Riven (26 page)

Our
standoff stretched out for several seconds until movement off to our
right brought both of us around. The smoke was even worse than it had
been before and it almost made me doubt what I was seeing.

Alec
stepped out of the darkness with his mother clasped in his arms and
Adri trailing along behind him. All three of them looked like they'd
been through hell, but Alec was covered in blood. That wasn't the
most incredible thing though. The thing that positively blew my mind
was the unearthly light coming off of their skin. I knew it was only
my moonborn eyes that allowed me to see anything, but I'd never seen
anyone glow that brightly, let alone two humans.

Alec
took in the tension between Isaac and me and then handed his mother
off to Isaac. "Please report, Ash."

Isaac
looked for a moment like he was going to protest, but Alec turned
pale blue eyes that were only a hairsbreadth from transforming on him
and Isaac finally nodded and headed towards the garage.

"It's
a relief to see you."

"You
too, now tell me what's going on."

"We've
got all of the survivors gathered here inside and around the garage.
Isaac just took a team back through the house and it wasn't pretty.
We've lost a lot of people."

Alec
closed his eyes for a moment and then nodded. "I figured as
much. It was unavoidable considering how little warning we had and
the fact that most of the fighters had already been through the
wringer once tonight."

We
stood in silence for nearly a minute before Adri wrapped her arms
around Alec and whispered into his ear. She probably meant for it to
be inaudible to anyone other than Alec but I was close enough to hear
her.

"Concentrate
on the living. Your mom and Rachel are both still alive and we
couldn't have done anything different than we did."

Alec
nodded and then looked back at me. "Did Grayson make it out
alive?"

"Yeah.
He got beat up pretty good, but he's alive still. He won't leave
Wyatt's side though. Carson was killed in the fighting and it doesn't
look like Wyatt will make it."

Alec
flinched a little at Adri's gasp, but he just stroked her hand and
nodded. "Go get Grayson and as many effectives as we still have.
We only have a couple of minutes before they come for us."

I
paused midway through turning to carry out his order. "How do
you know?"

"I
can feel them out there, all of them."

I
didn't understand, not really, but I nodded and double-timed it into
the garage. Things were even worse than I'd remembered from the last
time I'd been inside our 'sanctuary.' Wounded were on almost every
open inch of the concrete, blood soaking through bandages, their
breathing labored.

Donovan
was working on Wyatt while Mallory played nurse, but I could see
defeat in every line of his posture. I stepped into Grayson's field
of vision and pointed outside. "Alec is back and he needs you
outside."

"I'm
not leaving Wyatt."

I
pressed my rifle into his chest and gave him a cold smile. "You
swore an oath. If you use your power on me now the convulsions will
make my finger tighten on the trigger. Get out there before Alec has
to come in here and get you himself."

I'd
just made an enemy, but he nodded and slowly backed away from me. I
watched him leave out the side door and then turned to find that
Jasmin had come over to see what all of the fuss was about.

She'd
pulled a ha'bit on, probably from one of the RV's, but that wasn't
the only thing different about her. Even with all we'd been through
in the last hour or so, the rumor mill was still working and everyone
here knew that she'd manifested a hybrid shape well after such a
thing should have been impossible.

The
piece that hadn't made the rounds yet was just how big her hybrid
form was. Kristin had quietly told me that Jasmin was the largest
hybrid she'd ever seen, that she towered over James and was nearly
the size of one of the smaller, younger werewolves.

"What's
up, Ash?"

"Alec
just arrived. He says that we're due for another attack and wants me
to gather everyone that can still fight."

"Don't
worry about it. I'll go round everyone up and meet you outside in a
minute. You don't need to be pissing anyone else off today."

There
was the rub. Right now Jasmin wasn't any more dangerous than I was,
but she was a hybrid now. Unless someone killed her over the next
couple of months she'd grow into the potential of her new form and
then she'd be the next best thing to unstoppable.

I
nodded and walked back outside just in time to see Alec gently send
Adri into the garage. Once it was just the three of us, Alec turned
to Grayson and pointed off to the east. "They're clustered out
there. When I give you the signal I want you to use your power to
immobilize the northern half of the attacking force."

Grayson
shook his head tiredly. "My power won't work on werewolves. Even
if there are shape shifters with them the werewolves will still
short-circuit my ability. I'm no more valuable to you right now than
any other hybrid."

Alec's
smile was as unworried as I'd ever seen out of him. "You just
act on my signal and leave the werewolves to me."

Jasmin
walked out a couple of seconds later followed by a battered string of
men and women who were the best we had left to offer up to the gods
of battle.

Alec
looked them over, the strange glow from a few minutes before mostly
gone, and gave them all a sad smile. "Thank you. I know that
each of you has probably lost someone tonight. I'm sorry to ask you
to step up once again, but we have one last battle tonight before we
can stop and nurse our wounds."

There
was a low, unhappy murmur, but a sudden gesture from Alec stopped it.
"I want you to look around right now. Take in the faces of those
next to you and remember them. You're all witnesses. After tonight
nothing will ever be the same again. You'll be different; each of you
will be something more than you are right now. After tonight you are
all
truly
mine."

Silence
reigned supreme for a handful of heartbeats and then the sound of
taloned feet brought us all around.

Alec
unconcernedly stepped out in front of us as the first of the
werewolves appeared out of the smoke, running towards us with the
inexorability of time. The half-dozen werewolves were flanked by the
better part of thirty shape shifters and I felt my heart drop. Even
if we could somehow defeat the werewolves, we wouldn't be a match for
the Coun'hij's bully boys.

I
pulled my rifle up and sighted on the lead werewolf, waiting for it
to close the distance slightly as my finger started to tighten down
on the trigger.

In
the split second before my first shot rang out, Alec lit up even more
brightly than he'd been when he'd first arrived.

The
enemy line disintegrated into a sudden melee as most of the
werewolves instantly turned on the shape shifters flanking them. I
felt a surge of euphoria at the sight of our opponents tearing each
other to shreds, but even then I knew it was too much to hope that
they'd kill each other to a man.

The
fight was brief but brutal and five seconds later the werewolves had
all been cut down and the shape shifters had lost a third of their
number. It took a few seconds for the Coun'hij enforcers to shake
back out into a loose line, but then they once again started towards
us, confident in their greater numbers.

Alec
waited until they were only fifteen yards away from us before tapping
Grayson on the arm. Grayson immobilized half of the opposing force
while Alec dropped the other half. The fight was over less than a
minute later and Alec was right. With one fight we had changed
everything and every single one of us belonged to him in ways that we
didn't fully understand.

Adriana Paige
Graves Estate
Sanctuary, Utah

I spent another terrified fifteen minutes inside the garage waiting for
the werewolves to overrun Alec and the rest. I knew what I'd seen
when we went to save Alec's mother, but it still seemed too unreal
for me to believe that Alec would be able to turn the tide of the
fight.

My
fear for Alec and the rest was strong enough to cushion me from the
horror around me right up until I heard a cheer of celebration break
out from just outside the garage. Once I knew we were safe, I looked
at my surroundings and felt a wave of near despair wash over me.
There were so many people who were on death's doorstep.

I
found Dominic first and nearly cried at the massive hole in her
stomach that someone had tried to cover up with gauze. I picked her
hand up and felt my hopes fall even further at just how cold she was.
Shape shifters could maintain their body heat in almost any
environment. For Dominic to be this cold she had to be hurt badly
enough that even her natural regenerative abilities weren't working
any more.

I
sat there holding Dom's hand and finally let all of the tears out.
Tears for Carson, tears for Dom, tears even for Rachel who was
probably still alive but out there in a world she no longer
understood without anyone to watch out for her.

As
my tears splashed onto Dom's hand I realized that something had
changed. Her skin wasn't just warming up because I was holding her,
it was heating up on its own with a rapidity that was impossible. It
had to be some kind of flash fever. I was looking around for someone
I could ask for help from when Dom tugged on my hand.

"Where
am I, Adri? What happened?"

"You're
in the garage, there was an attack and you were hurt."

She
looked up at me with curiosity in her eyes. "I remember the
fight to save Ben, I remember being stabbed, but I feel fine."

Before
I could stop her she pulled off the gauze that had been the only
thing keeping her from bleeding to death. I went to grab the bloody
material and put it back on her stomach but there was no need. She
wiped the dried blood away and underneath there was nothing but a
perfect expanse of unbroken skin.

"It's
finally working again."

"What
do you mean, Dom?"

She
ignored my question and pulled herself to her feet. "Who's hurt
the worst?"

None
of it made any sense, but after what I'd seen Alec do earlier it was
hard to deny that anything was possible. I helped Dominic over to
Rex, who had a series of bandages across his head and chest, yelling
the entire time for Donovan.

I
watched as Rex's color visibly improved and then Dominic was blindly
reaching for me again. Her eyes remained closed as I led her over to
Rebekka and by the time Rebekka's breathing had normalized Donovan
was there to help guide Dom.

We
were an odd procession, Donovan, Dominic and I followed by those who
Dominic had healed, but we made our slow, steadily weakening way
through the garage and then just when I didn't think that Dominic
could continue, Alec arrived and placed his hands on Dominic's
shoulders.

I
still didn't have any explanation for what was happening, but I
caught the very fringe of what Alec did to Dominic and it was like he
washed away all of my pain and exhaustion. I suddenly felt like I'd
just rolled out of bed after the best night's sleep ever.

Sheer
chance had put Wyatt in the corner of the garage farthest from where
Dom and I had started, and by the time we worked our way through
everyone else Dom was stumbling and exhausted again.

She
collapsed on the floor next to Wyatt and put her hands over his
chest. I felt his skin heat up even from several inches away as he
almost seemed to go into convulsions. A few seconds later he
collapsed back down onto the concrete and Jessica frantically started
unwrapping bandages.

Wyatt's
chest was unmarred again except for the odd circular scar that we'd
noticed shortly after he'd arrived in Sanctuary. I didn't think
anything of it necessarily until I realized that Donovan hadn't been
limping for the last fifteen minutes that he'd been helping Dominic.

"Donovan,
I'm sorry if this is inappropriate, but could you please lift your
pant leg?"

I
received odd looks from everyone, Donovan included, but then I saw
the same realization dawn in his eyes that I'd just experienced.
Donovan slowly rolled one side of his pants up to his knee and there
wasn't a single trace of scar tissue.

Adriana Paige
I-80
Northern Nevada

We'd all wanted to
sit there and revel in the miracle of Dominic's healing powers, but
Alec had cajoled everyone into vehicles and got our huge convoy
moving away from the estate.

I spent the first
leg of our journey crying over all of the people that we'd lost. Some
of them had already started to get fuzzy inside my mind, almost as
though I was subconsciously trying to shield myself from the pain of
our losses, but my mental picture of Carson was still incredibly
vivid.

I wanted to stay curled up in a ball in the back bedroom, but once
the initial rush of tears passed, my mind started playing back
Carson's advice from the last time we'd been in the park together.

I knew I needed to
pull myself together and start exercising the influence I did have to
help keep everything together. It wouldn't be fair to just leave that
entirely on Alec's shoulders. It was hard to talk to Alec with
everyone else around and I spent a little while worrying that Alec
was going to keep everyone together rather than dispersing us as
Rachel had warned in her recording, but Alec addressed that point
once we stopped in Nevada at a tiny rest stop. Alec asked for Grayson
and Wyatt as soon as our massive RV stopped moving. Predictably Jess
arrived trailing along behind Wyatt.