Legacy of Flames- The Complete Trilogy, page 30
part #1 of Legacy of Flames Series
But we didn’t kill shifters. Never.
“Stop!” I said, tightening my grip. Becks prowled around the beast, nipping at its legs. Will stood at my side in gargoyle form. We were right out in the open in a place humans often came to, and the shifter had caused enough of a ruckus already. We needed to find a way to make it leave.
The beast lunged without warning and sent me flying into the air. I was so unaccustomed to fighting creatures that much stronger than I was that I didn’t block in time. Becks and Will yelled as I flew a good ten feet into a garden wall. Even with an overgrown bush to break my fall, air rushed out of my lungs and my arms grazed the ground. I clambered to my feet and ran towards the monster. The beast flung Will aside into the entryway to the office.
“Will!” I yelled, running up the steps. A scent overpowered my senses, abruptly flooding my nostrils and igniting the fire inside me. Moonbeam leaves. Someone left bait here.
Will staggered away from the door, still in gargoyle form. Becks continued to weave in and out of the beast’s legs, nipping and scratching, but even her wildcat claws couldn’t do much damage to a creature that size. If we’d been sent after it on a job, we’d have brought a knockout spell. But we didn’t have one.
The beast’s paw caught Becks, throwing her into the air. Will took flight and caught her in time, as I warily approached the beast from behind again. I aimed my attack for its leg, hoping to slow it down. My claws sank through fur and flesh and the beast bellowed in rage, kicking at me with its other back foot. I ducked and buried my claws in its thick hide, then withdrew them. Thick blood spilled out onto the road and I jumped aside as it reared back. Will had stopped mid-flight, staring at the beast. His claws slipped on Becks, and she fell out of the air.
I lunged to catch her, and her cat-form landed in my arms. Rather than wriggling free as she normally would, she remained frozen. Like Will. Furious black-grey eyes glared into mine. Oh, hell. It’s pissed. And it’d caused my friends to freeze in mid-motion. The beast was a shifter, all right. Some of them had a terrifying effect on humans, causing them to be unable to move, but I’d never seen it used against other shifters before. If anything, my own bloodlust burned stronger. The smell of moonbeam leaves drifted through the air again. Scales spread up my lower arms to my elbows and then higher. I was passing the point of partial shifting and heading towards the real deal.
The beast lunged. I swiftly put Becks down behind me and raised my claws.
“Can’t you shift back?” I asked desperately. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
But the moonbeam leaves—or something—had plainly driven it into a frenzy, and it didn’t see us as fellow shifters at all.
The fire overflowed, spreading down my legs in the form of bright red scales. My shoulders bunched, my head elongating and the world tilting as my head turned into a dragon’s. Part of me fought the shift, but the oncoming fire was relentless, consuming everything I was.
Dragonfire could kill shifters.
No. Don’t. I reined the flames in, but the beast struck at me again. Our claws locked. I was stronger in this form, but the beast could still out-muscle me when I was reluctant to deal a killing blow. The shifter roared loud enough to shake the buildings, and I roared louder, tearing into its body with my free claw. It fell, carrying me along with it. I saw red. And smelled burning.
The beast stopped struggling, the pounding of its heartbeat fading to nothing. Only then did Will’s cry of warning break through. The building behind me was on fire.
I didn’t do that.
Will grabbed Becks and pulled her onto his back, as gunshots reached my ears. Damn. I flapped my wings, taking off as the sound grew louder and a group of people appeared at the street’s end. The human police, not the hunters.
They’d think we’d started the fire. I couldn’t see the cause, and we’d drawn attention in the worst way. The beast was dead, its blood staining my claws. It wasn’t the full moon, when pure shifters sometimes lost their senses, so I didn’t know why it’d attacked us. Unless it’d been the moonbeam leaves.
Someone had set us up. The fire, the bait… everything seemed calculated to draw us into a trap.
I kept flying, even as my instincts urged me to turn back. My wings ached, possibly because I was unaccustomed to using the muscles I didn’t have in my human form. I’d definitely never flown so fast before, the city blurring beneath me as I rose higher and higher. My head spun, and my body felt like a dead weight, ready to fall out of the air. Ember, keep flying.
Finally, Will descended. I did the same. My wings gave out with Giselle’s house in sight, and I plummeted. I barely had the sense to throw my arms over my face to protect myself as I slammed down into the garden.
Blackness hit me like a hammer to the head.
“Does she normally shift while she’s asleep?” Giselle’s voice cut through the darkness.
I groaned and stretched, feeling the rough scales on my hands brush against bare floorboards. Wait, how was that possible? I was inside. I wouldn’t fit into the living room of Giselle’s place in dragon form, not with my wings out. My eyes felt weighted but I managed to get them open enough to see my clawed feet… and human body. Ah.
Will, Becks and Giselle stood against the far wall. Crap. What had I done? At least I didn’t kiss Astor this time.
Of course, that might be because he wasn’t here.
I twitched my feet, which slowly turned back into human ones. So did my hands and arms. “Hey,” I said. “What did I miss?”
“A hell of a concussion,” said Will.
“You broke my fence,” added Giselle. “I’d charge you for it, if I had any neighbours to complain about the mess. Which I don’t.”
“One piece of good news.” I sat up. My limbs felt floppy, but I managed one step, then sank onto the mattress again. Maybe not.
“Are you feeling okay?” asked Becks.
“Like I just ran a marathon.” I twitched my legs. “In half-shifted form. Can someone get me some food and stop staring at me?”
Becks cleared her throat. “Yeah. Of course. By the way, we’re not far off from getting that potion to work on the faerie.”
“Oh!” My exhaustion faded a little. “Good. He probably needs it.” I crawled to my front as Becks approached, throwing an energy bar at me. I pulled a face. I hadn’t missed eating the same tasteless crap day after day, but I didn’t want to stoop to begging Giselle for food when she could easily kick us out. It was damned lucky I hadn’t landed on the house when I’d crashed.
This needs to stop. If this kept happening every time I shifted, sooner or later it’d have a heavier cost than I was willing to bear. To my irritation, Giselle kept watching me. As though I was some fascinating animal.
“What?” I finally asked her, after shoving what was left of the energy bar into my mouth.
“You just fell twenty feet out of the air into my garden while in dragon form,” said Giselle.
“Want to know how I survived it? I don’t know. Shifters are usually more resilient than regular humans, and dragon hides are tough.”
“I don’t doubt it,” said Giselle, “but if you were trying to keep a low profile, you might have just blown it. Anyone might have seen you leave the city.”
“They didn’t,” I said. “There were too many clouds. Besides, you’re the only person living here.”
“Not for long,” Giselle said. “A dragon can be spotted from further away.”
“Fine. We’ll leave as soon as we can. We’re running against the clock, and if the Moonbeam ends up in the wrong hands, there’s more than our lives on the line.”
“Especially if the hunters have it,” said Will.
“Let’s assume they do,” I said. “It couldn’t be anyone else.”
“So they stole it back,” said Giselle. “Have you any proof?”
“They raided Carter’s place at the time it went missing,” Will said. “Either that or he stashed it somewhere else before they came, but I never got the impression he was that forward-thinking. Or he sold it. He needed the money to hand over to the gargoyles, and he never got hold of it in time. No… I think the hunters took the Moonbeam, and left him with no apparent choice but to turn us in.”
“It’d explain why they let us walk into their place, too,” I said. “They knew I’d be forced to cooperate if the only way to wake Cori up was to go back to them. Now… we don’t even know where they’re hiding. Unless Astor knows?”
“That’s why he’s been using the mages’ contacts,” said Giselle. “But no, he hasn’t found them yet. It’s much easier to hide now.”
“For supernaturals,” I said. “But then, Malkin doesn’t see anything wrong with sneakily turning his Elites into supernaturals, and using parts of us to make weapons and armour. And witch ingredients. He must have a supplier.”
Giselle’s head snapped up. “Of course.”
“What?” I asked.
She smirked. “Astor might be persistent, but he was a fool not to ask you for help. Then again, it might have spared you from getting yourselves killed.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Becks.
“I’m saying that you’re right. The League gets its supplies from somewhere, and I’m guessing at least one of you knows the contact details of the major suppliers of your witchcraft?”
Her gaze was on Will, who nodded slowly. “Yeah. There are three. One’s in Europe and it’s not been working as well since the invasion—they ship their ingredients over from France, but boats keep getting attacked by hydras or some shit. I don’t think the League’s operating from overseas, so it’s got to be one of the other two.”
“Question is,” Becks said, “do they have someone within the supplier itself, or are they ordering the ingredients in a different name? Because I’d have thought the suppliers would have questions about someone who keeps ordering supplies in bulk but apparently never selling them to witches.”
“I don’t think the suppliers track who they sell to,” said Will. “Most witches have always lived in hiding, remember. A fair few grow herbs and other ingredients themselves, but the rarer ingredients have to be obtained from outside. I’ll look them up.” He pulled out the phone Giselle had given him. I expected Giselle to object, but she shrugged and sat on the old sofa. Good, because I couldn’t take another argument.
With nothing else to do, I checked on Cori. The faerie remained asleep, too. “When will the potion be ready?” I asked Will.
“Half an hour, but it might take a while to work. I don’t know how much iron they used on him. A healing spell didn’t do anything.”
His words brought a renewed surge of anger at the League. I hadn’t done nearly enough to help the faerie, nor did I have the faintest idea where he’d even come from. If he’d been imprisoned in the Orion Stronghold for years, would he even know where his family was? If they’d even survived the invasion? The more of us there were, the higher the chance we’d be caught. It was only a matter of time before one of us made Giselle put her foot down. Especially considering Astor apparently wasn’t going to stick around.
Now I was angry with myself for wanting to talk to him, to update him on the latest development.
Will looked up from his phone. “It’s time.” He walked over to where he’d left a potion simmering on the kitchen stove—to Giselle’s annoyance.
My anger melted away, to be replaced with tentative hope that the faerie would recover from the iron poisoning. A selfish part of me wanted him to because he was our only hope to translate the text, but also because I didn’t want another death to be my fault. I was one person—or dragon—and hadn’t even been able to protect my baby sister.
And I’d killed a fellow shifter today.
I shoved the thoughts away and went to help Will. Becks did the same, ignoring Giselle’s stares. She made no secret of the fact that once the faerie was capable of walking out, he was gone. That was a battle we’d fight later. For now, just getting the faerie to actually swallow the potion would be a challenge. He was awake, but staring at the wall, muttering to himself. He didn’t seem to mind Cori being there, but instantly tensed when the three of us walked over to him.
“Hey,” said Will. “We have something that can help you.”
The faerie didn’t even look up. Oh, man. We’d had enough trouble getting him to eat or drink, and he’d refused to change out of his prison uniform.
“It’ll help.” Will moved closer. “The potion will stop the iron—”
“No iron!” yelled the faerie.
“Oh, here we go,” said Becks. The faerie curled up in a ball, saying words I assumed meant go away and leave me alone. “Don’t mention iron, Will.”
“No iron!” yelled the faerie.
“I’ll hold him down,” said Becks.
“Not that way,” said Will. “He’ll think we’re the hunters. Let me try.”
“Will, he’ll lash out. What if he uses magic on us?” She spoke in a low voice, but Giselle hovered behind, listening in.
“I don’t think he will,” I said. “He knows we’re not the enemy.”
“Exactly.” Will crouched down next to him, not quite touching him. “Hey. Don’t panic. We’re not gonna hurt you. I’m a pacifist.”
“Can he even understand English?” asked Becks.
“He’s not a pure faerie,” said Will. “He’s half-blood. So he must have lived amongst humans before they took him. I saw his file in the prison. Can’t say I know where they caught him, though. I don’t know anything about the League operating outside of London… calm down,” he added to the faerie. He’d stilled, one bright green eye fixed on the potion. Green meant he was a Summer or Seelie faerie—like the magic he’d used to protect us against the gargoyles. He had some seriously strong magic. I hoped Will would be quick to get out of the line of fire if he used it against us.
“You’re from Summer, right?” I asked him. “The Seelie Court?”
His gaze fixed on me. He didn’t speak.
Will said, “But you lived with humans. Can you tell me about them?”
We’d tried this line of questioning before and received no answers. The only time the faerie spoke was when he screamed in his sleep or yelled random words in some faerie language.
Will held up the potion again. “It’ll stop the pain. I’m not going to hurt you.”
“I think all of us being here is bothering him,” said Becks. “Maybe we should step away—”
“Good idea.” I stepped back. “You okay, Will?”
“I can handle it,” he said.
The front door slammed.
“Astor,” said Giselle, walking into the corridor. “Mind telling me why you’re covered in blood?”
9
I jumped. The others turned around, except the faerie. I got to my feet before remembering I was supposed to be mad at him. At the very least, I was glad Astor hadn’t been here when I’d transformed, considering what happened last time.
Astor stood in the doorway behind Giselle, his clothes torn and bloody. With anyone else, I’d have been worried. Astor, however, looked almost bored. Which was pretty standard for him. I had to double check and make sure he wasn’t missing any limbs, because if he was, he’d probably wear the same expression. Though since the revelation of Malkin’s meddling with his Elite soldiers, I couldn’t help but wonder if his lack of reaction to pain had to do with that. Malkin himself hadn’t been able to feel anything when I’d stabbed him. Ew. Creepy.
“I told you, the car’s not being tracked,” he said irritably to Giselle. “Nobody’s coming here.”
“Can you see through glamour?” asked Giselle, crossing her arms. “No, because you’re not a faerie. How can you know it’s not stuck to the car?”
“What’s stuck to the car?” I asked, peering out the door.
Astor scowled at me. “Nothing. There was an incident back in mage territory.”
“Do they know where you live?” I asked.
“Of course not,” he said. “I gave them an old address of mine to stop them digging into my history.”
“And then you decided to bring a tail here,” added Giselle.
“I told you, I didn’t,” he said. “I was chased by something on the way back, but it wasn’t on the car. It was in the sky.”
“What?” I asked. “Gargoyles?”
“No,” said Astor. “It was bigger than that. I was too busy trying to overtake it to look up.”
“I didn’t see anything,” I said. “Are you sure you didn’t see me?”
“You?”
“Never mind.”
Astor looked past me, at Will and the faerie. “What’s going on over there?”
“While you were out doing whatever the hell it is you do, we brewed up a cure for our faerie friend’s iron poisoning.”
“What, you did?” For once, he didn’t sound indifferent, but curious.
“Yes. If we can get him to actually drink it, he’ll lose the side effects of the poison and be able to remember who he is.”
“And stop drawing attention,” Giselle added.
“And translate your notebook, right?” asked Astor.
I ignored his pointed stare, unsure why the notion of him knowing about the notebook bothered me so much. Perhaps because only a minute after he’d given it me back, he’d admitted the truth about kidnapping the other dragon shifter. “Maybe. He’s not pure faerie, so he might not be able to read it.”
“Then why—”
“Because unlike some people, I don’t only value others by how useful they might be to me.”
Astor’s mouth flattened. “Try not to destroy the house, then.” He nodded to Giselle then headed upstairs, presumably to change into clean clothes. I hadn’t asked him where the blood had come from, but it probably wasn’t his. Guilt and annoyance warred inside me, heated up by the aftermath of the shift and our narrow escape. Why did he insist on risking his life? Why did I even care? It was all a mess, and somehow spending time in the same place only served to make me blow up at him more easily. Probably because the alternative was to let my dragon side have free rein, and god only knew what would happen then.
