Hadley Werewolves, page 20
They escaped through the corridors, as the sirens grew louder. Car doors slammed. Time was running out. The cops would be here soon. They veered down a hallway, away from the moving flashlight beams. They reached the side exit, and the warm night air greeted them. Drew was never so glad to feel the dry wind on his face. Memories from attacking the witch were too fresh in his mind. Her blood had tasted strange. Instead of coppery, her essence was foul, like meat left out in the heat to spoil. He spit on the ground for good measure. Charly moved quickly beside him, her eyes set on the road ahead instead of who she carried in her arms. Eventually, they reached a safe distance from the museum.
Drew stopped so he wouldn’t hurt Trenton any further. “Does Ben know where to meet us?”
“Yeah, he’s on his way with a coven member.”
“Do they know we have the demon?”
“No,” she replied quietly. “But they’ll know soon enough when they show up.”
Drew settled Nevena on the ground and used his hand as a compress for her arm. She continued to bleed from the cuts and her face paled. Her chest rose and fell with shallow breaths. “She really needs to carry around medical supplies.”
“She does,” Charly said. “Just check her. I’ve watched her pull stuff from her pockets.”
Nevena’s hair had fallen into her face so he pushed it out of the way. Why did she feel the need to do this in her condition? One of these days, she wouldn’t survive. She’d been so strong earlier and now she lay vulnerable in a heap. He sighed and something tugged in his chest. He tried to focus on the task at hand as a medic, but the need to trace his fingertips along her cheek pulled at him.
He felt around the pockets on her pants and found all sorts of things: gauze, suture glue, and antiseptic. She was practically a medic with these materials. He grabbed a string and tied it around her arm. He didn’t like how much blood she’d lost, and he needed to slow it down. With the string secure, he pressed a piece of gauze against the scratch on her right arm. She had a strange symbol close to it.
He raised her arm in the air for Charly to see. “What does this picture mean? It’s almost like Chinese.”
“That’s the symbol for quake,” Charly said. “I’ve only seen that once before. Rather difficult to remember with all those smaller lines curved around the inner symbol.”
He opened her hand and ran his finger over her palm. She had so many of these tattoos on her body. For what reason did she do this?
In the distance, the lights from the museum continued to roll through blue, red, and white. A few uniformed officers might drive around looking for anyone who might’ve escaped. They couldn’t stay here long.
“Is there anything we can do to secure the demon until they get here?” he asked Charly.
“Unfortunately, no,” she replied. “Elders must push the demon back into the box.”
“How do they do that?”
“I honestly don’t know since I’ve never seen the ritual. I’m assuming it’s like that movie Ghostbusters where they zap the ghost into the containment unit.”
He tried to ask another question, but the van arrived and Ben strode out. Another vehicle joined them with the witches. Apparently, Ben was still a beacon of friendliness and the witches decided to go alone.
Finally, it was time for them to get out of there. He looked at the woman in his arms and a brief thought came to mind: Was he free now that she was asleep?
The need to escape the curse left as quickly as it came. Nevena needed protection. While he held her in his arms, he couldn’t think of a better place to be. She was still light as he remembered when he kept her from falling on her face. Her hair and skin were scented with faint stirrings of mint. He eased her into the van as the witches slowly approached their former leader’s body.
One witch pulled out a blade, while another eased in to touch the witch’s skin on her arm. It was Isabella. She didn’t display the fear the others had.
“Nevena managed a sleep spell.” She tsked. “A well-executed one.”
“How long?” one of the witches asked.
“I can’t tell. I’ve never cast one this powerful before, but I sense we have time. Not much, but enough.” She turned to the others. “Bind her arms and legs with the enchanted ropes.”
When the witches didn’t respond, she snapped, “Move! We don’t have forever.”
The witches sprung into action, tying Ophelia’s arms and legs.
Ben tapped Drew’s shoulder and offered him some clothes. “I still don’t understand why we can’t pull out a .45 and blow her ass away,” he grumbled as Drew slipped into a pair of pants.
“Killing the host won’t kill it,” Charly said, checking on Trenton not far from them. “If you kill her, it will move onto the next witch that touches her.”
He glanced at Nevena. Had she inadvertently hurt herself, getting too close to the demon? Hadn’t she touched it?
“We learned that lesson eons ago when they burned and quartered a possessed witch.” Charly frowned. “One of the witches who handled the body became possessed and a whole village in the northern Africa had been wiped off the map. I seriously doubt we want to repeat that massacre.”
Instead of heading back to the mansion where they hid away, the witches took them back to the compound. Charly explained this was where they had all the tools to keep everything contained.
Nevena didn’t wake up as he placed her on a bed. He shifted to get up, but tiredness clung to his limbs. A nap wouldn’t hurt him any. He tucked himself on the other side of the bed, giving her a few inches of space. Her hair left a black blanket across her pillow and on part of his. He was tempted to reach out and touch it. Before he thought about it, he ran his fingers through the silky loose curls. Sleep touched his eyelids. A bit of rest would do him some good, but he couldn’t sleep knowing the demon was near. He remembered how the ceiling suddenly came at him out of nowhere. The violent slam of the concrete against his flesh. He cringed as a broken toe righted itself, a perfect reminder.
And yet Nevena didn’t have a single broken bone.
“I’m good at killing,” she had said. The way she said it was confident. And now he had no doubt. While he had slowly circled in the shadows around the blood demon, she had faced Ophelia and spoke to it, leaving him an open opportunity to move.
If she was good at killing, then he was good at rescuing. But he’d turned his back on that town. So why was he stuck here? Was he turning his back on fate, only to find out his destined path had been shoved down his throat to keep him in line?
If the witches hadn’t attacked he’d probably have a mate by now and would’ve worked as an officer and emergency technician.
She sighed, her first sound. She didn’t move, only making a mewling noise as if her dreams had turned stormy. He put his arm around her waist, drawing her to his warmth. Her back was cold so he shifted the covers until they lay underneath. He told himself he should lay on the floor and leave her alone. They were still virtually strangers. Yet, a need to protect her was there. She couldn’t badmouth him to protest so he rested his arm on her hip and closed his eyes. He wouldn’t touch her inappropriately. Her back warmed slowly and she settled into him, the sounds of distress melting away.
Contentment replaced the pain. He’d had girlfriends, but a similar situation had never come up for them to be together like this. Post-battle, bodies exhausted. Her even breaths called to him and he followed her until his body floated into darkness.
Chapter 7
So I live. Nevena woke up to a slumbering Drew in one of rooms in Ophelia’s house. What had once been Ophelia’s home. Her body cracked as she stretched. The cuts on her arms burned with every movement. The price of pain for treating them like pincushions. The man beside her was furnace-hot, all hard muscle and male. She held still, wondering if she should give into the sensations for warmth and protection or if she should just angle away from him. She touched her cheek, recalling the last thing she’d seen. Ophelia’s face as she brushed her fingertips against it. The look in her wide eyes as Nevena’s life-force touched her own.
She shouldn’t have done it. She was a fool to do it. There had been unending hunger and blackness in Ophelia’s body. It was a hunger to reach out for her and swallow her whole.
Foreboding clung to her and her vision swam. What price would she pay for coming into close contact with a being that wanted her body for itself? She searched her mind as if that would comfort her. Did she have errant memories? Thoughts of killing? Her skin was still its natural color. Her thoughts were hazy and her body tired, but she was of sound mind.
Yet fear clung to her. She shouldn’t have touched the demon.
She slid out of Drew’s arms and swung her legs over the side of the bed. With a groan she reached into one of her pants pockets for a packet of pain medicine. The pills went down hard without water. The floor was cold, but the feeling was familiar so she stood and wobbled to stand. She turned to look at him, but he continued to sleep. She touched the gauze on her arms. Someone had helped her. The handiwork had to belong to Drew. No witch would dare come close to her.
Her stomach grumbled. She needed an infusion shot as well as some food.
Dirt and sweat covered her, too. She drew her arms up to yank off her shirt and cursed from the pain in her arms. Her joints didn’t feel too good either. Damn pills needed to kick in any time now.
Hands snaked in from behind her and the shirt went over her head. She turned to see Drew, shirtless, tossing her shirt to the side. Why hadn’t she heard or felt him rise? His stealth was amazing.
“Thanks.” She shouldn’t have come off as nonchalant, but she sucked in breath. She focused on finding a clean shirt in a nearby dresser instead of looking at the man who had shared her bed and now watched her dress.
I don’t care, she told herself. For good measure, she shrugged off her black pants and put on a pair of shorts she found, but when she turned around, there he was on the bed, lying down with his hand holding up his head. He wore a grin that made her insides tingle.
“You got the full show,” he said, the low timbre of his voice coursing through her. “How come I don’t get anything in return?”
“There’s nothing to see.” She gestured to a body containing years of scrapes and cuts. There was no reason for him to find her naked body attractive.
“I’d like to be the judge of that.” His words added to the fire coursing through her veins.
“I’d rather you not.” She took a spot on the only chair in the room, an old, black wingback. Just sitting down was painful—she should’ve stayed in bed. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, she needed help.
She opened and closed her mouth a few times before she finally spoke. “I need an injection.”
“Where is it?” He quickly got up, not asking why or questioning her.
“I keep a few backup vials in Ophelia’s infirmary.” She directed him to where she hid her medication in that location. He left the room and returned quickly. He administered her injection with ease, even putting pressure on the injection site and adding a Band-Aid. Up close she enjoyed the warmth that radiated from his body. Looking away while he worked seemed the best option, but she couldn’t tear her gaze away from every hard muscle on his chest.
Once he finished, he took his spot back on the bed without a word. She was grateful for that.
Silence filled the room until she broke it. She couldn’t help but think about how beautiful he was. “You should be used to seeing perfect women all the time. When you stripped, I didn’t see a single scratch on you. Haven’t you ever had a major injury?”
“Nope—unless you count broken bones. I’ve lost count on how many of those I’ve had. Most werewolves heal pretty quickly. My friends back home tell me I border on insanely fast.”
She nodded, finally feeling a tinge of relief from the medication. “I wish I had that ability.”
“What you can do is pretty cool in and of itself. I still keep seeing what happened to us last night play out over and over again in my head. How long did it take you to learn all those symbols?”
“Too long.” She opened her palms and looked at the endless glyphs. “But you’d be amazed what you can do when you have no choice.”
She laid her head back against the cool wall. “Three years ago, back when I was in Europe, my spellcasting could be classified as down-right shitty. The covens in Bulgaria had much stricter rules. They had a regime of daily study for witchlings that included six hours of glyph study and two hours of physical exercise. To the covens here in America, such regimes are considered barbaric, but it was all I knew…”
There was a whisper in the room that interrupted her thoughts. She tried to push it away.
“Tsvete.”
She glanced up and the werewolf hadn’t moved.
“Is everything all right?” he asked.
“Just fine.”
“Tsvete, your soul isn’t fine at all,” a voice whispered in her head.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
Her hands formed fists and she closed her eyes as the tension in her head sliced across her forehead. She’d gotten too close and had made a dire mistake of some kind.
Now things would only get worse.
Chapter 8
Three years ago.
“You’ll never learn these lessons if you keep daydreaming, Nevena.” The teacher’s hand slapped down hard on the desks. The ten young women looked up from the circle of seats, their attention diverted by the student who couldn’t pay attention.
“Should I punish you again as a reminder?” the woman asked.
Compared to other covens, the ostrich coven had much more severe forms of punishment. Nevena focused on the pieces of paper before her. Ten sheets full of endless symbols. Far too much for her seventeen-year-old mind to absorb. The simple ones bounced around in her head from countless study: fire, water, wind, and earth. But when the glyphs built one upon the other for more complex spells, the amount of data became mind-boggling. The symbol for an earthquake alone had twelve marks.
Life had been so different before the curse began.
She studied relentlessly, staying up late to copy symbols over and over again, but when she stared at a glyph she should recall, everything blurred together into a confusing mess.
“Let’s get back to the lesson for the offensive spell.” The teacher opened her book and continued to mark on the chalkboard the motions for the current spell. One of twelve new ones they had to remember that day. Nevena’s gaze flicked to the closed curtain. The window had been opened two days ago, and Bucharest’s sunlight leaked inside to bring warmth to an otherwise chilly environment. The tall opening was the only window in the room. The only escape for her to see beyond her home to other places.
Ten minutes later, everyone had to present one of the twelve spells they had learned, a task Nevena dreaded since she was never prepared—the teacher picked the one they had to present at random. Why did she have to learn all these things? The coven had over twenty enforcers. Plenty of people to defend them and keep witches away from the demon box locked away in the catacombs below their building. Two demons were trapped in that one. With so many locked doors and sets of stairs, the place was safe.
“Nevena, you’re next,” the teacher announced.
Her palms went damp. Why couldn’t the teacher pick the overeager girl whose hand shot up at every opportunity? Her classmate kissed ass like nobody’s business. She stood, almost managing to pick up the notes from the day, but one stern look from the teacher forced her to approach the teacher’s desk without them.
“You’re to present to the class the information we learned from yesterday. The float spell, I believe.” Their instructor was always smug when she asked such questions. She’d fold her thin arms across her chest and tilt her head to mock everyone who didn’t perform up to her standards. Nevena suspected she was so uptight because she’d never had a boyfriend before.
Time to finish this stupid spell. A wind spell was the basis for a float spell, her hazy memories reminded her. Floatation was crazy difficult to master. Levitating other things was far easier.
Nevena approached the chalkboard and tried to remember but came up with nothing. Days like these were common instead of rare. Just her luck.
“You may begin any time,” the instructor said with rising impatience. “The float spell please.”
Nevena traced wind. That much she remembered. Wasn’t float a combination of three or four more complex glyphs? She rubbed her forehead as if such a gesture would push the missing information from its hiding place. How had her memory gotten so poor since the school year had started?
She tapped her hand against the board. Whispers and barely concealed laughs from her classmates told her they must’ve found her confusion funny, as usual. Her cheeks reddened. She’d become dependable for a good laugh.
Then silence filled the classroom as someone stormed through the door.
“All witches to the safe room!” The enforcer left the room as quickly as she’d come. Everyone scrambled from their seats, following the directions from tried and true drills in the past. All witches under the age of eighteen had to hide in the safe room until their parents came for them. Girls filled the hallways, heading for the stairs. Nevena recognized other younger girls she had minded during the evenings, braiding their hair or helping them to sleep.
During the drills, her mother always stopped by to reassure her. Was her mother coming up like she did last time?
By the time her class headed down two flights in the eight-story building, screams and shouts from a few floors below forced everyone to freeze. Heads peered over the railing, curious yet frightened to see what was coming. Unable to resist, Nevena peeked with them, spotting a form advancing up from the second floor. An enforcer. Everyone that approached the woman in black were flung over the stairwell as if they were toys tossed aside in a tantrum. Their screams bounced upward until they hit the floor below with a wet thud.
