Chapter 36
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
MIKO
The white noise spat me out.
Pain rolled through my head, my eyes opened to bright lights and an annoying face looming over me.
Hot breath tickled my face, stinking of booze.
“Wakey, wakey.”
Lance.
Oh, God.
His face came into view clearly as my eyes adjusted to the light. “Well, hello there, my friend.” A few of his teeth were missing, but he looked much better after getting pummeled by me.
What a damn shame.
And friend? He could shove that up his arse.
My mouth was ashes and sand, my head a riot of pain. I tried lifting a hand, struggling.
“I’ve never seen you so limp,” he said, laughing.
Hilarious.
He crouched above me, metal bars around us.
“This a cage?” I asked.
“Well spotted.” He stood upright.
Big cage.
“The fuck’s going on?” From this angle, I saw strip lights in a high ceiling through the metal bars. Metal rafters, pigeons flapping in them.
I smelled shifters and blood magi.
Endured Lance’s face.
“A lot, Miko. A lot.”
“Ori…” I tried sitting up, far too heavy on the inside to pull it off.
“Is that a nickname or are you struggling to speak?”
I ignored Lance, trying to sit up again.
“Let me help.” Lance dragged me upright by the hair. I barely registered the pain, a round of shock sucker-punching me.
My cage sat on a walkway overlooking a factory. Clear of machinery, dirty as fuck, and full of cages packed with biters. Blood magi, clad in their red robes, wandered around the cages. Shifters joined them, scrawling notes onto pads of paper.
Lance released his grip. I grabbed onto the bars to keep upright.
A group of four blood magi had a biter in the middle of them, his head tilted back. God only knew what they were doing with him.
I looked for my pack, sniffed for them. The air reeked with the oily stench of generators sputtering somewhere behind me. I picked through every scent from the oil to unwashed bodies, trying to find my people, a trace of Orion, anyone.
Faint. My pack were definitely inside this building, along with the Gilmores. Somewhere deep. Really deep. But there was zero hint of the vampires or Orion and Basil.
“Where are my people?” I demanded, far too dizzy to kick his arse yet.
“Welcome to Operation…”
“Operation what?”
He tapped the side of his face with his right index finger.
“I haven’t come up with a name yet. Possibly Operation Lance.
Anyway, things are getting better. I was seriously pissed off you managed to slip through the net.
Again. You really screwed me over, Miko.
” He spat in my face. “That’s for my teeth and ribs. ”
I wiped my cheek with the sleeve of my jumper.
“But then along came the fae,” he continued. “The glorious, glorious fae. Looking for a fae.” He laughed. “The fae on everyone’s lips. Well, yours at least.”
I clenched my left hand into a fist.
“I made a deal with them,” Lance said proudly.
“If I helped them find Orion, they would let me keep Basil for my trouble. Luckily, I’d picked up your trail, so I obliged.
There were far too many of them to argue.
Even with blood magi around, they’d take our heads before I managed a fart.
I know when to sit back. Smart guy, me.”
My head was spinning. “Ori is…”
“What a shit nickname. Yes, Miko. Orion has gone home. It’s over.
Don’t even think those Faery gates will open again.
But everyone wins, right? No more agonizing over what to do.
I helped remove your inner conflict.” He winked.
“You’re welcome. And the blood magi get Basil to play with, on the condition they give me some of his blood. They are so excited.”
Did he know about the fae blood’s effect on biters?
“Basil’s not here,” I said.
“That’s nothing for you to worry about. Now we’re back on track, we can get to traveling to Dunstable together.” Lance’s voice stoked my killing instinct. “As I planned all along. Your people are locked up, along with that family, as I said they would be. If I don’t come back, they starve. Simple.”
“You…” I held off an insult to save him cutting out my tongue.
Because he would if pressed.
“Be very careful with your words, Miko. Don’t piss me off.” I anticipated a kick to the face. “Keep being a good boy and I’ll let you have a whiskey.”
No kick came.
“Once you’re feeling better, we will set off. I’m hoping a few days of rest will do you good.”
Orion…
It was over. He was home.
As much as it killed me, I had to focus on my pack right now. Get them safe, rescue Basil, then find my mate.
Pressure bore down on my shoulders as if the weight of the world jumped from being an expression to a reality.
“Do you know what happened to me?” I asked.
He shrugged. “You were comatose, you’re not now. My two medics looked you over and you’re fine. You just need to rest.”
I rolled my shoulders, the cracks they made from the movement pretty loud. “In a cage, eh?”
“This isn’t a hotel.”
“No shit.”
He laughed. “Always the boring cunt. Right. Well, I’m—”
It took a good ten seconds for me to understand what happened down on the factory floor.
First came the screams. Those blood magi circling the biter tumbling like dominoes in a spray of blood, their chests gouged open by pink claws.
Pink claws.
Pink. Claws.
The biter sported huge pink claws.
Blood magi moved in, casting spells on the guy. But he laughed, killing two more magi, his bare back bulging. Shifters fired their guns, the bullets having no impact. It seemed like they were bouncing off the man’s body.
“What is this?” Lance said, grabbing the open cage door.
“Bad,” I answered. “This is really, really bad.”
Damn my body for being wet clay right now.
The biter’s back burst open, a set of pink wings tearing out of his flesh. He hissed, the wings whipping open. Pointed, bat-like but scary. He twirled, the edges of the wings cutting through magi and shifters as if they were nothing.
Oh. God.
Lance pulled the door half-closed.
The biter reached the first cage stuffed with his undead buddies. Tore it open. Speedies spilled out like ants, attacking Lance’s people.
Was it wrong to smirk?
The werelynx alpha looked back at me. “What do I do?”
Offer yourself up as a snack?
I didn’t answer, more concerned about getting my people out of here alive.
More cages opened, the shifters and magi completely overwhelmed. They were dying quickly, unable to get away.
And then the winged biter took flight, coming straight for us. Lance slammed the cage, bolting it. He pulled a padlock from his pocket with shaky hands, securing it in place as the biter landed on the walkway.
Oh. Fuck.
The biter walked over, full of life, a pink glow glimmering around him. He grabbed the cage door, shaking it.
For now, it held. Which gave me zero reassurance. He’d tear it off like he did the others in no time.
“Witness evolution,” the not-so-dead man said. “I change. I feed. I grow. I will be free.”
I liked it better in the white noise.
The zombie’s pink eyes flared with rich color, his cracked lips spreading to reveal rotten teeth. Pink smoke curled out of his mouth as if he’d been smoking a cigarette.
“Eat,” he said. “I will eat.”
Lance tripped over me as he backed up, landing beside me.
Too close, his arm draped over my legs.
“We’ll do anything you want,” he tried.
Since when did he beg?
The biter shook the door. “I will eat.” Shake. “I will grow.” Shake. “I will be free.”
He tore the cage door off.