A Final Touch: The Complete Series, page 56
But he didn’t want to face it. He took several steps ahead. I tried to grab his wrist, but he was too fast.
“Did you eat?” he snapped.
“No.”
“I had someone send food specifically to you. You should have eaten.”
“… I’m sorry, that was your guy?”
“I thought you would simply tire him out. I didn’t know you would knock him out. How did you do it?”
Again, Jace wouldn’t turn to me.
I broke out into a sweat. Now was the point where I had to tell him everything. It was pretty impossible if I couldn’t look him in the eyes. Or maybe it made it easier. It was more like downloading everything into a diary.
“The Wizard King knew who I was. What I was,” I corrected. “He kept pushing me to use my powers remotely.”
Jace took a step then stopped. “… And you learned how to do it?”
Exhaling hard, I ran my fingers over my eyes until I could see stars. “Yep.” It was weird to hear that word coming out of my lips. Not because it wasn’t true, but because it was. Powerfully. Terrifyingly true. I could now use my powers remotely.
I hadn’t thought about this, but it kind of made Velos’s seals pointless now.
Jace sighed. God, I wanted to see his expression. Was it crumpled in horror or awe, or a mix of both?
“Did he hurt you?” Jace asked, seemingly out of the blue.
It took my mind a second to catch up. “The Wizard King? He was an idiot.” My voice didn’t even shake. Now that I had a face for the Wizard King, it was even easier to conclude how much of a buffoon he’d been. Cruel, 100%. But not the kind of shrewd, terrifying intelligence of Patrick.
“He burned me a bit. I mean, your doctors probably told you about the injuries.”
“… What did he do to your chest?” Jace’s voice tightened.
“I can’t remember. Oh, yeah, some kind of potion. Wait, he did something before then. I don’t know, it’s all a blur.”
“He’ll pay for his crimes.”
“Maybe.”
It wasn’t what Jace wanted to hear. He was trying to be protective. But my brain had switched on to statistical mode. Perhaps Barnaby would pay for his crimes. Or maybe the Kings would simply break him out of jail.
Jace was only just holding on. His shoulders shook then crumbled. “I failed you—”
“How did you fail me? I’m the one who broke out of your new compound in… what, two minutes?”
“Ten,” he said, proving he’d been watching the entire time.
I winced. “I thought I was being discreet.”
“You were. You did a good job tracking people’s movements. Your sense of smell is getting sharper.”
I couldn’t take it anymore. Whenever he addressed my sense of smell, he always got this look. I needed to drink it in, use it to soothe my freaking choppy soul.
So I lurched ahead of him, before he could push another step. I caught his eyes, and it was more effective than chaining him up. Turns out, making brief visual contact locked him to the spot.
Describing his gaze was impossible. It was shivering but strong. It held me but tried to back away. It seemed more instinctive and disinhibited than the currently controlled wolf. Maybe it was an indication of what he’d become.
“Serena—”
I swallowed and shoved my head back. “I knew what I was doing. When I ran away. I knew you’d never forgive me—”
“You did what you had to to save your sister. I haven’t forgotten about her.”
With a blink that got me in the heart, I realized I hadn’t thought about her all day. Here Jace was, holding the flame, though.
Fatigue will do all sorts of things to you. You might feel emotionally stable, then it’s like your brain flicks a switch, and the tears turn on.
Out of nowhere, I started sobbing.
Jace reached out. All he had to do was place one broad palm on my shoulder, and the tears stopped. All the fatigue and fear and anguish washed away.
He knew what effect he had on me. I saw those big brown eyes tracking my muscles as they loosened and fell.
His pupils narrowed with interest.
Virginia wasn’t here. She likely had no idea where we were. There was no Velos to interrupt us. And right now, the Kings were far away.
I tried to rock forward.
Maybe Jace knew what I was doing.
But he didn’t push away.
“Jace,” I began, gathering the courage to ask the one question I should’ve posed from the beginning.
Did he or did he not like Virginia?
But as I got over my fear, we heard scuttling feet.
Remarkably, I detected them simultaneously with Jace. Because both our eyes swung left toward the main library room.
“Move,” he hissed, flicking me forward with a strong twitch of his hand.
Breathlessly, I followed.
I might now have a new fancy power that worked against magical practitioners. It still didn’t work against spells. And Jace knew it. He blocked me with his big broad body and started practicing magic.
Those by-now familiar flecks of golden force rose up his form in a rush. It sounded stupid, but they were as exhilarating as lightning. And though I’d never gotten the urge to dance naked in a storm, they sure made me feel something similar.
We reached the library quickly. But we couldn’t immediately see the origin of the scuttling claws.
It still sent a shiver down my spine. I backed off closer to Jace. “What if we’re attacked like last time?”
“We fight our way out.”
“Who’s this we?”
He turned, eyes sliding up and down my figure. Was it wrong to admit I adored every single second? I might not be a particularly physical person, but that little look set my whole body alight.
“We’re here to find out what you are, Serena. A creature who can practice remotely, invisibly, and silently. Someone who can remove people’s magic, or at the least knock them out with no resistance. Do you honestly think this library has a chance against you?”
This summary made my freaking heart shake. Though it was stupid and girly, I grinned at him. Holding my gaze, Jace smiled back.
We soon had nothing to smile over. One of the little doors opened.
Scuttling claws filled the air, louder than before, almost as tumultuous as the rain on the street outside. But rather than an entire army, a single paper spider appeared.
It looked like perfect origami, its legs and back folded with neat lines. Only about the size of my foot, it pulled itself to its maximum height, but it was decidedly unimpressive.
My brows compressed. “Oh… is that it?”
“I doubt it,” Jace said.
But then the spider threw itself at him.
The quick Alpha proved he could fight, despite the fact he was more tired than me. I don’t think he’d slept in two days. And magic still coursed over his form as he immediately pivoted left. The screech of his rubber-soled shoes filled the air. Then the spider met him. It crunched down, and though it was made out of paper, it sounded like a train striking a wall. Jace had to brace himself, yanking his arm up, the muscles shaking and straining. More wild yellow light spasmed off him.
But despite our efforts, it started to pound its spindly legs down on Jace’s forearm. At first, enough magic protected him that Jace wasn’t injured. But the more the spider battered Jace’s field, the more the Alpha shook. It was just one spider.
Until a door opened behind me. Turning, I gasped to see another spider. Then another door opened. This one was even smaller. It looked more like a hole belonging to a mouse. Another spider skittered out. Then another. Soon we were surrounded by over 50. Jace couldn’t even fight off one.
“I’ve never seen the library use forces this strong,” he stammered.
He tried to grunt and shove the spider off him, but it voluntarily fell, rolled, missed an attack, then joined up with its brethren. Soon they spread around us in a deadly circle.
If Velos were here, he could simply fly us away. Who knew where the Engelos was? He’d been strangely silent during the press conference. He hadn’t said a single word to me. And though he was equally as protective as Jace, he hadn’t tried to visit me at the new compound.
“Press your back against mine,” Jace said, his voice shaking with the pressure of the situation. “When I tell you to duck, you do. Then run toward the door—”
There was nothing I could do. Though I would never leave Jace ordinarily, my eyes tracked toward the exit.
Only to see that a little spider now guarded it. It looked like a real spider, only the size of my thumb. Somehow I knew it’d pack a punch worse than the rest.
“I don’t think this library wants us to leave,” I hissed.
“Then we fight.”
Chapter 4
Scarcely were the words out of his lips when all of the spiders attacked. I had a shaking moment where I realized I’d probably die.
With no magic that could work against them, I was a sitting duck. But I’d forgotten my Alpha. Jace most definitely had not forgotten himself.
He moved in a coordinated twisting kick, catching a lot of spiders as they threw themselves at me. It quickly became apparent I was their target. I thumped down onto my butt and clapped my hands over my head but didn’t need to protect myself from any impending attack. Jace grunted, pivoted, then got more spiders with another sweeping kick.
He quickly tried out different moves. Some were purely physical, and they made the Alpha’s impressive muscles ripple. Others integrated magic. One was a pure blast of force. It sizzled out, reminding me a lot of the second function of that fancy gun I’d picked up in Barnaby’s basement.
At first, none of Jace’s attacks worked. But at least they threw the spiders back.
Unless we could get through them, we’d never survive.
My eyes traced toward the tiny one blocking me from escape.
And for a stupid second I went to throw myself at it, but then I trusted my intuition instead. It’d gotten me through my crazy night. Maybe it could help me now. As wild as it sounded, I knew Jace had this.
And remarkably, the werewolf did.
He kept cycling through moves, changing how much he balanced his physicality with his magic. When two spiders threw themselves at him and climbed his back, he tried something that worked. He pounded his hand down into the floor, and a disruption shook through it, making every book in the library shudder. For whatever reason, it momentarily confused the spiders.
… Maybe they came from the paper? Perhaps they were little leaves from various books? Or maybe they were magically connected to the books? The point was, damaging the floor disrupted them and gave Jace a chance.
With a roar, he now knew how to attack, and he went on the offensive.
He pounded his hand down into the floor then swept forward, only rolling away from me a mere meter. It was to attack a whole pile of spiders. Jace confused them with an attack on the floor, then pounded his fist into the top of the pile. There was the distinctive sound of paper ripping.
Because I couldn’t fight, it meant I could watch, and I quickly spun, staring at the opposite side of the room. A book had tumbled out of its shelf and now lay on its spine and jittered as if someone had ripped a limb from a human being.
“Jace,” I called over the kerfuffle, “the paper must come from the books. They’re connected. Do you want me to attack them?”
Even as I suggested it, I knew it was a bad idea.
“Leave it to me.”
And I could indeed leave it to him.
Jace made quick work of the spiders. Now that he could confuse them and weaken their magic, it was pretty easy to tear through the rest. Remarkably, though they all threw themselves at him, the little spider guarding the entrance didn’t do a thing. It was like it was set to watch.
When Jace finished the last spider, he spun. But I found my feet, held out a hand, and shook my head. “Don’t. I think… it’s judging us or something?”
I should trust Jace’s senses more. He’d visited the library more times than me. But perhaps he had more trust in me than I had in him.
He waited, and sure enough, the spider didn’t attack us. It simply trundled around, as if leading us somewhere. But the only thing at the end of that corridor was the exit. Was the library politely kicking us out?
Remarkably, Jace followed.
“Won’t that lead to the front door?” I asked.
“Who knows? The library is constantly changing its internal layout.”
With nothing else to do, I followed. We indeed did not strike the same corridor that led in a relatively long and uninterrupted line to the main door. This one meandered. We soon struck stairs, and the smell got to me like shoving my head in a bucket of rotting food. It was musty, ancient, dead. It smelled like someone had piled corpses in a room and left them to decompose.
I couldn’t help but flatten my hand over my face. Then I frowned at Jace. “Isn’t this driving you insane?”
“I’ve had more time to grow accustomed to my sense of smell. Don’t worry, you’ll adapt to yours quickly.”
My hand dropped. “What even am I that I have an intense sense of smell? Only vampires do. Am I a vamp?”
“Unquestionably not,” he grunted.
“How can you be so certain?”
“Because I would never have liked you if you were a vamp.”
His statement floored me. Slightly.
You can like someone platonically. Was that what Jace meant?
There wasn’t a lot of time to think of the distinction anyway. We soon reached the end of the stairs.
The sense in the air changed. It reminded me of that strange room I’d visited before, the one that blew my mind with all those ancient symbols.
My skin started to crawl.
Without being asked, Jace took a step back and grabbed my hand, wrapping his fingers around it.
I shouldn’t have. Oh, God, I shouldn’t have, but I moaned. Pretty freaking close to his ear.
If Virginia were here, she would have King-hit me.
Jace usually didn’t react. Now he did. Stopping slightly, he turned and faced me. My stomach squirmed as he made that direct eye contact again.
“Jace?” I asked breathlessly.
“Now isn’t the time.”
“For what?” It was the most leading question I’d ever asked.
And it was another test. He was a werewolf. He’d know how freaking attracted I was to him. If he fobbed me off and changed the conversation, he would prove he was Virginia’s.
But Jace didn’t say anything. He looked at me. The moment grew commensurately more intense. Until I had to blurt something. “How long until you’re aligned with Virginia?”
This threw him. “What?”
“Oh,” I panicked, “Kelsey told me that when two powerful werewolves marry, the weak one kind of aligns with the stronger one and gets some of their power. I’m guessing that’s true?”
He looked nonplussed. “Why would I align with her?”
“Because you’ll mate—” I sounded like a kid discussing this crap for the first time. What made it worse, my cheeks became halogen bright.
“Virginia and I—” he began, ready to spill the beans. And I wanted to hear every single word of them.
But a door appeared in the wall out of freaking nowhere.
Jace spun.
The spider had disappeared, and I hadn’t even noticed.
There was no decoration on the door, no symbols, no indication about what lay beyond.
While I knew the library could change its internal layout, this was insane. It spoke to its incredible power. “Do we open it?” I whispered.
“That indeed seems to be what the library wants.”
“The library seems to also want to kill us.”
“These are trials. It contains ancient, powerful knowledge. The trials are to ensure that only the worthy can claim it.”
“How many trials will it make us face?”
“It depends on how important it thinks the information is.”
A frown etched across my lips. “Are you trying to say that if this is incredibly important information, it’s going to make us go through hell?”
Jace’s eyes half-closed. “Yes.” Then he made a captain’s call and opened the door.
We walked in. The first thing that struck me was the scent. It felt like a body blow, right to my stomach. My hands weren’t quick enough to clamp my mouth and stop it from invading my nostrils. So my brain felt like it burnt, and this time, I wasn’t alone. Even the far better-behaved werewolf locked his hands over his nose then hissed, “A vampire.”
Was that the scent? Yeah. Once I got over the overpowering first whiff, I realized there was the aroma of ancient blood in the air. Thick, torturous, choking. I immediately backed off toward Jace.
We were in a long, relatively thin room. There was a simple plain thick stone plinth at the end. But as my eyes narrowed, I realized there was a little lip around it, suggesting it had a lid.
In other words, it was a crypt.
Though it was pathetic, my fingers lurched out, and I grabbed Jace’s arm. “Is that what I think it is?”
“The magical library should not have any crypts within it,” Jace hissed, his tone changing. I watched his muscles bristle.
“What do we do?”
The only thing we could do. I turned, but the door disappeared right in front of my face, the spider already gone for good.
There were no other doors in this room. The only thing we could do was open the crypt.
Jace unstuck his feet first. Then he walked over. He slowed measurably by the time he reached the crypt. The werewolf had at least dropped his hand from his nose, but his nostrils kept contracting in almost violent twitches. Who could blame him? This scent was appalling. While thus far I had only been able to get location information from smells and the sense of what it was, now it was like I could smell what it had been.
And the vampire in that crypt smelled like one of the most dangerous things in the world.
“Stay by my side. Do as I do. If it attacks, I will try to kill it.”
_preview.jpg)
