Chapter 29

29

The shifter’s blood dripped down on her, smearing together with the blood from her own wounds, her magic leaking everywhere. I felt it in the air, like someone had burst a balloon and let the pure power fall down, evaporating into nothing.

He didn’t give me much of a chance to feel guilty because he immediately turned to me and snarled, his lip curling up over those ferocious white teeth in a definite challenge. A challenge to deny his superiority.

“What have you done?” Screaming with rage, I launched myself at the shifter, my breath cut off when he easily dodged my attack and his claws ripped at my midsection, right above my fresh wound.

Sloppy. I couldn’t afford to be sloppy. Not now.

Shaking my head and pushing the pain into a smaller and smaller corner of my mind, I threw a spell at him designed to trip him where he stood and take away his balance. Not surprisingly it had no effect against the rampaging halfling form. Nothing I’d attempted had had any real effect.

But that didn’t stop me.

“You will not take me down,” I managed to get out.

My arm holding the dagger hung limp at my side and I raised it now, slashing at whatever part of him I could reach. Although the dagger seemed to glance off of him, I kept trying, kept pushing to gain whatever ground I could.

He twisted and dodged my blows, trying to find an opening but I slashed on furiously. It was draining me physically and I couldn’t help but worry that I wouldn’t be able to keep it up long enough to finish the fight.

Desperation broke inside of me. I clawed at the well of strength I’d recently tapped into. Pulling every drop I could reach to me just to keep myself upright. Still the shifter kept coming.

The dagger was no help. I wasn’t strong enough. I can’t beat this guy.

He wasn’t going to go down; he was too strong. How had I managed to fight him off the last time? Although I’d gotten the upper hand the last time we fought, I hadn’t been able to take him down permanently. I knew I would have a hard time beating him even in wolf form.

Do you want to be fair? Or do you want to win?

Because the difference might be life or death.

Uncle Will’s words echoed in my head. Did I want to be fair? Did I want to do the best I could and still maintain my integrity? Or did I want to make this guy pay for hurting innocent women?

He crouched in the middle of the forest, his dense fur flickering, flaring with his anger. Feral, animal. No trace of anything human remained.

I was staring at a nightmare. A dangerous, violent nightmare with long limbs and a supremely muscled body. Capable of killing me and everyone else around.

The half-shifter crashed into me the moment I called a protection spell. Magic boomed and reverberated outward but it was too little too late. Before I had time to gather myself for a second spell, he hit again, and the impact of his body sent me flying. I should be used to it by now. The last thing I saw before I smashed into the ground was the white blaze of his eyes.

Shock filled me as he rammed me again, roaring, his expression ferocious.

Something snapped to the forefront of my consciousness. He might be a half-shifter, but so was I, and I hadn’t survived this many games and tests and trials for no reason.

I didn’t know how to get to my own halfling form. But I’d grown up wolf. I’d grown up training to fight like a wolf and to use my shifter senses. I knew how to be a wolf. I centered my power on my core and grew the kernel there, merging with and releasing the female alpha inside of me.

Show me what to do, I begged her. Show me how to beat him.

And I had a faint awareness of her satisfaction as black fur burst from my skin.

The shifter leaped at me again, this time accompanied with a guttural growl. I snarled and dodged to the left as my body completed the transformation. Sliced at him with my claws as I went. He bounced off of the nearest tree and twisted his body, lunging forward again. His claws gripped my shoulders and I sagged under the pressure when he began to squeeze.

Those moves…

It was like he somehow anticipated my next move or how I would react.

I needed more power. I needed to be better, stronger.

I pushed through the barriers I’d put in place, one in the mortal realm to hide my Fae half, and one for Faerie to hide my wolf shifter half. Along with deception barriers for protection, there were physical restraints with any form. I didn’t want them anymore, any of them. I wanted to match this guy move for move, muscle for muscle. What did I need to do to improve?

His rear leg knocked into my midsection and sent me down again. Crashing back into a boulder, pain exploding through my spine and ribs. I coughed, muscles seizing. I finally managed to get up when the shifter brought his elbow down a split second later on the same spot where I’d landed.

I rolled into a crouch just in time to avoid the next bone-crushing blow and tried to swipe his legs out from under him. He jumped, striking down twice. Lashing at me with those impossibly long claws.

Nothing I seemed to do damaged him enough to matter.

I need more. My tongue lolled out as I lost my breath. Panting. Why could I not summon the halfling form? And why did it always seem like I never had enough power?

Blood dripped from a multitude of wounds and poured from his mouth, but he kept coming. His pounding steps toward me seemed to shake the earth and his next kick took me below the ribs, driving me back. I hadn’t had the strength to even attempt to dodge. A few more of those and I’d be done for…

Enough!

Except I didn’t say the word out loud. It reverberated in my head and a magical torrent burst forth from me, tearing at him with a million claws of fierce magic. He stumbled once and shook himself, like a dog shaking off water. The last of my desperation surged even as I questioned everything about my life, about my heritage, about my innate power and magic and why it wasn’t enough. I had just one last chance, and if there was ever a moment…

I took the magic I’d been sending at the shifter—and turned it on myself instead. Everything I’d planned to hit him with in wolf form, I now channeled inward.

And felt my body growing. Shifting. Larger, leaner. My fur grew longer and the bones along my spine protruded.

I writhed under the force, one I was not used to. The halfling took another step forward and my in-between form clawed at the air in front of his face.

He stopped just short, as if shocked at the sight of my claws growing longer, my muscles thickening.

More magic, I told myself, even when the logical part of me howled to stop before I self-destructed. But I didn’t want to stop. I couldn’t stop. Not when the power building up in me felt as if, for once, I might get the upper hand in this situation.

The down side? There just might not be any Tavi left when I was done.

A small price to pay if it meant taking this monster down at last. I let my inner nature take over completely. For Coral, for Bronwen, for all the women he’d hurt.

When I looked down, I no longer saw the usual wolf paws of my normal shifter form. I saw a nightmarish conglomeration of fairy and wolf together. Because it had finally dawned on me that I wasn’t a garden-variety halfling, half human and half wolf. Rather I was half wolf and half Fae. With innate powers of both. It just took an extraordinary event to make me aware at last that I was not tapping, in fact had never tapped, my full potential of each at the same time.

A lifetime of hiding my true nature no longer mattered. Even if I risked being exposed for what I really was—assuming I survived this encounter—I no longer had a choice.

I spotted the elemental dagger Coral had created from the mineral shards we’d collected in this Trial. Snarling, keeping eye contact with my opponent, I circled around until I could reach down to grab the dagger. It looked like a twig now compared to the size of my paw.

I attacked again and again. Ramming into him with my now-powerful body, slashing with claws and fangs, stabbing with the dagger anywhere I could reach. I grabbed the fur near his left ear and slammed him down into the ground with all my might, forcing his muzzle into the dirt, hoping to stun him long enough so I could get a few more slashes in with the dagger.

My fangs tore into the tendons at the back of his neck and I tasted his blood. The shifter let out a scream. Crimson pooled around him as I stepped back, panting, waiting to see what he would do next. He remained on the ground, barely moving, in obvious pain.

I should finish him now, I thought. Sinking the dagger into his chest should do the trick.

I wasn’t entirely surprised to see the fur on his arms begin to shrink, to withdraw back into his skin. His snout went next, shifting back into human form. Black fur turned to white hair.

My stomach dropped and roiled in a way that had nothing to do with the blood and gore. Fresh adrenaline shot through me, and I barely acknowledged it as my own body returned to normal form. I was in shock at the sight I was seeing before me.

“No.” The word sounded more like a moan to my ears. No, it can’t be.

Within seconds the half-shifter had returned to human, incapacitated in his agony. I knew this person. I knew him well.

Onyx.

His hands moved to his head, testing the back of his neck where I’d so viciously bitten him. Blood continued to gush from the wound and it looked even worse now. And suddenly a rush of regret filled me as I hoped I hadn’t dealt him a fatal blow.

“T…Tavi?”

Oddly, I didn’t hesitate. I knelt beside him, my friend.

A killer. A murderer.

“I’m here, Onyx.” My voice shook and the rest of me wasn’t far from complete breakdown.

Onyx tried to move but his body didn’t want to cooperate. He stared at his hands and the blood staining them. A horrible sound erupted from his mouth. “What’s happening? Where am I?”

How could he not know? I didn’t know what to tell him, or what kind of an answer he expected.

“Shh, don’t try to talk,” I said gently. I took his hands and found them trembling. “Everything is going to be fine.”

His eyes met mine, wide and terrified, his pupils pure black. “I don’t understand. Where am I? I can’t remember. Oh God! This is the fifth or sixth time this has happened to me. Am I going crazy? I’m going crazy, aren’t I?”

And I wanted to cry.

His words clamped around me and made it hard to breathe, hard to do anything around the press of panic crushing my chest.

“Please, Tavi. Tell me what’s happening. Why can’t I move my head? My neck…”

I shuddered, pressing closer to him, listening to his hoarse groans as he tried to breathe through the pain.

“I’m really sorry,” I whispered. Calling my magic, I focused it on Onyx. I closed my eyes and said, “I need to bind you. Something—or someone—is controlling you with magic.” I knew it in my gut. “I need to make sure you won’t put up a fight for this next part.”

Onyx said nothing as the spell reached out, encompassing his body, his arms and legs and spine, and at the same time keeping his own magic contained. The same kind of spell the king had used on me, like his version of house arrest. If Onyx tried any kind of spell, I would know, and it would return to him times three.

When Onyx looked up at me, I didn’t see the beast who’d murdered all those Fae. I saw my friend, looking at me with terror in his dark eyes, covered in blood.

“It hurts,” he moaned.

“I know. I’m sorry.” There was nothing I could do about the pain, at least not here. “We’ll get you fixed. I promise.”

I pressed my hand to his cheek once before sending out the call. I couldn’t do this, not alone; I needed reinforcements. Selene would be here in a matter of moments, if I’d sent the spell correctly.

Now to check on Coral.

When I stood and approached her, I feared she was dead. Coral was a twisted mess of limbs. Her wounds were severe enough to kill, blood pooled beneath her, and her skin had taken on a sheen I wasn’t sure was sweat or something magical.

I searched for a pulse, swallowing over a lump in my throat as I tested first her wrist then her throat. I sagged with relief. Oh thank God. Weak, but there.

“Hang on,” I begged her, pressing my hands to the worst of her wounds and calling on the strongest healing magic I knew.

How could she be alive? She was mangled beyond repair. She might not have much longer. Using the last of my strength before collapsing, begging Coral to stay with me, I sent out another call for help.

Praying it would arrive in time.