Page 58 of Bold Mercy

Chapter Thirty-One

I ripped the wand from Lennon’s hand, and though she fought me, she really wasn’t a fighter. I punched her in the face, holding back so I wouldn’t kill her, and when her grip loosened, I took control of her wand. I managed to get to my feet, and I stumbled and staggered to Avis, and I did not hesitate. I lifted the wand and plunged it into her heart. To me, that wand was simply a wooden stake. But the wand had other ideas.

It exploded with magic. Power shot up my arm and into my shoulder, so intense and shocking that I gave a hoarse scream, but I didn’t let go of the wand. Avis’s heart exploded with the magic, pieces of it hitting my face, the wall, the floor.

The vampire never moved away from the wall, but Lennon ran to me, and while I was stuck in the magic of her wand, she hit me in the head with what felt like a large rock she’d either pried up from the floor or wall or maybe had simply found it lying there. She was as caught in Avis’s awful magic as I was in the power of the wand, but then Avis died, and Lennon continued to hit me.

I was flung away, finally, as though I’d held a live wire that finally let me go, and I held a hand up as Lennon started toward me, her face twisted and wet with tears. “Stop, Lennon. She’s dead. The spell will wear off now and you’ll be okay. Just wait.”

“Give me my wand,” she cried, attempting to grab it.

But I knew if she got the wand before the magic was gone, she’d kill me with it. “When you’re calm,” I told her, holding her off as I finally managed to stand. Then it was just a matter of holding the wand out of her reach. She was short, and I was tall. She wasn’t getting the wand.

Seconds later, she fell to her knees, head hanging, and began to sob. “What have I done,” she cried. “Oh, God, Kait. Why did I try to hurt you?”

Barely able to stand, I crouched beside her. “It wasn’t your fault, honey. She did the same thing to Detective Moreno.” I slid the wand to her, but reluctantly. I really did want that wand. “But Avis can’t hurt anyone anymore. Let’s get out of here.”

She accepted the wand almost gingerly. “Let me help you heal,” she whispered. “I can purge you of the magic that’s keeping you from shifting. And I can at least wipe away some of the pain.” She looked at me, finally, her eyes brimming. “I’m so sorry, Kait. I’m just so fucking sorry.”

I patted her hand. “Not your fault,” I told her. “Do what you can to heal me. My wolf and Dr. Hayes will do the rest. We need to hurry. I have no idea what’s going on below.”

“The rogues will be easily controlled with Avis gone,” she said, her voice stronger. She straightened her shoulders. “The world is different, and we will adjust. Hold out your hands so I can push pain relief in through your palms.”

I held my hands out obediently, and she circled them with the wand, whispering words I didn’t understand. The light that wrapped around my wrists was warm, blue, and numbing, and I began to feel immediate relief as it spiraled up my arms. But then the light became restrictive, like rope, and I frowned.

“Just another minute,” she said, then fell back into whispering nonsense.

I didn’t know how long it took me to realize she wasn’t trying to heal me. She was trying to restrain me—and she was succeeding, because I’d patiently sat there and meekly held my arms out so that she could wrap them with her magic.

“Lennon,” I said carefully, trying to tug my arms away, “what are you doing?”

But she wouldn’t stop chanting, and then, I was well and truly caught. I was cocooned in invisible ropes of magic, and I could not fight my way free. Not from that.

Then she pushed herself away from me and sat with her back against the wall and her knees drawn up, her wand securely in her grip. “A long time ago,” she said, “I “saw” you. I was shown that you were a danger to me, my pack, my alpha. I knew I would be forced to have you killed, eventually, because as long as you’re alive, no one is safe. You destroy things, Kait. The councils have made you judge, jury, and executioner and though you have yet to completely immerse yourself in that role, it’s coming.” She grimaced and put her fingers to her throat, then continued. “Avis promised to help me. She’d see to it that Lucy disappeared and she would kill you, and I would go home and pretend none of this happened. I didn’t want to see you die.”

I shook my head. “You’re not the bad guy, Lennon. You can’t be.”

She hiccupped, then darted her tongue out to lick the tears sliding over her lips. “Of course I’m not the bad guy, Kait! You are the bad guy. I just want to protect my people. It’s simple as that. My pack and my alpha are everything to me. I’ll do anything I have to do to protect the nonhumans. To protect our world. But you have no loyalty. You’ve lost your way. You don’t even know who you are.”

“I would never hurt Jared or the pack,” I told her. Honestly, I was stunned. Was she right? Was I the bad guy? Is that how the nonhumans saw me? But I shook it off. I couldn’t feel sorry for myself. I couldn’t feel guilty. I needed my rage.

I forced myself to relax, then concentrated on using my own magic to try to break the bonds she’d restrained me with.

She looked at me with pity and frustration in her eyes. “You’re the reason all of this happened. You could have made different choices. You accepted the council’s request. You killed Axton. You destroyed his seer—and I saw that you would also destroy me. Just as your old pack alpha knew you would destroy him, which is why he forced you out of his pack. He didn’t want to kill you, so he sent you away. And guess what? You will kill him. Because of you, the nonhumans are in awful danger and the humans are dying. You are not a champion of nonhumans, and you cannot live in our world.”

“You’re the reason the pack hated me so much, aren’t you?” I asked her, filtering out her accusations. I would look at them another time, if I kept my life. “You planted fear and doubt. It wasn’t just that they thought my father was a traitor, though they hated me enough for his sins.” I needed to keep her talking. Her reluctance to do the dirty work and kill me could possibly help me survive this night.

“Your father was a traitor. He wasn’t a good man. He abused you your entire childhood, and you think he was a god.” She shrugged. “Maybe that, combined with your hobbled wolf, made you the horror that you are. You’re a traitor, too, Kait, and I was not going to allow you to destroy my pack. Unfortunately, I didn’t stop you before you succeeded. I was soft. I can’t be soft any longer.” She gave a sob, truly upset that she would now have to kill me. She squeezed her wand and began a tiny flurry of movements that would likely end in my death.

“What about Lucy,” I said, desperate to slow her down. I could feel the magic weakening. I couldn’t break the bonds, not yet, but I was getting there. I was sure of it. “Why did you want to hurt her?”

“She sees too much. Her dreams are confusing to her at times, but she would have become very powerful eventually. She would have known what I’d planned for you. She saw herself with a serial killer, didn’t she?”

“Rick is the serial killer?” I whispered, horrified.

“God, no. He’s a man whose mind is trapped by a dark magic he might never escape. It wasn’t his fault he was taken by Axton. That was on you, too, wasn’t it? No, Lucy saw herself with the serial killer because she was with the serial killer. Quite often. She was falling for him. Falling for a killer.” Her expression hardened. “Just as my alpha is falling for one. And I must protect him. You understand that, deep down, don’t you?”

Like she needed my permission and understanding so she could be at peace with her decision to murder me. And I was not going to break the bonds of her magic in time to save myself.