My hands were bunched into fists so tight they would need crowbars to pry them apart. My men stood around me, keeping me safe amid the battle. I felt as defenseless as a newborn kitten. My battle skills were beyond nonexistent. I wished desperately that my mother had spent some time or money in getting me some defense lessons at least, but we were too busy running. She wanted to keep her only daughter, and the child of some prophecy she never mentioned, alive and safe. Now it was coming back to bite me in the ass.
Rhydian snapped away from the circle to tear into a Hunter who came too close. The only reason I knew it wasn’t one of our hunters was that he wasn’t wearing a green armband Crian made all his hunters wear. We didn’t need to kill our own accidentally. Rhydian was breaking his vow of abstaining from blood for this battle. He said it made him stronger, even though it would change him, make him more bloodthirsty. I was hoping my bond with him would keep him safe. So far, it was. I could only feel a little darkness seeping into our bond but nowhere near to the same effect he said it was going to.
When I cast him a questioning look, he gave me a gentle smile. It only seemed a little creepy with his Camasotz face and blood dripping down his chin. I shivered but told myself it was just because I was cold.
The battle was so chaotic that I couldn’t keep track of who was winning. I saw bodies everywhere, naked and fully clothed. I frowned at the nude ones, wondering internally if they were wolves or shifters. I surely couldn’t tell once they were dead. It saddened me either way. They fought bravely. None of the nude bodies were older looking, so they weren’t the werewolf Elders, which made me a little happier.
I reminded myself to talk to Elder Cramen when this was all over. He was so knowledgeable about witches and werewolves together. Branden told me that he mentioned that werewolves used to be very close allies with witches, and I hoped to establish that connection with them again. We just had to make it through this day first.
When we first got to this clearing in the middle of the forest, dawn had not yet broken, but now the sun was fully above the horizon and casting shadows across the field of battle. The shadows moved as people danced amongst each other, creating a blood-washed snow and dirt mixture. White, icy crystals flew into the air as it was kicked up and water witches took advantage of all the snow to create icy blades or arrows that flew without the aid of a bow.
Dylan had a long sword in his hand that was crystal clear and pure, creating dancing light against the untouched snow around us. I stared, mesmerized by the light show until he peeled off to help a group of witches who were having trouble defeating the Hunters that were attacking them.
My heart leapt into my throat as I lost him in the crowd. The rest of the guys closed ranks around me, closing the space left by my missing Protector. I could feel Dylan’s fear and determination, so I knew he was alive, but I hated not being able to see him. I briefly saw Macy in the middle of everyone, her long, dark hair floating away from her head as her hands, surrounded by purple light, shot flares out towards the enemy. I had no clue what her specialty was, but I was in awe of her.
My head snapped towards Rhydian as he got pulled away to help some small shifted lioness who was about to be killed. Rhydian had a good heart, but he also knew the value of allies, and they weren’t any good if they were dead.
I soon lost track of him as well, which left Kyler, Branden, and Keegan with me. But when one of the she-wolves was threatened, Branden burst forward, attacking the Hunter who was trying to sneak up behind her as she defended her front.
I couldn’t help but look at my two last Protectors as they stood helpless, then I looked out at the battlefield. “Go! They need help!” I pushed them both forward, Keegan in the form of a polar bear cub, small but still dangerous.
They both looked at me before they nodded and took off in different directions. I watched as Hunters fought Hunters and other supernaturals in various forms. All the shifting colors out there was making it hard to keep my eyes on it. The sun shone so brightly that the light reflected off the churned-up snow and created a red light show of its own, adding more color to the melee.
A snowy leopard came barreling out of the group, a Hunter hot on her heels. She brushed right past me, and something stirred inside me. I felt her fear, and I also immediately knew it was Hilary, Keegan’s mom.
I went into defense mode, my hands coming up of their own accord. The Hunter barely paused in his tracks before bringing his sword up to cut me down. I turned my head away and closed my eyes. Then my body felt so hot I thought I was burning from the inside out. It traveled from the pit of my stomach, through my chest and into my arms and hands. As I waited for that blade to slice down, killing me, I was shocked to hear screaming, but it wasn’t my own.
My eyes snapped open and went right to the source. The Hunter, who was right in front of me, was on fire, and flames still came from my hands. I closed my hands into fists, breaking the stream at its source. But it was too late. The man was fully engulfed in fire and it was my doing. The smell alone was enough to make me gag. Have you ever smelled burning meat? Well, it’s like that but picture it a hundred times worse, especially since it was a person.
I turned away from the screaming, bent over, and spilled out everything in my stomach. It wasn’t much, just water really. But that mixed with stomach acid with the underlying scent of roasting human flesh… it made it so much worse. Tears sprang to my eyes as the cries suddenly cut off. When I looked back towards the dead man, I saw the leader standing over his corpse, the cooked man’s head still rolling down the hill and the body in front of me smoldering.
“As I said before, you are an abomination. You need to be erased from this planet. Consider this justice served.” He brought his blade up to hip level and started bringing it towards me.
It was too fast for me to react. I knew the blade was going to be what killed me, so I accepted my fate and slowly closed my eyes. I heard the sword meet flesh, but I felt nothing. I waited for the pain to come, but again, I was left with nothing.
I opened my eyes to see my mother’s hair in front of me. My eyes went down her body until I saw the end of the sword coming out of her back. “Mom?! Mom!” I screamed as I caught her when her knees finally gave out. My arms wrapped around her torso, but I wasn’t strong enough to hold her, so I went down with her, her upper body sprawled across my lap. The sword was still stabbed through her gut, leaking blood.
“Kirsten, you are so strong. I love you. Find Kian.” My mother’s voice was thready with pain, quivering over the words as she stumbled to finish a thought.
I put my hand on her cheek. “Mom, don’t talk. I need you strong so that we can get you to a hospital.” I had to move her off my lap as I went to her side, my hands fluttering around her wound. “What do I do here, Mom?”
Her head rolled towards me. “Pull it out and put your hands on the wound. Hold it there with pressure. It will slow the bleeding.”
I had a feeling that removing the blade would be a bad idea, but I did as she asked, slowly drawing the sword out. I felt her muscles twitching as she tried to hide how much it hurt. My skills were not going to be any help when it came to pain management. If only I knew how to control that weird fire thing that had happened, then I could cauterize her wound, but I had no idea how I was even capable of that.
Looking up at the muted battle around me, I saw the faction leader trying to break his way out of the ice block his lower legs were in. He was slowly chipping away at the crystals, so I had no clue how much time I had. My focus went back down to my mother, who was lying there looking like a bloody doll. She was a beauty, even now, covered in soot and blood. Tentatively, my hands reached out towards her stomach, shaking the whole time as I slowly pushed down. I didn’t want to cause any more pain, but I also wanted her to live. She was my mother and I couldn’t lose her. I had already lost so much already.
“Kirsten, you… need to push… harder.” Her breaths were coming in ragged gasps as she tried to talk, blood sl
owly trickling from the corner of her mouth.
I did as she commanded, putting more pressure until she nearly screamed in agony. “I’m so sorry, Mom. Why did you jump in front of me like that? My powers could have saved me. They already did it once already.”
She shook her head. “You are… my daughter. I would… do it for… you and… your brother. My children.” Her muscles quivered under my touch, and I could feel the cold seeping into her body. She was losing too much blood and I had no way of stopping it. I didn’t know how. She raised a failure for a daughter.
My head hung in shame. “I want to save you, but how?”
Her hand reached out and grabbed my wrist with surprising strength; her head lifted to look me in the eyes. “Learn to control your powers. With control, you can do anything.” I felt the life leave her body, her head falling back to the ground, her hand slipping from my wrist. Blood leaked out of her nose and mouth, her face as white as the snow around her. She lay in a pool of her own blood as it seeped into the pure snow, staining it a macabre red.
My hands pulled away from her as I sat down on my heels, shock trying to force itself into my body. My attention snapped to the man responsible for taking my family away from me, rage smothering out every other feeling as I stood up, blood dripping from my hands.
“This is your fault.” I hissed towards him.
I knew he heard me when he looked up from stabbing at the ice block that was quickly melting now that my mother’s magic was no longer keeping it frozen. It wasn’t melting fast enough, though. He tried to stumble away, his eyes as round as they would go as he took in my mother and then my face, which was a frozen mask that showed no emotion. I didn’t need to show any when I could show him with my power, the same power that was building so fast it was causing my joints to hurt. I embraced the pain since I deserved it. I deserved everything that came to me. It was my choice to declare war on these Hunters. It was my choice to ask for help from the other supernaturals, who were now dying for my cause. It was all my fault. But it was also his fault. And I was going to be the one to rain Hell down on him and send him there myself.
I let out an agonizing scream that shook the snow off the surrounding trees and brought everyone to a standstill. The scream made the snow around the leader and me fly away from us, leaving us standing on frozen grass and dirt. My hair flew backwards, waving in the wind my pain and power were causing.
When that scream stopped echoing around us, I let out another one. With this one, I flung both of my hands out towards the damn man, who was the reason I was now feeling so much hatred, fear, pain… loss…
His clothes fluttered around him, causing him to laugh maniacally. “Is that it?”
The ground shook, causing people and animals to lose their footing and trip over each other. Rogue Hunters, witches, my Hunters, naked werewolves, and shifters all clung to each other, not caring which side of the battle they were on. They tried to keep themselves up, but it was futile as another earthquake hit, causing an ear-splitting crack to echo around us all.
That damn man looked around, then down at the crack that started in front of me. With each quake, the crack grew bigger. With each quake, the shaking got worse. I was letting out all of my rage and grief as I proved to him just how powerful I could be when provoked. And provoke me he did.
The crack widened enough that it could swallow a man before it shot out towards the man frozen in fear. He only had time to let out a shriek as he fell down into the dark abyss. My heart was walled away, so I felt nothing as my enemy just kept falling. I had no idea how deep it was, and I didn’t care.
My hands lifted into the air; green light crackled around me before shooting into the sky. I watched as it went up so high, you could barely see it before it came crashing back down, following the rogue Hunter into the hole. The Earth shook more, and I watched as the crack slowly started to close itself back up, not even leaving a scar of where I had broken the Earth in two to kill a murderer.
I looked down at the blood still coating my hands, the blood of my mother. Shock finally settled in, so I just stared at it, not comprehending what was happening. When I looked back up, rogue Hunters were scattering, dropping weapons in their haste to leave the crazy witch behind.
Black slowly took over my vision, and the last thing I saw before I hit the ground was my men all running towards me.
36
I FOUND LOVE
Kirsten
I woke up to a buzzing in my head and a beeping outside my body. I hurt everywhere. It felt like I was slowly pulled apart and put back together wrong. My soul felt broken. Flashes popped up in the blackness of my mind. Nude bodies lying in the snow, blood splashed everywhere, and then my mother lying in a pool of her own blood on a blanket of white.
My eyes opened suddenly, the light momentarily blinding me. I blinked until I could see, but I still had the light flares in my vision.
I was in my own room, the beeping coming from a monitor next to my bed. An IV stand stood next to it, and I followed it down to the back of my hand where it was stuck into my skin and taped so it wouldn’t move. My other hand reached towards it, intending to rip it out, but another hand grabbed mine.
“Please don’t. You need it.” Kyler looked horrible. His face had more than just stubble. It had turned into the beginning of a beard. His eyes were shadowed and red-rimmed.
Rhydian popped up on my other side. “Glad to see you’re awake, Sleeping Beauty.”
I looked at them both confused. “How long was I out?”
Kyler and Rhydian shared a look before Kyler finally answered. “Almost two weeks. You were really starting to worry us.”
Sitting up faster than I intended, I nearly fell over in my dizziness. “Two weeks? What did I miss? Did you find my brother?”
Dylan came into the room, shutting the door with his elbow. “Don’t overwhelm her, you two.” He leaned against the wall by the door, kicking up a foot against the wall while he crossed his arms. “You didn’t miss anything. We’ve just been determining who we lost, who is still missing… yada yada. The stuff that you weren’t needed for.”
“That I am not needed for? Wasn’t it me who asked them to go to war for me? It is something I am very much needed for. How many did we lose?”
Dylan stood up straight. “If you really must know, not that many. There were more dead rogues than our kind: only one Hunter, eight wolves, three Shifters, and two Witches—one being your mother. So, you see, we came out on the winning side. It could have been worse, but they fled after your display of power.”
That news hit me hard. I was happy that not many were killed, but one of them was my very own mother, and that was the worse death. “What about my brother?”
Kyler’s hand squeezed mine. “He wasn’t at the battle, and the Hunters have left town. There has been no body found, so we think he is still alive, probably to be used against you after they regroup.”
It was better news than I expected, but he was still out there, probably terrified. “Thank you.”
Branden came stumbling into the room, a bandage around his torso, or what I could see of his torso with his unbuttoned shirt. “Kirsten, you’re awake.”
“And you’re fucking hurt.” The venom in my voice surprised me. I wanted to tear out the throat of the person who did that to him.
He waved his hand. “It’s just a scratch now. The more I shift, the better it gets. Rhianna has been tending the injured. Others fared worse than me.” When I scowled, he stumbled to continue. “But they are still alive. They just don’t have the same healing powers as us wolves.”
“Where is Keegan?” I asked, worried about the answer.
“You asked about me?” His tired voice popped up from the floor at the foot of my bed. “I was trying to get some sleep in .” Keegan’s head came up next, mussed from sleep.
I sighed in relief. “You’re all here, thank the Goddess!” I threw myself at Kyler, who either had to catch me or be thrown back himself. His
surprised oomph had me letting out a small giggle. “I was so worried something happened to one of you.”
Dylan came over to kneel at my bedside. “Let me remove this IV before you hurt yourself.” He gently grabbed my hand, pulling it closer to himself as he gently pulled the tape away, leaving a small bit to hold the plastic tube in my vein as he ripped open a sterile cotton pad. He put the cotton under the tube, peeled off the rest of the tape, and slid the plastic out, immediately holding the swab in place with pressure. Then he reached into his apron, and pulled out medical tape, ripped off a piece and taped the pad to my hand. “There you go.” He patted my hand before getting up to throw away the tape and the IV tube he unhooked from the clear liquid bag.
The thing was, even though I had been unconscious for two weeks, I didn’t feel weakened. Instead, I felt power coursing through my veins. It was intoxicating and scary all at the same time. I also felt empowered with my protectors. I felt their feelings flowing through our bond. I felt their love and devotion towards me. It was just the distraction I needed.
I escalated the embrace with Kyler to a kiss, my lips crashing down on his as I took what I wanted from him. My lips moved against his frozen ones until it finally clicked in his head what I wanted. This was all about us as a group, and I was establishing the boundaries, i.e., there were none when it came to us any more. I held on as his surprise turned to love. He didn’t take the reins from me, knowing that for me to feel safe, I needed to lead.
When I came up for air, the rest of the guys were standing where they started, their mouths hanging open. “Close those lips, come here and give them better use,” I demanded with a sultry smile. They jumped to it, coming at me with lightning speed.
Rhydian latched onto my neck, his skilled mouth doing wicked things, leaving me breathless as I brought my lips back to Kyler’s. I felt another set of lips latch onto my neck, right behind my ear. It sent a shockwave down my body, straight to my pussy, causing me to grind against Kyler’s jeans. I could feel his large bulge straining against his zipper as it rubbed against my clit through my satin pajama bottoms.
Spirit of the Earth Page 16