Chapter Twelve
“I Want the Dragon Shifter”
“Isobel...please.”
If the coven leader had heard her, she didn’t show it.
She and the nine other living witches had been chanting in unison for the past minute or so.
Whatever they were trying to do, whatever punishment they had in store for her, she had no idea, but it had to be far from pleasant.
The mere thought of it sent a shudder down Nora’s spine.
You’ll pay for what you’ve done tonight, Isobel had said.
“Please,” Nora begged. “You have to believe me. I’d never do something like this. I know what you saw—I mean, I don’t know what you saw, but whatever it was, it wasn’t me. I don’t kill. I don’t—”
She broke off, staring at the witch still lying on the forest floor in a pool of her own blood.
Horror gripped Nora’s insides like a vice.
How could she possibly have done something so grave and not remembered a second of it?
It didn’t make sense. But if all these witches claimed she’d done it, it must be true, right?
Even then, even if her wolf had attacked them, there had to be some reasonable explanation for it. Something else must have happened. But what?
She remained where she stood, her heart in her throat, as the witches continued to chant.
Their voices grew louder, and the air hummed with magical energy.
Nora felt her insides clench as the humming grew louder, and she raised her hands to shield her ears.
Before her fingers could touch her head, however, there was an explosion of light to her left, knocking her backward.
She staggered and fell onto her butt. With a grunt, she pulled herself back to her feet, lifting a hand to cover her eyes as the light faded. When she lowered her arm, the glare had completely disappeared. In its place stood a man wearing a tunic.
He had a hood pulled over his face, but it wasn’t low enough to cover his eyes—or at least, the part of his face where eyes should be. The man had no eyes, only a nose and mouth, blond hair creeping out from the sides of his hood.
“What...?”
As she watched, the man moved, his head turning first toward the body on the ground, then toward Nora, and finally, toward Isobel and the others. The witches had stopped chanting. Isobel had a slight grin on her face.
“Ergog the hunter,” she said calmly, as though he was no stranger to her. “Thank you for coming.”
“Why have you summoned me?” came the man’s reply.
“To right a wrong.” She pointed in Nora’s direction. “This hybrid is responsible for the death of one of our own. I want you to make her pay for what she’s done.”
Ergog turned his eyeless face toward Nora. He reached for his hip, where a pair of blades were tucked in a belt, and drew them. He took a step toward her, and then another.
“I’d start running if I were you, Nora,” she heard Isobel say. “Although I doubt that would make much of a difference.”
***
The hunter approached, marching across the grassy plain toward them. Even in the distance, nearly a hundred feet away, he was a disturbing sight. He advanced quickly, closing the distance between them in long, rapid strides, blades drawn and at the ready.
Henry stepped forward, Nora behind him, moving away from the truck. He swallowed, watching Ergog draw nearer. This was it. There would be no running this time. He and Nora would face the hunter. Hopefully, they would make it out of this in one piece.
And if not... Henry brushed the thought out of his mind.
He and Ergog were barely twenty feet away from each other when the hunter stopped in his tracks. Henry stopped, too, bracing himself for the inevitable attack. Nora came to stand next to him, and for the briefest moment, Henry thought he could hear her heart pounding. Or was it his?
“It was only a matter of time before I found you again,” Ergog said, and his lips curved in a grin. “Did you really think you could escape from me?”
Henry shifted on the spot. “The only reason you found us is because we wanted you to come.”
“I’m done running.” The look on Nora’s face was a mix of fear and determination. “I decided I don’t want to do that anymore. I’ll fight you, Ergog, even if it’s the last thing I ever do.”
When she put it that way, it did sound a lot like a suicide mission. But it was too late for either of them to back out now.
“It will be the last thing you do,” said the hunter. “My mission is to deliver justice. I hunt those who have done evil. The witch Isobel summoned me to avenge a murder, to balance the scales. And I will stop at nothing to do so.”
With that, he charged.
Henry had been anticipating an attack, but Ergog seemed to be moving faster than he remembered.
The hunter shot right at him, blades extended, and for a split second Henry thought he was a goner.
Before he could get skewered, however, an invisible force knocked Ergog sideways, sending him rolling several feet across the ground.
He turned to see Nora standing with arms outstretched, a wide-eyed look in her eyes.
“Thanks,” he told her. “You saved my neck.”
She managed a small grin. “Guess we’re even now, huh?”
“Not even close.”
Ergog shot back to his feet. The hood had been pulled back; his blond hair gleamed in the sunset, falling across his face as he turned to face them.
This time, it was Henry who attacked, colliding with the hunter before he could fully recover.
With a growl, Ergog tried to shove him aside, but Henry held on to him, trying to tackle him to the ground again.
He reached for one of the hunter’s blades, trying to wrest it from his grasp.
“You fool!” Ergog cried.
The next thing Henry knew, he was spinning through the air. He felt the wind knocked out of him as he hit the ground. The hairs on the back of his neck rose, and he instinctively rolled away from the spot. A split second later, there was a light thud as Ergog’s blade struck the earth.
“You doomed yourself the very moment you chose to defend a murderer,” the hunter said. “You made yourself complicit.”
Even before he got up, Henry began to shift, a scaly pattern forming on his skin.
He’d been hesitant to do so back at the fair with so many people around, but there were no humans here at the sanctuary.
Within seconds, he’d shredded his clothes and morphed into a fully grown dragon, towering over Ergog.
“A dragon shifter,” the hunter snarled. “I’ve killed a few of your kind before.”
Henry blasted a column of flame at him, but Ergog simply rolled out of the way, launching one of his blades as he did.
A searing pain flared in Henry’s wing, and he let out a bellow of pain as the blade soared back into its owner’s hand.
Ergog prepared to strike again, but this time, Henry turned, sweeping his tail in an arc, and sent the hunter flying.
Ergog skipped across the ground, his body bouncing past Henry’s truck and crashing through the fence, colliding with a tree.
It would’ve been enough force to kill even the strongest human, but Ergog clearly wasn’t human.
He hit the ground and promptly picked himself up, summoning his blades into his hands.
He stepped out of the woods, advancing on Henry again. If he had eyes, they would be blazing with fury, Henry thought. The hunter’s lips were pulled back menacingly, his strides determined.
Nora leaped out in front of him, blasting him with a ball of flame. Ergog staggered backward with an enraged cry but wasted no time recovering. Before she could attack him again, he lunged at her, knocking her to the ground with a single blow.
“I’ll kill you in a bit,” he promised. “For now, I want the dragon shifter.”
Henry stepped closer, preparing to hit the hunter with more flame.
He was more powerful in dragon form, but even then he was starting to wonder whether this wasn’t a losing battle.
His wing was definitely injured, and this hunter was moving too quickly.
He stepped forward, breathing an arc of flame toward his assailant.
Ergog ducked low, the flame sweeping over his body, and shot back onto his feet, charging before Henry had a chance to strike again.
One of those blades made contact with Henry’s side, and he lumbered backward in pain, immediately shifting back to human form.
He sat naked on the ground, bleeding from a couple of cuts in his side.
Nine hundred and ninety-five more cuts to go, said a voice in his head.
Ergog came to stand over him, his lips now pulled into a triumphant grin—a disconcerting sight since he had no eyes. He brought his blade close to Henry’s face.
“Don’t bother trying to fight any longer,” he said. “You will only make your death more painful. Now, if I were you, I would start to consider my last words.”