Page 89 of Witches Be Damned

Tunnels. Darkness. Limited room to move. Where the Karvosh lured us last time and broke Tor’s back. Odds I didn’t like nor wanted to contend with a second time. We rounded up all remaining vampires on Earth and hauled their ass back to their planet, which gave me some comfort. But who knew what other tricks the traitors had up their sleeves.

The enforcer’s dark and rich scent, like tobacco—even though he didn’t smoke it like the warlock Gable did—dominated over all others, and I think that was how he liked it. He liked to dominate by the way he fitted his wife onto his lap.

“How are they staying off our radar?” Blaze dropped the question on all our minds since transport through the Veil system was tracked by their computers, flagging any unauthorized crossings.

“Mothman spit is untraceable, and I’ve used it before,” I answered.

“Or with a fire opal,” Castor threw in. “The ancients gave it that name because it burned a pale fire in the air.”

“That could be the red stone Tor mentioned to me,” Cole informed the group of his meetings with my brother in the prison to adjust his exoskeleton.

The mention of his name sent a streak of warmth through my middle that I chased to hold, but it was gone in a flash.

Talon’s green-brown gaze hardened as he delivered what I sensed was bad news. “A fire opal was reported stolen from a far north Queensland Guild vault three months ago. They’ve been planning this fora longtime.”

Broad and powerful in his black Tollen uniform—which stretched over his thick, muscular frame, slightly smaller than mine—Talon commanded respect and authority and fought for the Alpha position with Blaze among the team.

Blaze turned to his right-hand man, the soldier dictating any strategy for our safety when it was his duty. “Do we have time to obtain the spit?”

We, too, had to keep our movements off the radar for obvious reasons when we didn’t know who the traitors bribed or whether they reported on Talon’s team’s movements.

“My supply is near the Guardian’s prison,” I said.

“That’s too far away and traveling there will raise eyebrows.” Talon cut that idea short.

Castor previously provided Talon with evidence on traitors within the Academy, but political favors called in saved their asses from a lifetime in the Guardians. It was who you knew, not what you knew, that was currency in this world. Justice would be served one way or the other… it was the natural order of balance the world needed. And the biker’s god, the universal reckoner as Castor called him, would play a key hand in delivering it.

Aaliyah shifted, clutching her swollen belly, uncomfortable by the weight of four quads she bore.

Watching her made me long for my mate and to fill her belly with babies. My fingers twitched to reach out and stroke Aaliyah’s belly, protruding from her maternity shirt, and whisper ancient blessings for a safe birth to the little ones and their ongoing health and strength. Permission I must seek from her mates. By the scowl of the one in the corner, whose laser gray and golden eyes burned into me for daring to look her way, it was likely his hawk shifter would peck out my eyes before granting it.

I averted my gaze back to the computer screen that Blaze, Talon, Gable, Cole, Luna, and I huddled behind, forcing aside thoughts of birth and child-rearing to focus on the task at hand. Apprehend the last vestiges of Brotherhood filth auctioning off innocent gantii captured from off-world. Imprisoning them, starving them, and demoralizing them enraged my wolf and I had to hold him in my skin or risk taking on the two male avatars.

“Negative,” Castor interrupted with a new update, flashing on his screen. “They just got wind that the aunt didn’t show at a meeting, and it triggered a warning to be sent out to the top silo. They’re on the move.”

Talon swiped along his powerful jaw. “We’ll have to go in via the Veil.”

The hunter in me preferred the element of surprise, but we had to go with the options we had, and without Mothman spit to cover our tracks, we fell back on the portals.

“Give us the coordinates, Knuckle Duster,” Gable muttered, on a roll with his silly nicknames like Covalent Bonds for my mate.

Castor earned the term for the set of rings he stored in his Jackals’ vest.

He jabbed a key on his keyboard, printing out schematic plans of what looked like tunnels as well as the numbers and names of who the phones belonged to. The printer clunked and whined as it worked.

When it finished, he shoved the paper in Talon’s hands. “You need to get going if you want to detain them and get them into custody.”

Talon reviewed the data and gave the order. “Let’s get back to the Academy, gear up, and get ready to apprehend these traitors.”

* * *

By the stenchin the tunnel, a combination of stale beer, cigarettes, and tinned food, the escaped prisoners holed up here for weeks. They were close. Close enough to taste their blood soaking into my tongue, satiating the craving of my wolf to lap up every last drop.

One scent in particular narrowed into the primary target of my wolf. Eduardo. I’d finish what I started in the prison’s laboratory when he came after my mate and sent in his minion to extract my blood and expose me to the Guild authorities. Rules that applied to the rest of my crew didn’t apply to me when my record and membership got wiped. I was free to exact my own form of justice. Death… the Lycan way, to avenge Little Wolf.

Predatory senses assumed control of the wheel, and I let my beast surge to the surface, needing him near for what was to come. Gray soaked over my vision and swallowed any color of the red brick walls, dusty brown floor, black and white signs, rust of the iron, steel of metalwork, green cabling, and stained pipes. Not that I needed color vision when I distinguished friend from foe by scent.

With the height restrictions in the tunnel clocking in at six feet, most of the males hunched over, me by the most, and I couldn’t let my wolf out completely. Only Luna fit comfortably at her shorter five feet three stature.

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