Chapter 18
Colt
The mayhem didn’t end once Kiara and her friends escaped. Some dragons and wolves took off after them, but I knew it would be futile. Mythguard would keep them safe. Instead, all attention turned to Lothair snatching Muriel off the ground and away from the baby girl.
The dragon I’d been fighting with had pinned me to the ground and punched me in the cheek. When he was distracted, I shoved him away and got to my feet. I couldn’t see what had happened to the child. People knelt around her and scooped her up off the ground; they took her away somewhere out of sight. My heart hurt as I feared she had become little more than a corpse.
All that was left on the ground there was Muriel. Lothair hoisted her up in the air; she had long since fallen limp, barely alive based on the shuddering gasps of her dying body.
“Enough!” My father stormed forward, limping and bleeding from his fight with Everett. He shoved everyone out of the way. I followed him, standing as tall as I could despite the pain radiating through my face from the dragon’s punches.
Lothair dropped Muriel to the ground and glared at David. “How could you let this happen?” he growled under his breath.
“You’re blaming this on him?” A voice rose up among the crowd. The dragon guard with the tattoo on his arm and a cut eyebrow emerged from the crowd. His hazel eyes flared with anger that appeared to be shared by everyone here. “David Hexen is not to blame for the chaos that left us all scrambling. You’re the one who did this! Abandoning us, disappearing without a word!”
“Sibyelle is dead, Kipling! I would rather lead in absence than lead in grief!” Lothair snapped back. “Sibyelle and my daughter are both dead because of the negligence of this selfish woman!” He thrust a finger at Muriel on the ground.
Nobody spoke up in defense of Muriel, who had no obligation to save the lives of the people who planned to sacrifice her for their own gain.
“I would rather serve a leader who places the needs of his people above his greedy heart,” said Kipling. “You’ve become weak, Lothair. How can we trust you to carry out your promises once you perform the Lycan ritual? What are we even supposed to do once you become Lycan?”
The atmosphere within the mine became heated. I worried that Kipling’s fury was still attached to me. I felt nothing for my father anymore, no desire to protect him from the anger brewing in the dragons, and certainly no determination to prove myself to him, not since he said I had to choose to kill either Aislin or Billie. As the argument intensified, I backed away, slipping among the bodies in search of my own freedom.
“The Inkscales will integrate into the ranks of Dalesbloom,” David spoke up. “You already know this.”
“Our alliance with Dalesbloom has already cut our numbers in half!” Kipling rebuked. “I’m starting to think this moronic scheme will rob us of the greatness the Inkscales once had. Even if we were forced to run in the night, at least we ruled the darkness. What will we have once our current leaders are reduced to mindless monsters? A town crippled with fear of us? Targets on our heads from Mythguard?”
I clung to the wall, sneaking away while everyone’s eyes were on Kipling, Lothair, and my father. Only when I felt the warmth of the sunrise coming in through the entrance of the mine did I pause, sensing Kipling’s attention suddenly on me.
“And David, you expect us to serve your son in your stead? The one seduced by cowardice?”
Looking over my shoulder, I found myself spotlighted by the sunlight in the gaping entrance of the cave. Everyone stared at me, my flight on full display.
Kipling narrowed his eyes. He already knew where my allegiance lay.
“Colt…” snarled David.
But I had made up my mind. I wasn’t going to continue defending myself to a legion of killers who would sooner skin me alive.
Without a word, I turned and fled down the mountainside, making my escape from the mine. I ran and didn’t look back. But I knew nobody was following me.
I could have gone in any direction, but my feet led me down the trail left behind by Kiara. Up ahead, I knew their escape had been hindered by the few shifters that had pursued them. I could hear snarling and howling, and I had seen a couple of human corpses discarded in the trees. I had smelled the blood once I was far enough away from the silver mine. After transforming into a wolf, I left my clothes behind for the weapons of my teeth and nails, and the instant I saw the human bodies of Gavin and Everett fighting unarmed against one last dragon, I lunged.
All the rage against my father that was pent up inside me guided my fangs into the spine of the dragon. Blinded by emotion I couldn’t control, I sank my teeth into the dragon’s flesh just below its shoulders. It arched wildly as it thrashed, trying to throw me off of it. Gavin was hurled to the ground, and Everett stood back, shocked, as I ripped chunks of flesh out of the dragon’s back. When it dislodged me, I hit the ground and rolled to my feet, jumping back into the fight. The damage I’d done to the dragon’s spine had slowed it down too much for it to counter effectively. Its arms trembled, unable to hold themselves up. Its wings flared in the sunlight, but nothing intimidated me anymore. I wanted to destroy this dragon the same way I wanted to destroy all of the Inkscales for bringing so much death and destruction into my home. This was equally as much their fault as it was my father’s. My first act of defiance would be to kill this dragon.
The moment I got its throat in my jaws, I squeezed, taking unnatural pleasure in crushing the life out of it.
When the dragon collapsed to the ground, I backed away, staring at what I had done. I’d never killed anyone before. Not even when we’d raided the Mundy house and set it on fire—none of those deaths were on me. I’d just been a bystander. But this dragon, dead at my feet—this was all my doing. Without looking back at those watching, my wolf ejected me out of its body.
I knelt in the grass, naked and panting.
Within seconds, two sets of hands each grabbed my arms and hoisted me to my feet. They turned me around, facing me towards Gavin and Everett, whose eyes were hard and hateful. One after the other, they punched me hard in the face, dropping me to the grass again.
“Fucking bastard!” spat Gavin, kicking me in the stomach.
Everett pulled Gavin away. “Why did you follow us, Colt?”
Groaning, I propped myself up on my elbows and stared blearily at the men towering above me, then past them, at the stragglers of Mythguard—a few humans, unarmed, including that Sebastian Hicks guy—and the girls. Aislin. Billie. Kiara, with her hand over her mouth, unwilling to relent to her tears.
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry?” Gavin echoed incredulously. “After everything you’ve done, now you’re sorry?”
“I had no choice.”
“You always had a choice,” Everett fired back.
“He killed my sister,” I said hoarsely, glaring at Gavin, then looking at Everett. “What did you expect me to do? Forgive him and turn my back on the only family I had left?”
“Your father is a rapist,” snapped Gavin.
“And a killer,” added Everett.
“I said I’m fucking sorry!” Breathing hard, I sat up straighter, desperately trying to climb to my feet.
Gavin lunged to attack me again, but Everett stopped him and guided his attention to Kiara, who was grimacing from the pain through our fated bond.
I stood up and let my arms hang limp, too much of my body aching for me to clutch any one part of myself. “Look. I know nothing I do or say can excuse the past; I just…watched it happen. I can’t take back that I tried to mark Billie. I can’t…undo what we did to Aislin’s family. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry that I let it happen. But I don’t want to be a part of it anymore. I can’t…keep…standing by…watching people suffer…”
The men stared hard at me.
“I don’t expect you to forgive me. You don’t even have to let me live. I know Mythguard are planning to exterminate me. I just wanted you to know I…I don’t want to be like my father. Please believe me.”
By following them, I had resigned myself to death. Mythguard would kill me on the spot, or if they spared my life, they would relocate me somewhere far from here. It didn’t matter. What mattered was that I escaped from Dalesbloom. I couldn’t be responsible for my father’s madness anymore.
Gavin and Everett retreated, sharing quiet words with the girls and Sebastian. I wiped the blood out of my eyes and forced myself to square my shoulders. As much as I tried to separate myself from my fated mate, I couldn’t help but glance at her, and when I saw she was looking at me, my chest quivered. Her eyes were red and puffy. She looked devastated, like the world had just been ripped away from her, and all I wanted was to hold her close. I wanted to atone for every terrible thing I had caused her to experience.
After what felt like an eternity, Everett and Gavin turned back to me. Billie gazed sadly over at me while Aislin frowned, displeased.
“You know we can’t trust you,” Everett said stiffly. “Nor can we accept you into our packs. But if we’re going to protect Kiara and stop David and Lothair from performing the Lycan ritual, we’re going to need to know everything that you know.”
I nodded. “I’ll tell you everything. Please. I want to help.”
But when I took a step forward, the group collectively bristled. “You can help by keeping your distance,” warned Aislin. “Remember, you’ve been just as bad as David, you creep.”
Her words slapped me across the face. My shoulders sank, and once more, I nodded. “Just tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll do it.”
Everett glanced over at Sebastian. “You still have those zip ties?”
The taller man nodded and, without a word, approached me as he withdrew the fasteners from his vest pocket. It seemed they had come prepared to take prisoners, if necessary. Perhaps particularly those on their extermination list.
To prove my willingness to work with them, I stuck out my wrists, standing quietly while Sebastian secured them together. He then grabbed my arms and nodded at Everett.
“Okay, let’s go,” said Everett, ushering the group in the direction of Eastpeak and his house.
I still didn’t know if I was even going to survive this. But at least now, everyone would see how desperate I was to redeem myself. They would know that I wasn’t the wicked monster I came off as by obeying my father. I wasn’t like him. I wanted so badly to be better than that.
While we walked, I took comfort in the sight of my fated mate ahead of me. She was the only comfort I could find now. Every now and then, she glanced back at me, and I wondered whether she understood my intentions, whether she felt my guilt.
If I could embrace her one last time, in earnest, I would die happy.