“I’m much like your ancestors, Blackwood,” she says. “I care about self-preservation just as much.”
“What the fuck are you up to, Hella?” Kade takes a step toward her.
“You know, Mother Kade.” Hella spreads her hands over the book, and for the first time I really look at her. She’s gone thin and gray since I saw her last, her hands shaking, like there’s not much left of her. “I’m not going to let Amir destroy this realm. You think I wasn’t planning ahead?”
Mara starts hissing again, low and steady, her whole body coiling. Kade’s head snaps around, scanning the dark.
Then we all hear it. Something like wind, but wrong, and under it the sound of too many bodies moving at once.
“I think,” Hella says, lifting her chin, “it’s time to wake up your magic. Let’s show the Witching Glen exactly what you’re capable of.”
Suddenly, the windows explode.
38
Aaron
Ithrow my hand toward the archway and slam the doors shut, sealing them behind a wall of blue-gold light just as the first bodies hit it from the hall. The frame shudders under them.
I keep my other hand up, and when Hella takes a step toward me, I level it at her chest. “Stay the fuck back!”
She just grins.
“They’re going to kill us,” I tell her.
She shakes her head. “No. They won’t kill you, or your mate. Maybe Kade, and this—“ she nods toward Josiah “—thing of a vampire might survive it. But no.” She looks back at me. “You’re going to be the new king of this Glen, Aaron. You’ll give it life again.”
“You have got to be fucking kidding me!” I growl.
Kade’s voice is pure venom, and she rounds on Ellie. “Bitch Ellie strikes again.”
She blurs, halfway across the room with her hands going for Ellie’s throat before Josiah catches her arm without seeming to move at all. He wags one finger at her, mild as anything.
Kade snatches her arm back. “What the fuck are you doing? Of all people, I’d think you’d be on board with this.”
“Page one hundred and forty,” Josiah says serenely. “‘The hand we raise in anger most often lands on ourselves.’” He tilts his head at her. “You’ll hurt your Leah. And it will hurt you.”
“Do not!” Kade jabs a finger at his chest. “Play therapist in here.”
He shrugs. “But they need one. We all need someone to talk to.”
“We are in the middle of getting ambushed. Again. And you want to—“ Kade stops and stares at him like she can’t believe he’s real. “You know what.” She spins to Hella. “Make them go away.”
“We can’t,” Ellie says from where she’s backed against the shelves, arms wrapped around herself. “They aren’t leaving until Aaron does what he’s destined to do. Or we all die.”
Mara drops into a crouch in front of me, teeth bared, and hisses at Hella and Ellie. Both of them back away, pressing into the shelves, and even Hella’s grin slips.
That’s all the time I get. “Fuck it!” I throw both hands out, and a shield snaps up around Mara, a dome of light closing over her head.
She rounds on me, hissing, slamming her palms against the inside of it. “Aaron. No. No.”
“I’m sorry.” I press my hand flat to the shield, over hers. “You tried to warn me, and I didn’t listen. I’m sorry.”
“Let them in,” Josiah says behind me. “I’ll talk to them myself.”
“When are you gonna fucking get it?” Kade’s already moving, dragging a podium up in front of her for cover. “They aren’t talking to any of us right now. They want to drain the life out of us.”
Josiah smiles. “Like a vampire?”
