Intuition
Jayce
Ihear the whisper of the voice through the earpiece, followed by the soft gasp that escapes Sienna, my blood running cold.
Not this time. Not my woman.
I move as fast as I can, feeling the instant connection to Sienna, pinpointing her location and sending a bolt of lightning her way. I don’t need to see her to know I won’t hit her.
The lightning surrounds her, and I hear a low snarl of anger as a second surge of aura engulfs the air all around.
It’s the very same aura I felt that night outside the takeaway shop.
Then I feel power surge from five different sources.
The enemy, the girls and Ahren’s – our cover is blown, and now we need to get this bastard into the centre of the concealed spell before he does any damage.
Seconds later, he comes into view, standing there, his eyes blistering with something that seems far more intense than even hatred; there’s a wild rage in them, one that seems to know no bounds.
His face is contorted, and in that moment, he doesn’t even look like he’s a teen anymore, his face ageing in a way that doesn’t even look human.
Ahren, Sienna, Heaven and Alessandra surround him, the lightning a barrier between them and him, and from his clothes that are burned and his charred arm, I can see that my lightning bolt hit its mark.
My gaze moves to Sienna, making sure she’s not hurt, making sure my lightning didn’t harm her either.
Satisfied she’s fine, I look into her eyes to see hers looking straight into mine from where she stands, composed and confident.
Her power is contained but present beneath her skin; something in my chest seems to ease up, and I let out a small exhale.
She gives me the faintest of nods. She knows I’m looking to see if she’s ok, and she’s just told me she’s fine – reassuring me, although I’ll never admit that I need that.
She’s fine, that’s all that matters.
The moment passes between us before I look away, both of us turning back to the primordial.
The girls exchange looks before stepping back and putting space between themselves and the primordial.
From an outside perspective, it would look like they’re trying to simply protect themselves, but they’re getting into position for the moment they’ll need to activate the spell and hold him in place.
Ahren’s power begins to gather, his dark aura growing around him.
One of the girls casts a spell, and I feel the ripple as the illusion affects our surroundings. To humans coming this way, they will think there’s construction work being carried out and will avoid the area, keeping them safe and unable to see what is really going on here.
“Who cares about a few mere humans?” the primordial says, his voice laced with venom as his gaze sweeps across us with clear hatred. So, he knew what the spell was cast for… I wouldn’t have known, but we had discussed it prior.
“Clearly not you,” Ahren replies, his tone calm but cold.
“Then let’s teach him a lesson,” I say. Ahren and I exchange a look.
There’s no need for anything more; we both know what we need to do.
The sky flashes, thunder cracking overhead as lightning tears down in violent arcs, striking again and again in quick succession, forcing the primordial to keep moving.
He reacts quickly; I’ll give him that, his body darting to the side with unnatural speed, but there is something off about it; he doesn’t move like a human.
Another bolt cuts off his path, forcing him back, and Ahren is already repositioning, his power surging forward as he attacks him from behind.
He’s moved him a little away from the circle where we need him, but it’s intentional.
One thing we can all agree on is that he is clever.
The moment he realises there’s a reason we’re moving him to a certain area, he will avoid it.
We’re allowing him to believe he still has options, even as those options narrow with every passing second.
Yet the more I watch, the more the unease settles in, my intuition screaming at me.
He isn’t fighting back properly.
There’s no real attempt to counter, no effort to strike back in a way that matches his reputation; he has avoided being caught for so long, surely he can do more than drain us of our powers?
Tell Ahren something isn’t right. I can feel it; I tell Sienna through the mind-link.
Understood! She opens the link, and Ahren’s voice enters my mind.
Ask him what he means by that?
I don’t know, but he’s got a plan. We need to end this, I respond.
I know the plan: capture him, weaken him and then take him in for questioning, but I’m not so sure anymore. It is a risk.
Ahren’s power wraps around him once more, dragging him across the ground, but he twists free at the last moment, and the air suddenly ripples outward in a slicing wave that carries enough force to tear through flesh.
I raise my shield of blinding blue, just as Sienna and Heaven move as well, their shields rising in perfect sync, the impact dispersing harmlessly against the barriers as they hold steady without faltering.
Alessandra surges forward at that exact moment, shifting as she darts past the other two, her body colliding with the primordial with brutal force.
I’ll hold him! Blast this fucker NOW! Alessandra’s voice grates in my head as she uses one of the abilities she has as a lycan, allowing her to mind-link all alphas.
We told her not to be reckless!
Ahren and I move together, his dark aura and my lighter one coiling around them both as we force them both the final distance, right into the centre of the trap.
A snarl that thunders through the air rips from Alessandra’s throat as she releases the containment net, and she slams her fist into his head, her timing flawless as she springs back as he staggers and the deployed net forces him to the ground.
The metal expands fully, his eyes turning completely black as he realises what’s happening.
He hisses, sending a wave of ripples towards her. I reach her, my arm wrapping around her waist as I pull her back, raising a shield, just as Ahren appears behind us, and in a puff, we’re gone. I see the spell ignite beneath us just before we reappear outside of the spell.
Runes blaze beneath the primordial, chains of magic snapping into place as they coil tightly around his body, binding him as he thrashes, a scream tearing from him as the glowing chains tighten around him.
The ground fractures further beneath the trap, the cracks spreading in jagged lines as the primordial’s aura begins to surge, growing stronger and stronger with every passing moment.
“It won’t hold,” Heaven’s steady voice states what I already know.
Alessandra steps between the two, shifting back to human form and closing her eyes as she begins to pour her energy into them. With every passing second, the power is pressing in on us with a force that makes it difficult to breathe properly.
Nothing is holding him, not the poison from the net that should have weakened him.
I can feel it building – not just his power but something else.
“We won’t be able to contain him, but we have to.” Ahren’s voice is barely audible from next to us.
We are running out of time.
I have to end him. There were reasons we wanted him alive, but…
My artefacts form around me as I step forward, the power within them igniting the moment they settle into place, surging through my body in a violent rush that sharpens everything, my vision narrowing, my focus locking entirely onto the figure bound within the spell.
“Jayce! What are you doing?!” Sienna shouts from behind me; but she can’t move, the spell she’s maintaining keeps her in place.
I feel the energy of the barrier weaken, even as Ahren rises into the sky, his wings unfurling as a dome begins to spread. So, he finally got those wings he had in the Gods’ Realm.
It will not hold. I know it with every ounce of my being. I know.
The moment it gives, even slightly, he will break free, and then we lose him and this chance.
“I’m ending this now,” I say quietly.
“Jayce! What are you doing? We need him alive! He can return Mama’s power!” Alessandra shouts, edged with something that sounds a lot like panic. Something that doesn’t sound like her.
Every second we hesitate, the pressure inside the trap grows stronger, the cracks widening beneath his feet, the runes burning bright. Too much pressure and they will explode.
Power begins to rise, stronger, and it’s rippling through the air. A wave of unease washes over me, a strong urgency pushing me as my wolf snarls for me to hurry.
There’s only one choice, and even though it might leave what-ifs, I have weighed the odds.
This is a decision I’ve made. Some decisions are hard, some are not always right, but as an alpha, as the Deimos King, in this moment, I have to do the right thing, the safest thing, even if it means losing out on helping those he has robbed of their abilities.
“Get back,” I command, drawing every ounce of power into myself. Lightning coils violently around my arm, building with a force that feels almost too powerful for this world. It focuses on my gauntlet as I raise my fist, everything channelled into it as I race forward.
“Jayce!”
“No!”
Now.
My gauntlet fist smashes through the barrier that shatters around me, finally succumbing to the strain. Then I’m past it, and by the primordial’s side. My power still resonates through the air as my fist meets its true target, where instinct is telling me to aim – his throat.
For a fraction of a second, everything stills.
His eyes snap wide, the shock hitting too late as the energy floods through him, lightning tearing through his body from the inside as the cracks begin to spread, thin at first, then rapidly widening, splintering across his skin like cracks in stone.
Then my fist is right through him, hitting the ground and tearing it apart.
His body cracks and the darkness seeps into the air before disintegrating, and I hit the ground on one knee beside the spot where he knelt moments earlier.
The pressure vanishes, and silence crashes down around me.
The only thing left is the echo of power still fading from my body, my chest rising and falling even in the silence of my teammates.
“Wh-what have you done?” Alessandra whispers.
I don’t respond as I rise to my feet.
Even now – even after it’s done, I know I made the only choice that mattered, the choice I had to, because if I hadn’t, we would have lost far more than answers.
And it reminds me of something I’ve always known, something that maybe I needed a reminder of: that the right path is rarely the easy one.
Sometimes the right path comes with trials; the right choice is hard to make; the right decision isn’t always easy to reach, but sometimes that’s the path you need to take.
It demands more, takes more, forces you to choose when there are no good options left to take, and it still expects you to stand by that decision when it’s over.
Because not everyone has the strength to make the right decision when it’s difficult.
And whether I like it or not, that’s a weight I will always choose to bear.
And yet… when it comes to the most precious thing in the world, I can’t do it. I can’t make the choice because it means having everything I could have dreamt of, and I’m afraid to lose that – lose her.