How obvious of her. I shuffled forward, slow enough that she could track the intent in my shoulders. “I can see your head turning, Becca. You really think you’re walking out of this one alive?”Becca’s grin slipped at the edges, but she didn’t drop it. In fact, it looked bored and condescending to the very curve. “You can kill me. You want to, I can see it. But you should consider that if I’m gone, the only information about what that is dies with me. Higan has no clue what he stole, or to be clear,” she looked right into my eyes this time,” Who he stole.”Suddenly, I'm back in the forest, at the Stark Mansion, right after my spar with Abigail, learning how far I can see and hear into town. The twisted voice I heard her talking to, the one that bled through my ears. The moment it all started.How had I missed that? I assumed it was a Melbringer, but I had never encountered what sounded so wrong so far, not even when I broke into her home.A muscle in her cheek twitched once more. She
Becca’s blatantly amused laughter quickly turned guttural with my nails digging into the skin of her neck.She was so confident she could swallow me whole in the dreamspace as though being weak herself didn't matter. I desperately wanted to smack the confidence from her upturned lips.I pressed tighter against her throat. Any minute now, or so I would urge myself to snap her neck. Yet, I hesitated. Would killing her here really do anything?Out of the blue, smoky shadows speared from her sides like spikey, sharpened tentacles, and they dug right into my gut.Blood leaked out of my wounds as I gritted my teeth, refusing to have her hear me scream out in pain. “Is that it? I can heal faster than you can cut me.”The smoky shadows twisted sharply, and they burned where they touched flesh.Becca leaned in, leaving the surreal feel of her breath to brush my ear. “Your parents beg to differ.”The rage tore through my bones before she could move her lips to smile again. I cried out and slamm
HARLYN SAGEWe charged in faster than Becca could bolt. We dropped on the earth at every side she could possibly turn to hinder any chance of escape. At least that was the initial plan.But when we approached, I quickly remembered her cunning ways. I armed myself with the ivory knife that I swiped from Lorcan in that same minute and while the rest of our group fell to circle her, I struck at her arm, slashing her as speedily as I could.Three hits on her right arm were followed by an audible pained wince from her. The knife buzzed with heat under my fingertips but I ignored it focusing solely on Becca.She protested out loud, her usually calm countenance growing frantic as her eyes landed on me. “What the,” Becca thrust her arm out as if to summon something but all that rushed out was the passing air.With a grin, I lifted my knee and thrusted it at her gut before swinging my fist at her face to knock her right out.“Harlyn!“ Ethan protested rushing to stop me but Becca had already fa
When my palm met her skin, the contact was frigid. I wanted to feel her panic, wanted to see anything break through that mask of hers but it was growing clear that she wasn't wearing any. That was exactly how she felt about me, how much she thought about me.I didn't see it as a threat. I didn't warrant her anger. My throat began to clog, my head pulling me to countless nightmares.Becca giggled this time in a soft manner that seemed beyond her. It was infuriating. Her hands didn’t even flinch away from the scroll!“Will you kill me, Higan?” she whispered. “Go on, love. Try it but I want you to think of what happens next.”My grip trembled. I hated how light she felt under my palm as if I squeezed, she’d drift away as smoke and leave me here with the ruin she’d made of me.“You're so going to get what's coming for you” I spat, my forehead pressed to hers now and my teeth bared. “No one's going to save you, not even me when they get their hands on you. I'm sure Harlyn will tear you apa
HIGAN SINCLAIR The cave reeked heavily of damp rot and dying moss. If I closed my eyes, I could almost pretend I was anywhere else but the wind wheezing through the narrow ribs of the newly found hole we managed to crawl in made that impossible. Every passing draft carried Becca’s suffocating scent in its careful stillness as though she’d somehow found a way to bleach the air around her.I detested that smell and how it clung to my nose, my clothes, my hair, my teeth. It was a bleak reminder that I was there, not in my own house, nor my pack’s territory, nor in Springville, but buried alive in a mountain like a rodent.All because of her.I sat slouched on the camping mat against the cave wall where a jagged line of stone persistently dug into my shoulder blade through my shirt. My boots tapped out a restless beat on the rock ringing out louder than I liked.I wanted to leave but someone had made that impossible for me.Becca and her whims sat about twenty feet away, cross-legged by
After some revision and tweaks to the plan, we all began to move. When the sun finally rose fully in the sky, the Melbringer's quieted down leaving an odd ominous storm to rumble through the skies.We didn’t have the luxury of subtlety anymore, only speed and nerve.Outside my old house, at the spot I'd first met Khalid after he fell off my roof, the morning was fading away to noon with the hush of werewolves moving in formation.The moonstone werewolves bristled in navy coats and boots and Ethan’s armed lone werewolves circled one of the parts of our plan. At the center, a decoy draped in my hooded coat with hair brushed to mimic mine stood with practiced posture.“Try not to get killed pretending to be me,” I said flatly to the girl, a Moonstone werewolf named Dana. Her honey eyes glanced around my face as she held a grin too wide for the moment.She flicked her hood up, her voice muffling beneath the cloth. “Can’t promise much, Alp—Harlyn,” she quickly corrected herself.I resiste