear. All of them were werewolves.
I glanced behind us. Men had come out of the deep cover of trees as well. In all, there were probably about a half–dozen, maybe more. From the balcony above the door we had left came Seth. He was bloody and bruised but smiling, because he knew he had the advantage.
We were surrounded.
Chapter Twenty–Eight
Jasper and I drew tightly together, my hand finding his. He squeezed my hand, a gesture of comfort, but I didn’t want it. Instead, I pushed the hilt of the knife into his palm. He glanced down at me, startled. He seemed to have forgotten that I had it. Our fingers brushed as he snuck it from me.
The men closed in, their bodies twisting and contorting as they began to shift. Teeth tumbled out onto the bloodstained snow. I glanced up at Jasper, my eyes wide. If all these men shifted, if they all became wolves, we would have no chance.
Seth strode toward us, his sharp teeth flashing in a grin. My hand clutched Jasper’s wrist, desperate for any contact and warmth before our execution. My breathing was ragged, puffs of steam in the frozen air.
“I had hoped it wouldn’t come to this,” Seth said, shaking his head. “I had thought you were going to make this easy.”
“You clearly don’t know us well, then,” I said, gritting my teeth.
Seth rolled his eyes. “Jasper, shut your bitch up, please.”
Jasper lunged for him, put I pulled him back. “Don’t let him get to you,” I said.
“We’re way past that now,” he said. His jaw was squared and fire burned in his eyes.
Seth was only a few feet away from us now. “You’ve left me no choice.” He shrugged. “Now we have to do this the hard way.”
“The hard way? You kidnapped me and held me hostage!” I spat at him.
“For God’s sake, Jasper, please, tell her to be quiet,” Seth whined.
“You’ve ruined my life,” I told him, my voice as icy as the snow.
He rolled his eyes. “Yes. So you’ve mentioned. Well, now I’m about to end your life.”
Seth put his arms out, gesturing to his wolves as they surrounded us. They were herding us in, giving us no room to flee. His arms still outstretched, Seth bent over, spitting out a mouthful of teeth onto the ground in front of me before looking up to wink. I wrinkled my nose in disgust. Once his new, sharp muzzle was in, his body bent backwards, as if his spine had snapped in half.
While Seth was in the throes of his change, Jasper pulled me in tight. He slipped the knife back into my hand.
“What are you doing?” I whispered in his ear.
“Take this,” he said. “I’ll be stronger if I shift. Use it to protect yourself. As soon as you get a chance, run. Run far away.”
“No,” I said, shaking my head, pulling him to me as tears spilled down my face. “No, Jasper, I’m not leaving you.”
“You have to,” he said as he held me close. “It’s the only way you’ll survive.”
“I won’t survive without you!”
He pulled away from me and looked me in the eyes. “Yes, you will. You’re going to have that baby, and you’re going to take care of him, and you’re going to give him all the love that you have. He’s going to be your reason for survival. Do you understand, Christine?”
I swallowed the lump in my throat and blinked as I tried in vain to hold back my tears. “I love you so much.”
He pulled my face to his, kissing me hard and deep. “I love you too, Christine.”
Jasper stepped away from me, leaving me standing alone in the snow. He bent over, hands on his knees as he began to shift. I closed my eyes. I always hated to watch. I especially couldn’t watch Jasper shift. There was something too primal about it.
While my eyes were closed, I stepped away, nearly backing into one of the giant wolves. He snarled at me, his hot breath on my neck. I stepped forward again, pulling myself in, trying to make myself as small as possible. I closed my eyes again, trying to ignore Jasper’s groans of agony as he shifted. I took deep breaths, getting ready to run as soon as I had an opening. If I were to wager a guess, I’d bet that I wasn’t going to get very far, but if Jasper was going to fight off half a dozen wolves, I could certainly make a run for it. I clenched my hands at my sides, trying to calm and center myself when I heard the first yowl.
My instinct was to look at Jasper, but he was fine, or as fine as he could be while in the middle of a shift. No, the yelp had come from behind me. One of our assailants had been jumped by a wolf from outside the circle. Then another went down. I peered beyond him to see several wolves coming out of the forest, wolves that I recognized.
We had help.
I could have cried, I was so relieved.
Chaos erupted. Snow billowed around me as masses of fur wrestled to the ground. I was knocked off balance and sat in the snow, stunned, for a moment. Realizing that if I stayed, I was in danger of being a casualty, I tried to pull myself to my feet. I slipped on the wet snow and fell back down, landing on my ankle at a bad angle. I cried out as pain shot through my leg. Try as I might, it hurt too much to put weight on it. I dragged myself through the snow, trying to avoid being trampled in the fight by the brawling wolves. I ducked my head, keeping it low as I crawled, narrowly avoiding one of the more massive conspirators of Seth falling on me.
I made it over to the stairs that led to the balcony above. I pushed my stocking down my leg to get a better view of my leg. My ankle had swollen up again, bringing back that eggplant aesthetic. I reached down and scooped up a handful of snow into my already frozen hands and packed it onto the purple skin. I winced as the cold hit, but I didn’t have any choice.
From here I was obscured from the fight, but not by much. If all of Jasper’s councilmen had come, he would have six men to help him, putting their armies at almost equal. I couldn’t see who had come; I hadn’t been able to count them all. Adam wasn’t in condition to fight, but it also wouldn’t have surprised me if he had come anyway. I struggled to my feet to gain a better vantage point. It was hard to see anything; they all looked like a writhing storm of fur and flesh. I would catch a glimpse of Jasper or Stephen, only to lose them in the next second. Blood was soaked into the ground now, as if the snow had frozen red. The blood ran down the walkway of the garden, weaving between the brick and coming to a stop by my feet. I swallowed. The sight made me sick. That might be Jasper’s blood. Conor’s blood. Adam’s blood or Stephen’s blood. What would happen if we made it out of here without one of them? The thought was too overwhelming. My stomach was in knots and my chest was tight. If I stayed standing, I thought I would pass out. I started to sit back down until I saw someone out of the corner of my eye.
“Christoph,” I breathed. He caught sight of me and rushed over.
“You need to get out of here,” I said. “Either Seth will kill you or someone else will.”
“I’m not worried about me. I’m worried about you,” he said, glancing over his shoulder at the war behind him. “Your ankle looks awful, and if you stay out here much longer you’ll get frostbite.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“Let’s at least get you inside,” he begged.
My fingers and toes were becoming stiff and blue. If I didn’t get warm soon, I’d lose them. I swallowed. I should be running away, but I wasn’t going to make it far if my ankle didn’t get bandaged and if I didn’t get warmed up.
I pulled myself to my feet with the railing and tried to walk up the steps,
but I still couldn’t put any weight on that ankle.
“Here,” said Christoph, wrapping his arm around me. He tried to lift me onto the next step, but with the stairs covered in ice and the uphill battle, we didn’t get far. His face fell. “I’m sorry,” he said.
I felt something soft brush my hand and I turned to see a wolf with shiny black hair nudging at me. I didn’t recognize this wolf, not as one of Jasper’s or as one of Seth’s. The wolf twisted its head, nodding to its back. Apparently, it was friendly.
“You want me to get on?” I asked, hesitant, and the wolf nodded. It sat down, wagging its tail, and the doctor helped me climb on its back. I clutched at the long hair, and the wolf stood up slowly. Sure that I was on tightly, it carefully climbed up the stairs. Christoph hurried up after us, opening the door into the house once he made it to the landing. We followed him through the hallways into a sitting room with a roaring fire. The wolf sat on the hearth, and Christoph helped me dismount. I sat on the rug to let the fire warm me. Christoph grabbed his bag from the table and sat down at my feet, examining the swelling.
The wolf sat there, tongue lolling out happily.
“Thank you,” I said. I paused then asked, “Are they doing all right out there?”
The wolf nodded, wagging its tail. I smiled.
“Who are you?” I asked.
I heard the bones crack first; it was a sickening sound that I was all too familiar with now. I kept my eyes down as the wolf transformed. When I looked up, Bridget was sitting on the loveseat, naked, a pillow pulled over herself.
I think I blacked out for a moment.
I blinked several times, but Bridget was still there. She smiled. “Do you have any spare clothes?” she asked.
“Upstairs,” I muttered, averting my eyes. She jumped up from the couch, apparently unashamed, and hurried out to the hallway and up the staircase.
The Wolf's Bait (The Wolf's Peak Saga Book 2) Page 21