Ties That Bind: a New Adult Fantasy Novel (The Spire Chronicles Book 2) (26 page)

The nurses were kind enough to lend me a set of scrubs and let me use their shower. My toes curled at all the red pooled around my feet. My long hair felt thick, clumped with blood, despite the beating spray of hot water having already washed everything away. I was tempted to grab a pair of scissors and just chop it all off. Or burn it off, though based on the way my arms shook as I scrubbed myself raw, magic wasn’t a good idea.

While I was changing into the comfy pink scrubs and tying my hair into a heavy, wet bun, a nurse entered the locker room. She was petite and polite, and offered me a wool cardigan.

“I figure you’re not staying here very long, and it’s pretty cold outside,” she said. “Your friend is already with the…suspect? Hunter? I don’t know. They’re in room 402.”

I slipped on the cardigan and thanked her before heading off to find Alex. Room 402 was at the end of an uncrowded hallway and the room itself was empty save for the two men. Tom looked like shit. So did Alex. So did I. Each of us for different reasons, but it was something we had in common. Right now, it may be the only thing we have in common.

“Is she the reason you’re acting crazy?” Tom asked, scratching around the IV stuck into his arm. “We’re friends, man. Don’t let some–”

I pounced, bouncing lightly as I landed on the bed. My hands wrapped around Tom’s neck, the muscles around his throat pressing against my palm. “Where is Wright?”

In my peripheral, I could see Alex’s eyes widen. “Morgan–”

“You had this whole time to get it out of him,” I said, my eyes never leaving Tom’s bulging hazel ones. He’d be fine; I wasn’t squeezing hard enough to kill, not with the way my hands were trembling. Besides, we were in a hospital – they had respirators. “Now, it’s my turn.”

“I just spent days being tortured by Garou,” Tom forced out as I tightened my grip. “You think you can break me?”

“I won’t lie, your loyalty is damn admirable,” I whispered. “But I’ve spent some time with the Garou, too, and you know what I learned?”

“What?” Tom snarled, his perfect white teeth bared.

Magic pooled into my hands naturally, like a flowing river; I didn’t even notice it until it seeped past my fingertips. I pressed my cheek against his. “They’re nicer than I am.”

Tom let out a pained shout as the skin under my hands heated up, the stench of burnt flesh filling the room. A pair of hands grabbed my sides and I was hoisted up into the air, steam rising up from the welts in Tom’s skin.

“Damn it, Alex.” I struggled in his hold, wet strands of hair slipping out of my bun. “Put me down.”

“Crazy bitch,” Tom mumbled as he sat back up.

“Shut up,” I said. “You’re being pumped full of drugs, I bet you’re already numb.”

“I’ve got fucking handprints seared into my neck!”

He was right. Angry, red handprints were visible on his skin. Now that the steam had dissipated, I could see parts of his skin were cracked and other parts were boiling. Fine, I overdid it. He could consider it a physical reminder of what he had done.

“That’s not even close to what the people you killed went through,” Alex said through clenched teeth as he set me down.

Tom looked away. “I just held them down.”

“Oh,” I scoffed. “Yeah, that makes it okay. ‘I didn’t skin them alive, I just held them down while someone else did it.’ Fucking A.”

“I’ve been in the hospital. How do you expect me to know where Wright is?”

“He shot my father.” I rushed for him again but Alex caught me by the waist. “He got caught, shot my father four times in the chest, and fucking ran off. Where the hell would he go? Take a fucking guess before I add more handprints to your collection.”

I sounded like a psychopath, and with the way my hair was spilling around, I probably looked like one, too. Nausea shot through me as I struggled against both Alex and the magic churning inside me. The lights flickered and the windows thrummed as my magic rushed around like a monsoon. I closed my eyes and tried to relax against Alex’s chest before the entire room exploded.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Tom held his hands up and looked at Alex. “Dude, you didn’t tell me Sir Wallace got shot. How long have you been here that you didn’t think to mention it?”

“You don’t get to play the injured party,” Alex said, turning me around so I wasn’t facing Tom anymore.

“Is he going to be okay?” asked Tom.

“
You
won’t be, if you don’t tell me what I need to know,” I growled.

“He’s unconscious but stable,” said Alex.

Tom sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

“You were skinning people alive,” I snarled, pushing Alex off me.

“I know.” Tom sighed again. “It wasn’t personal. I know, I know,” he said as I opened my mouth again. “It’s a shit excuse. Wright was like a mentor to me when I first left the academy. He was a good man, believe it or not.”

“Not.”

“Morgan,” said Alex.

“Fine.”

Tom looked between the two of us. “After he got crippled – Well, hunter crippled; holding your own against a vampire is a different kettle of fish to a bar fight with humans.”

I raised a brow. “A kettle of fish?”

“Anyway,” Tom said, narrowing his eyes at me, “his life went to shit after that. He started drinking so much that his wife got sick of it. She took their daughter and left, telling him they weren’t coming back until he got himself together. All it did was make him drink more. He couldn’t hold down a job, the money went dry… All that stuff.”

“He has a nice house for someone with money problems,” said Alex.

“Yeah. Now,” Tom said. “His wife – ex-wife – got really sick. Cancer. After he got the news, he started to turn his life around – stopped drinking, got a job, and eventually made his way up to Sir Wallace’s right-hand. But she kept getting sicker, and the medical bills kept coming in; he just couldn’t keep up.”

“He told you all this?” Alex asked.

“About two months ago, I came back from a hunt and we decided to grab a drink – catch up and all that. A few hours and a shit-ton of booze later, he poured his heart out. So, I made a joke –
a joke
– that he could steal some of those super dangerous artifacts that we’re supposed to turn over to the Council and sell them on the black market. Apparently, he took me seriously. Or at least he did after he met that dude.”

“Dude?” I said. “A vampire, right?”

Tom nodded. “Didn’t give me a name or anything. Just said he got an offer: Protean and Garou parts for money. Big money. Wright knew he couldn’t do it alone, so he asked if I was interested or if I knew people who were. I wasn’t gonna do it, but then he told me exactly how much the guy was offering.” He looked at us, regret aging him ten years. “It was more than anything I’d ever made in my life. And that was just for one body. I knew it was wrong, but I’ve got rent and bills and…other debts.” He shook his head. “I know what I did. I don’t expect forgiveness.”

Good, because I wasn’t giving it. I didn’t feel bad about it, either. A little sorry for them, sure – life gets pretty shitty when money’s tight, especially when people got sick. That didn’t excuse the things they’d done. At least Tom owned up to it. He even looked guilty, which I respected him for. A little; the sensations and memories of the victims’ were still fresh in my head.

“You two are close,” I said. “Where would he go if he was on the run?”

“Out of town,” Tom said, looking utterly defeated. “He’d stop at the cemetery first, though.”

“Why?” asked Alex.

“To say goodbye to his wife.”

17

Cold air drifted up the loose scrub pants I was wearing, freezing my calves. I was wearing a pair of sneakers, my boots – and the files I’d stuffed in them – were laying on the floor of my father’s hospital room. It was a decision I regretted as another gust of frigid air whipped around us. I should’ve at least dried my hair; the wet strands felt frozen, numbing my skull.

Despite it being morning, Dovesport Cemetery was as dim and creepy as if we’d been skulking around at midnight. As if sensing the mood, dark, heavy clouds overwhelmed the sky, blocking out all possible light and basking the city in various shades of gloom. It looked like the beginnings of a storm, and as silly as it sounded, I hoped lightning would come to strike Wright down.

Alex was with me, both of us holding our guns as we looked for the ex-hunter. Maybe I was still emotional over my father, because my eyes kept flickering back to Alex. I still didn’t want him here. I even tried to get him to go to the forest and get backup from the Garou instead. He pointed out that by the time he reached the pack, Wright could have fled.

Stupid, smart jerk.

It wasn’t safe for him here. Yes, he was a good hunter, but my dad had been a good hunter. And where was he now? In the fucking hospital because of the very man we were looking for. I almost lost him, I couldn’t – wouldn’t – lose Alex.

The wind howled, and I flinched at the sharp noise, whipping around to aim at the formless source.
Damn it, Morgan, find your center.
Look around. Strategize.
The thick tree trunks would provide ample cover, and if there weren’t any around Wright, then the tombstones would do just as well. Morbid, yes, but I’d rather hide behind a tombstone than be buried underneath one.

Walking into a confrontation brought with it feelings I’d long since accustomed myself to. It was a heavy veil draped over my shoulders, a weighing in my heart that told me I would have to take another life. The feeling was alleviated somewhat by reassuring myself that I’d done enough investigating to be certain I wasn’t killing an innocent.

But preparing to kill a hunter was a strange experience. The only other time I had to do it, I’d been more concerned about saving my friends and stopping the Spire from being unlocked than anyone standing in my way. And I wasn’t even the one who killed Vaughn – Alex was.

The thought of Vaughn had me frowning. Two – seven, when you counted Tom and his group – hunters gone bad in as little as two months, both in Order cities. Even if I did believe in coincidences, these incidents both led back to Fake-Corrigan. Sure, he preyed upon their needs (Vaughn with his thirst for power, Wright for his need of money), but he instigated all of it. He put the ideas in their heads.

If you do this for me, I can give you what you want.

Alex signaled to me and nodded ahead. Wright was there, kneeling in front of a tombstone. He was saying something, his words soft as a prayer. I heard him anyway.

“I’ll be going away for a while, Jenny. I just wanted to say goodbye since I won’t be able to visit. Don’t worry, though, Elizabeth will be fine. I put all my money into an account with her name on it, so when she’s all grown up she’ll have enough to live off of. She should be able to keep the house, too, if they don’t take it away. You’d have loved it, sweetheart – it looks just like the house you used to describe to me, the one we planned to buy when we could afford it. At least our little girl will get to enjoy it, even if we won’t get to see her grow up.” He let out a weepy chuckle. “She’s already grown up, though, isn’t she? Law school, just like she always dreamed of.”

I pursed my lips, shoving the emotion that welled up back inside. If I let every sob story in the world get to me, I wouldn’t be able to function. Alex and I split off in opposite directions to rout him. I signaled for Alex to be careful. Even from this distance, I could feel the dark magic radiating off the artifacts Wright had on his person.

“I hope you can understand and maybe even forgive me,” Wright continued. “I wouldn’t take any of it back, even if I could. My one and only regret is that I didn’t meet that vampire in time to save you, when I could have paid for something that would have kept you alive. These things–” he moved his arms, and I assumed he was gesturing to the items “–I shouldn’t have brought them here, they’re…evil. Even now, I can feel their taint sliding over me. No wonder Ken went crazy. I’m sorry your resting place is being violated by their magicks, but as malicious as they are, they’re powerful, and I need them.”

It would have been easy. Just one shot and it’d be over. I could’ve even used an ice spear for a better aimed hit. It wouldn’t have drained me much, and even if it had, Wright would be dead, and I could spend the rest of the week in bed. But I didn’t throw any magic or fire off a round.

I just stood there, listening to him say goodbye to his dead wife.

“That’s the only reason I did this,” Wright said, louder than before. He’d sensed us. Of course he had, retired or not, he was still a hunter. “My daughter. I did it to pay her tuition, her rent… I have to take care of her. She’s all I have left.”

“How do you think she would feel if she knew what you were doing?” Alex called.

“It’s easy to stand there and judge,” Wright sneered. “What would you have done in my position? If you got so wrapped up in your self-pity that you let yourself get lost in the bottle, if your wife left you because she couldn’t stand seeing you self-destruct, if she
died
because you couldn’t get your shit together fast enough. What the hell would you have done?”

“None of that excuses you,” Alex said as we approached the former hunter, stopping less than five feet away from him.