Page 35 of Triumph of the Wolf (Magnetic Magic #6)

Abrams wasn’t alone. He stood at the back edge of the platform with two of his armed men, all three of them sheltered by a control panel that probably activated the machinery around the building.

If he’d been more exposed, I might have grabbed the rifle from Izzy and fired at him.

As it was, my grip tightened on the hilt of my sword.

I wanted to put an end to Abrams. After all the torment he’d inflicted on young Duncan, and probably on young Lykos too, he deserved to have his stay on Earth—or wherever the hell we were—ended.

That platform would be a hell of a place for a confrontation. With gurgling vats on multiple sides and gaps in the railing, it looked far from safe. Not that Abrams was likely worried about anyone’s safety .

Unlike his hired thugs, he wasn’t armed with a weapon, but he gripped a flask in one hand, his thumb on the stopper. A dark liquid sloshed inside as he swirled it in agitation.

Izzy tapped my shoulder and pointed to something else.

On a catwalk attached to ours and halfway between us and Duncan and Lykos, two more men with rifles stood, aiming their weapons at Duncan.

They had a clear shot and could have fired.

Were they waiting for a command from Abrams?

What, did he want Lykos to be the one to kill Duncan?

To fight it out in some kind of test? Maybe the men were only there to protect Abrams if things got out of hand, if Lykos couldn’t best his older brother.

Lykos hadn’t even been a match for me, so I didn’t know how Abrams expected that to happen, at least not in a fair fight.

But… maybe Abrams didn’t intend for this to be a fair fight.

Indeed, Lykos appeared larger than he had moments before.

It was hard to tell from a distance, but his aura also seemed to have power that matched Duncan’s.

Had Abrams given him a potion? Tiger Blood or something else to enhance his abilities?

Though I didn’t take my gaze from the standoff between Lykos and Duncan, I pointed at the gunmen nearest us and crept in that direction.

Duncan hadn’t attacked yet, and I didn’t know what he planned, but it would be easier for him to win the confrontation without people taking shots at him from the side.

“ End him,” Abrams urged, his voice just audible across the distance and over the gurgling vats. “I gave you the power to do so.” He lifted the flask in his hand. “Drakon has declared himself an enemy once more, and you’ll never become the leader of a pack with him in the world.”

What the heck did that mean? What lies had Abrams been telling the kid?

He took a step toward Lykos, and the greenish light of a glowing and gurgling vat to the side of the platform turned his face a dreadful shade.

Jaw clenched with irritation on Duncan’s behalf, I continued toward the gunmen. With the butts of their weapons pressed into their shoulders and their cheeks to the stocks as they sighted down the barrels, they weren’t looking at us. Their backs were almost entirely to us.

I picked up the pace, judging from Lykos’s posture that he might give in to Abrams and attack Duncan at any second. The last thing I wanted to see was the kid killed. I sure as hell didn’t want to see Duncan killed either.

“He murdered Radomir and ended our plans for the distribution of my life’s work,” Abrams added. “You will end him, as I’ve commanded.”

Abrams pointed at something on the platform behind Lykos. Even with my lupine heritage giving me keen eyesight in the poor light, it was hard to identify from such a distance. Something made from glass? An empty vial?

Neither Lykos nor Duncan looked back at Abrams. Their gazes were locked on each other.

Since Izzy and I were deep in a shadowy section of the vast building, I didn’t think Abrams saw us creeping along the catwalk. The gunmen at his side were poised like the other two, weapons trained on Duncan.

I groaned to myself. Had Duncan not been worried about us—probably about me specifically—he wouldn’t have let himself be lured into this situation.

The bipedfuris growled, clawed fingers flexing.

His gaze shifted to Abrams, and he crouched, looking like he wanted to rush past Lykos and attack the man.

But Lykos hunched and growled back. In the glow from the control panel, the whites of his eyes were visible.

He was afraid. Afraid but determined. He didn’t look like he would back away.

If Duncan attacked Abrams, Lykos would attack him .

One of the gunmen closest to us stirred, his finger tightening on the trigger in anticipation. I resumed heading toward him, picking up the pace. We risked being spotted or heard, but I dared not delay. This was coming to a head.

To my surprise, the air rippled around Duncan, and he shifted back into a man. A naked and nearly defenseless man, at least compared to the powerful bipedfuris.

At first, I thought Abrams had thrown an alchemical concoction or used a magical artifact to force Duncan to change, but when Duncan spread his arms wide, hands open, I realized he might also have decided Lykos would attack if he threatened Abrams. But what if Duncan didn’t threaten him?

“ Kill him.” Abrams thrust a finger toward Duncan’s bare chest. “Now’s your chance.”

Lykos stiffened, as if magic compelled him to obey. It probably did.

“Really, now, old chap,” Duncan said to Abrams, though he watched Lykos. “Given all the things we’ve been through together, I’m aghast that you’re trying to arrange my death.”

“You tried to kill me ,” Abrams snarled. “All those years ago. And you destroyed my library. ”

“I do regret that. I adored the library.”

Lykos looked hesitantly back and forth between them. My heart went out to the kid for being caught in the middle of this.

“And then you destroyed my laboratory in Maple Falls.” Pure hatred filled Abrams’s eyes, as if that was the greatest crime of all.

“I don’t regret that,” Duncan drawled. “In truth, I helped you out. It was completely infested by huge insects.”

“ Kill him, Lykos,” Abrams growled.

Earlier hesitation evaporating, Lykos jerked into a low crouch, ready to spring.

“I’ve a better idea,” Duncan said, addressing Lykos now.

“Why don’t you change out of that form as well, and we’ll go for a fish, eh?

” He backed off the platform and to the railing on the catwalk where his clothes draped.

Keeping his movements slow, he waved at the magnet.

“Maybe we can find some more of those tins. Or even a bicycle. Have you ever ridden one? I had to teach myself as an adult. Abrams didn’t grasp the importance of showing a child how to ride a bicycle. ”

Lykos didn’t rise from his crouch, but he cocked his head, as if trying to understand. As if… curious?

Abrams turned toward one of his guards. To order them to fire?

I’d almost reached the other gunmen but paused, movement on the ground to the right of my catwalk drawing my eye.

A man I hadn’t seen before writhed about, a firearm several feet away.

Not only did his clothes appear to be stuck to the floor but a thick green vine stretching out from between two vats had secured his ankle like a shackle.

Slumped against one of those vats, another man bled profusely from fang puncture marks in his neck.

Had Jasmine done that? While still in her wolf form?

She and Bolin must have found each other.

“It’ll be a right fun time,” Duncan added. “ Much more fun than taking orders from that dusty old git.”

I was only five feet from the gunmen when one heard or somehow sensed me and glanced back. He cursed and spun toward me.

I leaped, hoping to knock the rifle out of the way with my sword, the same as I’d done below.

The crack of a firearm sounded right behind me, almost startling me into dropping my blade.

The second man, who’d also been turning to aim at me, flew backward as something slammed into his chest. A bullet.

As he pitched backward, I struck the rifle in the other man’s hands.

It clanged as it hit the railing and went off.

The bullet flew wide, streaking toward a wall and striking it.

I sprang upon the man, punching him in the nose before he could recover his equilibrium.

He stumbled back, and I kicked him in the gut.

When he lurched forward, I pointed the tip of the sword between his eyes.

He whirled, climbed over the railing, and jumped down of his own accord. Behind me, Izzy stood with the gun I’d given her. She nodded at me, then pointed it toward the platform.

I expected the two men who’d been guarding Abrams to have heard us—how not?—and be preparing to fire. But a green vine had snaked up from the floor below, wrapping around the waist of one of the gunmen. It lifted him from his feet, and he kicked Abrams in the back as he flailed and shouted.

“Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy,” I muttered.

The second gunman turned, not toward me but toward the floor and where that vine was coming from. He leaned over and fired.

“Shit.” I sprinted down the catwalk, not sure if he was aiming at Bolin or Jasmine. Neither was an acceptable target.

“I’m not the threat, brother,” Duncan said calmly, as if the chaos going on all around him was of no consequence. His arms were still out as he stood naked, his focus on Lykos. “Abrams is. Until he’s out of our lives, we’ll never truly be free.”

“ Kill him, boy!” Denied his bodyguards, Abrams rushed toward Lykos with the flask.

To do what? Throw more of a coercion potion on the kid?

Whatever he intended, Lykos, in his wolf form, must have seen it as a threat. Even as I reached Duncan, leaping to his side with my sword at the ready, Lykos turned on Abrams. He charged straight at the man and sprang.

Eyes bulging, Abrams backpedaled but not fast enough.

The wolf, made bigger and stronger by his own alchemical potions, slammed into his shoulder.

Lykos didn’t bite him, but his weight was enough to pitch Abrams backward.

He tumbled through a gap in the railing and landed with a great splash in the bubbling vat of green liquid.

Abrams screamed and flailed, utter pain and horror contorting his face. Only as his flesh burned and his screams worsened did I realize what should have been obvious all along from the gurgling noises coming from the vats. Those liquids were boiling .

Lykos stared for a moment, then turned his back on Abrams. Duncan set his jaw and didn’t move to help. I took a half step, so horrified that I wanted to pull Abrams out, but Duncan gripped my arm and shook his head once.

Before I could decide if I wanted to argue—even if Abrams deserved to die, surely this was too awful to inflict on anyone—the screams ended. Scalded to death, Abrams slipped under the surface and disappeared.

“Damn,” I muttered and glanced back to see if Izzy was still with us.

She’d stayed back but had seen it all. Her only response was to toss the rifle she’d used to shoot the gunman into the same vat that had swallowed Abrams. Destroying the evidence that she’d been involved.

I had a feeling the police wouldn’t show up at the door to arrest us, but I couldn’t blame her.

I felt… less than wholesome after the night’s events.

On the catwalk a few feet in front of us, Lykos sat on his haunches. His aura rippled, and he shifted from a wolf to an eight-year-old boy. Wrapping his arms around himself, he put his head between his knees and cried.

Duncan grabbed his clothes and went to him, resting a hand on his back. I started to join them, but an uncertain call of, “Aunt Luna?” floated up from below.

Reminded that those men had shot at Bolin and Jasmine, I ran to the railing on the other side of the control console and looked down.

Hair tousled and face red from whatever exertion creating vines took, Bolin stood beside Jasmine, offering her support. Somewhere along the way, she’d turned back into her human self. Her face was twisted with pain, and she gripped her left arm as blood leaked between her fingers.

“I want to go home.” Jasmine’s eyes weren’t as glassy as Izzy’s had been when I’d pulled her out of the cage, but she also looked rough.

“We will,” I promised and turned back toward Duncan and his little brother. “Lykos? Do you know the way back to Seattle? Can you take us home?”

After wiping his eyes, the boy rose. He looked numb and haunted by his choice, but he didn’t push Duncan away. If anything, he appeared glad to have someone standing with him.

He took a shaky breath, then nodded. “Yeah.”

“I say we take our leave then.” Duncan also nodded as he looked around at the potion factory and our ragtag team. “Let’s find a place with fewer bodies of enemies.”

“And more clothes,” Jasmine said firmly.

“There were some more lab coats in the cabinet I checked,” Izzy said.

Jasmine couldn’t have seen her from her position on the floor below the platform, but she must have heard the words, because she responded with a firm, “I’m not wearing anything that the freaks working in this place wore.”

“You can have my shirt,” Bolin offered. “And my pants if you want. Anything I’ve got. And when we get back, I’ve got a first-aid kit in my SUV.”

“Thanks,” she said. “I could really use a mocha.”

“Me too ,” Bolin said.

Maybe he still needed to wash the taste of that potion out of his mouth.

Lykos didn’t speak as he led us to a ladder heading down toward an exit out of the building.

I leaned my shoulder against Duncan’s while we walked, wondering if Lykos would be willing to stay with him now that his…

whatever Abrams had been to him was gone.

I could hardly call the old scientist a father or guardian.

Creator and captor. That was what he’d been.

“I’m surprised I didn’t have to change and lose my clothes too,” I said, certain Duncan would also have offered me his shirt if I needed it.

“That’s a shame,” Duncan said as we walked outside after Lykos, the rest of our group trailing us. “It’s always more romantic to be nude as a couple instead of alone.”

“I’ve not noticed that being nude alone ever bothers you.”

“Oh, I’m not bothered . Certainly not. But I do enjoy the experience more when I’m with you.”

“And your hand is on my boob?” I murmured.

“ Naturally .”

Lykos glanced back at us, and I remembered his keen ears would have no trouble catching murmurs.

Fortunately, Duncan refrained from flirting or commenting on nudity for the rest of the walk.

In the gardens, on the far side of the building from where we’d originally arrived, an arch-shaped glowing portal waited for us.

Thank the moon. I was more than ready to leave this place.