Nine
I stand in the kitchen with Maddox and Khalid, in a new shirt, agitation crawling across my skin. The pull north is damn near excruciating. Micha’s emotions are sluggish and muted, and I don’t know if that means she’s about to die, pass out, or has just dissociated; the inability to fucking do something about it is making me feral.
“Hurry the fuck up, Maddox,”
I snap as he stands in the middle of the empty space, our dining table having been shoved to the side. Mother would’ve preferred us to do this in the basement, where we have a dedicated spell room for shit like this, but that would have taken longer to walk to, and every second spent being here rather than out there running towards my wife is killing me.
Khalid clasps me on the shoulder and squeezes, a silent command for me to get my shit together. Maddox is moving quickly; his shadows are already swirling on the floor. It just always takes him a while to pull the cage free because the monsters living in there fight to keep it.
“She’s your wife, Varius,”
Khalid says when I stay tense beneath his palm. “But she’s our sister now, and you know how protective Maddox is of family.”
My jaw tics, but the fucker is right. Maddox is obsessed with Zita to the point none of us would be surprised if he claimed her. Yet, still, he’s willing to let me use her. She’ll be risking her life to save my girl, coerced to obey me or die. And that’s far from being the worst thing I’m going to do to her… or ask of him.
Closing my eyes briefly, I hold on to the blood bond I share with Micha.
Then I block it off.
Lock my emotions down.
I need to become the heartless monster I normally am. The ruthless Boss who never lets his feelings get in the way of business. If Zita catches one whiff of weakness, there won’t be a threat large enough to convince her to join our side. Antonio is the boogieman to her, the nightmare that can never be killed. She needs to believe we stand a chance of freeing her from his chains.
The cage finally pulls free in its entirety. Its bars are bent and covered in blood and saliva. Antonio’s granddaughter sits in the middle of her prison, her bony knees pulled to her chest, her thin arms banded around them to make herself as small as possible. Still, numerous wounds cover her naked body from where the monsters were able to reach her.
She keeps her head down, protecting her eyes from the harsh light of the garage. The Plane of Monsters is pitch black, and she’s been in there for days. Her skin hangs on a skeleton of starvation. Her once long white hair is showing her natural auburn at the roots. It’s a bird nest of broken strands.
Maddox opens the cage, which was locked by magic, and steps inside. Grabbing her by the arm, he hauls her to her feet, then guides her out. She follows without protest, her violet eyes blinking rapidly as she struggles to make out her surroundings.
She is lowered into a chair. She looks first at Maddox, then at me. Despite having been tortured for over a month, her eyes are still bright and sharp. Are Micha’s? Maddox has only been playing with his toy; Antonio wants to break his.
Burying those thoughts, I step up to Zita. Maddox moves back. A chair is placed behind me, and without taking my eyes off her, I sit down to face our captive.
She looks at me warily. But the longer I allow the silence to stretch, the more that wariness turns to confusion, then calculation, then triumph at figuring out the puzzle.
My entire makeup has changed with the breaking of my curse, including my scent. Hybrids don’t smell any different to other sups, but she knows what I smelled like before. And with her little nose twitching, she knows what I smell like now.
“So you’ve finally hit your ascension,”
she says as I study her. She doesn’t like the silence. Or perhaps she’s just trying to build a rapport, a connection between us so I see her as human rather than a thing to break.
“I was a late bloomer too,”
she continues. Rapport it is. Good.
If she was nervous under pressure, she would be of no use to me. Antonio would kill her as soon as she got home, paranoid we’d managed to turn her. But her intelligence will give her a chance to talk her way out of an execution. It will give Maddox a chance to sneak in. He’s been learning how to summon stronger demons from Lou, Micha’s sister, so if he gets inside, he can create the perfect opportunity for us to strike.
“You’re going home,” I say.
Her eyes widen. She glances at my youngest brother, no doubt expecting him to protest.
“You’ll tell them you escaped when our ward was down. Maddox pulled you out for an interrogation. Rudy’s magic spiraled out of control, so you took the opportunity to run.”
“Antonio isn’t going to buy that. He’s as paranoid as you are and even quicker to kill. I’m not being your mole.”
“You don’t have a choice.”
She yelps as her arm twists out of her socket and keeps going, the bone bulging against her skin, so close to tearing free.
“Go ahead and kill me.”
Sweat beads across her face as she pants from the pain. “I’m not a traitor.”
“Your Family would have to care about you for you to be a traitor.”
She glances away, that remark hitting hard. In the weeks since her capture, not once has someone tried to rescue her. She’s nothing but the omega to them, the werewolf with the lowest rank. They bully and beat her as a way to build pack morale.
“But we’re not going to kill you if you refuse,”
I say as I glance briefly to the side, at the curved zebrano wood that divides the cooking area from the table.
She holds my gaze, trying her hardest not to look.
Then she does.
Her face pales as she watches the grain and knots shift, a creature lurking beneath the surface.
She doesn’t know it’s there willingly, so I let her believe it’s a person imprisoned. A captive who didn’t do as they were told.
“Except, in your case,”
I say, “we will tie your soul to a toilet.”
Forever trapping her in a world of piss and shit.
“Olivia can taste the food we put on the counter,”
I say, letting her own mind turn against her. “She’ll never leave that place, even if the counter is burned to ash.”
Her head jerks back to me. Her eyes fly to Khalid, no doubt believing it’s his magic that’s responsible. In fact, it’s Mother’s, and I don’t know if she can do the same to Zita, but Zita doesn’t know that either. She’s seen the impossible happen with Antonio’s hybrids; she’ll believe this.
“Fuck,”
she mutters, knowing her fate is sealed.
My brother pushes his magic through the soul doll in his hands. Carved out of alexandrite, the dark-green stone has been molded to look exactly like her. A piece of her hair lies inside it, given to him by Maddox earlier, and it ties her soul to the doll. He fixes her arm, and she sags back in her chair. But there isn’t any relief on her face.
“When you get there, you’re to help Micha as much as you can. If she dies, so do you. Khalid will be watching you at all times, and if he gives you an order, fucking follow it.”
She looks at him warily, no doubt knowing exactly how he’s going to communicate with her. A pen can’t write on stone, but he can carve words into her flesh with his magic.
She glances dryly at Maddox. “And here I thought you were the worst brother.”
She looks back at me, not giving him the chance to respond; the bitch knows how to push his buttons, alright. He hates not getting in the last word.
“I’ll do everything you ask of me on one condition,”
she says. “When Antonio finds out about our deal” –she lifts her chin, utter certainty in her eyes– “give me your word that you’ll kill me.”
Seeing the terror behind her bravado, I wonder what the fuck he’s doing to Micha. Zita’s his granddaughter. Micha’s the wife of an enemy.
My control slipping, I stand with a quick nod. It’s a lie; we can’t spare the alexandrite. We only have three pieces of it left, and once it’s used to kill someone, it’s gone forever. But I will break every vow to save my wife.
As Khalid escorts her out of the house, I open myself up to the blood bond again. Relief hits me when I can still feel my wife. A part of me feared she died the minute I shut her out.
My chest tight, I resist the urge to turn in her direction. Instead, I look at Maddox. “Are you sure about this?”
What he’s willing to do for me is going to be the most dangerous thing he’s ever done.
He blows out a breath as he rotates a shoulder and cracks his neck. “Yeah…”
he lies. “It’ll be fiiiine.”
“If he kills her –” I start.
“I’ll be fine,”
he cuts in as he pats me on the shoulder and smiles. But I can smell his fear despite his easy grin. “Now go find Aleric before he gets distracted and wanders off,” he says before heading past me to head down the hall. I need the vampire’s ability to phase. Otherwise, I’ll be driving for days as I try to pinpoint Micha.
After a quick search, I find the vampire outside. He’s staring at the dead earth in front of the house.
“Let’s go,” I say.
He doesn’t look at me, his eyes scanning the yard. The stillness of his body is making me uneasy. The ward isn’t back up yet. If Antonio attacks us now, we’re fucked. I gaze out, trying to spot anything that’s out of place. I push out with my senses, checking that way too. Nothing.
“What are you looking for?” I demand.
“The source of a disgusting smell,”
he says, but for once there isn’t any humor in his voice. He’s fucking serious, and a chill runs down my back.
“Werewolves?”
“No.”
Grabbing my arm, he phases us north. We land in a walk-in closet full of brand name clothes, shoes, and purses on every wall. The room is dark, the only light coming from the crack under the door. A shower runs not far away.
The pull towards my girl is weaker now, and panic hits me. Does that mean she’s weaker, on the verge of death? Or just that we jumped too far? “That way,”
I snap, flinging an arm out in her direction.
“First, tell me how Caden died.”
“We don’t have fucking time for this.”
“Then walk. The door’s there.”
My jaw tics as I glare at him. The fucker’ll actually leave me here; no one matters to him but himself.
“He killed himself cursing her,” I snap.
He grabs me, and we phase again. The bond is weaker. My panic is stronger.
“What’s the curse?”
“Every time she uses magic, it drains her life.”
On the next jump, the pull to her is even weaker again. Fuck! She has to be dying.
“She doesn’t look weaker.”
“She’s a healer,”
I snap. She can hide such things with her magic, topping up her physical looks while the inside of her is a hemorrhaging mess. A part of me wonders how close she is to dying. The other part of me doesn’t give a shit. She set Micha up so I would be paranoid enough to torture her. And although Talon was really the one who set that fire, Mother had set up the kindling. Now Micha is without her magic because of her.
No. She’s damaged because of me.
Fuck! I’m so sorry, little monster. I’m so sorry.
I spin in place, feeling her pull. My frustration mounting, I try to figure out how far to jump. “Go half the distance that way,” I say.
He doesn’t move.
“Aleric! I will fucking sell her to you. Just go.”
“I don’t need to buy her when she’ll crawl to me on her knees.”
I lunge for him. He grins. We phase, and the pull to her is now stronger. I turn my head, trying to figure out where we are. Where we’ve been. Try to put it all together to –
Aleric knees me in the balls, and I go down.
I twist towards him, knocking out his legs. He falls onto his back. We’re in the woods, and as I jump on top of him, he grabs a handful of dirt and throws it in my eyes. I flinch away automatically, but I still manage to punch him in the face. He hits me in the spleen. Pain explodes throughout my body, and I fall to the side, blinking rapidly to clear the dirt from my vision. I get a brief warning of moving air before a rock bashes into my skull.
I crumble. He phases away, and I hit the ground as he stands over me, tutting. “You take after your mom when you’re angry.”
Blood pours down my face. My head thrums hard as my vision blurs. Stumbling to my feet, I pull out a knife.
He laughs. “Now, your love of patricide – that you got from me.”
He cocks his head, not at all concerned. “Then again, that could’ve come from Caden too. Nurture versus nature and all that.”
Cursing, I put my weapon away. Fighting with him will only drag this out more. “Ask your fucking question,” I snap.
“You’re normally not this much of an embarrassment, so what gives?”
I blink.
He smiles, enjoying how much he’s caught me off guard. “Come on, Vay Vay, talk about your feelings with your old man.”
Of course he knows Maddox’s fucking nickname for me.
“When we’re finished with Antonio, I’m going to kill you,” I vow.
He winks. “You’ll have to fight your mom for that honor.”
I breathe out through gritted teeth. Glancing around me, I wonder if I’d be better off on my own, but we’re in the middle of fucking nowhere. Trees stretch in every direction, and the clean air and colder temperature tells me we’re on top of some mountain. It’ll take me hours to get down, even longer to drive. She’ll be dead in that time, so I force myself to speak. “I can feel her dying.”
He snorts. “Doubtful. Antonio won’t kill her this quickly, and if she was doing it herself, she’d be finished by now. So sit.”
He gestures at a tree beside me. In the blink of an eye, he’s where he just pointed, perching on the branch near the trunk. The fucker is even kicking his feet. The urge to set this whole forest on fire is doused only by the knowledge that he’d just phase away.
“Come on up,”
he coos. “There’s room for two.”
“I’m not climbing the fucking tree,”
I snap. “I answered your question. Now phase –”
“It feel any different?”
“What?”
“The bond.”
I still, realizing it feels the same as when we first arrived here. It’s weaker than in St. Augustine, but it isn’t weak. It’s stable.
“The stronger a bond feels,”
Aleric explains, “the farther away you are. Connected souls don’t like being far apart, so they practically scream at you until you get back together. Annoying, right?”
“How do you know all this?”
Blood bonds are exclusive to witch partnerships.
A chill races through me as I recall Mother mentioning Caden left because of something she did. Did she fucking blood bond with his ass–
“I read it in a book,”
he says. “Your father –” He pauses. “Your fake father was pathetically ‘in love’” –he air quotes– “with Sau. He wouldn’t have cursed her. So tell me how he really died.”
“He found something out about her, left for nearly two decades, then came back and killed himself cursing her. If you want the next answer, fucking phase.”
He stares at me for a moment, eying me up like prey. Then he’s gone. I curse as I reach for my phone. Before my fingertips enter my pocket, he appears in front of me.
“Done,”
Aleric says. “But I phased twice to come back, so now you owe me two –”
I pull out my phone to call Khalid.
He laughs as he transports us to another part of the woods. “No cell service here,”
he says cheerfully.
“Aleric,”
I warn. Vlad, his second-in-command, might not want to lead the Blood Fangs, but he’s about to not have a fucking choice.
“Tell me what really happened,”
he says, “and I’ll hold all my other questions until after we find Micha.”
My jaw tightens, but I shove my phone back into my pocket. “Caden killed himself cursing her, probably because he figured out I was fucking yours. And if you don’t think my father was capable of doing that, that’s because you didn’t fucking know him. Now phase me that way.”
I point to my right.
“Oh, I knew him pretty well. He’s quite a talker after a hard fuck.”
He grins as he studies my face. “Now you have questions too. Good. I won’t have to hunt you down to have our chat.” Grabbing my arm, he phases us out of the woods.
He stays true to his word. The only questions he asks are how strong the bond feels so he knows how far to go. We jump another half-dozen times, narrowing down where she is, but vampires can’t phase anywhere they haven’t been and memorized.
The closest we can get is still too fucking far away. I’m left with a search area that’s hundreds of square miles wide, somewhere in the mountains of West Virginia, well inside Death Hunt territory. We can’t linger for more than a few seconds at a time either, lest a werewolf catches our scent.
When we land back home, I’m fucking furious. At Aleric. At Antonio. At Mother.
At anyone and everyone in this world other than her.
But most of all, I’m furious with myself. I didn’t leave enough guards on her because of my paranoia. After Talon betrayed us, I haven’t been able to trust even my brothers. And I wasn’t smart enough to realize what Antonio had planned. I promised her I would protect her.
I promised her.
But all I’ve done is failed her and our little girl.
Back in my room, I stare at the red splodge on my folded cotton shirt. She has been placed on my bedside table. On Micha’s side of the bed.
I couldn’t bring myself to let Khalid take her into his shadows. I’m not ready to let her go, so she’s frozen with magic, waiting for her mother to come home.
Waiting for her to say goodbye.
Turning from her, I open my laptop to start detailing the area we need to search for my wife.
I’m going to get you out, little monster.
Then we’ll bury our daughter together.