From the Ashes (Force of Nature #1)

by Amber Lynn Natusch

  * * *

  I'd never been a part of such chaos before, and I felt utterly useless. The boys were yanking bodies from the line of SUVs parked in front of the lodge and carrying them into the house. And there were a lot of them (bodies, that is).

  Knox and Foust were ordering the others around, but their words were choked off by the mounting grief within me. It blocked out virtually everything. I stood in the middle of the melee, staring at them as they scurried around like frantic bees diving in and out of their nest. I didn't hear what had happened to them in Anchorage, didn't hear how they'd escaped. I didn't know if anyone had been left behind. All I heard was the pounding of my heart in my chest echoing up through my ears.

  I had no idea how long Knox had been yelling my name until he grabbed my arm and wheeled me around to look at him.

  “Piper! We need you!” he said tersely, not awaiting my response. Instead, he started ushering me toward the lodge. At that point all the others were inside doing God only knew what to save God only knew how many. But I would soon learn just how great that number was.

  Soon I would witness the carnage I had brought upon them.

  The second we broke through the front door into the foyer, it all hit me. The living room looked like a makeshift triage unit, bloodied bodies strewn about on multiple surfaces. Those not injured raced around assessing their fallen brothers to see who was most in need of help. Knox ran in to grab medical supplies and brought them back to me, forcing them into my hands.

  “Can you take care of the two in the corner?” he asked, pointing to two of his pack members I didn't really know. “They're not in too bad of shape. They just need to be cleaned out before they can start healing.”

  Start healing, I thought to myself. And then it dawned on me why this scenario was so outside the realm of possibility for me. They were all werewolves, strong and powerful and capable of healing injuries almost effortlessly. Just earlier I'd seen Knox's cuts all but disappear from his body before my very eyes. Why then was his pack not only wounded, but unable to heal during the long car ride back to the middle of nowhere?

  I nodded to Knox that I could do as he asked.

  Satisfied with that response, he made his way over to the far side of the room where two of his pack members were laid out on the kitchen island. I hadn't seen them taken out of the SUVs when they’d returned. I knew that for fact because I would have remembered that sight. It would have struck an undeniable chord.

  Both men were charred beyond recognition.

  Swallowing the rising bile in my throat, I turned away from the macabre view and did as Knox had requested; I went to the boys with minor injuries and helped to clean them up. One had a deep gash in his arm, most likely from a magical blade. The other had a similar injury across his back. Both were starting to heal, evidenced by the tender pink flesh surrounding the wounds. But they both mentioned something about infection—silver—so I did as I was asked and flushed out the open area as best I could with a bottle of some concoction Knox had given me and then bandaged them up. Once I finished with them, I wandered around the room, helping out wherever I could. By then, the unmistakable stench of burnt flesh and hair had coated my nostrils. It was inescapable, as were the memories the familiar scent gave rise to.

  I instinctively clutched my stomach, rubbing the scars I bore—the scars given to me by the very same group that had attacked us in Anchorage. That thought made me keenly aware of something that, in all the chaos, I hadn't yet considered. Warlocks were powerful, Monroe especially, but even he alone couldn't have inflicted that much damage to an entire pack of werewolves. My blood ran cold at the thought. He hadn't been a scout. I'd been ambushed by the warlocks yet again.

  Only this time it wasn't me who’d paid the price.

  I rose slowly from my crouched position next to one of the wounded wolves, scanning the room for Foust. When I found him, he was standing next to the kitchen island, covering one of the bodies with a sheet, head and all.

  “How many?” I asked, my voice too quiet for even the werewolves surrounding me to notice amid the ruckus. “Foust!” I shouted, garnering his attention, along with his irritation. It would seem that he too blamed me for what had happened. By the end of the day, I expected that count to rise considerably. “How many were there?”

  “Casualties?”

  “No. Warlocks.”

  His brow furrowed at the mention of the enemy. Then his gaze fell to Knox, silently asking permission to discuss the matter with me. One nod from his alpha was all it took.

  “At first, there was only the one in the club. By the time I'd gotten back there to inform the others about what was going on, he was already making a break for it down an adjacent alley. While I followed him, I called Jagger and told him to get as many of the pack as he could quickly find and follow my scent—that I was tracking the warlock after Piper. It didn't take long for them to catch up to me, right about the time I had that fucker cornered in a dead end,” he explained, his jaw flexing hard as he tried to restrain the anger he felt, recalling the events that had happened. “He should have been shitting bricks, one lowly warlock against a dozen or more wolves. He was a dead man walking. But the way he looked at me—the smug grin that spread to an evil smile—I should have known something was up. That there was more going on than I realized. And that's when everything went to shit.”

  “There were more of them,” I added, knowing how Kingston's crew operated. They weren't known for playing fair. For a clean fight. Those concepts were foreign to them.

  Foust nodded sharply, acknowledging my observation.

  “A lot more of them. They came out of nowhere behind us. It was an ambush, and we were caught in the crossfire. Literally.”

  I hadn't realized that I'd been walking toward Foust as he spoke, the fear and desperation I felt carrying me.

  “How did you get away?”

  “We took out as many of them as we could, then we got the fuck out of there before any more of us got fried or sliced.” He looked at me thoughtfully for a moment before continuing. “If that's who you've been running from, Piper, I can understand why. They're no joke.”

  “I know.”

  “You should have called me. I would have come,” Knox growled, though his anger was not truly at Foust. He was frustrated with himself. Mad that he had failed his pack.

  “I gladly would have if one single cell phone had survived the fight, but none did. And I sure as fuck wasn't going to hang out and search the area for one with flying balls of fire whizzing past my head every five seconds.”

  “The fire,” I whispered, staring at Foust. “Was it blue?”

  “What?”

  “The fire that you were attacked with, was it blue?”

  “Yes,” Foust growled.

  My face went pale.

  “Did you see who attacked you with it?”

  Another growl, this time from the entire pack.

  “Yes,” Foust said, stepping closer to me. “A hand-less cowardly motherfucker that ran away through some kind of black vortex and left his brothers to die.”

  “Kingston,” I exhaled, not realizing his name had passed my lips until I heard it ring through the room that had fallen silent. “I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry this happened. This is my fault. All of it. Your blood is on my hands.”

  I looked to Knox, not realizing that he was staring at me. His expression was dark and unreadable. Tears stained my cheeks, but I quickly wiped them away. It was not time for my weakness. It was time to prove that their sacrifice meant something. I would not see any others fall because of me.

  I turned and went back to the wounded wolves, helping however and wherever I could. It seemed as though very few made it out relatively unscathed. While I worked, I finally came upon Jagger, whose hands were scorched from trying to save one of his packmates. They had already been cleansed since arriving at the house and were healing, but the gaping wound in his leg had not. I tended to the gash in his thigh, keeping my eyes low
and focused. I was too ashamed to meet his gaze.

  “I know you blame yourself, Piper,” he said softly, wincing a bit when I doused his leg with the liquid from the bottle Knox had given me. “But you shouldn't. After the night we met you, Knox explained that he knew something was after you. Hell, Foust pegged you for a runaway after being around you for five minutes.” I dared to sneak a look at his face. All I found in his expression was compassion. “Anyway, Knox told us his suspicions and made it clear that he was willing to do anything he could to keep you safe, but allowed the rest of us that choice for ourselves. But don't say anything to him about that. He'd deny it. He's a tough guy, but he's not unreasonable. In some matters, he lets us have a choice.”

  “And what did you choose?” I asked, my hands lingering on Jagger's thigh, holding a bandage in place to be wrapped.

  He shrugged.

  “Look around, Piper. Isn't it obvious what we chose?”

  “All of you? All of you chose to be part of this fight? A fight that isn't yours? Against unknown enemies?” He nodded. “Why? Why would you ever agree to something so insane?”

  “Because it's been a long time since any one of us has had something worth fighting for.”

  My eyes dropped to the floor.

  “If you knew me—really knew me—you wouldn't think that.”

  “We don't need to think, Piper. Not about this. We work on instinct. That's our gift and our curse. And our collective instincts said that we needed to protect you. At least until you can protect yourself.” I tied off the bandage and stood on shaky legs. “That's not really going to be necessary,” he said, unwrapping what I'd just tied up. “Now that we're near Knox, we'll heal up in no time.”

  “What?” I asked absentmindedly, scanning the room to find evidence that supported his words.

  “We needed to be cleaned out first, of course. Magical wounds are infections waiting to happen—and don't even get me started on silver wounds—but once they're flushed clean and we have Knox's power to draw on, we're good to go.”

  I turned to the kitchen again, only to find that the other wolf on the island was now covered with a sheet as well. Two fatalities. Apparently Jagger's little theory was more complicated than he'd let on.

  “They don't seem so good to go,” I said, staring at the dead.

  “Their injuries were far worse than the rest of ours,” he said solemnly. “We had limited supplies in the SUVs and we lost too much time on the ride home to save them. If Knox had been there, they would have pulled through. But...he wasn't, so...”

  “Now they're dead.” I finished his sentence for him.

  “It's still not your fault, Piper,” he reaffirmed, putting his hand on my shoulder. I shrugged it off and walked away from him. I couldn't bear to see the earnestness in his eyes. He really meant what he'd said, and yet somehow that made his sentiment all the worse.

  “The hell it isn't,” I muttered under my breath, walking off toward the hallway that led back to the living quarters of the lodge. Before I could escape there, Knox cut me off, stepping directly in my path.

  “I need to talk to the pack for a bit, but I don't want you going home. Not until I know more. Why don't you go get that rest you were so desperate for earlier, and I'll come get you when we're done.”

  Looking over my shoulder to the room full of healing wolves, I sighed and nodded. Unable to meet Knox's eyes, I brushed past him and made my way to the guest room he'd offered me the first night I’d met him. Sad, scared, and full of remorse, I crawled into that bed and buried myself under the covers.

  While Knox addressed his wolves, I racked my brain for a way out of this. A way that didn't involve any more of the wolves falling victim to Kingston's inexplicable vendetta against me. Was weakness really reason enough to want to erase me from the face of the Earth? Was it really that great an offense? As I considered those questions, I remembered that he was far from the only one that felt that way. My own mate had tried to kill me for precisely that reason, or at least in part. If Kingston was so hellbent on killing me that he would take on a pack of werewolves, then it was clear that he, like Merc, would not stop until he watched me meet my end.

  By the time my mind had exhausted the myriad possibilities of how I could be caught and killed, as well as the numerous attempts at escape I could employ that would inevitably fail, I fell asleep. It was the only peace I would find for a while. The only successful escape from my reality that existed.

  17

  The sound of arguing awoke me.

  I could hear them talking in the living room, the rush of their murmuring voices broken by an occasional outburst that carried all the way to the back of the hall. So much had happened. Too many were lost. I had never wanted things to turn out that way. It was the precise outcome I'd tried to avoid. And yet, they’d died anyway.

  Good intentions gone bad; that was my life story.

  Werewolves were not easy to sneak up on, but when they were embroiled in a heated discussion, it was possible to fly under their radar, apparently. I tiptoed down the hall, wanting to hear what they were saying more clearly. I also think a small part of me wanted to be punished for my selfishness. I never should have stayed when they’d found me out, but regardless, I had. That part wanted to hear the pain in their voices, the sting of their words as they cursed the day I’d come around. Revoked their bizarre allegiance to me. Maybe they were planning their revenge. A revenge I deserved. Hearing that would certainly spur me to act.

  Maybe that would make me leave.

  “We'll get answers when she's ready to give them,” Knox growled. The others went silent. Just as the room quieted, I stepped on a squeaky floorboard and my attempt at stealth was crushed in an instant. “Piper?” he called, coming around the corner to find me halfway down the hall. “Good. You're up. C'mon, the boys want to see you.”

  He ushered me into the great room to stare down a sea of mourning werewolves. It was almost more than I could bear. Then I saw Grayson, the youngest in the pack, just beyond them, pale and in pain, breathing hard on the couch. He had been badly burned, though not as badly as the other two that had already died. By the look of him, he wasn't far from meeting that same end.

  I felt a tear run down my cheek as I clutched my stomach with my folded arms. My tell, as Knox liked to call it.

  “Is he...?”

  “He should make it, but he's in rough shape. Even with his burns flushed out and his proximity to me, he's struggling to heal. Whatever magic that warlock wields, it's dark and it's powerful.” Don't I know it, I thought to myself. “Pain meds don't work so well on us, so all we can do is watch him struggle and suffer. I can't even imagine how bad it is for him right now.”

  “I can,” I said without thinking, my feet carrying me toward the couch. The burns covering Grayson's entire torso practically called to me.

  “Really?” one of the guys shouted out, halting my approach. “You look like you got away pretty unscathed.”

  “Brunton!” Knox barked, silencing the wolf. “Your bullshit isn't going to help anything right now. Got it?”

  “No, it's okay, Knox,” I said softly, turning to face him. “I deserve that. He's right. I did get away scot free...this time.”

  “This time?” Knox asked, his stare homing in on me.

  I had the attention of the whole pack, all of them staring at me with myriad expressions. Jagger looked sad. Foust looked exhausted, running his hand over his face repeatedly. Knox, however, was all business. He was about to get the answers he'd been waiting for all along, and I could see that he had already decided he wasn't going to be a fan of them.

  Smart guy.

  With a heavy sigh, I let go of my abdomen and grabbed the hem of my shirt. With one fluid motion, I pulled it up over my head and threw it down. The collective gasp from the pack was more than I could handle. I could no longer meet their eyes.

  “This is what happens to those that the warlocks deem as prey,” I said, looking to my right out the win
dow. “And that's all I've ever been to them and all the other Magicals, for that matter: prey. So one day they decided that my weakness should no longer be tolerated and had a little bonfire at my expense.” When nobody spoke, I forced myself to turn and face them. “They ambushed me when I was out for a run. They held me down with magic and set me ablaze.”

  “Motherfucker...” Foust exhaled.

  “They watched for a while—until they got bored with my screaming—then they left me in the park to burn. They walked away, laughing the entire time. I was always a joke to them. Apparently my death was, too.”

  “But how...?” Jagger started, unable to finish his thought.

  “How am I still alive?” He nodded his head. “It started to rain.”

  “But their fire was magical,” Knox interjected, coming closer to me. I took a step back instinctively. “Normal rain shouldn't have been able to put it out.”

  “I don't know how or why, but all I know is that it stopped. I was found by some vampires—some of the king's enforcers—and they took me back to their mansion. Their doc did what she could to save me, but none of their medication had any effect on me.”

  “Oh my God,” Knox breathed, staring at the marred expanse of tissue that covered my stomach.

  “So,” I said, turning my attention toward Brunton, “I really do know how he feels right now, and believe me when I say that I couldn't possibly feel any more guilt about it. Nobody should suffer like that. Nobody.”

  “How long?” Knox asked, nearly interrupting me. “How long did it take to heal?”

  “There was no change in my condition for a couple of weeks—”

  “Weeks!” he shouted. “You survived that hell for weeks?”

  “I had some help,” I said softly. “One of the vampires...he helped me in a way. I guess it was similar to being in a chemically-induced coma. I didn't feel anything. Whenever I would come out of it enough to start screaming again, he would put me back into whatever state it was that made it all bearable.”