A trap? It’s my turn to laugh.
“This is supposed to impress me?” I shake my head, my wereform not allowing a full smile as I go on. “You do realize I have sorcerers of my own with me.”
Caine lurches down the first step, face morphing to wereshape. “You’re too late to stop us,” he snarls. “I am the one true king!” His pack shift nervously, and I wonder if he’s lost his mind and their loyalty.
Rupe’s grin is as evil, his eyes bulging as he focuses on Syd. As he speaks, I feel the thread of power between him and Caine and realize it’s not the Californian leader who has cracked.
“I hoped you’d come.” Rupe is clearly broken inside, his mind gone, though what caused the snap I have no idea. He was deluded and had a God complex the last time we met, but he wasn’t insane. Not that he showed me. The sorcerer who stands on the dais is no longer fully in control of his faculties.
Though he is, it seems, of his power. I feel it crush down on me, try to take me over again. But Syd is faster, her rainbow maji magic slicing through the rope of black he throws at me and mine.
Like this. She shows me what she’s done, how her power made a barrier. I try to emulate her, but without access to my sorcery, I fail.
I can’t, I send. I can use the elemental magic of the witches and the demon power, but I have no access. I fumble at my own magic with growing frustration.
Sorcery isn’t in you, she sends. It is you.
She leaves me to ponder that as she speaks.
“You’re done, Rupe.” Syd sounds sad mixed with angry. “I don’t want to kill you, but I will if you make me.”
He thumbs his nose at her, sticking out his tongue like a child even as the sorcery encasing the throne room tightens a notch. I feel darkness push outward, know the Steam Union are fighting him, but their number is far less than Rupe’s followers. Eva and her dozen or so members are hard-pressed to combat the now fifty odd Rupe has at his command.
This trap might not be so ludicrous after all.
“Caine was right about one thing,” Rupe says, hands jerking at the collar of his shirt. A bite mark scores his flesh, oozing blood, unnoticed against the black fabric until now. “But he was wrong about being king. I claim the throne of the werenation!”
Caine spins on him, snarling, crouching as he slips into wereshape. “That wasn’t our agreement.” Has he broken free of Rupe’s influence, or did the insane sorcerer release him? I have no way of knowing, but Caine suddenly is open to me, no longer shrouded by the dark sorcery binding him to Rupe. He tries to approach the throne, but is held back by a wall of darkness that ripples when he hits it.
The whole room sways as the werewolves are drawn into the power Rupe siphons, myself included. Syd tries to block him again, but I feel the pathways he spoke of, the old ones of my birth that tie me still to the Black Souls, open to the sorcerer. My power goes to him without a fight. I feel the pressure of the coercion field then, whispering to me, that I’m surrounded by enemies, the ones I came with here to enslave me. My only hope is with my wereking, Caine and the lord of all, Rupe. It would be so easy to fall, to allow these thoughts to win. But I am too far past the truth to let such magic defeat me.
The field isn’t strong enough to survive my determination. As I shake off the influence, I look around at my people, gazing with glazed eyes at the throne. Are we that weak minded, to be controlled by a film of magic? A glance at the sorcerers Rupe brought tells me we’re not the only ones he is stealing energy from, and realize the coercion field is merely a side-event to Rupe’s true intent.
Rupe sits slowly as his power increases, a huge, scary smile on his face. “All hail the wereking!”
Again, he crushes down on me, almost driving me to my knees, though his slippery attempt to take my mind fails. Syd grapples with him, but with his own sorcery and the power he’s stealing, pushes her back.
Her eyes meet mine. He can’t be infected, right?
I don’t know. It shouldn’t be possible, but who knows?
Her blue gaze bubbles with anxiety. I can’t free you, she sends. You’re going to have to learn to do it yourself. She shows me a dark flower, the blossom beneath her. I’ve heard her describe it that way before, but never experienced it, at least not like this. You see it?
I do. I feel it, too. But when I try to create the same in me, my sorcery slips out of my control.
The power is you, Syd sends, repeating herself, and as Rupe crushes down harder on me, I finally understand. I’m reaching for something I already have, trying to find a magic right here, and in searching am missing the point. There’s nothing to find. Only something to call on.
My wolf chuffs as she shifts inside me, magic gaping and a rush of black power surges outward. The controls Rupe holds over me shatter and fall away as dark magic pools at my feet, wavering like wind-swept grass.
Rupe’s eyes bulge as he glares at me, Syd’s voice in my head ringing like a battle cry. Well done!
I take a step forward, my sorcery crawling around me as I glance from side to side at the people who have come to fight. The witches, vampires and weres will have no protection, can serve as a source of power to Rupe if this goes on much longer. I must act before they can be harmed.
This is my war to win.
I take another step forward. “In case you weren’t aware,” I snarl, “you’re in my seat.”
Rupe’s narrowed eyes focus on me, his sorcery pushing against me, burrowing through to seek out the controls he’s lost. My wolf snaps at him and sends him running. Maybe I can force him to focus on me, to weaken his concentration and give the Steam Union a chance.
I don’t get a chance to find out if my plan will work. Caine howls in anger and throws himself at the shield protecting his former ally, bouncing away from it, sideways, toward Sage. My love screams in protest, his wolf body altering to wereshape as he flings himself at Caine. The two meet in mid-air, the thunderous crash of their coming together echoing through the throne room as their magic impacts at the same time.
Now! I send the thought to Syd, but she’s already acting, as are the Steam Union. I crouch and hurry forward, staying low and out of the way, as Syd’s magic batters the shielding around the throne. The were holding my grandfather is so stunned by the unfolding events, he barely registers my attack as I take him out with a solid blow to the side of his head. Oleksander’s power is blunted, I feel sorcery controlling him, so I use my own to shatter his chains and pull him out of the way, into the arms of waiting Gwendolyn and Finlay, Maks and Isabelle tight on their heels.
When I turn back, it’s to the sight of Sage pinned to the carpet, Caine’s wolf jaws descending to my love’s throat. I have no time to reach them, to save Sage. Caine was right after all.
I’m too late.
Sage! I scream in his mind, my magic the only part of me fast enough to close the distance, to show him what I’ve uncovered, discovered about myself, my sorcery. And in the split second between his coming death and his last moment of life, Sage’s mind breaks through the controls, seizing his dark power, and I feel him return to me.
Caine’s teeth close on empty air as Sage, human and thinking again, does the unexpected. He scoots sideways, out from under Caine’s body, twisting as he goes, legs locking around his opponent’s. I’ve seen this move, had Sage use it on me before in the dojo. Only this isn’t some marital arts training session, it’s life and death. And, I know Caine doesn’t stand a chance against this maneuver, now that Sage is back.
I’m not too late after all.
It’s Caine’s turn to howl as Sage strikes, extended claws slicing through the Californian’s shoulder and neck while a mist of black undulates beneath them, Sage’s sorcery drawing on Caine’s strength. Panting and still struggling despite the loss of blood, Caine reverts to human while Sage does the same.
“No!” Rupe’s scream takes my attention from my love and his success, to Syd pushing with relentless purpose through the shielding protecting the sorcerer. I’ve never seen her look so determined, or so full of the need to kill. The werewolves of my nation are falling to their knees as the coercive field fails. Eyes no longer glazed, they remain unable to fight, their very lives sucked away by Rupe, as are the sorcerers he made part of his trap. I focus on my sorcery, on the connection he has to all of them, and feel the embedded thread of darkness running under the floor of the throne room. It has many branches, like the sickening tentacles of a mythical kraken, drawing out the power of those it's tied to. I follow it back to the root, to the edge of the shield Syd forces herself against, and link with her.
She sees what I’ve discovered the moment our minds touch and, with my power tied to hers, slashes outward with the power of the maji, cutting the cord.
The whole room sighs, bodies hitting the floor, the sudden release and recoil of their magic sending the werewolves down, but the sorcerers flying backward.
Rupe’s scream of denial echoes in the huge room as he claws at the air around him, as though trying to pull the threads back. His body begins to morph into wereform, but I know immediately something is wrong with his transformation. Misshapen and incomplete, his limbs seem oddly bent, patches of baldness on his exposed flesh showing diseased skin. He leaps from the throne, personal wards still in place, still strong, though weakening now he has no one to feed them, shifting back and forth between horribly mutated werewolf and mad human.
The pressure is so powerful I clamp my hands over my ears, my fellow weres doing the same. Something must give or we will all rupture from the intensity of the two magicks coming together.
It’s Rupe’s that breaks, snapping back from Syd like a bungee cord severing under too much weight. She staggers, enough time for Rupe to spin, red face still clutched in madness, and run behind the throne. She runs after him, but I can feel his power sucking at the energy in the room and know he’s already gone.
The sorcerers he brought with him lay scattered, mostly unconscious, around the throne room. I cannot bring myself to feel sympathy for them as the werewolves of my pack begin to round them up.
I turn to run to Sage, relief making me giddy. And gasp as his smiling face turns to me, not seeing the hate in Caine as the injured Californian rises and lunges for my love.
I’m already throwing power at Caine, but Sage is in the way and I can’t risk hurting him. Too late, this time, I’m out of position and Sage is too slow to spin at the sound of Caine rising. Time slows. I’m locked in a well of inching seconds. Sage turning, Caine lashing out with sharp claws, the strength of the blow surely enough to remove my love’s head from his shoulders.
Three shapes—one white, one gray and a third black—streak across the carpet. The black wolf is fastest, slamming between Sage and Caine. Time snaps back into motion and I’m running already, grasping for Sage, shoving him out of the way, my own claws striking, taking Caine across the face with one paw, the other embedding itself up under his ribcage to grip his heart.
He gapes at me as I jerk the pumping muscle free and hold it in front of his dying eyes. He shifts to human, falling at my feet, blood pooling around my paws, his heart jerking two more beats in my hand before falling silent.
I look down, at the white wolf who is my mother, the gray who is my brother. I realize the third, the black shape who saved Sage, now lying in a river of running blood with his body cut almost in half, is my father.
I fall to my knees at his side, the white wolf whimpering as she licks his face. Raoul is human again, but when I reach for him with magic, I feel his wolf dying, unable to heal the massive injury. I’m crying, clutching at him, pushing power into him, but it’s not enough, will never be enough.
It’s only the power of the wolf that keeps him awake, aware, as he looks into my eyes. My grandfather joins me, kissing his son, weeping openly while Raoul tries to speak.
“Olena,” his voice is a wet, bubbling sound as his lungs fill with blood. “I did as you asked. Everything I did, I did to protect our children.” He meets my eyes. “Including taking the first chance I had to free Charlotte.”
Free me? And then, I understand, and I’m sobbing, a broken-hearted little girl who blamed her father for the wrong thing. I thought him a coward, without caн. But Raoul Moreau gave up his own honor in order to align me with Syd, to force me to bond with her.
“How did you know?” I bend over my dying father, tears mingling with his blood.
“No one ever,” he coughs, gasps, “stood against the Dumonts. Until her.” He twitches, the light in his eyes dimming. “If anyone could free you, it was Sydlynn. And her family. At least you would be with those of honor.”
I bow my head, heart squeezing tight with regret. So long I blamed him, held him in scorn. But he did what he did to save me.
Breath bubbles heavily in his chest. A normal would be dead by now. Though we’ve had our differences, and I’ve doubted his courage, my father saved me the only way he knew how. And now, he’s given his life to save my love when he could have let Sage die. For that, I will always be grateful. As I must be grateful I at least have a chance to say goodbye.
The wolf in me is that practical.
My father’s fingers rise, run through my mother’s fur, a tiny smile on his lips and love in his eyes. And then, his gaze glazes over and Raoul Moreau dies while the werewolves in the room howl over his loss.
***