Page 158 of Devoured

“I am not a Lone Wolf. Nor could I ever be one because I will always, always have my Jack.” The threads of navy, I realize, twining through her charcoal. Protecting it. Strengthening it.

My muscles tense. And my fingers—my fingers loosen around the gun.

I recall that moment I dove into my own vision and tried to rewrite history—the moment I almost broke the world. There was blue there. Inside me. And instantly, I understand: There is a piece of Celeste that will live in me forever.

It’s because of her that Sin’s compulsion didn’t hold during the massacre. And it’s because of her that Cora’s won’t either.

I am not Cora’s to compel.

Celeste, my mind breathes. It’s a sigh of recognition. Of relief. Because she’s been here all along, and I can almost imagine her sitting beside me now, cross-legged in the muck. She winks at me. “Took you long enough.”

Cora grips the barrel tighter, even as it burns her. “No! No, you bitch! You will listen to me! You will obey!”

I tear my gaze from Celeste to glare at her, my chest rising and falling rapidly as my throat heals itself from her torment. “No,” I say—and I rake a claw down her face. Her hold loosens as the surprise throws her off balance. With a growl, I shove her away from me. “You don’t own me.”

She throws back her head, glowering at me, preparing to charge, but I aim the gun at her.

I pull the trigger.

Silver explodes from the barrel, and she tries to dodge it. She tries to roll away. But even a werewolf can’t outrun a bullet; it lodges in her chest in a flash.

It lodges just beside her heart.

She roars against the pain, desperately digging at the silver with her claw. It’s no use, though. She’s as good as dead.

I rise to my feet, repressing the ache in my legs, in my sides, in my throat and chest, and glare down at her. “Rot in hell.”

She spits at my feet, burrowing claws in the earth and crawling toward me with whatever strength remains. Her voice is thinner when she speaks, however, as if she struggles to draw breath. As if she’s in tremendous pain. Good. “Aren’t you going to finish the job?” she sneers, still desperate for the last word. Her face has gone bloodless. Ashen. “Or will you always be a coward?”

“Why would I? You’ll suffer more this way,” I tell her, “and you deserve this. You deserve to lie here and remember all the pain you’ve caused everyone around you. You deserve to feel it returned tenfold.”

She hisses again, and I watch as she struggles to pull the bullet out. I watch as she realizes it has penetrated her bloodstream. I watch as she dies. And I don’t feel a single ounce of pity for the woman who just murdered her own son.

In her last, anguished moment, she tries to reach me. She stretches out a trembling hand.

And in her gaze, I spot terror. The terror of a young child raised in a heinous court. The terror of a werewolf broken again and again by her own family.

The terror of generational curses that destroyed her entire house.

Sin is dead because of her.

So is Celeste. So are Oona and Shepherd and Nettie and Myles and Eric and Queen Jae and King Zhiyu. I think all their names. I remember them, repeat them under my breath, as I stare at Cora.

“Plea—” she begins.

But she dies before she can finish the word.

And I turn on my heel and leave her to rot there forever.

53

VANESSA

PORTIA’S SCREAM RENDS THE AIR, AND I REACT BEFORE I even realize I’m moving.

The battle isn’t over just because the evil queen is dead.

“Get—off!” Portia pleads. Her ivy grows from the earth, wrapping around Jasper’s middle, but he slides a claw between her ribs with a snarl.