‘I’m walking now, this is ridiculous,’ Jesse insisted.
‘No, you should rest—’
‘Cazz, if they’re here and we’re about to fight, these males need to be free—not carrying me. And besides, we’re moving so slowly now, I can keep up, no trouble.’
I shot her a look over my shoulder. ‘No trouble? No trouble at all? Really, mate?’
‘Fine, it will be hard, but I can do it. And besides, I need to be free of that sling. If something does
~ JESSE ~“Cazz, no,” I said, much more firmly. “They’re equipped. They have tools. You can’t just rush at them because they’ll see you coming—and besides, I won’t be able to keep up.”“Which is fine, because you won’t be coming. This is a hunt, Jesse. You’ve just swept this entire area of threats. Now you’re going to stay here while I take the power in there with the Gammas and—”My entire body jolted and my back spasmed. “Cazz, no! We do this together, remember?!”“Love, you got us this far&md
~ JESSE ~Another pain tightened in my belly. I gasped as it shot through my middle and up my back, and I had to freeze, and breathe the way Maya had told me to when the contractions started.I was caught then in the surreal notion that I was sitting in the middle of the forest, with Cazz walking into war, while my body tried to expel our baby.Why, God? Why did it have to be now?But there was no answer.When the contraction passed after a few seconds, I looked at Reeca and she nodded slowly, then turned to the wolves around us.“Find the quietest, darkest thicket you can—completely shielded from eyes. Gather grasses and leaves, feathers, anything soft
~ CASIMIR ~I’d been through almost every inch of the catacombs and to its depths. I’d run as my wolf and sprinted as a man. I’d fought alongside guards, Gammas, and even healers. I had blackened the tunnels to blind human eyes, and darkened the stone with blood. I’d played minds like musical instruments, and I’d fought like the warrior I was trained to be.The tunnels stank of death—human death. And the few men who’d invaded our mountain and remained alive now fled before me, believing themselves bitten and poisoned by impossible creatures. The few that remained would die because they knew too much.The pack ran behind and before me, those with training racing after the humans, to kill any that broke through the compulsion, and to keep the rest moving.
~ CASIMIR ~The quiet confidence in my aunt’s voice wasn’t faked. I knew that. She was over a century old. She wasn’t afraid to die. She just didn’t want to.And she really believed she could beat me.The problem was… I wasn’t sure she was wrong.Careful to keep that side of my mind completely walled off from her, I reached out to some of the other wolves that were still in the catacombs, and still strong, pleading for their help, showing them what Maya had shown me, and begging them to quietly, carefully, make their approach.Relief washed over me as I felt Rory roar into the link, and immediately begin racing closer with a fist of Gammas, strong and true.But e
~ JESSE ~My world was pain. And panting.I lay, twisted in the sheets in a bedroom I didn’t recognize, trying to conserve what little energy I had while Maya checked my progress and smiled, patting my leg when I gritted my teeth and tried to breathe through another contraction, then slumped, nearly weeping with both the pain, and frustration.She’d taken us, all of us, and it hadn’t even cost her.I’d been in that thicket, Reeca talking me through because the contractions were regular, which meant labor probably wasn’t going to stop. And I’d been terrified of delivering out in the forest, in the dark, with no equipment or even blankets.But Reeca had gently assured me wolves had been bo
~ CASIMIR ~I paced the tunnels, just out of reach of Maya’s power, my body growing tenser and tenser, and my mind spinning.Rory had brought backup, but I’d warned them to stay two halls away—I didn’t know how far Maya could reach, and it occurred to me that if she could reach these minds that weren’t bolstered by the power, she might use them against me.I gave them all a quick lesson in defending their minds—though it wouldn’t stop Maya entirely, it might slow her down enough to give me warning if she was reaching for them—then made them stay back and only answer my call when it came.But why would it come? What was I going to do?All I could see in my mind was my father laughing, telling me how weak I was, an
~ JESSE ~Maya had me sitting up in the bed, curled forward, gripping my knees. Reeca on one side, helping prop me up, a guard on the other.My body was nothing but a conduit for pain. Wave after wave, my entire lower body condensing, contracting, pushing to get this baby out. I could barely think.Cazz was there, so quiet, so distant, but there, calling his encouragement and pushing love at me through the bond.There was a moment when I thought I wouldn’t make it, when I thought my body would give and I would just drift away.But then I caught Maya smiling. Leaning forward between my legs, reaching, grasping, for
~ CASIMIR ~I felt the moment the power went out of Jesse. The entire mountain felt it.I howled with triumph and shifted, sprinting towards the room, ecstatic when there was no sense of Maya gripping my mind or stealing anything from me. But of course, there was no power left for her to steal.I prayed and pleaded and ran, Rory and the others coming in my wake. And the moment I broke through that door in my wolf—the only power left to me anymore—everything slowed. Though my body whipped and my mind was singularly focused, it was as if everything happened in slow motion.I caught a bare glimpse of Jesse on the bed, and at first my heart leaped. She was moving, awake, aware,