Crimson Dahlia (19 page)

A
group of about ten wolves were lined up in front of them, creating a wall of
bared fangs and snapping jaws. But they didn't attack.

"They're
here for me. Maddox sent them," Lila murmured.

Ramsey
wasn't about to wait around for them to coordinate an attack. But his brief
hesitation to assess the situation was long enough for them to move a little
faster than he did. Before he could light them up, the wolves were in the air,
lunging for them.

Reacting
on instinct, Ramsey threw himself over Lila and braced himself for the crushing
blow of the wolves’ bodies…of their teeth and claws ripping into him.

But
it never came.  He looked up to see all ten wolves suspended in mid-jump
directly over his head.

"Way
to go, Alex!" he shouted with relief.

"Stay
where you are!" they heard Griffin call.

"What's
he doing?" Ramsey asked Lila.

She
listened for a second. "Using his shield. He's going to—” The wolves
suddenly went flying, catapulted by Griffin’s invisible force.

"—toss
‘em,” Lila finished.

Griffin
and Alex both ran off to help someone else. Before Ramsey and Lila were even on
their feet, they heard a sickeningly dull thud, and suddenly both of them were
drenched in blood. Ramsey looked down and pulled what appeared to be a piece of
guts off his pants.

“Sorry,”
Jason, one of Selene’s Vyusher, yelled over to them. He was a powerful
telekinetic with the ability to crush anything he wanted, and apparently he’d
just splatted one of Maddox’s wolves.

“Behind
you!” Lila yelled back.

Jason
spun on his heel and zeroed in on the wolf trying to sneak up on him. Ramsey
and Lila got a firsthand look at just what Jason’s capabilities were. The wolf
just sort of imploded and exploded all at once. It was the kind of horror so
sickening to witness; even Hollywood would have put the action off-screen
rather than traumatize their viewers for life.

Ramsey
glanced at Lila, who looked a little green. "You okay?" he asked,
even though he wasn't feeling all that steady himself.

She
shook her head. "I'll never be able to un-see what we just saw. Let's just
keep going.”

Lila
kept backing up, moving in sync with Ramsey as she telepathically watched his
moves behind her. She’d been using her psychic power since the melee broke out
– or at least she’d tried to. Given the sheer number of people fighting, she
had difficulty concentrating enough to be effective, but at least she’d managed
to get Alex’s and Griffin’s attention when she and Ramsey were confronted by
the pack of wolves.

What
the hell does Maddox want with me so badly that he would waste fighters in the
middle of a battle to get me?

Out
of the corner of her eye, Lila caught sight of one of the men who she thought
was part of the Russian tribe. He was surrounded by about four or five wolves.
She couldn’t tell with so much going on between them. Lila was about to signal
someone close by when he acted. Moving at impossible speeds that reminded her a
lot of Nate, he reached out and touched one of the wolves on its paw.  It
turned a strange shade of blue, and when the wolf stepped back down, it
shattered into tiny pieces.

Wow!
He can turn something to solid ice with just a touch
!

Lila
had to keep most of her attention on her immediate surroundings. But when she
looked back over, the Russian was standing in the middle of several wolves, who
were now on the ground howling in pain, all missing body parts that had frozen
and fragmented.

Yet
another mental image I didn’t ever need inside my head.

Lila
shook it off as she continued to keep moving in lock-step with Ramsey. They’d
made it about halfway to Selene, when a picture flashed into Lila’s mind from
Maggie's point of view. A gigantic, dark brown wolf stood before her, ready to
pounce. Maggie was terrified. Though she was a wolf herself, Maggie was on the
small side. Selene had once told Lila that Maggie had never actually fought in
any of the battles, even when Gideon was in charge. She was only used for her ability
to project sound.

Something
about that wolf Maggie faced off against seemed familiar to Lila.

Looking
around desperately, Lila finally located where Maggie was standing, not too far
away. "Ramsey," she called. "Maggie needs help. Over
there." She pointed.

But
Ramsey was too busy fighting a different wolf to pay attention. "I'm going
for her!" she yelled.

Without
waiting to see if he heard her, Lila took off at a sprint. When she was almost
there, she saw another wolf running on a trajectory to intercept her. Lila was
thinking through her options when a column of flame flashed past her and
knocked the attacking wolf out of her way.

Lila
was going to be too late. She saw the wolf get ready to lunge at Maggie. And
then, in the blink of an eye, Maggie completely disappeared. Lila checked
herself and then kept running. She knew what’d happened to Maggie—Desmond had
gotten to her first and turned her invisible. But Lila didn't stop running
towards the large brown wolf. She knew who he was now.

Lila
made it to where Maggie had just been standing and threw her hands up to ward
off an attack. She reached for her emotional control and shoved every amount of
serenity and comfort she could muster into the creature standing before her.

"Dane…
Dane, it's me, Lila. Can you pull out of the wolf?" she pleaded, while
simultaneously sending a frantic mental message to Marcus. If Dane was here, so
were the others that Maddox had taken out of their cell. And possibly some he’d
abducted from their home in the Louisiana swamps.

The
great beast in front of her shook his head. Lila felt the confusion radiating
out from him in powerful waves and was only vaguely aware that Ramsey was
helping to keep all the other fighters at bay.

Using
her telepathy, Lila flashed scenes to Dane’s mind from the last year she'd
spent with him and his clan. They were memories of friendship and camaraderie.
And a memory of what his true natural-born power was… the ability to turn into
a giant grizzly bear.

"Do
you see?" she asked him. "This is not who you are. I know it's hard –
practically impossible – to break away from the wolf pack you’re linked into.
But you've got to try. Reach into yourself… the bear is there."

Dane
looked at her and shook his head, his eyes filled with hate. She was losing
him.

"I'm
here, brother," Marcus said, as he calmly stepped in front of Lila.
"I am your
true
tribal leader. I order you to become the
bear."

Dane
hesitated, but Lila felt a flash of recognition move through him. "It's
working. Keep talking," she whispered in Marcus's ear.

"You’ve
got to let the wolf go. Shut the pack off from your mind," Marcus
commanded.

Dane
whimpered, and his whole body started to shake violently. Suddenly one of his
paws shifted into a bear’s, though only for a moment, and then back to a wolf’s.
Then his fur started rippling, changing color and consistency and length.
Beneath the fur his body shivered and contorted.

Suddenly
he was a bear. Then back to a wolf. He flashed back and forth several times.
Finally, with a mighty roar, a great grizzly stood before them, his sides
heaving from the exhausting struggle. But the wolf didn't return.

Lila
felt his emotions and read his thoughts. "He's safe," she told
Marcus.

Marcus
approached his friend, who stood there motionless. When he got close enough,
Marcus laid one hand on the big bear's shoulder. "Welcome back, mon ami.
It’s good to see you.”

Dane
nodded.

“We
could use your help.” Marcus pointed toward the commotion. “You up to it?”

Dane
answered with terrifying roar, and then he turned and ran into the fray. He
batted at wolves with his huge paws, swatting them across the field like flies.

Lila
turned to Marcus. “You can’t use your toxic gas here,” she said.

“Nice
to see you too. And I know. I’d kill our people too.”

“Go
find the others. I’ll help if I can.”

“Thanks,
peanut.” He kissed her on the cheek and then sprinted away.

“Don’t
run off again like that,” Ramsey’s harsh voice caused Lila to turn around. “I
almost didn’t get to those wolves in time. You promised me.”

Lila
grimaced. “Sorry. I had to get to Maggie. And Dane.”

Ramsey
said nothing, and they resumed their previous positions and kept moving
forward. But four more mild skirmishes later, and they were still no closer to
reaching Selene than before. A big part of the problem was that Lila couldn’t
defend herself, and she was realizing that Ramsey could do much better if he
didn’t have to protect her the whole time.

She
had an idea. One so stupidly brilliant, Lila almost slapped herself in the head
for not realizing it earlier.

“Ramsey,”
she called.

“No,”
he said back.

“What
do you mean, no? You don’t know what—”

“I
know that tone of voice. You’re about to break your promise to me.” He blasted
a wall of flame at another wolf and then turned to face her. “Let’s have it
then.”

Lila
grimaced, but looked pointedly up at the sky.

Ramsey
caught on immediately. “No way.”

“I’ll
be able to see everything from up there and relay it back down to Selene. Ellie
and Griffin have other powers needed down here, but I don’t.”

“No
way,” he said again. “You’ll be too far away for me to protect you.”

“You
won’t need to protect me. Not when I’m up there,” she said. “And you’ll be able
to move faster and do more down here without me holding you back.”

“That
giant condor is still up there. You don’t even know if you can fly. You haven’t
even tried it out or practiced,” he argued.

“It’s
instinct. How hard can it be?”

Before
Ramsey had a chance to protest further, Lila shifted to the falcon and took
off.

“Lila!”
she heard him yell after her.

“Go.
Help the others,”
she mentally answered him.

“Woman,
I swear you will be the death of me,”
his grim thought came through loud and
clear.

“
Only
if you keep watching out for me instead of yourself down there. Go. I’ll keep
in touch. I promise
.”

“I’m
not going to bother answering that comment. Watch your back for that condor. I
don’t see him right now, but he’s gotta be somewhere,”
he replied.

As
Lila circled higher and higher overhead, she was thankful to see him finally
pull his attention back to the battle surrounding him and start fighting again.

Lila
gained a good altitude and started circling the field. The condor was nowhere
in sight. She sincerely hoped someone had taken it out already. The sheer
volume of noise coming out of the fighters below had her wondering how the rest
of the world couldn’t be aware of what was happening.

“Selene,
Griffin, Ellie,”
she mentally called.
“I’m up above you. The bulk of the fighting is centered
directly in front of Selene.”
She sent them an image of what she was
seeing.
“Put that big black and grey wolf out of commission. He’s one of
their leaders.”

Once
she had that message sent, she looked for her sister. Griffin had said that
Adelaide could shift into a falcon now. They could work together.

“Adelaide,
where are you?”
she called. She flashed an image to her sister of where she was, and in what
form.
“Get up here.”

She
got a flash of her sister standing off to the side of the skirmishes, partially
hidden in the trees. A man was standing behind her holding what appeared to be
a lasso in his hands. Lila could tell that Adelaide was unaware of his
presence.

Before
Lila could warn her, Nate came busting through the underbrush and tackled him.
He managed to knock the guy out cold, and the lasso disappeared. Nate ran off
again, and Adelaide morphed to her own falcon form and took to flight.

“What’s
the plan?”
Adelaide asked Lila.

“Circle
and report. Let’s see if we can’t at least give them information,”
she answered.

What
seemed like ages later, Lila and Adelaide were still at it. They helped Selene
single in on stronger fighters to cut off their powers and coordinate attacks
on larger groups of wolves. But the battle raged on, and Adelaide and Lila
couldn’t tell who was winning. They were too evenly matched. And both sides were
losing more and more combatants.

“They
got Meagan,”
Charlotte informed all the telepaths. Meagan had the unique ability to create a
vacuum, sucking all the air out of a space. The Vyusher would feel her loss.
Maddox’s forces had already taken out Sylvie, who could conjure a tornado, and
Jason with his crushing telekinetics.

Lila
had also seen them take out Stephen, one of Marcus’s key leaders who crushed
people with steel bands. She wasn’t sure if he was unconscious or dead, but
Charlotte had gotten to him and taken him back to the castle.

“Watch
out!”
Adelaide’s voice screamed in Lila’s mind.

Lila
dove into a stoop as a ball of lava came whizzing right at her.

“Alex,
stop that fireball from hitting anyone as it comes back down,”
Lila said. She
watched as it froze in midair, and then the fire went out completely and Lila
knew Ramsey had doused it. She used her falcon’s keen eyesight and located the
perpetrator.

“Marcus,”
she thought
“Seamus
is here.”
She showed him where to find his friend.
“Go talk some sense
into him.”

Another
lava ball came flying at her.

“Fast,”
she added.
“He’s
trying to take me out with those damn projectiles of his!”

Alex
and Ramsey handled that second ball of fire too. Only this time, she watched as
they brought it down to Dexter, and he turned it to solid metal. Griffin used
his shield to lob the chunk of iron, landing it right on top of one of Maddox’s
largest wolves.

Lila
looked for Seamus to see if Marcus needed her. Marcus got to him fast but not
quite fast enough. One of the Timening had seen his lava bombs and decided to
remedy the situation. Before she could stop the Brazilian, his power was at
work.

Dirt
shifted and moved under Seamus’s feet. Tendrils of earth came up out of the
ground and wrapped around his ankles and then started pulling him down, under
the earth. It was like a scene from a zombie movie, only the dirt was
swallowing him whole, dragging him under. Seamus screamed… he was about to be
buried alive. Marcus got there just in time to grab his hand.

“Let
him back up,”
Lila mentally instructed the Timening fighter.

“Who
the hell are you to tell me this?”
he asked.

Griffin’s
voice entered the conversation.
“Let him back up, Gustavo. But not quite all
the way. Just his head for now.”

Seamus
spluttered and coughed as his head appeared from the ground. He glared at
Marcus, who still held his hand.

As
they had with Dane, Marcus and Lila worked together on Seamus, until the heat
and anger disappeared, and confusion took their place. On Griffin’s command,
Gustavo brought Seamus all the way up.

Lila
turned her attention back to the fighting.
"This isn't working,"
she thought to all of her family.
"We need something bigger."

"Oh,
I’ll give you bigger,"
Ellie answered.

A
few minutes later, Lila saw Ellie in her black falcon form fly out of the
ruckus. Once she got enough height, Ellie shifted into her magnificent black
dragon. The sight of her was so awesome that for a moment the fighters stopped
and stared. All of them.

And
then, they scattered as the obsidian beast dove at them. Ellie couldn't use her
fire because she would torch allies as well as enemies. So instead she scooped
up handfuls of Maddox's forces in her huge talons, flew to a great height, and
dropped them to their deaths.

Lila
watched as Ellie did this over and over. And it seemed to be helping, possibly
even turning the tide. Maddox had yet to show himself in this battle. She’d
been looking for him.  If they could kill him, they could stop all of this by
cutting off the head of the snake. But he’d been nowhere to be seen.

And
then she caught a stray thought… Maddox! He seemed to almost be arguing with
himself.
"If I don't do this, we are lost. But I don't have Lila yet to
bring me back."

What
on earth did he mean by that? And then she saw her enemy. He stood on a faraway
hill overlooking the battle. He was in his wolf shape one second, and then he
changed.

The
scene was like watching Ellie when she morphed. Maddox’s body seemed to shimmer
and shift. His wolf head grew larger, the fangs dropping down to form a row of
menacingly sharp teeth. His fur changed into gleaming silver scales. The light
refracted off them, almost blinding Lila to the rest of his change. Tail…
wings… talons. If Lila hadn't seen Ellie do it, she never would’ve believed her
eyes. Where only moments before there had been a wolf, there now stood a dragon
so gargantuan in size that he dwarfed Ellie in her own dragon form.

Massive
wings unfurled. The wind caused by them knocked fighters on the ground off
their feet. Maddox shot into the skies and headed straight at Ellie.

"Ellie!"
Lila screamed
at her friend.

"I
see him,"
Ellie said. She was fairly high up in the sky, having just dropped another
talon full of wolves.

The
black dragon dove, wings tucked against her back, and slammed full force into
the silver dragon. Their bodies hurtled to the earth, tangled in a mass of
writhing limbs and tails. Jaws snapped. Claws raked.

Just
before they hit the ground, they broke away from each other and regained
altitude. Then they crashed together again. The noise of their impact sounded
like a clap of thunder. And this time there was fire. Purple and silver flames
danced together around the struggling beasts as over and over they continued
their deathly air battle.

"He's
too strong. Too big,”
Ellie's frantic voice sounded loud and clear in Lila’s head. She knew the rest
the family heard too.
“Selene, turn him off!”

“I…
can’t,”
Selene thought back.
“I’ve been trying, but I can’t get a grasp on his
power. It’s too big.”

Lila
shuddered. She knew if Selene and Ellie couldn’t stop him, there was no way
they’d win the battle.

"Alex,
freeze him,"
Lila ordered, letting everyone else also hear her thoughts.

"He
says he can't,”
Griffin
answered.
” He's also been trying. Maddox is too powerful. He keeps breaking
out of it.”

“
Ellie,
get out of there!”
Adelaide’s voice pleaded.

But
it was too late. Maddox managed to get Ellie’s throat in his powerful jaws.
Blood spouted from where he’d clamped down, and Ellie’s form went limp.

“No!”
Lila heard Alex’s scream from where she was still hovering in the air. His fear
tore straight through her.