Page 112 of Primal Mirror

You sound desperate, Mother, she said. The lovely nurse did let me know your brain is going critical. How much longer can you last? She deliberately channeled the piece of Shoshanna that was now part of her, the part that could think with cold clarity and the part, she now realized, that could be used to defend as well as attack.

Shoshanna had used her will and her ability to think with crisp clarity to hurt people. Auden could do the opposite with the same tool. Because that was all it was, a tool, and one that would stand her in good stead in the years to come as she protected all those who were her own. Liberty. Remi. And the pack that had enclosed her baby in its arms.

No one would ever get to RainFire as long as Auden lived.

Changelings! A shocked cry from Shoshanna. You are consorting with changelings!

That answered one more question. Strange that you didn’t know already, if you transferred your consciousness to mine. Seems like I’m tough enough to keep my memories and experiences safe from you. The relief she felt at that confirmation was a roar through her veins that gave her even more power. You are dead, Mother. You died that day you collapsed. What you are now is an abomination, a fragmented shadow that is half-insane.

A screech of sound that hurt her mental ear—and removed any doubts about her conclusion. The Shoshanna she’d known would’ve never lost control that way. Auden had never, not once, seen her mother display any emotion.

But even half-mad, her brain functions nowhere near optimal, she was still a 9.5 telepath with razor-sharp offensive capabilities.

No. Auden frowned. Shoshanna now had access to the same brain machinery as Auden—which meant all she had was psychometry and the most basic telepathy. This was Shoshanna using her knowledge of strategy and telepathic combat to confuse and distract in an endless barrage that stole from Auden’s own power.

Auden shoved back with every violent tactile memory she had—and knew it wasn’t enough. Even with the piece of Shoshanna inside her, she didn’t have enough offensive knowledge to outsmart a woman who’d once been a Councilor. Even with only the brain of a psychometric in her arsenal, Shoshanna was winning.

Auden felt herself bleeding on the physical plane. Blood vessels bursting in her eyes from the pressure and tiny hemorrhages appearing on the skin of her body as her mind tried to redirect the violence. I will never give up! I’d rather die than let you live!

That was Auden’s line in the sand: Shoshanna ended here, her evil stopped before it could continue on.

Because Auden knew she wouldn’t be the last if this infernal “transfer” and “integration” actually worked and Shoshanna maintained even a semblance of thought. She’d find another victim, might even track down Liberty.

You can’t stop me. Chilling confidence, Shoshanna’s control returning as a clawed telepathic hand gripped at Auden’s mind, every ounce of her own telepathic power concentrated in a way she’d never known could be done. But Auden had one final ace up her sleeve that she’d prepared long before she’d stepped foot back in this house.

One last act of love from a mother to her child.

Chapter 43

Henry is showing signs of mental degradation. A lingering effect from the implants we decided to utilize precipitously? It seems the most logical answer, given his previous stability. It is pure luck that I have not been similarly afflicted.

—Private journal of Shoshanna Scott (personal archive, address unknown)

AUDEN COULD STILL see and feel her direct link to the PsyNet. The Arrow shield didn’t affect that. Nothing could affect that. It was so deep inside a Psy mind that it was a thing primal.

Cutting that link with no attempt to lock into another network would be a death sentence. Psy brains couldn’t survive without the biofeedback provided by a psychic network. It was a necessity akin to air.

A piercing beeping on the physical plane that seeped into her consciousness.

Bye, my baby, she whispered to Liberty, I love you. Because her baby would survive. The Arrow watching over her would notice the shock wave, move to protect the child. She trusted in that unknown Arrow because she trusted in Remi.

I love you, Remi, she said, even though he couldn’t hear her.

Such a huge emotion she had inside her when it came to the alpha who’d prowled into her life and shown her happiness, pleasure, laughter. It was so different from her love for Liberty, had so many more jagged edges and harsh demands, and it was as beautiful.

I wish I could say bye to you. I wish I could tell you all you are to me. I wish we could’ve had forever.

But her time was over; she’d held the line until she knew she was hemorrhaging internally—but death of the body wouldn’t end Shoshanna unless Auden ensured a psychic death at the same time.

The only way to take Shoshanna down was for Auden to go down.

Auden sent out one last pulse of rage in an attempt to distract Shoshanna while she cut the link…but that rage burned with a feral anger so hot that it singed her insides. It had claws and teeth, was a thing of muscle and strength of enormous size. As if it was the rage of tens…a hundred…more…people fired up in battle against the monster that was Shoshanna.

Auden roared with them, as feral and as ferocious, her psychic claws digging into the bed and her eyes shifting form.

That was when she knew.

Remi had come into battle with her. He’d brought with him the wild fury of every single member of his pack. She didn’t know how, but she knew it was a one-way street. Shoshanna couldn’t get to him—because even Auden had no idea how he was there.

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