Chapter Twenty-six #2
Time warps as it speeds back up, and I realize less than a minute has passed. Garth and Bellamy are already in motion, charging into the crowd. Many of the original coven members are confused. The angry mob that wanted to tear us apart earlier in the day is gone.
When the townspeople see two shifters nearly feral with rage charging at them, they frantically scramble out of the way. A few aren’t fast enough, and they quickly find themselves plowed over. I take a staggering step after the men, my body feeling all floaty, but I catch up after a few strides.
Geoffrey stands at the base of the church, his twisted scowl full of hatred as he glares at the shifters. “Take them down,” he orders his men, dismissing the males as irrelevant and focusing his attention on me.
The goon with the scar across his face steps forward, his arm pulls back, and his whip uncoils like a snake ready to strike. A large crack echoes across the clearing, and the thin leather rope latches around the neck of an unfamiliar townsperson, dragging the poor soul forward.
It doesn’t take long for goon number two to step forward and snap his neck, the crack of bone loud in the silence.
Then chaos spills through the town as the two opposite forces surge forward and collide.
One vampire darts out of the recesses of the chapel, snatches a man from the back of the crowd, then drags him into the darkness.
A scream can be heard, quickly muffled and replaced by the juicy sound of feeding.
Another two vampires dash out of their hiding places from nearby buildings, tearing into the necks of Geoffrey’s little army. They’re already bloody, the three of them having obviously started the fight early.
Blood spills down their chests as they feed, their fangs tearing out their tormentors’ throats as they viciously take their vengeance.
Though smoke rises lightly from their skin, they don’t burn, thanks to the spells wrapped around them.
The sun still has to hurt like a bitch, but they don’t complain, jumping from shadow to shadow as they pick off their prey one by one.
Leaving them to do their jobs, I focus on mine—killing Geoffrey.
A red globe appears around him, one I instinctively recognize as a shield, and I gape in shock.
As Givvens predicted, my abilities are growing.
While I can normally sense magic, today is the first time I can see it.
My eyes throb under the strain, but I grit my teeth and endure the slowly building pain, refusing to release my hold until the fucker is dead.
Only strict training and pure stubbornness keep me moving. The smirk he tries to repress tells me I’m doing exactly what he wants. Magic slowly floats toward him, drawing faster and faster until it swirls like a tornado.
A mix of black and red rises from Geoffrey—the beginnings of a dark curse. The closer I am to the man, the more I can see the madness tainting his soul. It writhes around him like a frenzied cloud of insects, feeding off him.
I’m so repulsed that my steps almost falter.
Magic eddies around me, the sense of urgency increasing, and I lengthen my stride, determined to reach him before he can cast it. Instinct warns me that if he releases that spell, none of us will be the same again.
Reaching out, I shove my hand into the raw magic swirling through the air, and it feels like I've stuck my arm into the blades of a lawnmower. I stumble over my own feet, and my knees slam to the ground with enough force to jar my bones. I catch myself, my free hand landing hard in the grass.
“Force it into the ground.” Isobel stands next to me, throwing spells right and left as the guards fight their way toward us. She’s keeping them off me for the most part, but they are edging their way ever closer.
A few of the old coven are fighting with her, but not enough.
The battle is brutal and bloody, my guys never venturing far. They don’t give a fuck about who wins. They only care about keeping me safe.
The least I can do is the same.
If I can’t stop Geoffrey, we’re all dead.
Claws slice through the tips of my fingers, and I sink them deep into the earth. The contact feels like completing a circuit. The pressure threatening to crush me vanishes, and I concentrate on forcing more of the energy directly into the ground without absorbing any of it.
Geoffrey snarls in rage when the magic is diverted, his spell sputtering, forming an ominous dark cloud around him. His healthy complexion pales, his facial features slowly withering, his skin aging dramatically. Wrinkles soon sag his whole countenance, and greenish liver spots form over his body.
Or I thought they were liver spots…until they slowly grow larger and larger.
Instead of spots, large holes begin forming in his flesh, and I realize that he’s actually fucking rotting from the inside out. It’s like watching him decay in real time. His hair thins before receding, and his face stretches alarmingly before it starts to fucking slide off his face.
The fighting around us slows as they stumble away from the walking disease. More than a few of his men abandon him, and I scowl when I see the goon with the whip slip behind the church and disappear.
As much as I want him dead, I can’t afford to split my focus.
The second I waver, parts of Geoffrey’s body repair themselves, and I double down on my efforts.
The decomposition increases with each second, blood and pus dripping from his wounds.
The stench of decay is so strong that I have to swallow back my bile.
Bits of tendons and bone shimmer underneath his paper-thin skin, yet he still refuses to loosen his hold on the spell he’s trying to cast.
Since I’m diverting the magic floating in the air, he’s consuming the spells that are keeping him alive, burning through them at an alarming rate. The red shield around him flickers and fades, but his whole focus remains on achieving his goal—my demise.
It’s his only hope for survival.
I tighten my hold on the ground, pulling harder on the magic in the air until it fades completely, stealing everyone’s access to it.
Instead of forfeiting, the fight around me turns physical.
A few people surrender and a couple more flat-out run away, leaving enough remaining that the city streets look like an all-out brawl.
My men tighten their circle around me, keeping everyone away with their fangs and claws.
Tyler darts in and out of the fight, ruthlessly destroying anyone who wanders too close.
Bellamy methodically destroys one opponent after another.
Dante is nearly as efficient, but he’s more brutal in his destruction.
Though every inch of him is drenched in blood, the psychopath is smiling, like he’s having the time of his life.
Garth remains in his beast form, killing anything that dares to even look at me.
His muzzle is matted with blood, his ears pressed flat against his skull, a continuous snarl rumbling from his chest. I would say that he’s lost to his rage, but he’s very careful never to venture more than a foot from my side.
When anyone attempts to lure him away, he disengages from the fight and circles me, hunting for his next kill.
Isobel is a few steps away, her own group of men around her in a tight circle, her guards viciously fighting with blades.
The bodies are piling up.
Unfortunately, I am weakening.
My head throbs like when I receive one too many blows during training.
Warm liquid trickles from my nose, and I hastily swipe it away with the back of my hand.
It comes away with a smear of bright red blood.
I swallow hard, and the pain of holding so much magic burns through my veins like I’ve been guzzling acid.
I sway alarmingly, but I refuse to release my hold.
Not yet, not until the threat is gone.
Gritting my teeth, I force the magic deeper into the ground when it tries to rise, ignoring the way my muscles feel like they’re slowly being stripped from my bones.
Despite the pain, I can’t turn away from the horror when Geoffrey staggers in my direction, like he would physically suck the magic out of the very marrow of my being.
His body twists unnaturally with each step, a large hump forming between his shoulders, and his advance slows to a painful shuffle. Raw hatred gleams in his beady little eyes, but the stupid fool refuses to stop.
He knows if he stops, he will die.
Only pure spite is keeping him alive at this point.
Instead of a dapper gentleman, a wizened old man now stands in his place. The elegant clothing he’s wearing swamps his twisted frame, making him resemble a child dressing up in his father’s clothing.
The black cloud around him thickens. He’s so close that I realize it’s not insects circling him, but actual souls from the many victims he has harvested over the years. There must be hundreds of them, and I’m sickened by the destruction one man’s greed has wrought.
Without him pulling on the magic, my hold on it suddenly goes slack, and I fall back on my ass, gulping air like my body has been deprived of oxygen for too long. I cradle my arms to my chest, my whole body aching like one giant wound, and I’m unable to tear my eyes off what remains of Geoffrey.
The stubborn asshole stumbles toward me, his hold on the spell sputtering before it extinguishes altogether. Each breath the old man takes rattles in his chest, but he never turns away from his target—me.
Only a few scraps of skin remain stretched across his face, revealing milky eyeballs and a grungy skeleton yellowed by age.
A few tendons flex along the side of his face, the stringy muscles the only thing keeping his lower jaw attached.
His mouth moves, but no lips or tongue remain, so nothing emerges but a chattering of teeth and a whisper of what sounds like air escaping a tire.
His whole body trembles as he lifts his leg, a wheeze escaping his throat. When his foot lands, the leg crumbles under his weight. He teeters for a moment, then crashes to the ground like a felled tree.
The instant his body slams to the ground, his fragile bones are obliterated on contact.
His clothes barely contain the shattered remains of his skeleton.
A fine plume of powder and grit explodes in the air and dusts everything in the vicinity.
I immediately cough, ducking my head away to avoid breathing in the toxic cloud.
“May the gods save me, I think I just inhaled him.” I sputter and cough, trying to scrape my tongue with my teeth. “So gross.”
I don’t realize the fighting has stopped until Tyler snorts and crouches in front of me. He reaches out and clumsily swipes at the dust coating my face, and I grimace when his fingertips come away black.
Just fucking great.
“I need a shower.” I pull my shirt away from my body, shuddering when more Geoffrey bits tumble further down my front.
Surprise lights his face, his eyebrows shooting up, then a heated look brightens his green eyes to a dark, burnt gold. He flashes me a flirty wink, his expression a little too eager. “Do you need help?”
I snort at his horrible flirting.
Much to my surprise, damn if it doesn’t actually work.
Only I ruin everything when I shift, and my bones rattle around like loose marbles beneath my skin.
His flirting turns to concern. Before he can open his mouth, Garth shoves his big body between us.
Tyler is knocked away with a grunt, and I find myself with a lap full of a very concerned black wolf.
I forget just how massive he is until I can barely see over the top of his shoulders. He’s careful not to put his weight on me, and I can’t resist sinking my fingers into his fur.
He grumbles slightly, and I freeze.
Is he…purring?
The sound immediately stops, and his giant head swings in my direction. I swear his expression is accusing, but it’s ruined when he pouts and presses harder against me in a silent urge for attention.
After the way he protected me so diligently, who am I to deny him?
As my fingers dig deep, he melts into a puddle, a guttural groan rumbling deep in his chest. He swipes his tongue across my face, and I sputter, twisting away from his attempts to clean me.
I weakly lift my arms to fend him off and end up flat on my back with mud oozing around me. The sludge squishes obscenely loudly when I try to move, and I swear that I’m suctioned to the fucking ground. Dante leans over, looking at me upside-down, wearing an infuriating smirk. “Need help?”
I roll my eyes and glare at the asshole. “Ya think?”
His grin only widens, and I huff in annoyance, knowing what he wants.
That doesn’t mean he will get it.
Instead, I glare at the fucker. “Now.”
Delight twinkles in his eyes, and he chuckles in a way that has my abused body relaxing even more. “Very well, kitten. Up you go.” He reaches for my arms, then pauses when Garth only glares at him with a snarl. “Get off her, you big doofus.”
He glances at me, then deflates when I don’t protest. He slowly lumbers to his feet, moping with a sad puppy dog expression that twists my heart. Dante draws me from the mud, and I swear it feels like it’s trying to suck the soul from my body.
The sludge squelches loudly, then I basically shoot up like I’ve been greased, nearly knocking Dante over…and splattering him with mud at the same time.
The look he gives me promises retribution, but I don’t know why it’s a big deal, since he’s already covered from head to toe with blood.
Just to be a bitch, I slap a muddy hand to his chest, taking great pleasure when more mud splatters him.
Unrepentant, I crack up at his unamused expression. “Did someone mention a shower?”