Page 247 of Shadowblood Souls: The Complete Series

Fang peers at me with a wary air. “I thought—I wouldn’t have wanted to kill that girl, but I saw her attacking the others, and… Aren’t you angry with me?”

I gulp air, overwhelmed by the response so different from what I expected. “I mean, I wish she was still alive, but I can’t blame you for protecting your people.”

“You protected us too,” Billy says. He flickers through the shadows to emerge at my side and takes my hand tentatively.

There’s nothing but genuine appreciation in his big faun eyes as he smiles up at me.

“Even when shadowkind have attacked you , you’ve never wanted to see us hurt unless there was no other choice. I should know that better than anyone.”

Tears hit me like a punch from inside my skull. I swipe at my eyes. “I hurt you before. You didn’t?—”

Billy’s smile doesn’t waver as he cuts in.

“You stopped. I felt you pull back—I felt how quickly you yanked away the moment you realized. It was foolish of me to leap into the middle of the fight. We all make mistakes. I might not have much experience with the mortal realm yet, but it seems to me that what should matter is what we do about our mistakes when we see the problem.”

For the first time, I fully believe that he doesn’t blame me for aiming my power at him. I’ve known all along that I never meant to do it, but it still felt like a vicious act. Like proof of my monstrousness.

What if it’s actually a sign of how human I am, that I could screw up so badly… and regret it so much?

Rollick clears his throat. “My associates aren’t looking to cast you out. But we do need to come to a decision about what to do about your fellow shadowbloods who are still out there on their rampage. Last night only culled their numbers by about a quarter.”

“Right,” I say, still grappling with my whirling feelings. “I heard we captured a few of them. What happened to those three?”

The demon tips his head toward the doorway. “We’ve got them in another room. You can come see them.”

Something about his tone makes my stomach sink. The guys join me as we head out the door—where we nearly run into Toni, who’s rushing over to the bedroom with a paper bag clutched in her hand.

She pauses and swipes at her now-rumpled bob with a slightly self-conscious expression. “Are you all right, Riva? You must be feeling better if you’re walking around. I just got into town a few hours ago—I was out grabbing something Pearl said she wanted for breakfast.”

At the mention of the succubus, a hint of a flush colors Toni’s cheeks. Huh. I can’t help remembering the little kitchen interlude I saw between the two of them back in Rollick’s Spanish mansion.

“I’m doing fine,” I say with a quick smile. “I’m sure Pearl will appreciate the food.” From what I understand, shadowkind don’t need to eat in the usual mortal way, but a lot of them seem to enjoy the act all the same.

As Toni hustles by, Rollick leads us to the third bedroom. He pauses outside the door. “All three of them have been… difficult any time they start to come to. Lull has been keeping them unconscious with her powers to avoid any violence.”

The lamia. I guess that’s a little better than constantly drugging them up.

I cross my arms over my chest, just shy of hugging myself. “What have they been doing when they wake up?”

Zian rubs his shoulder. “One of the kids tried to tear my arm right off when I went to talk to him. I could barely hold him down—whatever his powers are, they include a lot of strength. He wouldn’t stop yelling long enough for anyone to get a word in.”

Rollick eases open the door and motions us into the room. Three cots are set up with the dozing figures, who are pinned to their beds with heavy chains.

The one girl has a gag tied across her mouth. The man is blindfolded.

Before I need to ask, Andreas points to a large black splotch on the wallpaper. “The older guy has some kind of rotting power he projects with his eyes. He nearly disintegrated a hole in the wall.”

The plump woman with a silvery sheen to her skin wavers out of the shadows near the teenage boy—the one who attacked Zian, I guess. She looks at Rollick in question. “He’s starting to wake up. Should I send him back under?”

Even as she speaks, the boy’s limbs twitch. I square my shoulders. “I’d like to see how he is. At least as much as you can let him wake up before he’s a real threat.”

Rollick inclines his head to give his agreement. Lull stations herself near the boy’s head in anticipation of using her powers.

A tremor runs through the boy’s body. He jerks against the chains before his eyes have even opened.

Then he thrashes his head from one side to the other, but the movement is still a bit sluggish with sleep. “Let me out of here! I’m going to rip you all to pieces, you freaks. If I?—”

The lamia brushes her fingertips over his hair, and his voice falters. His eyelids droop again, but they don’t fully close.

I dart to the end of his cot. “We want to help you. But we can’t do that if you’re trying to fight us. If you could just listen for a minute or two—my friends and I are shadowbloods just like you?—”

“Nothing like us,” the boy mumbles out in a thickened voice. “Deserve everything you get. I hope Cutler finds you and chops you all to?—”

His arms have started to slam against the chains again. With an apologetic pursing of her lips, Lull presses her whole hand to his head, and he trails off into slumber.

I take a step back, my posture deflating. How the hell can we get through to him when he’s still so caught up in his rage, even separated from the rest of the group?

There’s obviously nothing more to see. Rollick ushers us back into the living room.

I walk to the sofa and then back again, my nerves jangling. “And the other rogues—the ones that got away? Do we know what they’re doing?”

“It seems like you shook them up some,” Rollick replies. “They bashed up a few things—and people—on their way out of the city, but they didn’t stop to revel in the destruction. They were in a hurry. I don’t think they liked how close you got to overpowering them.”

“Not close enough,” Jacob mutters.

I swallow a choked laugh. Not close enough by a long shot.

One of his colleagues appears on the other side of the room and points to the bedroom where I woke up. “The wild shadowbloods are on the TV again.”

My stomach sinking, I hurry over with the others. The TV mounted on the wall across from the bed emits a reporter’s clipped but slightly frantic-sounding tones.

“No one’s quite sure who the culprits are or what the motivation for this massacre was. Police are pursuing every possible lead. We can’t help speculating that it may be connected to the recent string of attacks attributed by some to ‘monsters.’”

The imagery on the screen shows a city park. Shrouded bodies too much like Booker’s scatter the blood-stained grass. Paramedics are loading some figures onto stretchers as quickly as they can.

My throat clogs with a lump of nausea. I want to shut my eyes against the images, but I can’t let myself.

The reporter is still giving her commentary. “The only message officials assume was left by the murderers was a few words carved into one of the paths: We won’t be tamed. What that has to do with the slaughter of more than fifty seemingly random pedestrians, it’s impossible to say at this point.”

“Fifty.” I repeat the number raggedly. “Oh, God.”

Andreas looks as sick as I feel. “‘We won’t be tamed.’ Do you figure that message is directed at us?”

Zian’s eyes widen. “They killed all those people just to get back at us for trying to stop them?”

Jacob scowls. “From what I’ve seen of them, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“They are… very, very angry,” Griffin puts in quietly.

The newscast has switched to a different story. Dominic picks up the remote and turns off the TV. Then he glances at me. “We obviously can’t leave them out there still on their rampage. What are you thinking, Riva?”

I finally allow myself to close my eyes, ducking my head and rubbing the back of my neck. Feeling the fine chain of my necklace shift beneath my fingers. The symbol of family and connection Griffin gave me all those years ago.

Yes, we have to do something about our fellow shadowbloods. We can’t let them keep wreaking havoc wherever they go, killing dozens upon dozens of people out of pure spite, for who knows how long.

It’s not even just the already awful threat to all those innocents. We have no idea what the Highest beings Rollick mentioned might do if they feel they need to intervene.

I’ve been the one calling the shots when it comes to the younger shadowbloods, demanding that we give them a chance to stand down. Which means if that was a mistake, I need to be the one to say so.

It all comes down to me.

A wave of loneliness sweeps over me, absurd when the five men I’m closer to than anyone in the world are standing right there.

My thoughts must be louder than I realize, because another familiar figure slips past the bedroom door and approaches. Ajax offers me a soft smile and a voice inside my head. Whatever you decide, I’ll help you do it. You’ve tried so hard. We all know that.

Suddenly, tears are pricking at my eyes again. Griffin eases his arm around my waist, and Andreas strokes my cheek with the back of his fingers.

Dominic studies my expression with his usual pensive air. “We’ll talk it through. We’ll figure it out. We still have options.”

Not many. But the sense of their solidarity pulls me out of my momentary despair.

We are blood. We are family. So are the shadowbloods carving a path of destruction across the country… but that doesn’t mean they can’t be wrong.

What does it say about the rampaging rogues that they’ve made mistake after vicious mistake, and all they want to do is keep at it?

They’re our blood, yes. That doesn’t just mean we should save them if we can, but also that we have a responsibility to stop the damage they’re doing.

We don’t owe them infinite patience when they’re leaving bodies of other people who deserved to live just as much in their wake. We’re the only ones who have a hope of ending the devastation.

I glance toward the room where Sorsha and Pearl are recovering. All those shadowkind are waiting for my answer too. Trusting me to lead them.

“I want to save everyone,” I say quietly. “But what… what if we can’t?”

Jacob’s mouth twists. “If anyone could figure out how, it’d be you, Wildcat. But even superheroes can’t win every battle.”

If I even am a superhero by any definition. What would I do if I was?

That answer is shockingly easy. I gird myself before I say the words. “Then we have to do what’s best for the most possible people. What’ll save the most lives.”

Even if I hate it.

Rollick doesn’t ask me to spell out what I mean. He simply cocks his head with a glint of sympathy in his eyes. “Any preferences for how we get started on that?”

I think about the past battles—how the other shadowbloods defied us, struck back at us, escaped from us. The injuries and losses we’ve taken.

What are our best chances at ending this once and for all without another mistake?

I raise my chin. “Sorsha and I can take them out the fastest from a distance. But Sorsha can’t be moving around right now. And we don’t want to leave the rogues any avenues for escape.”

Dominic’s gaze goes distant in contemplation. “Trying to pen them in with just our powers hasn’t worked out all that well. If we could get them into an enclosed space where you and Sorsha could focus on them all at once and they couldn’t attack anyone else in the process…”

The idea comes to me with a queasy lurch of my stomach, but I can’t deny how perfect it is.

A shaky laugh spills out of me. “I think I know just the place.”