“NOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!” Caia screamed falling beside his body, stunned out of action as she glanced around for the killer. There was no one there. A sob broke out from deep in her heart and she cried over her mate’s corpse.
The cold solidity of it vanished and Caia fell face first into the sand. Propping herself up, spitting the beach out of her mouth, her hands searched the ground for Lucien. He was gone. Looking around she realized she was no longer on the beach. She was in a room that seemed familiar. A child’s room filled with toys and books. Familiar toys and books. A scream rent the air and terror exploded throughout her. Mama! She cried inwardly, hugging her small knees to her chest, shuffling further back against the headboard of the bed she now sat on. Growls and howls reached her ears from the outside and she jumped at the crescendo of items crashing on the ground floor of the house.
“ELIZA!” She heard her father scream, and she scrambled forward on the bed, hearing his footsteps pounding down the hall. Her bedroom door burst open and her father stood there, pale and grief stricken. He clutched his chest and it was then she noticed the swamp of thick blood soaking his entire upper body.
“Run,” he ordered hoarsely, and then collapsed to the floor.
Instinct took hold. She was always to listen to daddy! Shutting out the sight of him dying on her floor she turned to the tall window beside her bed and hitched it up with all her might. Rucking up her night gown, her whole body trembling, she began climbing through it and fumbled for purchase on the wall creeper that allowed her mother’s ivy to neatly decorate the wall outside. A blast of power shot past her shoulder, sending shards of glass in every direction. She felt little cuts slice through her skin like bee stings but it only made her move faster. She swung herself fully onto the creeper and began scuttling down it. Thank goddess she was on the first floor.
“GET HER!” She heard an unfamiliar voice scream as her bare feet touched grass. She turned and stared out over the garden. Beyond the garden was her father’s land and beyond that a lake and beyond that woods. If she could get to the woods she could hide.
Caia jerked awake, sucking in a rush of air in her panic. Eliza. The little girl from the Septum! The little girl may not have recognized the voice that screamed ‘Get her!”’ but Caia would know it anywhere. Marita was going after Eliza Emerett and it was all her fault. She jumped out of the bed she had been given in the hotel and hurried into her clothing. She had to save Eliza and there was no time to wait. Drawing on her energy, she used a communication spell to take her to Vil and Laila’s room praying she wouldn’t interrupt anything. It was daytime after all. She snorted at herself. Like that would stop them. Thankfully she didn’t, but her energy shook the two magiks awake from a nap.
“Caia, wha-”
“I have no time to explain.” She rushed to Vil, throwing his jeans at him. “Put these on and take me to Eliza Emerett’s home. Specifically the gardens!”
Caia had never adored anyone more in that moment as he pulled on his jeans and gripped her arm without a word of question. She could have kissed him!
The travel was rocky, probably because Vil was still half asleep, so they got there feeling a little woozy. The sounds of growls and shrieks met their ears instantly and Vil paled as he realized what she had gotten them into. Perusing their surroundings, her heart gave a thump as she saw the little white figure in the dark a few hundred yards ahead of them.
“There, Vil, take me to her!” She pointed and they were gone again, and then back within seconds.
“Oomph!” Vil grunted and Caia shook herself together in time to see Vil wrap his arms around Eliza who had ran straight into them. She began struggling and crying and he fought to hold on to her.
A howl shot through the night and Caia looked up to see six lykans crossing through the gardens towards them. Oh bloody Hades!
“Vil, this is Eliza Emerett and those are Marita’s lykans. Take her back to the pack. Now!”
His eyes widened as he struggled to hold the hysterical girl. “What about you?!”
“Never mind me. Go! That’s an order!”
Stunned and unhappy, he gripped Eliza and then vanished.
Heart thudding in her chest, Caia turned to face the lykans and sought the warm heat of her lykan energy. She was a wolf in seconds.
A wolf that was ready to destroy those who had killed Eliza’s parents and were hell bent on spilling the little girl’s innocent blood.
She drew back her muzzle as they drew nearer, snarling and posturing, thick saliva dripping over her jaws. With a harsh howl of her own she propelled herself forward, launching herself at the nearest lykan, her claws slashing across its fur. The lykan whined but managed to swipe at her, making contact and tugging her body close so they were locked in a fight, jaws nipping, bodies tumbling as each tried to gain an advantage over the other.
Finally, Caia managed to protract her claws into the lykan’s belly and pull upwards. The lykan howled and went limp. Dragging herself out from under its injured form, Caia found herself outflanked by five other lykans; Marita and an unfamiliar magik stood at their backs, smiling smugly.
“Oh, dear Caia. You are in a pickle now, aren’t you?”
“Not quite.”
Caia jerked her head around at the voice. Vil and Jaeden stood before them, Jae’s hand outstretched, face fierce with concentration.
A baffled yell.
Caia watched with pleasure as Marita and the magik were blasted a good hundred yards away from them.
A sharp, piercing pain ripped through Caia’s side and she yelped at the attack, shaking the wolf off in order to turn around and face it. In her peripheral, she witnessed Jaeden utilizing her telekinesis on the wolves and was distractedly stunned. Magik wasn’t supposed to work on lykans! What the Hades…
But the thought drifted away as she was forced to spar with the bigger lykan, the wound in her side slowing her down. Just as she was about to dive on the lykan, a blur of fur beat her to it, the two wolves tumbling and rolling together. She watched in amazement before a crunching noise unsettled her stomach and only one of the wolves got up. His silver eyes glared at her. Lucien. Oh thank gods. His warning growl told her to whirl around. She did, just in time to see another lykan leap at her. Falling under him, his huge jaws descending towards her, Caia gave a hopeless swat that barely stirred him. A massive weight collided with them and the wolf was thrown off her. A familiar brown wolf, his muzzle peeled back in a fierce growl, stood over her, his head bent low, telling the lykan she was under his protection. Ryder! She had never been happier to see two people in all her life. Rolling up onto her fours, Caia quickly took in Lucien and Ryder dealing quite nicely with the remaining lykans. Vil was nowhere to be seen, however, and she hoped to Gaia he had returned to the pack.
Her heart jolted at the sight of Jaeden pinned to the ground by magik, Marita and her companion grinning evilly down at her. This time Caia took control of the icy vapor that was her magik energy and used it to move her through the change instantaneously, clothing her naked form before it could be chilled by the crisp night air of the English countryside. She sent a shock of water out, forcing the pressurized liquid into the mouth of Marita’s companion, flooding his lung cavity. Panic suffused his features and he dropped to the ground, clawing at his throat and gasping silently. Marita looked up sharply, forgetting Jaeden and clearly feeling no compunction to save her companion. Caia held on tight to the water that was suffocating the magik, even as she trembled with fear at Marita’s stoic face. They took quiet steps towards one another as if there wasn’t a miniature battle going on behind Caia’s back.
“I’m going to kill you slowly,” Marita said quietly, knowing Caia would hear her anyway with her lykan hearing.
Before Caia could respond, the air shimmered with energy, and Marion and Saffron appeared behind Marita’s shoulder causing Caia’s eyes to widen and her grip on the other magik to loosen. She was pretty sure he was unconscious anyway.
Marita paused, her entire body tensing with the unexpected, her eyes telling Caia she couldn’t believe it.
“The only person that will be dying today sister… is you,” Marion bit out.
Marita’s eyes widened in disbelief and she spun around to face her sister. “It can’t be… you were dead. I felt it in the trace.”
Marion smirked. “You really aren’t very good with that trace, Marita. I think it’s best we give it to Caia after all.”
With a shriek of unchecked ire, Marita sent an animalistic stream of fire rushing at her sister, its body hissing and diving in attack. Marion easily deflected it with a mere swipe of her hand. “Is that all?”
Marita’s retort was a wall of fire that encircled her sister from head to foot. Heart pounding, skin hot from the roaring fire, Caia immediately envisioned a waterfall that appeared over Marion’s head, obliterating the flames. Unfortunately, it doused Marion as well, and she threw Caia a bemused look, a look they shared in just enough time for Marita to utilize magik to suspend Jae into the air. When Jaeden began screaming Caia couldn’t work out why, until she realized Marita was scoring burn marks into her with invisible flames. An untold fury took possession of Caia in that moment, refusing to let Jae experience once more second of that kind of torture after having survived it at the hands of Caia’s uncle, Ethan. She thrust her hands out and up and a tidal wave of water the likes of which she had never conjured before towered over Marita like a python readying to strike. Caia gave a jerk of her head, parting a curtain in the wave so as it descended towards Marita it bypassed Jaeden. A yell was muffled into a gurgle as the wave crashed to the ground, whooshing across the grass and taking a bedraggled and spluttering Marita with it. Her magik let go of Jaeden and the lykan tumbled to the ground.
“My goddess, Caia,” Marion’s voice broke through and she looked up to see the magik smiling at her in wonderment. “That was very cool.”
Well, brace yourself, because there’s going to be more! She thought, as she began striding towards Marita, who was pulling herself out of the water with a stream of curses. She straightened in time to see Caia heading determinedly for her and her eyes widened.