17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

Cora

“How are you so calm?” Pike asked her, still pressing his bleeding wrist to Kimble’s mouth. The vampire had swallowed a few times, but not enough to keep up with the sluggish flow of blood from the rapidly healing cut. Small drops of blood escaped the corners of his mouth, leaving trails of crimson down the sides of his jaw.

Cora blew out a harsh breath. “I promise I’m not.”

She might not have gone as far as to twine her soul with Kimble and Pike yet, but it felt like she might as well have. She’d never felt so much fear and panic in her life, not even when Vincent was threatening to kill her and Imani. She wanted to collapse on top of Kimble and sob. She wanted to shake him and scream for him to wake up and say flock, or growl, or any sound!

These two men had only been in her life for a week, and it felt like she couldn’t live without them. It was terrifying.

Pike tilted his head, as if listening to something. “You should open the front door.”

Cora didn’t hear what he was saying at first because she was caught by his eyes. They were glassy with tears, bringing out the green in his hazel eyes. His expression was open and vulnerable.

It occurred to her that Pike was everything nurturing and caring that she wasn’t. He’d never voluntarily leave her, and he’d willingly live every day ready to be anything she needed. She knew with confidence he’d lay down his life to protect her and Kimble.

That’s when she realized she felt the same. If that wasn’t love, she didn’t know what was.

“Cora?” Pike urged. “The door?”

Pulling in a sharp breath, she gave herself a hard shake. “On it.”

She ran to the door on shaking legs, stumbling a little over the mess of her former coffee table. She flung open the door just in time for a red-tailed hawk to come flying through. The hawk flared his wings and tail, dramatically slowing its speed as he back winged. The bird’s form blurred, and Cora thought her eyesight was getting as shaky as her legs.

“What the fuck?” she exclaimed as the bird morphed into a man wearing an immaculate three-piece suit. Coming to a stop in front of the mess that had been her coffee table, he looked around as he straightened his already perfectly aligned tie.

“What a quaint home,” he said. It didn’t sound like a compliment. This had to be Tobias.

“You’re not here to critique my design choices,” Cora growled, striding up to him and grabbing Tobias’s arm. “You’re here to save Kimble.”

“Don’t touch me,” Tobias hissed, moving out of her reach with so much speed she couldn’t track his movements. One moment he was within touching distance and the next he was on the other side of the couch. “Do that again, and I’ll rip you apart, even if it would upset my Briar. No one touches me except my flock.”

Surprised at his vehemence, Cora held up both hands palms out. “Sorry! I won’t do it again.” She pointed to the kitchen with one hand. “Dying vampire in there.”

“Tobias?” Pike called out, leaning back so he could see into the living room. Fresh tears fell from his eyes. “Please, help him!”

Tobias seemed to disappear from Cora’s sight. Suddenly she was alone in the living room with the front door wide open. After slamming the door shut, she rushed to the kitchen. Tobias was kneeling on the opposite side of Kimble from Pike, the spot where she’d been before getting up to open the door .

“Are you fixing him yet?” Cora asked as she took a position next to Pike. The bear shifter’s wrist was still pressed against Kimble’s mouth, but she didn’t think the wound was even bleeding any longer.

Tobias didn’t look up as he spoke. “There’s an entire layer missing from his aura. Even in his diminished mental state no one could’ve simply taken it. He had to have given it away.”

“Why would he do that?” Pike asked. “He had everything he needed.”

Cora gasped and both men looked at her. “What do you know, human?” Tobias demanded.

Pike made a harsh sound, halfway between a bark and a growl. There were still tears coming from his eyes at irregular intervals, but the planes of his face had changed, and his teeth seemed bigger. At that moment, he looked like the deadly beast he could be.

“Don’t talk to her like that. Her name is Cora.”

“Don’t waste my time,” Tobias shot back then refocused on Cora. “What do you know?”

Feeling all kinds of guilt, Cora pulled the necklace out from under her shirt. “The night he showed up here, he gave this to me. I thought he must have stolen it or maybe found it.”

Tobias leaned over Kimble’s body to get a closer look at the piece of jewelry. “That’s powerful bruja magic. He must have traded for it and that’s what caused this.”

Cora tried to find the clasp to take the necklace off. “Here, you can have it.”

Tobias shook his head. “Giving it to me won’t do Maksim any good.”

“But that happened over a day ago, why is he hurting now?” Pike asked. When Cora looked at him, she noticed his face was fully human again.

“He’s weak now but was powerful once. He had enough of his former self leftover that he was able to last for some time before succumbing to the loss,” Tobias explained, then raised an eyebrow at Cora. “If he had both his flock bound to him, he would’ve probably not been affected at all.”

It was as if those words were a slap in the face, making Cora rear back and gasp. She opened her mouth, not sure what she was going to say, when Pike spoke .

“It has to be her choice,” Pike bit out. “An unwilling soul poisons the flock.”

Tobias’s eyes started glowing with power. “Are you unwilling, human? Or is it something else?”

Cora fell into Tobias’s gaze. All her worry vanished and the room around her disappeared.

“Tell me why,” Tobias said, his voice wasn’t harsh anymore. He sounded kind and understanding. Trust blossomed inside her and the words poured out of her mouth.

“I’m scared,” she heard herself say. Why was she admitting this? Even more strange, why wasn’t she upset? She should be furious at voicing any kind of weakness, but instead, she found herself wanting to tell him everything.

“What are you scared of?” Tobias asked.

She heard a faint choking noise but it barely registered as she explained.

“What if I can’t leave? Binding souls is forever. I need to be able to leave. What about my family? I can’t be vulnerable like that.”

Tobias made a questioning sound. “Do you think your vampire wouldn’t help your friends and family?”

Complicated scenarios filtered through her head, making it hard for her to speak even though she wanted to. Thankfully Tobias continued to speak.

“Your vampire will care deeply about everything and anything you care about,” Tobias told her. There was another choking sound, then a gasp and a sharp intake of breath. Tobias looked away, and she followed his gaze to see Pike red faced, hunched over, and gasping. “Calm down, bear. She’s perfectly fine. Don’t make me hold you still again.”

“Kimble’s dying, and you decide to put Cora under thrall for questioning instead of fixing him?” Pike croaked out.

“I’m trying to gauge if I can bind her soul,” Tobias said with a disdainful sniff. “It would be the best way to help him. Unfortunately that’s not a viable option. She has too much doubt. It’s something the three of you will have to address eventually.”

“What can you do instead of binding Cora’s soul?” Pike asked .

Cora felt herself coming out of whatever Tobias did to her. It was almost like waking from a dream. Shaking her head, she tried to understand what Tobias was saying.

“I can take from each of your auras and use them to repair his,” Tobias explained.

“Did you hypnotize me?” Cora asked. She tried to feel outraged at the loss of control, but there was still a strange leftover calm from what Tobias had done.

“It’s called thrall, human,” Tobias answered. “Now catch up with the adults. I need to take some of your aura. It’ll be painful and debilitating for a short time. Do you understand?”

Her calm didn’t extend to Tobias’s outright disdain. She smiled, showing all her teeth. “I might need to stab you later.”

A smile flittered across the vampire's mouth, then he spoke in a dry tone. “Charming.”

“Ditto,” Cora answered then held out her hand, offering up her wrist. “Take whatever you need to fix Kimble.”

Pike pulled in a sharp breath. “It’s not going to feel good, Cora. I’ll recover within a few hours, but you’ll feel like you got hit by a truck.”

“I’m tough,” she assured Pike without looking away from Tobias. Her rapidly beating heart and sweat breaking out over her body belied her confident words.

Tobias pushed her hand away and tapped the floor. “Both of you need to lay on either side of him.”

Pike flopped down and rolled on his side so his front was pressed against Kimble. Cora was slower to lay down. She didn’t like Tobias looming over her.

Tobias shifted and raised both hands, hovering them over the three of them. He closed his eyes, humming to himself as he concentrated. Cora didn’t feel anything and was about to open her mouth when she realized she had no control of her body at all.

“I’ve put both of you under thrall, so you don’t scream,” he told them. “Unfortunately, I can’t block the pain. Brace yourselves”

That was all the warning she got and then it felt like someone was trying to rip her skin off.

Blood roared in her ears, and her lungs froze. She’d never experienced such pain in her life, and she couldn’t even scream. Could someone survive something this horrible?

It was a relief when her vision grayed, and she passed out.