Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
"Take her NOW!"
Iris's command cracked like thunder, and the entire coven moved with the synchronized precision of predators who'd done this more than once.
Gray's bones kept breaking before conscious thought formed.
His spine cracked, vertebrae separating and elongating with pops that sent white-hot agony through every nerve.
His fingers split next, joints multiplying as bones stretched into something between hand and paw.
Not the smooth transformation to wolf he'd mastered over decades. This was the partial shift he’d been practicing since Ash died.
The elusive form between forms that might save someone when full wolf wasn't enough and human was too weak.
His wolf ripped free but held at the edge, balanced on the edge of control.
Blood ran from his palms as claws burst from behind his fingernails. His jaw cracked, dislocating before extending into a partial muzzle filled with too many teeth.
Shaw launched himself at the nearest witch, in full wolf form, two hundred pounds of grey fury.
She went down screaming, but green fire erupted from her hands, sending him rolling across wet stone with the stench of burnt fur.
Calix and Fen flanked left and right, trying to break the circle before it could form completely, but the witches were ready.
A wall of sickly green light rose between them and their targets. Calix hit it full speed and bounced back, yelping as magic scorched through his nervous system. Fen tried to circle around, but the barrier curved, complete and impenetrable.
"Hold the circle!" Iris commanded, producing black candles from nothing. They ignited without flame, green fire that shouldn't exist in the ocean wind but burned steady and wrong. "Begin the binding. Restrain the vessel."
Vessel. Not Lily. Not a person. Just a container of power they wanted to steal.
Gray tried to roar his rage, but what came out was neither human nor wolf but something twisted between that made two witches step back in genuine fear.
Good. They should fear him. His mate lay dying in his arms, her breath too shallow, her skin too cold, and these vultures wanted to pick her bones clean of magic.
"Stay with me." The words came out mangled through his deformed mouth, but Lily's fingers clutched weakly at his torn shirt.
Through their incomplete bond, he felt her terror, not of dying, but of becoming nothing.
Of having her consciousness dissolved into the others until even her memories belonged to someone else.
Black rope materialized from the shadow, winding around Lily's wrists with phantom hands. She made a sound—a whimper—but through their bond he felt her scream. The magic wasn't just binding her body. It was reaching into her soul, trying to unravel the threads that made her her.
"No!"
Gray lunged at the barrier. His claws met resistance like electrified glass, sending shocks up his malformed arms. But rage was stronger than pain. He struck again, and again, each blow drawing sparks and making the nearest witch stumble.
"Her power will survive even if she doesn't," Iris said to the witch beside her, as if Gray wasn't feet away trying to tear through their defenses. "The bloodline is all that matters. Individual consciousness is merely ego. Selfishness weakens the whole."
"You're killing her!"
The voice came from inside the circle. Willow, Lily’s young cousin who reminded him so much of his mate. She took a half-step back from her position. "Iris, look at her! This isn't binding, it's murder!"
"You will stay in the circle,” Iris hissed.
"She's my cousin! My blood!" Willow's hands shook as she maintained her part of the barrier. "The ritual requires a living vessel, not a corpse!"
"She will live. Her body will walk and breathe and cast—"
"But it won't be her!" An older witch, grey-haired and maternal, broke from her position. "I've seen thirteen minds in one body, Iris. I've seen what we become. Empty shells puppeted by committee. That's not life. That’s not what we are supposed to be."
"Margaret, return to your position."
"No." Margaret stepped further back. "I agreed to save her from going nova. Not to commit murder."
Gray threw himself at the weakening barrier where Margaret had stood. This time his claws found purchase, tearing through magic like shredding wet paper. The witch maintaining that section cried out, blood running from her nose as her magic snapped back.
But before he could push through, two more witches stepped forward to reinforce the gap. Their combined power slammed into him like a physical wall, sending him skidding back across rain-slick stone.
Shaw struggled to his feet, fur still smoking. “Gray, we can't do this alone."
"Yes. We. Can." Each word hurt to form, his throat raw from the shift. But Lily's breathing was getting shallower. In front of his eyes, he saw her essence being pulled away in green threads visible to everyone. Every piece ripped from her made their connection scream.
"Perhaps a demonstration of commitment will restore order." Iris pulled out a ritual blade that caught moonlight and held it, glowing with its own sick light. "Sarah, Martha, prepare the secondary binding. If the vessel expires before completion, we'll anchor the magic to her corpse."
"Corpse?" Another witch, barely older than a teenager, went pale. "Iris, you said—"
"You all need to get over this already. I said we would preserve the bloodline. The method is irrelevant."
Gray's vision went red as his wolf took full control of the transformation. His ribs cracked outward as if someone had grabbed them from inside and pulled, making room for his larger than normal transition. His skull stretched, jaw extending into something that could tear throats from any being.
The partial shift was agony. Muscles tore and reformed. Tendons snapped and re-knit in new configurations. Every nerve screamed as his body became something that shouldn't exist, trapped between forms, neither wolf nor man but something monstrous.
But the agony was nothing compared to watching Lily fade.
The green threads pulling from her body had multiplied, dozens now, each one taking a piece of her away. Her eyes were still open but unfocused, staring at something beyond this world. Their bond felt like a candle flame in a hurricane, flickering, failing, about to be extinguished.
Calix tried another run at the circle, this time aiming for a younger witch who looked terrified. She screamed, throwing up her hands, and silver lightning erupted from her palms. Calix hit the ground convulsing, his wolf form smoking.
"Cal!" Fen abandoned his attack to drag his pack mate to safety.
Three wolves down to two. Thirteen witches down to eleven, with two wavering. The math was still shit.
But then Gray heard it, engines in the distance. Not boats. Cars. Multiple vehicles approaching fast from the bridge side of the island.
The pack. Damien had mobilized everyone.
"Speed the ritual!" Iris commanded, hearing the same thing. "We finish this now!"
The chanting grew louder, all those voices weaving together until his skull ached from the sound. The black candles flared higher, green flames reaching toward the moon. And Lily—
Lily's back arched as magic ripped from her core.
Gray broke.
The last thread of control that kept him from becoming pure beast ripped away.
He charged the barrier with everything he had.
The impact should have killed him. His beast-enhanced strength drove him into the magical wall hard enough to crack it. The barrier shattered.
Green glass exploded outward, sending witches scattering. Gray was through the gap before they could recover, his half-shifted form moving with impossible speed.
A witch tried to stop him with binding rope. His claws severed it and left four parallel gashes across her chest. Another raised her blade. He caught her wrist in his jaws, and bit down until she dropped it screaming.
"Stop him!" Iris commanded, but her voice had lost its calm certainty.
Because half of her coven was backing away now. Five witches had broken formation, refusing to continue. The perfect circle had broken.
"This is wrong," Willow said, tears streaming down her face. "This is all wrong. We're supposed to protect her, not—"
"We ARE protecting her! From herself! From the fate that took her mother!"
"Her mother CHOSE her fate!" Gray snarled through his malformed muzzle, finally reaching Lily. He pulled her against him. "She chose death over letting you erase her! Just like Lily chose to run rather than submit!"
"She cannot choose! She is too weak and selfish.”
"She chose me." The words tore from his throat, barely understood but needing to be said. "She chose to stay when she could have run. Chose to trust when she had every reason not to. And she chose to love even when it terrified her."
He looked down at Lily, so still in his arms. Her skin had gone translucent, veins visible beneath, like she was becoming glass. Through their bond, he felt the tiniest spark of awareness. Still there. Still fighting. But fading with every breath.
"I love you." The words ripped from his ruined throat, barely recognizable but unmistakable.
"Not the bond. Not fate. You. The way you fight when you should run.
The way you stayed when I gave you every reason to leave.
" His claws pressed against her skin without breaking it.
"You made me want to live again. Please don't make me learn how to die. "
Her fingers twitched against his chest.
"You chose me. You could have run, could have rejected this, but you stayed. You're destroying yourself to save my pack." His claws flexed carefully. "You've been choosing me this whole time, and I was too stubborn to see it. Let me choose you back. Let me protect you now."
Through their bond, the tiniest flutter. His name. Gray.