"Oh my god," she shrieked and squealed at the same time. In the next moment, she had her eyes closed and was chanting. If I'd been nervous she couldn't control her magic, it would've been for nothing. Brown had complete control over herself. The magic filled her and the paleness of her skin grew into a rosy tan. The fear was gone. She glowed.
"Thank you, Davy," she spoke in the next breath.
A wolf howled in pain. The sound split through the night air.
It had begun.
I lifted my head and was there in the next moment. Wren pulled her sword back and stood over the wolf. Its body quivered in pain underneath her feet. It lifted his head and looked at her, but the fight quickly left its body, its neck slumping back down.
The first kill went to the vampires. Pete's anger exploded into full force. He leapt through the air, right behind Wren and Tracey. Both vampires jumped out of the way, but his mouth was opened. One of his fangs nicked Tracey's leg and she screamed. Her body twisted and convulsed. Poison from him shot through the vampire. Wren screamed and lunged in the air. Her sword was poised above her head, ready to strike, but he turned his head. He waited, ready to open his powerful mouth.
I appeared in that moment. He turned to see me and sniffed into me. His eyes widened. He wasn't ready for what he saw, but it didn't matter. Wren's sword pierced his eye in that moment. Instead of reeling back from pain, he snapped his jaw at her. I threw myself forward and opened my arms. A light from me blinded him and he recoiled.
"What the—" Wren gasped, but he was gone. She ran to Tracey.
I knelt on the other side of her and reached inside. The poison was flowing throughout her entire body. There was a glazed look in her eye and her body began convulsing in a seizure. Her head was thrown back and her body lifted off the ground. When her eyes met mine, I knew she saw me. Wren had no idea I was there. I was invisible to her, but it didn't matter. Tracey's blood saw the thread in me, the same one that had been in her sister and mother before that. I felt her mother's essence battling to get back into me. It wanted to rejoin the Immortal, but it couldn't. It was still locked inside of Pete, but Tracey saw that too.
"Mom?" Her eyes were white around them.
"Tracey, honey, don't go. Stay with me." Wren patted her cheeks.
"You," she gasped. Her tongue got stuck and she repeated the word over and over. Her throat was convulsing at the same time. Her eyes locked onto mine. I couldn't look away.
Wren lifted her head and looked around. Sounds of battle filled the air now. Wolves growled. They whelped. They screamed.
My eyes couldn't leave Tracey's in that moment, so I went into her. My empathic nature shifted and separated from the Immortal. I felt her fear, but I also felt her yearning. She wanted her family back. She loved Wren, but she had returned because of me. I was connected to her sister and she wanted her back. The love she had for her sister and mother was blinding. It brought tears to my eyes. Before I left her, I took some of the fear from her. She calmed and her body lay back down on the ground.
Wren's fear subsided then.
My empathic side connected with the Immortal again and I reached inside of Tracey. I sucked the poison into my hand. Unlike the vampire, the poison bonded with me. It was from the essence of the Immortal and it wanted to be back with its master. When I stood back, Tracey was already healing. I watched as her strength sparked and built. Wren sat back and gaped in relief. Before long, both of them were looking at the other. No words were shared, but they turned as one and jumped at a passing werewolf.
I returned to Brown the next moment and found her bent over the deck's edge. She cast spell after spell below her. Werewolves had braved the treacherous terrain. They were slowly inching their way up. It wouldn't be long before they overcame us.
Brown groaned as she gritted her teeth. Magic sparked from her fingertips. One by one, werewolves fell, but then they got back on the cliff. It was as if she had never hit them. I snapped back to my human form and could feel their magic in the air. The Alpha was keeping them from falling to their deaths.
"Brown," I said.
She gasped. "They won't die. Why won't they die?"
Each spell she sent to them was powerful, but the Alpha's was even more so. My eyes shifted into the Immortal's and then I was able to see through the darkness below. A net had been strung up below them, made of magic. When the wolves were hit by Brown, they fell, but bounced back up. They bounced to a higher place.
She was helping them.
I laid a hand on her arm. "Stop."
"I can't. They keep coming."
"His magic is stronger than yours. He put up a net below them. They can't fall through it."
"How do we break it?" Brown wanted to help. I felt the need in her. It was strong. Tears filled her eyes. "I need this, Davy. I need to help. I need to be useful for once. All my life, everyone's laughed at me. I'm tired of it."
I nodded. "Instead of hitting the wolves, shoot below them. I think your magic can undo the net. The wolves will fall then."
She clamped her mouth shut and turned. Her shoulders were square. And she concentrated with everything she had. She drew up a spell stronger than she had ever imagined. It came out from the depths of her magic and built at a furious rate. I stood back, slightly awed at the gift Brown had. If this was what she could do now, I wondered what she could do when that box was broken in pieces.
"Tres all conte, break the binds he has made. Break the net to fall free. Tres all conte, tres all conte, tres all conte, break the binds he has made. Break the net to fall free. Tres all conte," she repeated. As the power built in her, she narrowed her eyes and the magic blasted from her. The net burst into flame the next moment. It singed the air and crackled. As it fell, the sounds faded. Then a smug look came over Brown's face.
I grinned and stood back. The wolves didn't stand a chance against her.
"
Davy
!" Gavin shouted at me. I whirled.
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX
When I flashed to Roane and Gavin, I saw the Alpha in mid air. He was lunging with his massive jaw open and ready to tear into Roane, who stood with his back to him. He was facing Gavin, who had another wolf lunging at him.
"No!" I thrust my hands up. Everything stopped in that moment. Both wolves froze in mid-air. Only Roane turned to me.
I walked towards the wolf that was ready to pull Gavin's spine out. After a jerk to the fur underneath his neck, I knew the wolf would fall on the ground. Then I went to the Alpha and stood there.
"No—" Roane started.
I snapped my fingers and time started again. Pete's jaw closed around me instead of Roane.
"No!" I heard Gavin yell in the distance, but I closed my eyes. I felt Pete's surprise, but it didn't matter. He tried not to clamp his teeth together, but everything happened so quickly. He couldn't stop in time. I wanted all my Immortal power to burst within him. I wanted it to be like a bomb. And I wanted to take back Talia's mother's essence. She belonged to me. She wanted to be with me and I wanted to take her with me. As the Immortal's energy built up, I felt her beside me.
Pete struggled. He knew what had happened and was trying to take it all back. He was trying to open his jaw and unclench what he had accidentally swallowed. It didn't matter. He wasn't the Immortal, though he thought he was. I saw that now. The Mother Wolf had told him that he was the Immortal. He had the essence therefore he was the one all the prophecies foretold.
He had been wrong. He could feel it now.
For a split second, I looked up and saw Talia's mother. Her hair was red like her daughter's and flowed back. Her black dress billowed beneath her hair and blue eyes flashed at me. She smiled and I heard her thoughts, '
It is time for my energy to join the rest. He is not to blame. What was put in him was not his fault or his inspiration. He has been led astray in many ways.'
It didn't matter. Pete meant to hurt someone I loved. Her pleads wouldn't save him. I pushed forward and let the Immortal explode within him. When it sparked, he reeled backwards and tried to spit me out of his mouth. It didn't matter. I wanted this to happen. It needed to happen. The Alpha's body twisted and convulsed round and round. He tried everything to get me out, but I held firm and then the explosion happened. When it did, his jaw snapped open and I was flung from it. Talia's mother and her essence went with me. She had joined the Immortal and was at peace. As we were thrown in the air, her eyes closed. She laid her hands on her chest and melted away. Then I felt her join the Immortal.
We landed on the ground a few feet away. Pete was flung across the hill. Roane and Gavin had fallen back too. I was beside them before they awakened.
A sudden tingling on my neck made me look over. Pippa stood above Pete's body. She watched him. Somehow she knew what had happened, though I didn't know how. I didn't care at that moment.
I stepped towards her. "Let him be."
"He loved her," she wrung out. Her eyes didn't leave his form as he lay on the ground, writhing in pain.
I watched as she knelt at his feet.
"He's not the same, Pippa," I warned her.
It didn't matter.
She shook her head and ran a finger over his forehead. "No matter what he's been told, he loved her. He's lost Emily as well as the trust he had in Mother Wolf. You don't understand the betrayal he's feeling." She looked up with tears in her eyes. "He was supposed to become my mate. She changed that. She changed everything."
Pippa closed her eyes. The wolf spirit within her went into him. I closed my eyes and followed. Where I went, I wasn't expecting what I saw. The two were pups again and they were playing in a field. Pippa tripped him with her large paws and Pete grinned crookedly, tongue hanging out as he bounded towards her. He stumbled over his own paws, but the two rolled over each other in the grass. Though in wolf form, their joy was evident. Both grinned and whimpered in excitement until the air cooled. They stopped in the next second and lifted their heads to gaze at the far corner of the woods.
An older woman in black garb floated out of the trees. She held a long arm with a finger pointed to them. As a spell started to spew from her mouth, I lunged at her. Black eyes widened and whirled to me before I fell on her. All her battles were won or lost through words and magic. I grinned in enjoyment as I wrapped both hands around her neck and lifted her head free. The fight was over. Her body slumped to the ground, both pups breathed in relief, and her head melted in my hands. It became a puddle of black gunk and I dropped it in disgust.
I felt Pippa's approval, but was back in my real form the next moment. She was still bent over his body. The air sizzled with relief instead of despair and I breathed more lightly.
Roane grasped my elbow and frowned. "What just happened?"
"I have no idea." I smiled at him. "But I think it was good."
He cast a concerned look at the two wolves. "Are you sure?"
"It's for the best. I promise."
Pippa looked up now. She brushed tears away. "Everything's better now. She can't touch him again."
"Mother Wolf?"
She jerked her head up in a nod. "That was her inside him. She was trying to come back in and fix him. She underestimated you." A laugh sputtered from her. "Who knew you could do that? You stopped her, Davy. Thank you."
Pete still lay on the ground unconscious. He had curled into a fetal position.
"Is he going to be okay?"
Pippa shook her head. "I have no idea, but I'll take him back with me."
"To school?" Alarms went off in my head. If Emily went back there too, how would that go?
"No." A grave look entered her eyes. "I'll take him back to my family. I won't be returning to Benshire again."
"Huh?"
"I come from the old wolves. We want to remain hidden. We don't want to war against the vampires. We'll never win. That was her agenda for the last hundred years, but now that the Alpha doesn't exist anymore, we'll make our stand. You shouldn't have to worry about us anymore."
When she turned to leave with a determined glint in her eyes, I was taken aback. There was fierceness in the female wolf that I'd never witnessed before. She was like a new person, but one that I already respected.
"How are you going to move him?" But as I asked, the words died in my throat. Wolves emerged from the shadows surrounding us. Their green eyes glowed in the night. I jerked forward, but Roane caught my arm. He pulled me back.
He murmured in my ear, "They're allies."
"How do you know?"
"She called them."
"Pippa?"
I whirled back to where she was greeting one of the larger wolves. He had shaggy grey fur. His old age was evident, but his eyes looked through me. In wolf form, he towered over Pippa. He would've stood a foot higher than even the Alpha's wolf form. As more wolves moved to the unconscious wolf, a sense of ancestry filled in the air. I felt it surrounding us and knew it came from them. They were old, wise, and strong.
I was grateful that they had chosen the side they had. If we had gone against them, I wasn't sure who would've won.