Page 45 of Pack Rage (The Splintered Bond #4)

Chapter 44

Consuming Evil

GRIGOR

N o one in the clearing besides me knew what could happen when a powerful hybrid witch died. I’d killed dozens over the years, from weak ones who’d preyed on humans, to a coven who’d slaughtered the very last of the bear shifters in Russia for their pelts and power.

One like Elina McDonnell—who’d committed evil deeds for decades, who had sacrificed her own lover that very day for more—would still be filled with tainted energy for weeks or months after her death.

Unless someone consumed it.

My wolf side recoiled, remembering the ones we’d hunted before. The feral beasts who’d preyed on the innocent, and whose remaining power had needed someone to hold it, rather than let it seep into the land and end up feeding more evil.I didn’t want to be the one to swallow Elina’s death. Didn’t want to go to my little queen oozing residual corruption.

But already, Elina’s magic was leaching into the earth. If I didn’t act quickly, she would make an indelible mark on the packlands, situated as her corpse was at its very heart.

Its dead center, such as it was.

Though I tried to make light of the task ahead, my wolf still struggled as we moved to stand over the corpse. I’d never been particular about my meals, and I was hungry. But this whole battle had made me and my wolf sick at heart. I’d watched young girls fall under blades held by full-grown males. Watched unarmed women throw themselves over boys to save them from bullets the only way they could, with their bodies. Hundreds lay dead, dying, or grievously injured.

It made my stomach growl. The death that surrounded me, and not only Elina’s, was a lure to the darkness inside me.

I let myself look at Flor, her bright hair somehow still shining in the fading moonlight as Finnick embraced her. She was all that kept me sane now, if I could ever be called that. Her presence, her fierce goodness, kept me from drinking it all in, bloating myself on the darkness.

Night covered the battlefield, inky shadows stretching out from the trees. My brothers had begun to move around the clearing, calling out orders to the Mountain and Northern shifters, looking for any of theirs who might be saved, and beginning the terrible work of counting the dead.

As I hesitated, two or three lean wolves crept out of the shadows and slunk toward Elina’s still-steaming corpse. These were shifters who smelled of the old world, and who might know what lay at my feet. Power, going to waste, trickling into the earth.

I hissed them back into the forest, but eyes gleamed from the shadows, and the next few who ventured out of the tree line belonged to this pack. They were famished, their bones birdlike and cheeks gaunt, their spirits sputtering like half-blown candles. A few of the girls from the Mansion had been starved witches, and the sight of all the power she’d stolen from them was turning them feral. They seemed confused, uncertain what was drawing them toward the one who’d tortured them.

“Grigor, fix it,” Sergeant called out, stepping in front of the females. I narrowed my eyes at his command, but obeyed when Flor nudged me along our bond. I kicked Elina’s head closer to her body, then kneeled to press one hand to her cold face, the other to the closest part of her body I could touch, her arm.

This was going to… How did Flor say it? Ah, yes. This was going to suck.

I closed my eyes, needing to think of how best to do this. I was no longer immortal, and I was tied to my little queen as well as my brothers now. That meant I could not be careless, or cleaning up the witch’s mess could damage us all. I lowered my head, inhaled, and allowed the heavy weight of her stolen power to seep up my fingers, to my wrists, then elbows. It came sluggishly at first, then faster, like a mudslide flowing downhill, gathering speed. Coating everything it touched with a filth so deep, it was suffocating.

I kept drinking it in, packing it down, away from my bonds. It hurt, like drinking shards of glass mixed with burning liquid. Maybe because she was of my own bloodline? I wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter.

I didn’t matter. Only my mate, only that she was kept away from?—

Brother. The word was a command, and my eyes flew open. Brand stood in front of me, in his wolf form, the scars on his pelt and his eyes gleaming silver. You matter. You don’t need to do this alone. He nudged my hair with his enormous muzzle. This is what it means to be pack. To be family. Share your burden. He opened his mind to me and, before I could stop him, reached into me and grasped the thick sludge of contamination I had been consuming. His snout wrinkled. Eh. Tastes like shit.

I closed my eyes again. I wanted to laugh, but the pain was too sharp, the pressure of keeping Elina’s evil away from my center too intense—until he lifted his head to the moon and howled softly. Nearby, others began to howl as well. Flor, Glen, Finnick, Luke, all of them shifted into their wolves, wherever they stood on the battlefield, entered my mind, and took up the singing along with Brand.

Sing with us, brother, Luke murmured. He stepped up on my left, and Glen on my right, both of them taller than I was in this form. For the first time since my mother had died, I felt… protected. Finnick was behind me now, and Flor joined Brand, her dark red wolf like a drop of midnight blood, her eyes still blazing amber fires. She pulsed with power in perfect balance: the moon’s pure, clean light, and her own red rage that flowed from her wolf and through her five-armed scar, fueling me along with the rest. I was in awe of her, of the perfect balance between witch and wolf magic that she’d attained in the past few hours. She was a miracle, and she was, somehow, mine.

Sing with me, Grigor.

My heart raced. I was theirs as much as they were mine. Their pack. Their responsibility and their joy. I lifted my head and let loose a dark howl of my own.

The pressure eased, though the power was still sliding into me from where I touched the corpse, even faster now, as if it were being drawn from me at the same rate as it entered. Where was it— I gasped as it became clear. Brand was funneling it somehow, out of me and into the sky.

To the moon itself.

I gaped at him as his wolf glowed bright, turning silver, his howl so loud my ears ached. How was he doing this? My wolf trembled, not with fear, but awe. This was a holy moment.

When Brand’s howl died off at last, the earth around us was clean, and I was no longer tired. I felt energized, as if some of the power had remained inside me, but was purified now. Brand shifted into his human form, and the others did likewise, standing beside him as we all stared down at Elina’s remains.

Emotions swirled inside me, so many that I felt almost dizzy. The worst of them came from… Finnick. He was not dealing well with this.

Luke laid a hand on Finnick’s shoulder, and Flor laced her fingers with his. “You okay, Sparkles?” she asked gently.

His voice was raw. “Yeah. But I need to…”

Flor nodded to Luke.He understood immediately; Finnick didn’t need to see this. “We need to get the injured ones taken care of. Finn, come with me and Flor?”

Yes. Help Sergeant, and… get her some clothing , I thought at Finnick. He was stunned, his expression that of a lost soul. No one but us deserves to see her perfection.

A little of the desolation eased in his gaze. Agreed. If he realized that I’d wrapped a weak look-away spell around her nudity after she shifted, he didn’t speak of it. No one was allowed to see our glorious queen but us, and the task gave him a reason to leave the scene of his mother’s death.

The three of them moved toward the Mansion, until it was just Glen, Brand, and me who remained. No other shifters came anywhere near us, though that may have been because I was using a stronger look-away spell to keep from having to interact. No one spoke, until Glen finally said, staring down at Elina, “The fuck? ”

Brand made a disgusted sound. “My thoughts exactly.”

I blinked, confused. “No. No one should fuck that.”

I ignored the groans of the others as I nudged what was left of the witch with my toe. Her head lay on the ground, though the skull had been squashed, somehow. All that was left was the mummified skin of her face, her hair covering most of it. The body was a shriveled husk, her clothing more substantial than the remains.

Glen squinted at the mess and mumbled something that sounded like, “Flat as a pancake.” He wasn’t wrong. “Where’d they go?”

Brand just straightened and crossed his burly arms. I suspected he was trying not to let the way his stomach was churning show on his face.

Glen turned to me. “Where’d her bones go, Joaquin?”

I chewed at my lip while I checked for residual magic in the dust that spilled out of what was left of her face. Elina’s magic had been bone deep—removing all of it meant that I’d had to draw it out forcefully. Though if I was being honest, I hadn’t taken much care to leave her intact. I’d wanted her to be pulverized. “All her magic has been dispersed,” I assured Brand when he growled. He wasn’t glowing now, but I could still feel the thrumming of magic in him. “Given back to the moon.”

“Makes sense to me. She was bad to the bone.” Glen hummed a few lines of a song, for some odd reason. Had he sustained brain damage from the fight? Brand and I exchanged concerned looks.“You two worked together really well,” Glen went on, ignoring us. “What are you gonna do with the rest of her?”

The scraps of Elina really were clean, not a shred of magic or intent left. Safe to use, though Brand was a sculptor.

A sculptor , of course. I cringed. No wonder he was disturbed—I’d taken an artistic opportunity from him. “I apologize. I should have left some bones for you to carve.”

Glen chuckled, and Brand rubbed a hand over his beard. “Why would you think that I’d want to carve her bones?”

“Flor suggested we might participate in some kind of joint artistic effort with the bones I kept back at Southern.” I shrugged. “We could have made something to remember this night by as well. A souvenir.”

“You’re not serious.” A thought drifted through my mind. Not a single point of any fucking kind on his moral compass.

He wasn’t wrong, but perhaps he couldn’t see the possibilities. “I apologize for the lack of bones to carve. But there’s enough left to make a purse. I could even make a backpack.” The idea had merit. I wasn’t allowed to kill shifters indiscriminately anymore, which meant I might have more time on my hands than I was used to. “I might need a hobby of some kind,” I mused aloud. “I’ve never done leatherwork.”

Now Brand covered his whole face with both hands. “No. Just… no. Remember?” He pictured Finnick in his mind.

Ah, yes. Of course. “I apologize again.” I sent a burst of magic toward the remainder of the witch, and it burned up, leaving only a slight stench in the air that the night breeze wafted away quickly. Brand relaxed, dropping his hands, and I looked up at him. “Thank you, brother.”

“For what?”

“For being my… moral compass. I would never want to hurt one of our pack, but I might do so inadvertently. Killing is second nature at this point.”

He nodded once. “Perhaps you do need a hobby. Have you ever tried whittling?”

“Or music,” Glen added helpfully. He was gathering up fallen silver weapons, including the garrote, though he’d wrapped his hands in a length of fabric first. “You’re already a decent guitar player, Joaquin. And I don’t mean to brag, but I can play the tambourine like a pro. We can court Flor with duets.”

I nodded, but cautioned, “You do need to provide a few more courting gifts of your own, if you don’t mind me saying so. Not just songs, pup. Our queen enjoys more substantial offerings.”

“The heads of her enemies? Their entrails?” He curled a lip, but his eyes sparkled. “Thanks, but I’ve got it covered. I’m giving her the boxed set of the 1995 Pride and Prejudice . We’ll watch it by the lake, and I’ll wear a white shirt, fling myself into it, then ardently declare my affections. She’s gonna love it.”

“Moon save us all,” Brand muttered. He shifted back into his wolf form, moving across the battlefield, sniffing at dead shifters, and making sure there were no more magical surprises left for us.

With a smile, I wrapped my hands to gather silver alongside Glen, though I answered Brand in my mind. The moon already did, brother.