Chapter 40

 

 

Everything went still. Bodies froze, and the last few hounds dropped to the ground in pools of coppery blood that made my throat tighten and saliva pool in my mouth. Had Brannigan said transition? And what was he going on about with all the magic warnings?

I should probably have listened to him, but ah well.

“Dean?” I whimpered, blinking fast to try and clear my eyes. He’d stopped grunting in pain, had stopped making sounds at all. I knew Hugh was nearby, but I couldn’t hear him breathing, and Edison and Slasher had gone silent, too. “What did you do to my mates, you hippie psycho?” I screamed into the whirling blurriness around me.

I pushed against the blood-drenched ground, grinding my teeth, and hissed when they sliced through my bottom lip, sharp as my wolf surged against my skin.

“I froze them, obviously,” Vivian replied, her footsteps loud in the sudden silence, her sensible heels scraping against stone.

I needed to get off the floor, and fucking quick.

“And why do you want me dead again? I think I missed that part,” I rasped, breathless as I shoved my upper body off the ground, the world spinning. Fuck, I was a mess. I blamed Ivelle for this. If I’d never come to Blake Hall, I wouldn’t be sick and dizzy and about to be murdered right now.

I decided there and then to help the Discard Society take down Blake Hall, purely out of spite.

Sharp-nailed fingers twisted in my hair, and I gasped in surprise as I was wrenched to my feet, struggling to get them under me as I almost fell.

“You were supposed to die in the first trial,” Vivian hissed, clearly put out that I was still alive. Well, that made two of us. I wanted her dead fucking yesterday.

“Boo hoo,” I spat, gritting my teeth when everything went sideways around me. Nope, that was just me almost falling as vertigo hit for no reason. “I’m still alive; what are you gonna do about it?”

I shoved her, but did she let go of me? Nope. Did she budge even a little bit? Nope. Did she get smeared with hellhound blood? Yep. I’d take the little victories where I could.

But that was my blood. Mine . I bared my teeth and hissed, deep and throaty and—I froze.

That … wasn’t a growl.

Oh, no. Transition . Like a vampire transition?

“I’m going to do what I should have done when you refused to drown in the rapids,” Vivian growled deep in her throat. “Get rid of you my fucking self. Sabotage and curses are all well and good, but nothing beats carving out someone’s heart with your own claws.”

“I’m having a moment here, jeez,” I huffed. “Can’t you see I’m revelationing? I think I’m a damn vampire.”

“You’re an abomination,” she snarled, right in my face. Ugh, her breath tasted like scrambled eggs and weed.

“Huh. Didn’t take you for much of a stoner, Viv, I gotta say.”

The only upside to being out of it and dizzy and possibly in vampire transition? My smartass mouth hadn’t gone anywhere. The chances of talking myself out of this were pretty slim, though. Especially as Viv tightened her grip on my hair and tugged me so suddenly I fell against her. Tina sank right into her side. Ooopssssie. Totally unplanned.

She screamed, more in rage than pain, and brought her fist down on my hand so hard Tina was knocked to the floor.

Noooooo, my baby…!

“I had to take the edge off somehow,” Vivian spat in my face. No really, spittle landed on my cheeks, and I gagged. “Being around you made me physically sick.”

“Could’ve just … killed me in our lessons,” I pointed out, trying to get purchase on the ground as my psychotic magic tutor dragged me away from the door in the mountain—she’d given up on getting me inside then?—and away from my mates. Nothing good would happen when she got me alone. Although with everyone frozen, it felt like I was pretty alone now.

No one was coming to save me, and that hurt. I had to woman up and save myself, even if I felt like complete shit and I was probably going to be sick.

“Ivelle would have sacked me,” she dismissed. “Until you arrived, I actually liked my job. Which is why you have to die during the trials, so it can’t be linked to me. And why all your mates have to die, too, so no one can tell my boss what I’ve done. She’ll never know,” she added smugly, and grunted when I fell into her as my boots snagged on a crater in the ground. “And then I’ll have my dream job back.”

“Your dream job is teaching magical losers how to not be criminals? Wow ,” I drawled.

And regretted it when Viv whipped around and grabbed my throat, throwing me against the side of a mountain so hard my brain shook inside my skull.

Woah, the sky was swirly.

Vivian spat in my face. Actually spat.

“Great, now I need a tetanus shot,” I muttered, not learning from past mistakes one little bit.

A fist slammed into my stomach so suddenly and painfully, I cried out, curling over myself and nearly toppling to the floor. Only the mountain at my back kept me upright. I wanted Slasher’s arms wrapped around me, and wanted to snuggle into Hugh. Fuck, I hoped my mates were okay. What about Dean, who’d been whimpering? Had he stopped because Vivian froze him, or because he was…?

No.

Fuck no. Fuck that.

“If you’d died in the woods,” Vivian hissed, grabbing my throat again and slamming my skull into the stone, “I would have let you die quickly, staked by the wooden cage.”

“But now you’ll drag it out?” I guessed. “You want to enjoy it.” I laughed. “We’re not so different, you and I.”

Except Vivian was in full health, and I felt like my stomach had been run over by a stampede of whatever killed Mufasa, my head was spinning, and the blood sprayed all over the rock smelled really fucking good.

“We’re nothing alike!” she screamed, and I flinched away from the eardrum-bursting noise. “We’re nothing alike. You … you’re a freak. Nobody wants you here. No one will miss you.”

“Tell that to my mates,” I muttered, her attempt to hurt me sliding like rain off an umbrella. Before I’d come to Blake Hall, ironically, that would have struck deep, but I wasn’t alone anymore. I had mates who loved me, who fought for me and with me. Viv was bullshitting.

Orrrr she was projecting.

“Who’ll miss you, huh, Viv? Who’s gonna cry at your funeral? Will your mum and dad miss you? You got any brothers or sist—fuck.”

She hit me so hard that I felt something crack. But my wolf rushed up and pushed through my skin while I reeled, protecting me from the break by shifting. My human scream twisted into a wolf roar, so much louder, deeper.

“Don’t you dare talk about my brother,” Vivian screeched, her lip curled back. Magic slashed through the air when she punched my side, and I collapsed to the floor with a yelp of pain. “You know nothing about him.”

I remembered the photos on the walls of her classroom, my memory as blurry as my vision as I panted hard through the pain. So she had brother issues. Good to know. Didn’t help me when I couldn’t talk, but good to know.

“He’d still be alive if it weren’t for you,” she seethed, drawing her boot back to kick me ruthlessly in my ribs.

I pushed away from her, weaker on paws than I’d been on hands and feet, but my wolf growled defiantly, refusing to give up. Power thrummed through my bones, as sharp and bright as lightning, but without an incantation—or, y’know, being able to speak—I couldn’t use it to heal myself.

How the fuck had I killed her brother? Oh, wait. I was a hitlady. I probably killed him for doughnut money.

“You shouldn’t even exist,” she seethed, her nostrils flaring. It wasn’t her best look, all splotchy and crazy-eyed. She flicked her hand and a long, silver baseball bat formed in her fist. Aw, fuck.

Come on, magic, make me supersized. Now would be a really good time to shift from my black wolf to my massive silver, glowing form. I could just eat her. I was sure she’d give me indigestion, but it would be worth it just for her to stop ranting about my gall to exist.

I gave her a look that said, tough shit, I do exist, now live with it, and scrambled to my feet, my joints threatening to collapse and send me back to the floor in one false move. But at least my vision was clearing. The silver lining was more dingy charcoal, but it was a lining, and I was thrilled to have it.

Vivian’s lips curled back from sharp, canine teeth, her green eyes flashing. “You’re an abomination. You ruined everything , but I won’t let you ruin my pack, too. If word gets out that we sired another dual, we’ll be shunned. Exiled.”

I blinked.

Another. They’d sired another . She was the first, which meant … I was the fucking second.

Ohhhhh, so she was the family member trying to kill me. Not Aunt fucking Denise or my dickhed cousins. But this random woman I’d never even met before Blake Hall.

“You don’t even know, do you?” She laughed, a twisted sound, and swung her bat without warning.

My paws skittered across the ground as I jumped aside, but not fast enough to avoid the crunch of my back paw under ruthless metal. I cried out, a broken welp that I failed to trap between clenched teeth, and dragged myself away. Pain made the tiny bit of vision I had vanish into a void, and I panted through the agony, flicking my ears for her footsteps and the whoosh of the bat through the air.

I was fucked. I was dead.

Killed by a family member I never knew existed, to protect a pack I didn’t give a shit about. And all so they wouldn’t be looked down on for siring a dual-blood?

Really? Fucking really?

Everything came back to this: fear of other people’s opinions. It was why I’d been shoved to the back of the Falcon line the second everyone realised I was a dud. It was why Ana let Kyle get away with horrific beatings. It was why Edison had been cast out of his family.

“You,” Vivian snarled, the air shivering around her and brushing over my fur. Not good—whatever she was building up to was not fucking good, “Are my brother’s bastard heir. That witch mother of yours corrupted him. She made him fall in love with her, convinced him to risk fucking everything for her, and then broke him when she died.”

Footsteps scraped the stone, and I stumbled back, disoriented and blurry, every breath coming short and sharp as I anticipated her next move.

“And then last year he found out about you . And instead of being disgusted at you like any sane fucking person, he wanted to meet you. He was going to leave us.”

I fell back a step, surprised as hell. I couldn’t form the words, but they shone in my eyes as I stared into the blurs around me.

You killed him.

“I had to!” Vivian screamed, completely psycho. “He was going to leave us!”

Well, this brought new meaning to if I can’t have you, no one else can . Fuck. This crazy woman really killed her brother so he wouldn’t track down his illegitimate kid?

I didn’t know how I felt about that. About having a dad who wanted to meet me. Who was now dead. Something crumpled behind my ribs, but I was already in so much pain and absolutely fucking terrified for my mates it didn’t really register.

The air shifted, a low sound cutting into my senses, and I jumped—the wrong way.

I screamed, my wolf vocal chords struggling to form the sound as unyielding metal rammed into my side. Blood, thick and sharp, coated every one of my senses until I tasted it on my tongue.

I tried to go with the flow as a low, rolling growl formed in my throat, and hunger rose so suddenly that I couldn’t breathe.

So I wanted blood as badly as I wanted mocha cappuccinos now, no big deal.

It’s my blood, I wanted to shout at my dumbass vampire self.

Still growl-hissing, I stumbled and smacked into the mountain. I was going to pass out, right on the damn verge, but I gritted my teeth and held on.

What would Viv do when I was gone? What would she do to my mates? She’d said they had to die so she could keep her damn job. No way in exercise-infested-hell was I going to let that happen.

I felt for my magic, that core of lightning and frantic energy, and tugged hard, praying I knew enough now to do wordless magic like Edison could. I hadn’t used a spell in the trial when we were nearly hanged, and I’d shifted to my supersized wolf then.

It was the only hope I had left.

But the next hit didn’t come from the baseball bat; magic slammed into me like a fucking semi truck, and I screamed, my wolf voice twisting it into a pitiful whine.

Something cracked in my ribs, and I felt the rush of blood inside me as I bled.

Power trickled from the well at my core, and I frantically commanded it to heal me, or to make me strong, or to kill Vivian— anything . Lightning spread like fire through my insides, making my fur stand on end, and I caught my breath in hope, but pain consumed me in the next second.

Magic hit my jaw, rupturing through my skull and down my throat, and I whimpered, the magic inside me rushing in a panic and doing absolutely nothing .

Could I not command it in wolf form?

Fuck, I was going to die. Actually, genuinely, for good.

I wanted a pink gravestone, with a pegasus carved on it. And glitter. Ooh, and spikes! Why didn’t people put spikes on graves more often?

“You were going to take him from me,” Vivian muttered, talking to herself at this point.

I blinked hard, trying to get my vision to form a blurry glimpse or shadow I could use to fight back. I was starting to suspect Viv had blinded me with a spell, because all I could see was pitch, onyx, jet, and ink. My favourite colour scheme turned against me. The betrayal stung, but not as badly as my magic as it crackled through my insides and brushed my internally bleeding bits.

The scream that tore up my wolfy throat wasn’t because of Vivian this time, but because an inner cataclysm of heat, light, and fury sent me to my belly in the dirt. My fur buzzed, my teeth on edge as power met blood and turned to crimson fire.

So this was how I would die. Burned from the inside out by my own blood.

“No,” Vivian breathed, her voice distorted by my fucked-up hearing. Ugh, my senses were getting worse, the dizziness was raging and—

Cut out all at once.

What?

No, seriously—what?

My blood boiled, and another scream tore up my throat as my whole body was set alight from the inside. I couldn’t feel my injuries over the bubbling, noxious mess in my veins, and even my bonds grew dull and quiet.

“You little bitch ,” Vivian snarled, so loudly I jumped to my paws and skittered back.

Hey, I was on my feet. And my feet didn’t hurt. I was loving this new direction. Yay for non-hurty feet. Paws. Whatever.

I dragged my eyes open, and blinked at the mossy mountains on either side of us. She’d kicked me away from my mates and that door she’d been obsessed with me opening, and now we were all alone, shadows dappling the austere path. And darkening my magic-tutor-slash-aunt’s murderous expression.

She was looking a little worse for wear, sweat sticking her blonde hair to her head and her face splotchy, blood running from her nose and ears. Ooh, had she used too much magic at once? How nice would it be if that killed her?

Ugh, please. Let her mind be cooked to mush inside her skull. If there’s actually a god in the world, let her brains be soup.

I took several steps away from my psycho tutor when her eyes narrowed with rage, my fur bristling at the feeling of magic, and—

Um, hi? Could someone tell me why my paws were red? Red! Deep, blood-red crimson fur covered my legs when I glanced down, streaked with black and silver, like my two wolves had merged together with this new … red wolf.

How many did I have? And more importantly, why didn’t I have a pink wolf? I wanted to be candyfloss coloured, cute, and fuzzy, dammit.

Although I’d take scarily red and fuzzy. Especially when I flexed my paws on the stone, and razor claws shot out of them, as big as knives. Nice.

I rose to my full height—and kept rising until I loomed over Vivian even a few paces away. I hoped she was terrified. Hoped she knew I was going to crunch down on her bones and tear her limb from limb.  

“What’s wrong with you?” she sneered, stalking towards me.

I took a step back—and then reminded myself I was a total badass, and matched her steps with a deep, threatening rumble in my throat. She’d hurt my mates. She’d summoned those vultures, and then the hellhounds. She was the reason the men I loved were bleeding.  And now I felt three steps away from death rather than one, I was going to make her fucking pay for it.

Shift , I growled at her, baring my teeth in a threatening, wolfy grin.

She scoffed, flicking her fingers through the air in a complex shape.

Fine. Guess she was too cowardly to face me in her wolf form.

I tugged on the magic crackling in my core—a mutating mass of lightning and fire, blood and power—and wrapped a shield around myself with a very pointed build a shield, make her yield . The last thing I needed was to do magic without an incantation, and sure I made the damn thing up, but at least it rhymed.

Red light wrapped around me in a bubble, and I snorted as Vivian’s spell bounced right off it.

I was a complete badass, I was invincible, there would be ballads written about me and sung in all the pubs and—

Her next spell sliced through my shield and sent me flying down the path. My ass scraped the ground as I skidded five meters, and fuuucccck that was one hell of a friction burn.

I whimpered, but it didn’t stop me stumbling back to my paws, anger making me stubbornly determined now. I coaxed another rush of magic, blood, or whatever the hell overflowed my inner well, and ordered, draw her blood, and make it good.

She evaded the spell easily, which was rude. I wanted to see her bleed. Fuck , I really wanted to see her bleed. My mouth watered, a deep snarl curling my lips off my teeth, and I drooled, a nice gob of it dripping onto the stone.

Gross. I was self aware enough to admit that was disgusting.

But I could smell her blood now, could sense it pounding through her, filling her veins, and I shuddered, hunger cramping my belly. If I’d had any doubt that I’d become a witch-wolf-vampire, wanting to drink my enemy’s blood would probably have tipped me off.

Drawing blood? Absolutely. Playing with it to make pretty pictures? Completely normal. Drinking it? Um. Help.

I was so distracted by the rumble in my belly and how damn good her blood smelled—and how I could feel it throb through her throat even from several metres away—that a rope of deep brown magic slashed across my back and took me by surprise. My legs trembled as weight pressed on my furry red spine, wanting me to collapse.

Fuck this, I growled at myself—and chuffed a laugh when power erupted from the well of magic at my core, blasting through the magic weighing me down. Okay, that was my favourite incantation yet.

I grabbed hold of the power that shot from me, baring my teeth in a wolfy grin as I shaped it into a massive hammer and bonked Vivian’s head with it.

A low, rumbling laugh shook my chest when she toppled over. I made sure to form the hammer of solid steel. Well, steel-like magic. You know what, I didn’t know how it worked, and I didn’t care. I only cared that Vivian’s head cracked open and her brains spilled out.

I panted against a sudden cramp in my stomach, taking confident steps down the path. With another burst of power, I grabbed my steel-magic hammer and smashed it down onto my crazy aunt again, and again, and again. She wouldn’t try to kill me again, wouldn’t catch my mates in the crossfire again. Wouldn’t kill another of my trialists, either.

People had died, and all because she wanted revenge on me for something that hadn’t actually happened. My absent father could have tracked me down, and I could have hated him. I could have wanted nothing to do with him. But she hadn’t even given me that chance; her brother had expressed a tiny bit of interest in me, and she’d fucking killed him.

I brought the hammer down especially hard on her throat and watched it collapse. That was for him, the dad I never met because of her. That would hurt, I knew, when the pain and adrenaline wore off. I’d had a dad, for however long he’d known about me, and then he’d been killed, because of me.

Maybe I’d track down his pack. I didn’t give a shit if it got them exiled; I existed, and they could live with it. I might have more family, maybe another aunt who wouldn’t try to kill me.

Even in wolf form, my throat closed up at the thought of having a family who wanted me. I had my mates, and I loved them, and I had friends now, but family … it was a gaping hole, something I’d been missing ever since I lost Ana. Nothing and no one would ever replace her, and I’d stab them if they even tried, but it would be nice to have family again.

Sounds of movement echoed off the mountains ahead, and I whipped my head up—blinking at how small everything looked since I was fucking huge.

I growled a warning at whatever enemy was coming for me now, ready to smash more brains onto the rocky path.