I don’t try to speak to him again, and I don’t question whether his summons is a trap or not. The energy flowing through me at the moment makes me stronger than he couldever imagine. Even if he’s set a trap, I have the physical advantage at the moment. I’m going to end this once and for all.
Kill, kill, kill.
The words fly through my head as I leap from my deck, shift in midair, and sprint to him. I’m finally going to kill him. I’m not giving him another chance.
I should thank him, really, because killing him might be the only thing that saves me from killing Lumi.
Blood stops me in my tracks as I run through the village my pack has created. The scent floods my nostrils until it’s all I can inhale.
I slow when I spot the first body—Calix. He’s one of my best fighters, and yet he’s bleeding out on the ground with two puncture marks on his neck. I run to his body, shifting back into my human body.
“Calix! What happened?” I scoop his head, cradling it in my lap.
He starts to open his mouth, but I realize I already know what happened. I don’t need his explanation. I just need him to live.
“You’re going to be okay. I won’t let you die,” I say with the command of an alpha behind the words, ensuring that he doesn’t die while I heal him.
“Go, I’ll heal him and the rest,” Serenai says as she kneels beside Calix.
The rest…I look up and see body after body lining the street. At least a third of my pack lays lifeless, bleeding from vampire wounds. But I can hear their heartbeats. They’re alive.
Whether the vampires didn’t have time to kill them or tried and failed to control them once they took their blood, I don’t know, nor does it really matter.
“Go! I won’t let any of them die,” Serenai says, starting to tend to Calix’s wounds. She’s the best at what she does, so they’llall be okay. But it still feels wrong to leave my pack when I can help.
Serenai lays her hands on Calix’s wound, while looking up at me. “Make him pay for what he did.”
“I will. I promise.”
And then I shift, my dark fur and muscles forming in less than a second.
Nyx dies for this.
He deserved to die for what he did before, but this…this is the final straw. I won’t let this action go unpunished.
“Nyx!”I scream through the woods as I approach the spot where he told me he was. I don’t bother to shift back into my human form. I know he can hear me, and I’m not here for a conversation. I’m here to kill him.
Nyx barely moves, but I see him there in the shadows—always in the fucking shadows. Standing in his human form, he doesn’t speak. He knows what I’ve discovered. He knows I know what he’s done. And there will be no more talking.
A deep, guttural growl works its way through my body. Every shifter, vampire, or witch in my territory can hear it.
“I told you to leave or die.”
Nyx doesn’t flinch. His blackened eyes lock on me in an unblinking focus. There is no emotion in his features. He’s lost whatever emotions he used to have years ago.
“You can’t kill me, Ambrose.” His voice is bored and unbothered.
“Watch me.”I squat, ready to leap and slash his throat in one jump when I see her—the reason he’s so sure I won’t kill him.
I freeze.
Nyx smirks; his vile, evil grin covering his entire face. “Now that I see I have your attention, let’s talk.”
I shift as my heart sinks. “What do you want?”
“I want collateral. I want insurance that the curse will be broken on the next full moon.”
“It will be.”
