Chapter 14

The EMT's didn't understand why Ben started thrashing when they pulled Jasmin away from him, but it only took them a second to realize he calmed down as long as she was touching him. They let her stay as they pushed Rachel and me further back so they could get some kind of power tool close enough to cut him free.

By that time a crowd was starting to gather. The owner of the Funcade was among the watchers and I could tell he was thinking 'dead boy' and 'lawsuit' with about equal frequency.

As the ambulance drove away with Jasmin and Ben in it, Rachel handed me her phone. A short while later Mom blessed our trip to the hospital and Rachel and I were on our way.

The hospital was just waiting followed by more waiting. About midnight Mom called Rachel's phone and told me she'd be excusing me from school the next day. I managed to get permission to stay a little while longer so I could find out what Ben's surgeons said and then went back to waiting.

About a quarter to one I got one of the better surprises of my life. I was lying back in a fairly uncomfortable chair when I heard familiar footsteps. As I opened my eyes Alec pulled me up into his arms.

"You're back!"

"I'm so glad it wasn't you."

"Me too, but I'm worried about Ben. He's been in there for hours and nobody will tell us anything."

Alec nodded and pulled his phone out. "Let me see what we can do about that."

While Alec stepped away to make his call I noticed that Jasmin was awake. Once the doctors had put Ben under there hadn't been any need for her in the operating room so she'd been relegated to the waiting room with the rest of us. She'd curled up on a couch and closed her eyes.

"Hi, Jasmin. Alec is going to see if he can get us an update."

"Doesn't matter."

"What do you mean? We've all been going crazy out here wondering what was going on."

"He's going to survive. I couldn't stop him from falling, not without revealing what I was. I had a second to choose and I chose to obey Alec's orders. I let him fall. I kept him from being impaled through the chest, but in the end it doesn't matter."

"You're not making sense. Of course it matters. You saved his life."

"I saved his life, but addicted him to my touch."

"So? He's addicted to half a dozen other things. That hasn't stopped him from functioning. He'll go through rehab or whatever and get over it."

"It doesn't work like that. You don't know him. The things he can kick he avoids. Best case he'll never speak to me again. Worst case he'll follow me around like a puppy, only it won't be him, it will be the addiction."

I opened my mouth to try and offer comfort, but Alec was walking back over, Rachel a few steps behind him.

"Ben's stable. They've finished repairing the artery in his leg and they're just about done closing him back up."

Whatever Jasmin might have said was cut off by Alec's phone ringing.

"This is Alec."

For the first time in ages I was actually able to hear Donovan on the other end.

"Sir, you'll need to come home now. Your presence has been requested by the Coun'hij. Agony arrived about twenty minutes ago."

None of it made any sense to me, but the very way that Alec's voice became cold and uncaring told me things weren't okay.

"Have they hurt anyone yet?"

"That is a relative concept. Nobody has been…permanently damaged."

"Do what you can to guide Isaac and James through the minefield. I'll be home in ten minutes."

Alec slammed his phone shut and turned to Jasmin. "We're leaving now. Rachel, take Adri home and then meet us back at the estate. Don't dawdle, but call when you're still a couple of minutes away so we can send out an escort. We can't afford a misunderstanding."

Alec's phone was ringing again, but he ignored it, turning to me as he dug a business card out of his pocket. "You have to do exactly what I tell you. Go home and stay with your mom. If she's going to be gone for more than a few hours then call this number and ask the person on the other end to give you a ride into town. Stick to places with crowds as much as possible."

"I don't understand. What's going on?"

Rachel's phone was vibrating now, but Alec refused to be distracted.

"Adri, focus. This is important. Don't spend any time alone that you don't have to. If necessary lie to your mom. If you can somehow convince her to take a weekend down in Vegas or up in Salt Lake, all the better. This is the whole reason I've tried to keep you in the dark. With any luck they'll decide you are a non-combatant and choose to leave you alone rather than suck you deeper into a world you're not supposed to know about."

Rachel held her phone up. "Alec, it's Donovan. He says to tell you that Adri's been specially requested."

"Damn it."

I still didn't know what was going on, my mind was spinning like a bunch of stripped gears, but I was pretty sure I'd never heard Alec swear before. I followed the others out to Rachel and Alec's cars in something very near a daze. A shaking Rachel threw Jasmin her keys and then climbed into the back seat of Alec's Porsche.

Alec had his phone back out. He was talking to someone named Shawn, but I didn't even try to follow the conversation. I'd had too many shocks in too short of a time. Rachel was putting on a brave face but I could tell she wasn't holding up a whole lot better.

As we rounded the last couple of bends before the estate, Alec closed his phone again and turned to me.

"Rachel has an idea how things are going to go down. She's been preparing for this her whole life. Whatever you think you're getting into, though, it's going to be worse than you could possibly expect. Don't speak unless spoken to, don't volunteer any information you don't have to when they do ask you questions, and stay near one of the hybrids. Jasmin will do in a pinch. I'll do everything I possibly can to keep you both alive."

There were two huge guys waiting outside Alec's house when we arrived. I didn't recognize either of them, but there was no mistaking the low-level buzz of shape shifter energy. Jasmin pulled up a second later in Rachel's car.

Alec led us up to the newcomers. "Agony requested our presence, take us to him."

"Right. You know my favorite thing about going out on visits with Agony?"

The shape shifter who had spoken was a black guy with dreads and facial piercings who looked like he could have given Brandon a run for his money in an arm wrestle.

"I don't particularly care why you do what you do, Abaddon. Mostly it just matters that you've chosen to do so."

"Ah, Graves. You're too much like your dad. That's the beauty of things though. You pissant pack leaders all start out so high and mighty, but by the time we leave you always bow and scrape just like you're supposed to."

Alec's fists went white. Whatever he might have said was interrupted by Jasmin.

"I find it equally interesting that someone of your breeding would abandon the position of his pack to go fawn over the Coun'hij. Did you lose any sleep when the Sacramento pack tore your friends apart?"

"Your girl's got a mouth on her, Graves. You should do something about that before she gets hurt."

Alec's smile highlighted the ice in his eyes. "Jasmin's as dominant as they come. She can say pretty much whatever she likes. If you want to call her on it be my guest, but you might want to do your job and get us to Agony before letting her rip your throat out."

Abaddon pointed at the door. "Oblivion, lead the way."

Oblivion looked like a recruitment poster for the Aryan Nations. Blond hair, blue eyes and a complicated web of tattoos up his arms that was oddly surreal. Oblivion looked at Abaddon for several seconds, as if to establish that he wasn't scared of the darker shape shifter, and then turned and opened the front door.

We went through the halls in a clump. Jasmin, then Rachel and I holding hands in a desire for communal reassurance, then Alec with Abaddon taking up the rear.

I'd spent weeks in the Graves manor and still didn't know all of it. We were quickly led to a sub wing I hadn't ever explored, and down three flights of stairs.

The room waiting at the bottom had been carved directly out of the rock the house had been built on. The lighting was provided by a series of candles and torches. The flickering illumination concealed almost as much as it revealed.

Alec took my hand as Abaddon moved around us to stand next to Oblivion. We were another few steps into the room before Alec's hand tightened around mine.

It took a second for my mind to process what I was seeing. Isaac and James were in the front of the group, both sporting a large collection of gashes. I had a split second to wonder how hard you had to hit a shape shifter to make them bruise like that and then my gaze moved on to the other members of the pack.

Jess and Dom had both shifted forms and their normally lustrous coats were heavily stained with blood. Further back, Jack, Alison and Sam had also shifted forms to reduce their vulnerability to attack. None of them had escaped without wounds either.

Andrew and Addison, Jess's father and James's mother looked less the worse for wear than anyone else, but were both trembling with fear. Everyone was scared, but the older pair looked as though they'd already seen this course of events play out and knew the ending was going to be ugly.

Standing almost to the very back of the group was Donovan. The old shape shifter was still in his human form, still unbowed, but the right side of his face was a mass of bruises and blood. The sight drew a gasp from me, but it was nothing on what I felt when I saw Alec's mother lying motionless behind Donovan.

I half started forward, but Alec's grip stopped me from completing the motion. Jasmin was suddenly at my side, between Rachel and me, her voice low. "She's still breathing. She probably freaked out when Agony arrived and had to be tranqed."

Alec pulled us forward until we stood in front of our friends, between them and a slender man who was distinctive in his lack of tattoos or piercings.

"I protest the treatment of my people, Agony."

"It's no less than you deserve for your disgraceful hospitality, young Graves."

"Had you informed us of your coming as tradition requires then you would have found a much different reception awaiting you."

Agony scanned through the pack, starting with Alec and seemingly ending with me. "Oh, but we did attempt to inform you. I had my man call that device you're so fond of. Each time he got a message that your phone was out of service. Once upon a time we would have relied on couriers to provide the necessary niceties, but with you younger leaders we've found modern means to be best."

"Far be it for me to dispute with the Coun'hij or abandon practices which have served our people well for so many years. Please let your fellows know that in the future I'm happy to receive notice via runner. Your man Abaddon, for instance, knows the way here now."

Abaddon moved forward as though to respond to the jab, but Agony stopped him with a gesture. "While that may indeed help avoid future misunderstandings, the fact remains that offense was given. You know our rights?"

Alec went utterly still for the barest instant. "You can demand punishment for those lesser members of the pack which created the offense. Those pack members may in turn demand trial by combat if they feel the punishment is unwarranted."

"Ah, yes. You're quite the scholar of tradition and law, much like your father was before you. It availed him little, much as I suspect it will prove a slight shield for you."

"Tradition and law is all we have as a people to separate us from the animals, all that allows us to constrain our beasts. Even the Coun'hij is bound by the strictures that bind the rest of us."

Agony's dismissive expression didn't fill me with reassurance. If he didn't hold with the laws Alec seemed to be relying on, then what hope did we have?

"I select your Donovan as the worst transgressor. His actions would have been bad enough from any of your people, but coming from one so lowly they were doubly insulting. I had thought I'd taught your mentor better on the occasion of my last visit. It appears the lesson needs to be refreshed."

A barely-perceptible stir of movement ran through the figures behind me as Agony's target was named. Donovan's graceful limp slowly brought him even with me as he moved towards the open space between Alec and Agony.

Despite Alec's order to keep my mouth shut I was halfway to protesting the situation, but Alec tapped my hand and then reached out and stopped Donovan.

"It's your right to demand his punishment, but he stands under my protection. As such, it is equally my right to stand in his place and demand trial by combat. Who will you name to oppose me?"

There was a growl from the cluster of figures behind Agony. For a moment I thought it would pass unremarked, but Agony's sadistic smile argued otherwise.

"I believe there is one among my party who has waited a long time for this opportunity. I trust, young Graves, that you remember Vincent?"