Wounded: Book 8 (A Rylee Adamson Novel)

by Shannon Mayer

  Something he didn’t want anyone else to have.

  Snarling, he drove her back, his body barely able to lurch forward. She squealed and dropped the copper knife. The scent of burnt wood curled around him and then Blaz’s voice was there.

  Get away from him, bitch. You are not his mate.

  The woman backed away, her teeth bared at them both. “He is mine. He just doesn’t know it yet.” Liam struggled to understand how she had gotten here. Wasn’t she supposed to be in London? Not on the cold dirt outside of Louisa’s house.

  With Blaz beside him, he lowered back to the ground. Louisa moved to his head.

  “This may hurt, Liam. Try not to bite me, I like not being hairy.” Her hands smoothed along his jaw, down his neck and settled over the wound in his chest.

  Pain was not the word, nor was agony. It felt as though the copper knife was being dug into the wound while on fire; acid burning his flesh couldn’t have hurt as badly.

  A howl ripped out of him, but he kept his mouth away from Louisa. She would heal him; she had to.

  Otherwise, how could he die for Rylee?

  There was no time to wait. I made a fist and raised my arm; Pamela ran to my side. She snapped her hands in front of her and the zombies, dripping wet and covered with seaweed and barnacles, were lifted out of the water. She moved them toward the boat, dropping them on the deck as fast as she could. I did a head count. Fifty, and they were already going to work, disappearing into the depths of the boat.

  But no witches came out to inspect who was using magic. Not one.

  “Let’s go,” I barked out and then pointed at the gangplank.

  Frank ran to catch up with us as we crossed the gangplank, one by one. The fucking thing shuddered underneath us and as Frank crossed, it slipped and fell, taking him with it.

  I dove back, catching his hand before he fell far, though his eyes were wide and startled.

  “Pam, little help here.”

  She grunted. “Can’t, not with you touching him.”

  There were moments my immunity to magic really sucked ass. This was one of them. Putting my feet against the edge of the boat, I pulled hard, Erik reached over and helped me haul Frank onto the deck. I didn’t give him time to be freaked out about what had almost happened.

  “Make sure your zombies only go after the witches.”

  Frank gasped a breath as he nodded, his hands on his knees. “Yeah, doing my best.”

  Now came the fun part.

  I led the way, Tracking witches and the three kids, but also now Tracking my dad. He was alive, but hurt. The threads of so many lives tangled inside my head and I struggled to keep it together. It had been a long time since the emotions of a salvage had been so rampant, longer still since they had caused me to slow down.

  One thought rose above the rest. How in hell had the witches known about my parents? Had they been following us? It was the only answer that made sense. They knew we were coming.

  Which also meant they knew we were here.

  Fucking hell. “They know we’re here. We go in guns blazing. Got it?”

  Frank and Pamela nodded in tandem, and she pushed her sleeves up her thin arms. “Everything we’ve got?”

  “Everything. We have to kill them all.”

  Frank paled. “What about those who don’t fight?”

  “Use your discretion, Frank.”

  Erik locked eyes with me. “There are at least two demons in this boat.”

  Crap. I knew one of the kids had been possessed, but had I missed one of the others going under? “How can you tell?”

  He tapped his head. “Different than Tracking, but you should be able to sense them as we get near. I’ll explain later.”

  Of course, that was assuming we’d all have a later.

  I locked onto the threads of my parents. They were the bait as much as the three kids, and I would take it. Hook, line, and sinker. Only the witches were the ones going to do the sinking.

  With a quick twist, I had my sword in one hand, my whip in the other. No more words needed. I ran forward, navigating the narrow halls of the ship, taking us on a direct route where the trap was most likely set.

  The halls were tight, gray, and empty. Good and bad. Meant we would be able to get where we needed to go without much problem. We rounded a final corner and the hallway opened into a huge room that had tiers of walkways descending to the lower level. Four levels of tiers, and all empty. I looked at the bottom floor, over the edge of the railing.

  A pentagram was carved into the metal and inside the protective bubble of the spell being spun, a witch was on her knees, bound and gagged, a collar on her neck with a large ruby in it visible even at this distance. The collar was like the one Milly had been caught by, and it would force the witch to do what the black coven wanted. That must have been how they had so many members pulled together in such a small area. There was another figure inside the pentagram, but I couldn’t get a good look at that one.

  My gut twisted as I looked over the coven. There, to the left was my mom’s friend, Leanne, a smile on her face. Suddenly the answer to ‘how did the coven know I was here and that taking my parents would draw me in’ was answered. Fuck, fuck, fuckers. I would have come for the kids either way, but my parents—the witches must have wanted insurance that I would show.

  But why? Why want me there if they knew I was going to try and stop them?

  Around them were most of the black coven, if I was reading things right. They stared up at me, some with malice, others with apparent glee. Leanne waved, the stupid cow.

  Well fuck them, too, and the brooms they rode in on.

  “Frank and Pamela, you stick together, fight from here, run if you have to. Erik, you go after the demons. Alex, with me.” I didn’t wait for them, hated that I had to ask so much of them, but it was the way of things.

  I ran for the guard rail, grabbed it, and swung over and down, snapping my legs at the last instant so I landed on the level below. I didn’t feel like trying my luck at flying through the air all the way to the bottom. Something zipped by my head as Alex landed beside me. It looked like a large bullet, about a foot long and pointy, making holes in walls and bodies. Maybe something left from the ship’s fighting days. Didn’t matter, it could still take me out, and the coven obviously knew it. The joy of everyone knowing I was an Immune was that they knew magic could hurt me only through indirect means.

  “Fun stuff, Rylee.” Alex danced in place beside me, his golden eyes sparkling.

  “Always fun with me, buddy.”

  He snickered and we repeated the process of using the momentum of our fall to flick our bodies onto the level below us. Again, things flew our way, but then the coven was somewhat distracted by a shuffling, groaning, stinking mob.

  The zombies had arrived. They fell over the railings and onto the floor below, not even bothered by the four-story drop. I caught a glimpse of the zombies as they moved en masse toward the black coven, surrounding the one woman in the center of the pentagram.

  If the withes stopped their spelling now, there was a good chance the demon couldn’t be brought through and, from what I understood, it was a hell of a lot of work. Not to mention the backlash, which could be ugly if the spell suddenly went wild and out of control.

  The witches held their ground while the zombies bit and grabbed at them. Alex and I hit the floor at the same time, my feet stinging with the impact. There was no hesitation though, there couldn’t be.

  There were at least two dozen black coven members and I could see four witches with collars. The black coven had taken the few good witches left and forced them to help by the looks of things. Bad, bad juju.

  The first coven member had his back to me and I didn’t wait for him to notice me, I just drove my sword through his heart. Normally I’d take his head, but with Frank up top, I was hoping he could make use of a few more bodies. Sure enough, the second the witch died, Frank brought him back and he lunged for the coven member closest to him. />
  Alex dove into the fray, biting legs and taking people out at the knees before grabbing them around the neck. He hit hard and fast, and they barely had time to lift their hands to lay a spell on him.

  “Alex, with me!”

  He listened, ranging behind me as I cut into the coven members. Though they may have been expecting us, they sure as hell weren’t prepared.

  Or so I thought.

  The woman in the center arched her back and I dove through the bubble into the center of the pentagram with her. While it would keep me safe for the moment from the witches outside the circle, it brought me face to face with—

  “Oh fuck,” I whispered, for the first time really seeing the woman at my feet. Her long blonde hair and tattered blue dress.

  I bent and grabbed her arm as the demon started to pull itself through the pentagram.

  “Amelia, get up!” I yanked her hard, unable to be kind in that moment.

  “Rylee, this is a dream. What’s happening? Don’t touch me!” Her blue eyes were confused, but I didn’t have time to explain anything, certainly not that her world was about to be flipped upside-down.

  “Stay back.” I didn’t recognize the demon, but it was ugly, like a hound with three sets of wings sprouting from its back and the jaws of an alligator. Fucking hell.

  I stayed between Amelia and the demon, and from the corner of my eye I saw Alex get to those witches with collars. He knocked one down, ripping the collar off. He was thinking about the long term, which was good. If we could get the captive witches un-collared, then they might be able to help. Or at least, they wouldn’t be forced to attack us. Alex was thinking, unlike my idiotic self.

  The demon hound lunged at me and I spun to one side, coming down hard with my sword at the base of its neck. The blade dug deep, but the hound just laughed as the sword stuck and ripped from my hand.

  “Stupid, stupid, little Tracker. Your hate is sweet on my tongue.” To emphasize, he flicked his tongue out and curled it up and around his nose, dipping it into the oversized nostril.

  I didn’t hate my mom. But my mom sure as shit hated me, and that hatred was feeding the demon.

  “That’s not me you’re tasting, you fucker.” I pulled a short blade from my lower back and held it out in front of me. “That’s her hatred, and that’s why I can do this.”

  I dropped the knife and put my hand out like Erik had done, laying it on the demon’s face. Every good memory I had of my mom, the sweet moments in the past, I relived: baking with her, the feel of her hands on my hair as she braided it, the joy of seeing her smile at something I’d done well.

  The demon hound howled and curled back from me, scrambling to get away, but it was too late, the damage was done. He lit up from within, like a lightning bug, going still as a statue and then exploding into nothing more than dust. Red and bone-colored dust, but still just dust.

  The bubble around us dissolved and the sounds of fighting beat down on my ears—blood-curdling screams and the groans of the ship as it took stray hits.

  “Stay out of the way,” I yelled over my shoulder at Amelia as I bent to scoop up my blade. Or at least, I tried to.

  My second sword was jerked out of my grasp, the blade skittering along the floor and into the hands of a witch I didn’t recognize. He was of average height, bald, and he wore a very nice suit. Not Gucci, but nice, the cut flattered his body. A bubble of fear trailed up my throat. The witch didn’t scare me, but the demon possessing said witch, that one I did know all too well, and he was more terrifying than any coven. Of course, that didn’t stop my mouth.

  “What the fuck, Orion, you thinking you can speed things up?” Shit, shit, shit. Bert had been wrong, Orion wasn’t going to wait on killing me, and we were going to end up dying because we stupidly believed the gods-be-damned doppelganger demon. I faced him, the chaos raging around us, Amelia cowering behind me.

  “No, no, not at all, my dear. Things have changed. I’d like to help you survive a little longer, though you do seem intent on pushing the boundaries of your life at every possible turn. You see, you have something I want very, very badly. Especially since you have spirited away little Zane. He would have been perfect. But I think the irony of what I have planned now is much, much better.” He smiled, perfect white teeth that could only have been gained through expensive dentistry and thousands of dollars flashing at me.

  “Go fuck yourself.” My hand gripped my whip and I wished to hell I hadn’t dropped my smaller blade. Sure, it wasn’t much, but it was something. Better than nothing, which at that particular moment I wasn’t far from.

  Orion let out a sigh. “I can’t stay long to play, that is the downside of being me, I suppose. But”—he lifted a finger—“I realize this coven is no longer working for me as I wish, and I no longer have a use for them. Too unruly. Unlike our precious Milly.”

  “Don’t you fucking well talk about her!” It was stupid of me, but I couldn’t help it, I couldn’t just let him talk about her. Behind him, I saw Erik appear, but a witch knocked him back, held him against a wall.

  Orion shrugged. “Milly is biddable as always, more so now that she is no longer with child.”

  Horror flickered through me. “She died.”

  “I brought her back from the brink. Demons can heal, you know.” He winked at me like he’d given me some super secret handshake. But all I could think about was the fact that Milly wasn’t dead. That she’d survived and was still bound to Orion.

  Before I could say anything, his hands swirled upward, clapped above his head. A wave of magic blew out from around him, a boom resembling thunder close on it’s heels. The magic ripped through the ship and the metal groaned with the invisible impact. A crack in the floor below me ripped along a seam, bolts twanging out with a speed I couldn’t follow with my eyes, and salt water spewed up in a spray. “I will save you the trouble of killing them all.”

  The water plastered my hair over my face and I pushed it away, frantic to keep my eyes on Orion. What the fuck was he up to? It almost seemed like he wanted to help me, but how could that be?

  “Why would you do that? They’re your allies.” I carefully circled around to where my smaller knife lay on the floor and scooped it up. Amelia stuck close behind me and the coven seemed oblivious that their benefactor was about to do something very, very bad to them.

  Orion tipped his head to one side. “You have a precious gift and I want it. They would kill you with no real care of what they would take from the world. From me.”

  A witch ran behind him in an attempt to get out of the spray of water. He reached out and touched a finger to the back of her head, like a gun. Hell, he even made a shooting noise with his mouth.

  The witch’s forehead exploded, blood and brains splattering out in front of her. Amelia started to scream as the witch’s body fell to the metal floor, her blood mixing with the sea water.

  Through the water droplets falling in a briny rain, I stared at Orion. Did I dare try to take him out now? No sword, no magic on my side, nothing but what I’d learned from Erik, and my knife. My hands ached at the thought of doing that again. Of the pain that would rip through me.

  “Yes, that was unpleasant, wasn’t it?” He let out another sigh. “I must say, I was surprised you had the gumption to do that … considering.”

  I frowned at him. What the fuck was he talking about?

  Orion’s eyes widened and then he laughed. “Ah, I see you are, as always, somewhat oblivious. Then I will not tell you; far be it from me to steal your secrets away.”

  Fear thumped through me, the pulse of my blood and heart in tune with the primal understanding that I couldn’t kill Orion. I didn’t know how and I was too afraid to try again, even though he stood there threatening me.

  “What? No ‘thank you’?” he said softly, stepping toward me. I stepped back, stumbling over my mother who had fallen to the floor, sobbing.

  “You aren’t helping me, not really. You’re doing whatever the fuck you want just
because you can,” I snarled as I scrambled back to my feet. Without looking, I grabbed for Amelia and again hauled her behind me. I couldn’t even look where we were going. I was too focused on Orion, on his face and eyes, which seemed to suck me into them.

  And he was so close.

  His face was right in front of mine and a distant part of my brain knew he’d caught me in some sort of thrall, but it was too late, I couldn’t stop him. Didn’t know how.

  “You will come with me, Rylee. I will care for you and when it is time, I will end your life mercifully.” He reached up and stroked a hand down my cheek, wiping away tears I’d not even known I was crying. “No more fear, no more fighting, you can finally rest. You can finally be free of all this. I will save you from it, from the pain and hurt.” Leaning close, he brushed his lips across mine, drawing a shudder from me. I swayed on my feet, unable to detangle my eyes from his.

  I couldn’t think, couldn’t make my brain function around what he was saying and his touch, how it made me feel. Safe and unafraid. Like with Liam.

  With every ounce of willpower I had left, I struggled to pull myself out of his thrall. I wanted to Track Liam, and use his love for me as an anchor. Of course, he would be too far away. So I Tracked Erik. Tapped into his emotions, felt his strength flow through me, felt his love for me as his niece wrap around my heart and … fuck this shit.

  I snapped my hand out that still held my knife, upward and across Orion’s throat. His eyes widened as he tumbled to his knees.

  Breathing hard, my chest heaving, I stepped away from him, feeling as though my heart would indeed burst with the effort it was taking just to draw air. “I will never go with you willingly.”

  A snarl curled his lips as his stolen body fell back with a splash into the pooling water. The shakes took me as I realized how fucking close that had been. Clinging to Erik’s threads, like a child clinging to the belief that under the covers was safe from the monsters, had been a close call. I forced myself to look around.

  Every single coven member was dead, both those collared and un-collared. Their bodies were blown apart. That’s what Orion had done with a single clap of his hands through a witch of power. How much stronger would he be if he took possession of Zane?