Page 116 of Elven Shadow

Because at that moment, Maxwell spun around to hover over Aldous, so completely expressionless but for another glint of silver in his glowing eyes as leveled his assault rifle at the sniveling changeling instead.

“Aldous Corriger, you are hereby relieved of your duties as Commander of Shade.”

Before he’d finished that shocking statement, his security team had already pivoted and swung their weapons toward the changeling instead.

Well look at that. A double-double cross.

Aldous was still too busy sneering at the rebels to recognize the last-minute change of plans.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he said with a groan, then tried to shove Maxwell aside with a sweep of his arm. “Then I’ll just have to do it myself—”

Maxwell caught the changeling’s outstretched arm in one hand and pivoted, coming up behind Aldous to yank the guy’s entire arm behind his back. Then he jerked it up at a dangerous angle, snarling.

Aldous screeched and struggled in the shifter’s grasp. He was either too exhausted or too beat up or just too much of a coward to keep it up much longer.

“You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me! I’ll fucking kill you! I’ll kill every last one of you for this! You can’tdothis to me! I made you. I fuckingownyou!”

Rebecca managed a small smile at this rather fortunate turn of events and let the ready battle magic in her hand snuff out. “Obviously not.”

As Maxwell wrenched Aldous’s other hand behind his back to secure them together, everyone else kept their weapons trained on the seething changeling.

Though the tension in the garage was just as thick, Shade’s members were starting to realize how quickly and easily they’d managed to pull this off. Flickering smiles and determined smirks appeared on nearly every face.

It looked like Hector’s jealous frenzy had made this whole thing possible without so much as a drop of blood spilled. Except Hector’s, of course.

Rebecca would have liked to see something a little harder and more metallic secured around Aldous’s wrists than the damn zip ties Maxwell had put on him, but with the entire task force turned against the changeling, he didn’t have a whole lot of options if hedidescape.

Then Maxwell spun around with Aldous firmly in his grasp. The changeling missed his footing and dangled by his bound hands behind his back for a moment before the shifter hauled him back up to his feet. “Walk.”

“Where are you going?” Diego asked.

“Locking him up,” Maxwell replied tersely without looking at anyone.

“Wait, wait. No.” Leonard jogged toward the shifter, then paused when he received a warning glare from silver eyes before trailing behind at a slower pace. “That wasn’t part of the deal.”

“We can take this to a tribunal,” Maxwell said. “Or find someone else who wants to get rid of him just as badly. Then we can wash our hands clean.”

“Hannigan, you don’t get to wash your hands clean if you don’t get ‘em a little dirty first.” Diego power-walked to keep up with the shifter, glanced quickly at Maxwell’s hand and forearm covered in dried blood, and shrugged. “Okay, well maybeyoualready did, but you know what I mean. We want apermanentsolution.”

It was the absolute wrong time for another wave of dizziness to hit Rebecca, but she bore through it to stay on her feet. She wanted to see how the restof this played out. Plus, it was a distraction from looking down at her own trembling legs.

That wouldn’t exactly have sent the right message to everyone else diligently watching her. She was fine for a little longer. She had to be until they finished with this particular problem and moved on.

Then she could find Zida again in private and ask for some other helpful little magic trick before figuring out how the hell she was supposed to undo what the homunculus had done to her.

A bitter laugh escaped Aldous as he leaned toward her again, his arms still held firmly in Maxwell’s grip behind him.

While their former leader tried to look intimidating and fearsome in zip ties, Rebecca couldn’t help but notice the widening of the shifter’s silver eyes before they narrowed even more into a curious frown that also settled on Rebecca’s face.

At the very least, the shifter wasn’t trying to fight her on this.

With a hiss over his shoulder at the shifter, Aldous moved slowly, glaring at anyone and everyone who looked his way—which was every single one of his former subordinates now as they converged behind him.

If they had to, they would force him into stricter confinement, but they were giving him a chance to live by taking him to the compound’s stockade while they decided what to do with him.

Hopefully not whatMaxwelldecided to do with him. Hopefully, the rest of the task force would have an opportunity to weigh in on that decision as well, but now clearly wasn’t the time to try it.

It was far more than he deserved, and Aldous clearly did not fully appreciate the opportunity they’d presented him for the final time. His last chance.

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