Chapter 89


    Chapter Eighty-Nine


    N runs.


    She pours on the speed and we race along the shoreline of theke, toward the mountains that were in


    my vision. I’ve been here before as a child. Healmsworthnds butt up against this vast stretch of


    preserve. The memories are vague.


    Time seems to ripple or maybe it’s just my consciousness.


    The sights and smells are simr to my vision but not quite the same. The mountain is exact. The river.


    The position of the stars overhead.


    I run so fast my heart feels like it will burst out of my chest.


    Please be safe.


    Please be safe.


    I round the bend and cut into the woods.


    I smell it now. The familiar scents.


    Death and old earth.


    Blood.


    Wolves.


    I reach the clearing in the woods where this swatch of trees opens up in the valley. I stop so short my


    N?velDrama.Org copyrighted ? content.


    hindquarters scrape the ground.


    It’s carnage.


    The wraiths are dead, spewn across the grasnd like lifeless soldiers. The ones from my vision. Their


    hearts ruptured exactly as I foresaw.


    But behind them, many more wraiths battle.


    I see Jace and Liam, Michail and Den.


    Cameron is in his lycan form. He fights with Cassian. They sh and bite, Cassian’s beauty is peeled


    back to a feral creature, one more monster than man.


    The brte that had been spared…she rises.


    Blood drips from her mouth. She approaches Cam’s blindside.


    I don’t think.


    I run and tackle her. My front ws dig into her shoulders and I hold her down. I snap and snarl at her


    face, letting her know I could kill her–I will kill her. She goes for my eyes with nails as sharp as talons.


    I shift back partially and head butt her.


    The moment of shock helps me to restrain her.


    When I nce at Cameron, he has Cassian pinned.


    Cameron is winning.


    He’s not in danger.


    Cassian’s bleeding from the self-induced cut on his throat and from the many gashes and bites from


    Cameron’s massive wolf.


    I watch as Cam sinks his ws into Cassian’s chest.


    There’s a brutal crack as the sternum and ribs split.


    “No!” I shout. I don’t know why. The instinct boils up and I can’t contain it.


    Cam’s attention is divided. He nces at me and it is all the distraction the vampire needs.


    Cassian rolls with Cam and slices his wed fingers across Cam’s throat.


    “Nooo!” I scream again.


    Oh my gods, what have I done!?


    Cam gurgles. He growls and brings up his hind legs, eviscerating the vampire before tossing him aside.


    Both males lie on the ground. Bleeding out.


    I hurl this changeling vampire aside and rush to Cam.


    I p my hand over his neck. “I’m here. You’re okay.” He’s not okay, not remotely. “Shift. Come on,


    Conn. Push all the way through. We need to seal these arteries.”


    Cam’s eyes are glowing gold and I know he wants to, but he’s losing so much blood.


    “Now!” I demand. I am his Luna and Cameron is tied to me.


    My body is weakening. My strength drains in time to the blood leaving Cam’s body.


    We’re mated.


    If Cam dies… there is a very good chance I will too.


    “Cam, I need you. Your kids need you. This pack. Fight! Fight now, Cam. For me!”


    I press my hand to his chest. The link we share, as mates, as whatever connection my bloodline allows


    to go deeper, mind to mind. I connect us.


    And through that link, I pour my energy.


    My love.


    My life.


    “Please Cameron! Fight!”


    His heart slows. I hold my breath, waiting for each beat, thinking it might be thest.


    “No. No!”


    I open my mind–my heart.


    It’s like sinking beneath the water.


    Darkness, shes of light.


    Nothing and everything all at once.


    There’s a thump. Then another.


    Cam draws a ragged breath and then his body gradually morphs. One second his skin is cold and


    bloody beneath my hands, the next, I hug Conn’s huge head and smooth his fur.


    There’s a hiss from not far beside me.


    I gently lower Cam’s head to the ground and let my own lycan form break free.


    Cassian’s body is mending. The ribs and muscles knitting together.


    I kneel and thrust my hand into his chest.The muscles squeeze my wrist like a vice and the bones


    splinter through my hand as his body tries to heel.


    I sink my ws into this creature’s heart.


    “I spared you,” I tell him.


    I nearly cost my own mate his life in doing so.


    “Call them off,” I tell him.


    He smirks, then nods. His eyes flicker. One by one the remaining wraiths copse into some kind of


    suspended state.


    It’s a truce… for now.


    “What do you want, child?” Cassian asks.


    Child… We look to be only a few years apart. But I know that means nothing. He’s ancient.


    I ease my hand away from his heart.


    His blood is so dark a red it’s nearly ck. It drips from my fingertips.


    The metallic scent is strong in the air.


    Child…


    The word sparks a thought that begins to take shape. Details coalesce around me.


    The bloodline of Seers.


    Save a life. Or take a life.


    Even Cassian’s words in my vision: Blood is life.


    “We have a child,” I tell this vampire.


    Cameron growls. I ignore him.


    “She’s ill and has been tainted by magic.”


    I nce between this vampire and Cam. Around us, the fighting has stopped. The pack wolves close


    in, watching and waiting. The wraiths are dead or subdued.


    Only Cassian rises and his one changeling.


    Cassian smiles slowly…