169

Just as Lara had said, the Executioner and the Tracker had finally arrived, with Havoc following close behind.
“Are you going to come with us willingly, Sophia?” The Executioner spoke first, her voice a delicate falsetto. “Your little magic won’t work on me, but I’d love to see you try.” A gut feeling told me not to use my abilities on her. This was one of those rare, undeniable instincts I couldn’t ignore.
The way she sang my name sent a shiver down my spine, which I suppressed with gritted teeth. She plucked a knife from one of the straps around her leg and held it in her hand. Her glossy auburn hair was tightly pulled back, wrapped in a braid at the base of her neck.
Her knife reminded me of the blade Peter had given me before he left with Louis. It was a kind gesture, considering I barely knew how to use it. If the Executioner got her hands on me, this blade might quickly become my salvation.
She was clearly the leader, the star of the show. Havoc was foaming at the mouth, flashing a movie-star smile that seemed all wrong with the cruelty in his eyes. The Tracker just stood there, mindlessly staring at the five of us, nostrils flaring as he took in our scents.
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” I assured her, forcing as much false bravado into my voice as possible.
The Executioner shrugged indifferently and nodded at Havoc, whose smile widened into a grin. A tremor of excitement seemed to snake down his back, making his fingers twitch and his eyes sparkle.
“Fuck yeah, been waiting forever for this,” he whooped, inky hair falling back as he threw his arms out towards the five of us.
I realized too late what Havoc’s ability was, and that he hadn’t been aiming for the five of us, but for the twins.
Ethan and Kieran’s obsidian eyes brightened, turning a rich shade of crimson that mirrored Havoc’s. Horror enveloped me when I realized that while I could still feel the mate-bond, I no longer had access to their stream of thought. Awareness was leached from their sight, leaving room for nothing but chaos.
Ethan and Kieran turned towards one another, snarling and tensing up. I acted without thinking the moment I saw Kieran’s hand shifting into that of a wolf, nails elongating into curved claws. I lunged forward, though not towards the twins, and not physically.
I lashed out with my abilities, desperately trying to sink my hooks into Havoc and pull with everything I had. Just as I felt myself make contact and form that connection, the Executioner sliced through them with cold-hot steel.
She leaped forward with incredible swiftness, the Tracker tailing her. Her muscular form still moved incredibly fast, making me scramble into action. Havoc was engrossed with the twins, using them like a child would battle with two action figures.
Kieran lunged at Ethan, slashing his elongated nails across the soft flesh of his face. I snarled in sync with Ethan, who was already shifting before my eyes. I needed to do something, and fast. Another minute and I’d be lucky if I had one mate standing.
I wanted to glance at Kat and Lara, who were both just as exposed as I, but I couldn’t risk placing attention on them.
Instead, I did what any completely sane werewolf would do and ran.
I veered left into the forest, knowing I wouldn’t make it very long or far. The goal wasn’t to escape, but to get them away from the twins, Kat, and Lara.
It was the exact opposite of what everyone had been telling me-that I was more important than everyone else, that I had to stay alive and away from Maverick at all costs.
My chest was wracked with pain because, at the end of the day, I couldn’t sit by and let the people I cared about die for me.
So here I was, running into the arms of the enemy.
Even as I heard the Executioner’s snicker at my back, I couldn’t bring myself to regret doing everything humanly possible to save my mates.
If there was one thing I promised myself, it was that now I needed to be strong. Sophia, weak human daughter of Lauren, was skin shed from my shoulders. There was room for nothing else-no one else, except for Luna Sophia.
I was knocked to the ground, shoved into the dirt just half a minute in. The taste of it filled my mouth, followed by a disgusting, grainy texture that crunched beneath my teeth. The gentle scent of gardenias and rose petals filled my nose, and I met the not-so-gentle eyes of the Executioner. They were a deep, chocolate shade of brown that held rich undertones of caramel.
Even though I lacked the fighting skills of a typical Luna, I still had the reflexes.
I wrapped a hand around the leather-bound hilt of the silver blade currently hidden within my belt loop. I had no doubt the Executioner had earned her name by writ of blood, but she had made the same mistake everyone makes when they become the best at their trade: she became complacent, she underestimated me.
I’m positive she was told everything about me, that my abilities were the most dangerous aspect of my personality. I had no formal training, no lifetime of being raised a werewolf, but I now had a network of people dedicated to train me, to keep me alive.
I wasn’t sure where I had found this sudden bout of brutality, or whether it had always lived within me, but I tore the blade from my belt and jammed it into the first thing I could think of: her chocolate-colored eye.
The heart would have been the obvious choice, the easiest when it came to securing a kill. Ethan had taught me that going for the obvious kill wasn’t what you should do against a more skilled opponent. Surprise them, use your inexperience against them.
She hadn’t been expecting me to attack, much less something like her eye. Such a vital part, especially in her profession.
Metallic warmth splashed against my face, mixing with the dirt granules in my mouth, and the Executioner’s furious howls grated my ears. Instead of panicking and turning her attention to her gaping wound, she tore the knife from her eye and frantically ripped her gloves off. I could still hear the sizzle from her flesh as the silver knife burned her skin, destroying any chances of healing her wound.
Her bare hands touched my skin before I had the chance to get away, and it was then I fully understood what her abilities were.
She didn’t just block magic, she fed on it; stole it from other white wolves.
Her touch made my blood run cold, my sweat freeze, and my breath come out in strained huffs. My veins were clogged with ice, churning and scraping against my flesh as my heart continued pumping.
Her nails were digging into my skin, pinpricks of cold in a torrent of ice and snow.
“You fucking bitch.” She hissed incoherently, so furious with me that I wondered if she’d just end my life here and now. I could feel her spittle-or perhaps blood, misting across my face. “This is silver-this is fucking silver! I’ll never heal from this. I’m going to fucking kill-”
“Executioner, you good?” Havoc’s husky voice sounded from a few feet away, jolly even as it made my hair stand on end. The Executioner let go of me, and I gasped as the pressure was finally lifted from my body. She snarled at Havoc, whose eyes widened in genuine surprise. “Why in the fuck did you let her get the upper hand on you? Boss isn’t gonna like this, Executioner. You better not let this screw up your rate.”
“I didn’t let her get the upper hand, and it won’t screw up shit,” she hissed, sending me a look so full of venom that I thought I might actually faint. “I can still kill you just the fucking same.”
I let out a grunt as a bony shoulder slammed into my gut, followed by the rancid scent of body odor as it flooded my nose. I opened my eyes to see an upside-down version of the world, watching my hair as it trailed across the ground. I was slung over the Tracker’s shoulder like meat, hauled deeper into the forest.
The world sloshed back and forth slowly, leaving doubles and triples of everything. With the blood rushing to my head, I could hardly keep up with what I was seeing, so I decided to focus on what I heard instead.
“What did you do with her little mates?” the Executioner asked, sending me another death-and-destruction-filled look that overlapped one another three times. I could still feel the cold rattling in my chest from where she had touched me with her hands.
“Left them wounded real nice,” Havoc sighed unhappily, catching my attention. “Didn’t have time to maul them like I’ve been practicing, not with you screaming in the middle of a damn invasion, making Tracker drag my ass through the woods.”
Relief washed over me, dulling some of the cold dread. They were alive, which meant Kat and Lara must be too.
“She took my fucking eye, Havoc,” the Executioner hissed. For a moment, I thought she might either murder Havoc or finish her work on me. “I’d like to see how well your little tricks work with one eye.”
“Y’know, I don’t see why our soul-eater here needs two eyes to work some magic,” Havoc commented, whistling a repetitive tune. He bent over to look me in the eye, his movie-star grin turning lopsided. He had the perfect boy-next-door vibe-if the boy next door was a raging psychopath with crimson eyes. “I call dibs on the brown one. I think I’ll dry it like one of those little heads.”
“An eye for an eye,” the Executioner mused, her expression chillingly contemplative.
My eyes fluttered as we finally emerged from the forest. I must have blacked out because the sun was now hanging low in the sky, casting splashes of orange and yellow across the horizon.
“Shove her in the back,” the Executioner’s voice grew louder, followed by the sound of a car door opening. Her form was hazy at first, but cleared as I blinked. She was glancing at her watch, tapping the small screen. “We’ve got fifteen minutes before the alpha and his bitch show up with the entire brigade.”
“I told the boss those wolves weren’t ready for real battle,” Havoc sighed dramatically, though I knew he wasn’t upset about the lives lost.
An idea flitted through my head. Fifteen minutes-if I could stall them that long, Louis and Peter would show up. That had to be who they were talking about.
I groaned as I was tossed onto a cold leather seat, but quickly turned over and pushed myself into a sitting position. I had limited time, and I scoured the van’s floor for anything useful. Among splotches of paint and dirt, my fingers ached when they brushed against a slightly bent construction nail. Judging from the sting, it had some silver in it. It was stuck under a small piece of plastic, protruding from the floor.
Within seconds, the Tracker slid into the front seat and the Executioner into the passenger. I wrapped my hand around the nail tightly, trying not to look frazzled. My heartbeat echoed through the van, but the fast-paced pattering wasn’t unusual.