Page 87 of Witchbane
“Sebastian can handle this,” my mother said. She stared at me a moment, her expression unreadable, then closed the door to the house. I turned away, my goal to stand my ground. Protect the pack house, Korissa, and the rest, until Liam arrived with a better plan. Funny how he’d become the brains between us, and me the brawn. It seemed a bit backward him being the alpha, but I could live with that if he could.
Carl and Toby still fought, a heap of claws and fangs. I wondered if Carl would be proud that I wasn’t running. Or calling me a fucking idiot for leading trouble right to the pack. But I’d promised Liam I wouldn’t run without him, and nowhere was I stronger than at home with him, nestled in the center of our pack. The ground here recognized me, even through the layer of snow and sleeping plants. In the distance the trees shuddered, dancing in the wind. The garden, asleep for the winter, resting but waiting, felt like home. And it called to me. I realized for the first time it was more than home. It was my territory, a place I’d sent up roots. Bound to the pack and the land, it wasn’t all that unlike the sanctuaries Kiran had created. My space, shaped and growing rather than fading as magic ebbed away. Here I would stand my ground, do the best I could for the pack.
For a few seconds Toby seemed to be winning the battle against Carl. Then I felt a sting of excruciating pain as Carl dug teeth and fangs into Toby’s side. I staggered as the dark ooze worked to try to devour Toby, digging into him, wrapping around his section of the pack bond with a suffocating grip and reaching for me.
I shoved back at the cold, pouring heat into the tie as if it were hot oil to clear away the ice. I leapt across the distance, slamming into Carl and knocking him away. But another changed wolf rushed me, a half dozen actually, giving Carl time to get up, and letting Toby crawl away. I slashed into the flood of dark wolves, batting them away, bringing their attention back to me. Keeping them away from Toby, and shoving power into him with the hopes that it would keep him from being lost to theHuntand help him heal.
It was me they wanted anyway. If Liam didn’t get here soon it was going to be a bloodbath. I really hoped I wasn’t the one slaughtering all our wolves to save the remaining few, but I’d do what I had to.
Several wolves landed on me all at once, dragging me down with their bulk and number. I couldn’t tell who was who anymore, they were all dark. The ties to them were frozen solid no matter how I tried to clear them. Claws and fangs were laying me open. Blood, hot and sticky, began to pour from my side, bringing pops of pain and sparkles of white to my vision. My kitsune struggled to fight them and the drugs. It was a losing battle.
The kitsune wanted to be free to destroy them all. We could survive that way, tearing them apart, devouring the magic that had created them. But I wasn’t ready for that yet. They were pack. Mine to protect. Mine to kill too if I had to. But only if I had to.
My heart raced, pumping out more blood, which made dark edges gather around my sight. I fought, slashing and kicking and sending blasts of fire, actual fire. Okay that was cool. Fireballs a plus. But a dozenHuntwolves, who were actually my wolves, on me at once? I didn’t stand a chance. Not without the full release of the inner kraken of my power.
A force hit the side of the wolves piled on top of me, bowling a couple off and rolling away to start another battle. Another wolf, the bond tugged tight and for a few seconds I hoped it was Liam. But it was Dylan. Full werewolf, but not corrupted by the ice. He snarled and howled, a wave of power pulsing through the bond that almost felt like Liam. It was a bit of a demand. A sort ofstand downcommand from an alpha to the pack.
The wolves infected with theHuntactually paused. For a few seconds I saw parts of them cross their eyes, like they were fighting it. It gave me hope that they were still in there. I rolled from beneath the wolves, climbing wobbly to my feet, and losing blood faster than I’d like. I sent another blast out through the bond of my omega presence mixed with the heat of the kitsune, trying to thaw the ties closest to me.
The ice covering them cracked.
It was working!
A dozen vampires now hit the outer ward. A flood of rippling power backlashed hard, rolling through the area like a sonic wave, knocking me off my feet and shattering every window in the house and the cars. Toby and Dylan staggered, both shaking their heads, dazed and dizzy, as if the power had shattered their eardrums too. The thawing in the bonds vanished and the ice curse took back control.
Find the leader!Dylan’s cry echoed through my head, taking the place Liam’s voice often did. He gave a warning swipe at the rabble of wolves facing him down, but even the three of us together wouldn’t have stood a chance against that many regular wolves at once. Changed into theHunt, they were a thousand times more deadly.
Seb!
What leader? Hugo? I’d left him broken and bleeding. Sure, he could have healed some of it by now, but enough to do this to the wolves? It wasn’t really an ability of the vampires. It was more a fae power…
Fuck.
I recalled sucking down the power before, yanking strength from everyone and everything tied to Hugo, until I’d gotten to the top and been cut off. Not a vampire, a fae who had tied the vampires to them. And now they were corrupting my wolves.
Find them!Dylan said again as he lunged into the wolves. Toby, mostly healed but breathing hard, followed, racing in to a fight none of us could win.
The vampires crossed the second barrier, my magic shattering like shards of sharp glass which cut them badly and slowed them down. It was something at least. But I needed to follow a tie, find this asshole and be done with them for good. I leapt over the wolves, landing in a pile of bleeding vampires, the rest coming up behind like the demons they were, and I ripped through them, my claws slicing a dozen of them in half. And biting down hard on the first I could reach.
From there it was a draw of energy. They’d all been well fed, pumped with fae blood, which infuriated me. But it also made it easier to feed on. The kitsune was hungry. Always hungry. Power called to it like a siren’s song. The individual vampires didn’t have much actual magic, like the wolves they were more a network, a web of linked energies, and that I could drain. And that’s exactly what I did.
A swirl of bright lights and heat filled me, changed from the cold, icy death of the vampire’s creation and whatever led them, to my soothing warmth. Deciding not to keep it all to myself, I shoved it into the pack bonds, layering all that blazing heat over the frozen ties. TheHuntwolves began to pause, stagger, and stumble, the black ooze fighting to regain hold even as I assaulted it with a lava flow of power.
Through the pull on the magic, I felt every vampire. Hundreds, stretched out for miles into the distance. All of them had been coming, but now they were all food. I really hated the taste of vampire. Like a can of slugs covered in salt and left in a rusted tin too long.
But it wasn’t the vampires I wanted anyway. I followed the ties of magic, my mind racing through the maze of ties until we found a wall. Someone trying to keep me out. I snarled and barreled through it, undeterred. I was kitsune, disruptor and devourer of magic. My pack was under attack and my mate still missing. That meant I had to protect them. They were mine as much as Liam was.
I sent a blast of that thought through the pack bond. A resounding wallop of magic that burst the dredges of ice over the ties, sending theHuntwolves to the ground. I prayed they weren’t dead, that my wolves could be restored, but the burst of heat also shattered the last wall between me and the fae. I could feel him close. Could see where he was now through that skewed maze of ties. Those endless strands of reality, a mix of magic and science woven together in an elaborate array; the kitsune could see it all. It was an odd sense of recognition, like the last piece of a puzzle dropping into place. The kitsune was a creator and destroyer of worlds. I could see how it was all put together. I could also choose which threads to move or even cut.
Trickster they’d called me. But that wasn’t it. The doorways, the heat, the true picture of how life and reality were woven together, those were more powerful than some tricks. And I was willing to use it all in that moment to save the pack, find my mate, and restore this space to the home it had become.
I dropped the vampire, spitting bits of it from my teeth, and opened a portal. It was as easy as breathing. I simply shoved a section of the woven world open around it. My goal was to get to the fae who was fucking with us. Didn’t matter if it was some dark queen or fae lord, I was done with this constant mess. I had a mate, and a baby now, with whom to build a life and a future. No antiquated bullshit from some oligarchy of the past was going to take that from me. The portal was laser focused on that fae, spun through the weave of life, following the ties he’d created to the vampires, and the nasty curse he’d placed on my wolves.
The portal didn’t open to another world, Underhill or some creation of the high fae hiding here in the mortal realm. No, when I leapt through that portal it took me to a familiar parking lot on the edge of town, filled with cars of older makes; Sean’s garage.
Fuck.
Chapter 25