I staggered when I finally stopped. The defence line had already lowered their shields and were back to their usual fighting.
‘Alpha!’ Chiara, in her wolf form stepped forward in concern. ‘Do you need a break?’
“Our enemies don’t rest. We won’t either.” I breathed out.
She held my eye before nodding and let out a war-cry howl that was joined by many others. We needed to keep each other motivated if we wanted to make it till help arrived.
“Ah!” I heard a cry and saw a little girl fall down inside the defence line. So many people were being brought in that it was a race to get inside the palace and save themselves.
I made my way inside and let out a growl, “walk in rows. No one gets left behind. Help the injured, kids and elders first.”
The people who were running like headless chickens stiffened before they realised what they were doing. They automatically started walking in rows, helping injured, picking up the kids and holding hands of the elders.
“Sorry Alpha!” A man came running and picked up the little girl.
I nodded and then he went running back into the row.
‘For far are you?’ I asked Mikhail through the mind-link. The Neos army was our only hope. We needed those stones now. And we needed the numbers too.
‘Twenty minutes. Alvar is mostly taken care of. We will be there soon.’ Meaning most of the people there were now in secured locations.
‘Be quick, things aren’t looking good.’ I said as I made my way back outside and joined the fight.
‘Yes, Alpha.’ He replied while I went back to killing.
I was in the middle of ripping off the spinal cord of a zombie when I felt Ava. She was near me. I thought we decided on resting. She’s not strong enough to fight right now, I need to go find her and protect her.
I looked around, hoping to catch a glimpse of her silver hair but all I could see were half-dead witches and my pack struggling to defend themselves and save as many people as they could.
It was pure chaos.
People were dying in front of my eyes and I couldn’t do anything. Every second, I felt the snapping of a bond, signalling the death of a pack member.
I saw a wolf fighting a zombie but three others jumped on it’s back, chanting spells, choking him. I ran towards them with my fiery claws out. I swiped the zombies away and watched them burn as I helped the wolf to his feet. Half of his neck was ripped open and he was bleeding profusely. “Go back to the palace, get this taken care of.”
He let out a soft whine before he lowered his head and ran away, towards the palace.
I felt Ava more closer to me than ever and then I heard something.
My head snapped up and I swear I saw an angel. Large white-gold wings, long silver and an ethereal silhouette.
Familiar electric blue eyes met mine and for a second the whole world faded away. All I could see was her. My angel. My mate.
“Avalyn.” I breathed.
She has wings now. She’s truly a faye now, in every sense of the world.
“Nikolai!” She spotted me and started lowering herself to the ground.
I saw a group of zombies coming near me and I burned them dead. No one is touching my angel.
She mistook the distance and her speed because of which she was about to crash down but I jumped in the air, caught her in my arms and landing back on my feet to make sure she had a safe landing.
“Thank you,” she whispered, looking around with wide eyes before she finally looked at me. “Natalia and Dimitri found a cure. Don’t kill them, they can turn back into normal living witches again.”
I looked around, “they’re killing our people, Love.” I breathed. “If we don’t kill them, they kill us.”
She chewed on her lip as she thought about it.
“Mikhail is on his way with the Neos army, we can hold them then but right now the only way to defend ourselves is killing them.” I pecked her forehead as I fired another group of zombies running towards us.
“Okay then. What do you need me to do?”
“The people are still hiding away in the houses. The zombies are breaking down the doors and windows. You need to get them out of there and drop them at the palace.” The wings will help speed things up.
“Okay, be safe, Nik.” She started flapping her wings and I fired some more zombies who got too close for my liking.
“You too, Love.” I said as I made sure she was higher up in the air and out of reach of anyone. Only after that, I continued killing. This time, I stayed near the defence line, making sure they weren’t overwhelmed.
I lost count of the number of zombies I killed. The pain of my pack members being killed was less than earlier but it was still constant. I knew that Silverwitch Bay and Alvar were in the clear now. But most of the population of Soare-Luna was in Imporia and we needed back up right now.
‘We’re here, brother.’ Mikhail came through.
‘Tell the Neos to start handing out the stones to the warriors first before they started engaged in a fight with the witches. Dimitri and Nat have found a cure so tell them to avoid killing the witches, but not at the expense of their lives.’
‘Yes, Alpha.’ He replied.
It was impossible to not feel the presence of the over five thousand warriors of the Neos Army. They swooped in and I could already see that the condition was getting better. Most of the pack members had stones but we were nowhere near close to winning.
Counting the Neos, we were around six thousand of us fighting and we were still wildly outnumbered.
I aimed my palms towards a group of people running towards the palace when I heard a scream, “no!”
A witch who smelled rotten, wearing rags came kneeled in the middle of the ground, “please spare my life, Alpha.”
My eyes widened. Zombie witch couldn’t speak. Was this… was he cured?
I walked towards him, “you’re cured.”