24. Finley
Finley
My mind filtered in and out of consciousness as Rath tried to keep me from feeling the worst of the pain as Vanya worked.
She was moving quickly, removing what she could as swiftly as possible, but the lead pellets seemed the worst as they burned through my body.
Clenching my jaw, I tried to concentrate on anything besides what was happening.
I was catching snippets of what the others were saying when they talked through our bond, but I wasn’t following.
Suddenly Derven was gone from the place he’d been holding my hand and Lane filled the spot right away.
I clenched onto his hand, using it as a lifeline to stay grounded in my body when all I wanted was to float away from the pain.
Outside there was screaming and yelling from hundreds of people. I felt Colt talking to the others and listened in, catching that someone was challenging for the beta spot. Before I could figure out what caused the screaming, I heard Derven warning the others that the man was a witch.
“It’s a distraction,” I called out, begging for them to hear me. “Before he died, he told me there were more coming…”
Hot angry tears rolled down my cheeks as my brain clouded in pain.
This never should have happened. If I’d listened to my men, then I wouldn’t have been there and gotten shot.
Then again, it was by one of our own, so it still could’ve happened and been even worse.
He could have killed me if I wasn’t already on the defensive.
Now I had to fight to make it through this.
I wasn’t going to let the Senate take me out before I had the chance to fix this.
My death would take everyone I loved from the world and that wasn’t how this should go.
A hand smoothed away the hair that fell in my face, then wiped away my tears. “You’re doing amazing, sweetheart,” Lane whispered. “I know this is painful, but you’re strong, and we are right here with you. Vanya says she’d gotten all the silver pellets. Now it’s just the last few lead ones.”
I took a shaky breath and squeezed his hand so he knew I heard him.
“We got you, babe. I promise this will be over soon,” Noah encouraged, letting his hand run through my hair. My wolf let out a whine when he didn’t continue petting me. Right now, I would take any and all comfort I could get. “Alright, I won’t stop as long as you keep breathing through this.”
True to his word, he continued as I made the best effort I could to keep breathing. If only I could use my own magic on myself. Then I could heal the damage and push the pellets out of me or at least stop them from burning through my flesh… Wait, why couldn’t I do that?
Turning my attention inward, I sank into myself until I reached my well of magic.
It was leaking everywhere, and my wolf lay beside it, breathing shallow as she tried to drink up some of the magic flowing out of us.
The damage to my body was affecting everything else in turn.
Maybe if I could repair this, it might help everything else.
Was this what lead poison looked like internally?
Did it erode away at my magic, then kill me once it was through that?
Anything was worth a try. I knew Derven’s blood helped for a bit, but with how much blood I was losing, I doubt adding more of his was a good idea.
The last thing I needed to do was add another supernatural species to my list.
Kneeling down in front of the fountain of magic, I placed my palms over the largest crack.
In my mind, I imagined the crack sealing itself, stemming the loss of magic.
Pain roared through my body as I slowly, inch by inch, filled in the fissure.
My breathing was coming hard and fast, sweat breaking out on my forehead as I gritted my teeth and kept pushing.
“Finley, what are you doing?” Rath asked as he appeared next to me.
I couldn’t deviate my attention to answer him, afraid that I would lose whatever momentum I’d found.
“Nin mel, whatever you are doing is taking too much of a toll on your body,” he tried again. “Please, talk to me, tell me how I can help?”
My body gave out and I collapsed against the fountain, but when I looked, the crack was half the size it was before. “I need to fix it. If I can stop the magic from leaking out, I can slow the lead poisoning.”
“That’s crazy, Finley. No one has been able to combat the damage done by lead. It’s the one thing we can’t heal,” he challenged.
I looked at him over my shoulder. “Are you really going to stand there and tell me to just give up? To make this my fate? You and the other keep telling me that there isn’t a limit, that I can be more. Well, right now, all I want is to be whole. Is that really too much to ask for?”
“No, nin mel, it’s not too much,” he said as he knelt beside me. “I will do what I can to assist you, lend you whatever magic I have to offer.”
Stealing myself for the pain I was going to endure, I placed my hands higher on the crack.
With everything I had within me, I focused on mending the fracture.
It was the largest damage and if I could heal this part of my well, then the others would be easier…
or so I hoped. Rath placed his hands on my shoulder and the cool feeling of his magic entered me.
Then as if he’d become the conduit, I felt my connection to all my mates and to the forest around me.
The magic that I poured into it every day for the last few months was sitting there waiting for me.
I could have wept as I funneled all I could into this wound, keeping my mind’s eye on the image of it being fully restored.
My mind went to the first time I found it, seeing it shooting so high in the air, filled with so much power I had to let some of it go.
This is what I wanted it to be like once again, brimming with magic to the point that I would need to release it back into the world or explode.
“That’s enough, Finley,” Rath warned. “You can’t take in any more magic, give back what you’ve taken, or else you’ll shatter your source this time.”
Opening my eyes, I looked around to see he was right.
My center glowed in a soft blue light with little darts of energy that reminded me of fireflies.
Next to me, tongue lolling, was my wolf healed and eyes glowing with a power I’d never seen before.
She nudged my arms, pushing them off the fountain that was repaired, not just repaired but shining with silver glint.
Like I’d taken what was left in me and coated my magic in a protective force.
My wolf nipped at me with a whine, shaking her body as if she was uncomfortable.
She was holding power, trying to keep it from overwhelming me, but now it was becoming too much for her to hold onto.
I reached out and wrapped my arms around her fluffy neck, hiding my face in her fur.
“Thank you,” I whispered, knowing she was being so brave in protecting me like this.
She licked my face reassuringly and sneezed loudly like she was ready for me to get to work. Slowly I drew the magic out of her and sat back, turning to Rath. “I need you to take me outside. There’s no way I can dispel all of this without having direct contact with my forest.”
“Will you be alright if I leave you?” he questioned.
Reaching out, I cupped his face with my hand and pulled him into a kiss returning the magic he’d given me and then some. “You never leave me. We’re connected for life.”
He returned my kiss fiercely, then vanished from my side just as suddenly as he had appeared. I looked back at my wolf and gave her a wink. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of this. You’ve done your part.” She sat down, her tail wagging as I let myself return to the world around me.
“What do you mean take her outside? We can’t do that,” Mason argued. “She literally almost died and you want us to put her in the dirt with her wounds?”
“Don’t argue with me. She’s the one who told me to do it,” Rath countered. “Finley pulled all the magic she could from the forest and it’s going to hurt her if she doesn’t let go of it. She said that she needs to be directly connected to it for that to happen.”
An arm slid under my legs and behind my back. While I was no longer in danger of dying, the damage the shotgun blast did to me was still incredibly slow to heal and hurt like a bitch.
“Listen to her. You’re hurting her,” Noah snarled.
Groaning, I managed to crack open my eyes to see the twins blocking Rath’s way. “Stop… let him go…” I rasped.
Their eyes snapped to me. “Snuggles, you don’t know how bad your injuries are. We shouldn’t move you.”
“Magic will kill me… have to let it back out…” I tried to explain, but I was so incredibly tired.
“I’m not going to lose her,” Rath said, his voice booming like thunder. “Now, get out of my way.”
The two backed away, but the moment we passed them, they were right on his heels.
“What’s happening?” Zander asked as he appeared in my vision.
“She needs to be in the forest,” Rath answered.
“Like fuck she does,” Zander spat. “Colt, Derven, and Elias are dealing with the traitors and the last thing that needs to happen right now is Finley being out in the open.”
“You’re not going to win this argument. She needs to release the magic she gathered, or she’ll die. Trust me when I say that as she’s doing this, I don’t think anyone, not even us, will be able to touch her,” Rath shot back and shoved past him.
Moments later, my broken and battered body was placed in the soft grass.
The earth around me welcomed me, softening, so it was more comfortable for me to lay there.
I took a deep, ragged breath before letting it out, allowing my magic to flow with it.
I remembered the first time I did this, awakening the forest around me.
Now, as I gave back what I borrowed, it funneled it out to the areas that needed it the most.
“The fuck is going on?” I heard Colt’s demanding voice. “I feel like my hair is standing on end as if I’ve been shocked.”
“It’s Finley,” Noah answered. “How is she doing this?”
“That young wolf is the power of the queen of elves,” a stranger answered, his voice accented from a dialect I couldn’t pick out. “What has happened that she required such a massive amount of magic?”
“Don’t answer that, Rath. First, these guys are going to tell us who they are.” Elias snarled.
“Your Sentinel is right. We should introduce ourselves, but I believe now is not the right time. When our queen is done blessing the forest, we will speak properly. Until then, we will commune with the land while she works,” another new voice spoke, his tone nasally and far too proper.
Tuning all that out, knowing I was safe for now, I concentrated on the task at hand.
My magic flooded the earth around me, entering into the deep network of roots traveling out into the wide reaches of the forest until it reached the mountains.
Then it spread wide, encompassing all the forests of the Smoky Mountains.
As it circled back to feed the remaining power to the forest closest to the pack, I found an encampment of men.
Using the eyes of animals around the area, I found it was more werewolves armed to the teeth and far too close for my liking.
“Have you heard anything from the point team?” a man asked, poking at the fire they’d made.
Another shook his head, looking at the radio next to him. “It’s a mixed bag, isn’t it? They could be dead, or they could still be radio silent. No way to know until we hit them later tonight.”
“Either way, they’ll assume that was the attack and never suspect that the real fight hasn’t even begun,” the first man said with a laugh.
“Bitch will be dead before she ever gets the chance to say a word to the press. Problem solved quickly and cleanly like Alpha Vaughan wanted. Can’t believe that cunt of a wife betrayed us. ”
Rage filled me as I listened to these men talking so carelessly about the innocent lives they were going to take.
That wasn’t going to happen, not in my woods.
These bastards were going to die before they ever had a chance to step food near my pack.
The ground opened up and swallowed the fire, leaving them in the dim light of dusk, unable to see the vines and tree branches coming for them.
The forest was just as enraged at the treatment of these men chopping off branches to burn and killing animals that were young and healthy.
Before they had any chance to realize what was happening, the first man was run through with branches as another was strangled with vines.
The sounds of their screaming filled the night air scaring away all the animals.
I trusted the forest to do what was needed and bury any and all evidence of them ever being there.
Satisfied that the forest was free of danger, I withdrew back to my body, confident we would be safe for the evening.
When I opened my eyes, I was surrounded by three ancient-looking men in flowing green robes sitting cross-legged and hands palm up resting on their knees.
Looking down at my body, I was dressed in a simple sky blue dress that was light as air but covered my battered body.
“Eithel govannen nin rís,” one of them greeted, bowing his head. “It is an honor to meet the one who will lead us out of darkness back into the light, your majesty.”