Wounded: Book 8 (A Rylee Adamson Novel) (7 page)

“I want to help.”

Doran looked down from the fountain. “How are you at controlling wind?”

“Better than anyone else here.” Blushing, even though I was being honest, I crawled up the edge of the fountain and took the hand Doran offered me.

“Rylee said we should go,” Frank called after me.

“I’m not leaving without her or Liam. They’re my family.” I didn’t look back at him. It wasn’t that he was a bad guy; he was just needy and naïve.

With a seemingly effortless tug, Doran pulled me up to his perch on the top of the fountain. He wrapped an arm around my waist to steady me, but I couldn’t help the heat in my face. I tried to cover it, but Doran gave me a wink, only making it worse.

I looked out toward the ogre encampment and tried not to think about his arm around me. Focusing on the task at hand helped. I knew I could blast the ogres, even at that distance, but I didn’t know how that would help when we had friends out there. “What do you need me to do?”

“Blow the fog faster. The sooner we can expel the evil spirits, the faster we can get Rylee and Liam back.”

That I could do. I lifted my hands and centered my being like Milly had taught me. Picking through the elements, I touched the third one, wind. Breathing evenly, I pulled the element through me and to my fingertips. Wind was not my strongest ability, but it still listened when I asked it to come forward.

From behind us, the cool night breeze turned into a roaring wind that tugged my hair out from my braid, wrapping it around my face and obscuring my vision. But that didn’t matter; the fog was moving faster now.

“Good job, little witch,” Doran murmured and I looked at him. He wasn’t looking at me, but out where the battle had started. I lowered my hands, feeling like it wasn’t enough. What I could do was never enough.

“Come on, now. We need to go or Rylee will have both of our asses.”

He hopped down and held a hand out to me. I took it, focusing on my footing on the slippery fountain. “Yes, that’s true. But one of us would like that very much.” His green eyes popped wide and I slapped a hand over my mouth mumbling past my fingers. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to say that out loud.”

I should have known, though, that Doran of all people wouldn’t be bothered. He threw his head back, laughing. “Truer words were never spoken, little witch.”

Frank slid in between us, frowning at Doran. “Come on, Faris has a doorway open and there’s nothing you can do now.”

That wasn’t true, and I dug my heels in. “You go ahead, Frank. I’m waiting for Rylee.”

I folded my arms over my chest and did my best imitation of Rylee, even tried to lift an eyebrow, though I’m pretty sure the damn thing didn’t budge.

Doran chuckled still, though whether it was over what I’d said to him, or what I was saying to Frank, I wasn’t sure.

“Frank, go. I’ll look out for her,” Doran said and Frank reluctantly backed away.

Doran put a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Rylee will come out of this.”

“How do you know? Can you Read her?” I asked, hoping that was the case.

“No, I used up everything she gave to make that fog. But I know her. This will just be a bump in the road.”

I looked out, saw the explosions of magic, heard the cries of the wolves and the ogres and wasn’t so sure. This was a battle and we needed to be in it with them. Not just stand back.

Doran’s hand tightened. “Don’t. It isn’t time for you, not yet, little witch.”

The way he spoke made me turn toward him. “Not my time?”

His lips tightened. “Your time is coming soon, when they will need you to be stronger than both of them. Which means you need to be there. Not diving into a battle here that will get you killed. That much I
can
see.”

Stronger than both Liam and Rylee? Was that what Doran meant? His eyes never left mine until I nodded. Though in my heart I wondered how I could ever be stronger than Rylee.

He squared off against Raw as the ogres tightened the circle around him. There was no way to run, no way to get out of this.

He’d just have to kill Raw and hope it would give him enough time to make an escape. The red ogre lunged at him, the copper knife swinging out, screaming through the air. Liam shook his head. He had to be hearing things. Nope.

Another swing and the blade screamed again, coming even closer. The muscles in his chest seemed to echo the scream, demanding he lay down and rest.

He snarled and tried to shift back into human form. Nothing happened. Panic clawed at him behind the pain in his body. No, he wasn’t stuck; it had to be something to do with the knife wound.

“Silly wolf, you’re going to die, why not just lie down and be a good doggy for once?” Raw swung a kick at him, grazing his hip. Whatever the copper blade had going for it, it had already slowed his reflexes.

Which meant if he was going to end this, it had to be now.

Liam went to the ground, hoping to draw Raw in close. He let out a whimper and lowered his head, panting. But from the corner of his eye, he watched the ogre approach.

Raw lifted his hands, talking to his minions. “Orion will rule this land, it is said in the book of prophecy that the great wolf would bend knee to a demon, and here it is.” He pointed at Liam with the hand holding the copper knife. Better yet, he looked away from the wolf at his feet.

Liam exploded from the ground, his teeth snapping down over Raw’s wrist, taking the ogre’s hand off. He spit it out without pause, not even giving Raw time to be surprised by what had just happened.

Digging his claws in, he drove himself up Raw’s body until he could get his teeth around the green neck that beckoned him. This demon would go after Rylee, and that alone was reason enough to kill him. One less enemy for her to face once he was no longer able to protect her.

Bones and skin burst under the pressure of his jaws, the hot blood spurting out and steaming in the night air. With his back turned, he heard the approaching ogres, but he couldn’t get out of the way. Three blades drove through him at the same time, cutting deep into his body and neck, but none were the copper blade. That was likely his only saving grace.

A gurgled whimper rolled out of him as Raw’s body fell and he went with it. They hit the ground hard, but Raw didn’t move. Liam crawled on his belly to the hand he’d removed. The copper blade still sat inside the now limp fingers. That knife was deadly, and the demons couldn’t have it. The other ogres laughed behind him and one called out, “No, don’t finish him. Let him suffer, let him see his people cut down as they try to rescue him.”

With the last ounce of his strength, he lay down by the hand and scooped the handle of the copper knife gingerly in his mouth.

He closed his eyes, praying that he was right, that this wasn’t his time.

And that Rylee would come for him.

We were fucking surrounded. Erik was on foot, and wherever he went, the demons were driven out of the ogres’ bodies. The ogres didn’t survive the expulsion, but it still wasn’t enough. We’d taken out at least two dozen of the hundred or so in the gang.

I trusted Nikko to keep me safe and finally Tracked Liam. Everything in me froze. He was hurt bad, his heart beating so slowly I wasn’t sure we’d make it in time.

“BLAZ!” Fuck them all, they could roast, but not until Liam was out of the way.

The dragon had been waiting for me and dropped from the sky like an avenging big ass angel. He swooped low, teeth and claws snapping ogres in half, following the thread I’d tied to Liam. When he launched back into the air, I could see the limp form of a black wolf in his claws. “Get him help!”

Pamela can help him?

I nodded, knowing Blaz could sense my intent as well as words unspoken. Liam was out of the way, but we were still in trouble. A flash of light drew my eye and I turned to find Erik had worked his way back to my side.

“Rylee, you truly have a knack for diving in, don’t you?”

Erik parried with a green ogre who was small, at least as ogres went. Erik ducked inside of the ogre’s guard and put his hand against the skin over his heart. The ogre fell, screaming as the demon ripped free of its body. Twenty-five down, seventy-five or so to go.

Piece of cake. Perhaps not so much.

Three arrows shot through the air, two driving through Nikko’s side, and one through the red unicorn’s neck. The red unicorn went down with a gurgling cry, his eyes rolling up and showing the whites as a group of ogres leapt forward, slashing and hacking him. Nikko let out a piercing scream that ripped through the night. I looked down and realized one of my legs was pierced through with the arrow, sealing my fate with Nikko’s.

It has been an honor to know you, Tracker. Blood of the Lost, you will save us all.

His head whipped around and, with a sharp yank, he grabbed the arrow pinning us together, then gave a mighty buck, sending me flying through the air.

“That won’t save us!” I yelled as I fell from the sky, only to be snatched up before I hit the ground by a familiar set of talons.

“Rylee, I see your lizard has left you alone again,” Eve said as she tightened her grip on me. I twisted in her claws.

“Erik, we can’t leave him!”

“We won’t,” she said, flipping me into the air and then diving underneath me so I landed on her back.

“Slick moves,” I gasped out as I clung to her back.

“They have to be, to keep up with you.”

I turned to see a blur of grayish silver wings dive and scoop Erik out of the melee, much to the roaring and consternation of the ogres. I couldn’t see Nikko any more and my heart tore at the loss of such a pure spirit and a great ally. But like every other loss in my life, there was no time to dwell on it.

Life was about to get real ugly for the demon ogres, at least, that was what I was hoping. Fog rolled in around them and where it touched, ogres froze. Not all of them, but enough that I could see the fog was doing something to them. An undertone of screaming, faint echoes of voices trapped and now freed curled up through the air, tangling with the fog.

Those ogres possessed by evil spirits and not actual demons were no longer controlled by Orion. Doran had come through.

I opened my mouth to yell to tell them they’d been fooled and their friends could not be saved. But I didn’t need to.

Those ogres released from the evil spirits fell on those who were truly possessed.

“I don’t understand what’s happening, why are they fighting now?” Eve called out. Erik answered her.

“Evil spirits can be expelled, they don’t attach to the soul of the creature they possess like a demon does.” Simple, yet still horrifying to think of a soul being latched onto by a demon.

Madness, total and complete, erupted as the ogres attacked one another. My heart sank as I watched the bodies pile and the number of the dead rise, and it was not on the side of those who’d been freed.

Erik and his ride, an odd-looking silvery gray harpy, caught up to us. “The weak ones are free, but they will be dead soon. We have to get the hell out of here.”

He was right, this was a lost cause and we had to give way, much as it sucked shit.

“Eve, how far behind are the rest of the harpies?”

“They are on their way to London.”

Her words stuck in my brain and I struggled to speak. “How could they have known?” Were they in on it? Shit, was I going to have to check every person who came within our close-knit circle?

“They have seers.” She turned her head so I could see the chagrin in one eye. “I argued with them, told them they were needed here but they insisted they would meet us in London.”

“Don’t feel bad.” I put a hand on her neck. “I would have done the same thing, argued ‘til I was blue in the face.”

The silver harpy swept in close, his baritone startling the shit out of me. “She made a good argument.”

I cranked around in my seat to stare at the first male harpy I’d ever met. Now that I was looking at him, I could see the differences. He was far thicker in the legs, body and neck, and his face didn’t have the feminine lines Eve did. His eyes were pale, a gray blue that would have disappeared if not for the black feathers around them like a mask.