Chapter 17 #2
From head to toe, he was clad in leather.
Coat, waistcoat, breeches, boots. His tricorn was worn low, and a mask was pulled up over his lower face, so she’d no idea what he looked like, but his eyes were icy gray and glinted with cold hatred.
A baldric holding two pistols slung across his wide chest. In his hand he held a silver-edged sword.
He brandished it, forcing Clara to take a step back.
The Guardian would chop her down, right here on the landing of her own home.
Gideon’s arm went around her waist, hauling her back. As she was tugged away, Des and Bram rushed forward. Des used his forearm to knock the Guardian’s sword aside as Bram pushed the intruder. The massive man stumbled.
As the Guardian struggled to regain his footing, Hugh appeared behind him. He was dressed and standing, and he rammed a fist into the Guardian’s kidney. When the Guardian doubled over in pain. Hugh shouldered past to join Clara and the others.
“They showed up ten minutes prior,” Hugh cried. “Been running from ’em since.”
Clara spun in Gideon’s arms and pointed to one of the open doorways in the corridor. “Through there!”
She led the way into an unoccupied bedchamber, and the five men barreled in behind her. Hugh slammed the door shut and locked it.
At once, she went to the wall and pressed on a panel. It opened with a snick to reveal one of the secret passageways.
“In here,” she said.
Even as she spoke, the sounds of more heavy footsteps thudded in the hallway. There were footsteps below, too. Guardians infested her house. They weren’t bothering to hide their approach, a sure sign that they saw no need for subtlety or silence in the face of a certain victory.
Wordlessly, Des and the others quickly filed into the passageway.
It was a narrow space, far too close to comfortably fit these large men even in a single file.
But they kept their silence as she guided them through the snaking corridors.
Weak illumination from high, narrow windows lit their way.
They barreled into a stack of books, and she shoved them aside to clear their path.
She led them around one corner, then another, before finding the panel she sought.
Pushing the hidden door open, she hurried into a small room.
Des, Gideon, Hugh, Bram, and Liam all followed.
Once they were all inside, she shut the panel, enclosing them in the chamber.
There were no windows, but it did boast two doors, one on either side of the other, and she rushed to each to lock them, throwing bolts in front of the doors.
“Where are we?” Hugh asked.
“The original owner of this house was somewhat fearful,” she explained. “It was he who constructed the secret passageways, and he had this room built at the heart of the manor so he might take refuge should any unwanted intruders force their way inside.”
“Yet you never hid here when we came,” Gideon noted.
“I tried,” she confessed, “but I lost my way and wound up in the attic instead.”
“We can hold them off from here,” Des said.
As he spoke, however, the doors began to rattle. They shook as Guardians on the other side tried to force them open with greater and greater might. Guardians threw their bodies against the wood.
“For how long?” Bram demanded.
“Long enough to turn into wolves,” Clara said.
All five men stared at her.
“It’s daylight,” Liam pointed out. “None of us can change simply by willing it.”
“The ability is inside of you,” she insisted.
“We need the full moon for that,” Hugh said.
She drew in a breath. What she proposed was madness, but then, the world was mad.
“Can’t you feel it?” she asked. “How close you are to transforming?”
Puzzled, the men looked at each other, then at her. Des, Gideon, and Hugh gave small, uncertain nods.
“It’s pulsing beneath my skin,” Gideon said. “But why?”
“It feels as though…as though I am your full moon.” She struggled to explain. “I’ve always felt in me a connection with the moon. Whenever it waxes, I sense it in my body. And when it’s full, it’s as though…”
“As though its strength is in you,” Hugh murmured.
“I’m…” She reached for the words, the feeling. “I’m wild…powerful. The moon is inside of me, shining out of me. I felt it last night, and even now, it’s within me.”
Des gazed at her. He frowned, but not in dismissal. “That’s what I’d sensed in you,” he said. “Part of what pulled me to you.”
“As with me,” Gideon said. “There’s something inside of you, calling to me.”
“Calling to all of us,” Hugh added.
The doors shook even harder. The hinges began to splinter.
“Yes, yes,” Clara said with growing force. She pressed a hand to her chest. “The power in me, the strength of the moon I have inside.”
“I feel it, too,” Bram said, and Liam looked in agreement.
“Use that,” Clara insisted. “Now.”
Des, then Gideon nodded. Hugh followed, and then Liam and Bram did the same.
Despite the sounds of shattering wood, she closed her eyes and tried to concentrate. Though the sun was high, she perceived the moon in the heavens. A sliver of it was missing, but she was that sliver, filling out the pale disk, completing it.
She collected her energy. It was inside her, until her skin was alive and her senses sharp and expansive, growing beyond the confines of the room, the house, the land. She was part of the sky and shone down on everything.
She was the enchanted being from her fairy stories. All the mystical entities that granted wishes and imbued the world with magic—she was one of them. And now, it was her turn to bestow power on those who needed it, the ones who held the ability to shift from men to wolves.
The energy built up inside of her. Yet she needed to transfer it to the pack. Spreading her hands, she guided her gathered power into them in invisible waves. It pulsed from her, strong and alive.
Growling filled the small room.
She opened her eyes. All of the men within the chamber were hunched in on themselves, bodies straining against their clothing, faces contorted. Their garments split, torn asunder by swelling muscles that sprouted fur.
The pounding against the doors strengthened. More wood splintered, and the doors began to break apart. Through the shattering wood, the masked faces of the Guardians appeared, all of their eyes sharp with hate.
What kind of men were these, to hunt others, but hide their faces like cowards?
The doors broke apart in a hail of fragmenting wood. Two Guardians appeared at one door, three at the other.
Brandishing pistols, they started to storm into the chamber—then drew up short.
Five werewolves now stood in the room. And in the middle of them was Clara.
“Get out of my house,” she commanded.