Everything Carries Me to You (Axton and Leander Book 3) (57 page)

It did not include Ilias, Axton noted, or Jack. But Jack looked drawn and worried, while Ilias...

His dad was having a great time, Axton realized. Goddamnit. Fucking typical.

"Will you stand with me to avenge the death of your father?" Leander asked, taking a half step towards Dana, locking eyes.

"I..." Dana tried, overwhelmed and uncertain. Pain flickered in and out of his expression.

"Do you accept?" Ilias asked, looking at Dana.

"...I accept," Dana said slowly. He looked dazed. "How can I say no?"

"Very well," Ilias said solemnly. To Axton, it sounded too serious to actually be serious.

I'm glad everyone else is having a fun fucking time
, Axton thought. His initial flabbergasted reaction had passed, and now he was just irritable and twitchy. He was frustrated and still battle ready. Leander looked to be perfectly in character, calm and righteous, and Axton could not smell any fear on him.

"Now, wait a second," Dru said. "Dana is my lieutenant, my right hand man. You can't just make him--"

"I accept," Dana said, snapping free of the dreamy, confused panic that had blanketed him. "I will be the challenger's second."

"This is ridiculous," Dru said. "This farce has gone on long enough. Why don't you tell us what you really--"

"Do you decline?" the werewolf who had pushed his way to front asked. "Do you decline the trial by combat? Do you admit you're gui--"

"Quiet, if you please," Ilias said, in a low, quiet voice that Axton recognized as dangerous. He lowered his hand and turned towards Dru. "How do you plead?"

"Innocent!" Dru shouted. "Of course I'm innocent! This is ridiculous!"

"Then you are not declining the combat you agreed to not an hour ago?" Ilias clarified. The shadows seemed to deepen as his voice lowered, and then everyone else's silence intensified as he finished nearly in a whisper.

Dru looked out at the crowd in front of him. They had been murmuring amongst themselves when he said
ridiculous
, but now everyone looked back at him with wide eyes. Axton saw how he searched their faces, one by one, always moving on to the next because he didn't find what he was looking for. Axton saw his eyes flicker, possibly involuntarily, to the woods behind them, but there was no way to run. Finally, Dru glanced back at Ilias.

"Of course not," he said shortly. "Of course I'm not going back on my word. Proceed."

"Choose your second," Ilias said, impassive.

"Trevor," Drusus said immediately. "I choose Trevor as my second."

Who?
Axton wondered, but the sharp intake of breath nearby told him: it was Fridge Guy.

"Do you accept?" Ilias asked.

"Uh," Fridge Guy said, looking at Dana, looking at Dru.

Axton did not envy him. Even he knew Fridge Guy was Dana's best friend, or, at least, the person that Dana would have chosen as his second, if he'd been asked. Dru was counting on Dana not being able to beat up his friend.

Privately, Axton thought that was a terrible mistake. Dana had been willing to shoot the ex-boyfriend he was still in love with. Granted, he seemed to feel at least a little bad about it and he insisted it had been to save Axton's sanity, but...he'd also been willing to beat Axton into the ground to fake a hate crime.

Dana could hurt those he loved. Maybe Dru didn't know that, but Axton could not forget it.

Maybe Dru couldn't recognize that quality in another person. Maybe it ran in the family. For the first time, Axton bothered to wonder what it might feel like, being angry enough to kill your own brother.

"I accept," Trevor said, bowing his head, unwilling to meet anyone's eyes. "I accept."

Ilias motioned him forward. Now Trevor stood with Dru, and on the other side of Ilias, Dana stood with Leander. Jack had fallen back slightly, expression grim, his grip on the book tight.

"The accused may choose his weapon first," Ilias stated.

"Unarmed," Dru said. "I need no weapon here." He shot Leander a furious look.

"Challenger?" Ilias prompted.

"Unarmed is fine by me," Leander said breezily. "Though I think we should adhere to the traditional practice of both combatants being in the same form."

"No!" Dana yelled, and the crowd, too, was muttering.

Ilias made a gesture for quiet and it was the first one that went ignored. For the first time, too, Axton saw that his father was surprised.

"It'll make for a more fair and elegant fight," Leander went on.

"Look, we love Lee and all," the short wolf at the front of the crowd said, "but--"

"Quiet!" Ilias barked. He turned to face Leander. "Are you suggesting," he said, with a note of heat rising in his voice, "that someone here turns you--"

"No," Leander said, all innocence. "I'm saying he should fight me as a human."

Ilias rattled off a string of curses in Russian, too low for even the wolves in human skins to hear--but Axton recognized the shapes his mouth made, and Axton saw the barest hint of a smile tug at Leander's lips.

Goddamnit, they were
both
having a great time. Axton could have choked on his very sincere rage and exploded with nervous dread over the outcome of the night, and he was sure Dana and Dru and Jack and Fridge Guy and the twins he forgot the names of and everyone else felt the same way, but his dad and his boyfriend were having a fucking blast playing their parts in a production of their own devising.

Which, Axton realized, with a start, would have been great in any other set of circumstances.

That was ideal, right, your parents and your partner getting along? How were they so sure of the outcome that they appeared relaxed? What if Dru attacked? Had his father agreed to protect Leander if anything went wrong? That was the only possible excuse for their confidence. And Axton thought that was supremely unlikely. And it wasn't like that
guaranteed
victory and safety, although it was…reassuring.

"Let him come in whatever shape he has," Dru said sharply. "Let's fight man to man. It's all the same to me."

"Very good," Ilias said, sliding his mask of indifference back into place. "Unarmed, man to man. Do the seconds agree?"

They nodded.

"Is there anything else?" Ilias asked. "Before we begin?"

"Yes," Jack said, speaking up for the first time. "We have a witness. There she is, now."

Everyone turned towards where he nodded. They could barely make out a tall figure dressed in a dress so white, so unexpected in the woods that it seemed to glow in the night.

"Is that--" Dana asked, but his voice failed him.

"Shh," Leander whispered. "Don't ruin it."

A woman stepped into the clearing, stray fresh leaves still clinging to her gently wild hair. She was slender and tall, yet the hem of her billowing dress nearly touched the ground. She was barefoot and beautiful and the scent of berries still clung to her skin somehow, her scent at once familiar and strange.

Axton loved her, at least a little. He remembered that she had held him in his grief; he remembered running with her when they were both wild with wounded hearts.

It had worked, he realized, his aching heart throbbing in his chest with relief. His work, or Leander's, or the culmination of all the hours they both spent with her, trying to coax her back into words--it had worked.

She walked with slow and strange grace and stood before the assembled wolves.

"Lady," Ilias said, bowing slightly and extending his hand for hers. "Welcome."

"Hi, Helen," Leander said helpfully. Apparently he wanted everyone to know that he wasn't surprised. "Thanks for coming."

Dana was rooted in place and unable to speak. Axton could smell the threat of tears from where he stood.

Helen accepted Ilias's hand and stepped closer. Her eyes were bright even as she stayed silent, and she looked at everyone in turn before glancing behind her at the crowd. She did not let go of Ilias's hand at what would have been the normal time, and the socially odd gesture was painfully familiar to Axton. He did it himself all the time.

"Hello," she said finally, the timbre of her voice unusual and a little halting, as if she wasn't quite at ease with how to make her throat move to make words. This, too, was devastatingly familiar to Axton. He knew exactly what that felt like.

How much longer had she stayed wolf? Axton wondered. How much longer than even he ever had?

"Helen," Dru whispered, stricken.

Helen's eyes flickered to him and then down and away, the distressed fluttering of her eyelashes quietly broadcasting her pain.

"Oh,
Helen
," Dru said again, anguished. He took a step towards her. His voice had never held such emotion, the entire time Axton had known him. He loved her, Axton realized, or Dru loved her like Dana loved Axton--maybe it wasn't love, not really, but it passed for love in the right kind of lighting, and people got hurt for standing in the way of it.

"Don't," Helen said. "Dru, please. Don't."

Axton was still watching his father carefully, and he could see the subtle shift in posture. His dad hadn't ever taken a new mate that Axton knew of, but he still had a lifelong protective streak for women and children. Axton had always thought it a little old fashioned of him.

Jack cleared his throat.

"Helen," he said. "Could you please tell us where--"

"No," Helen said. "Don't make this long. I've spent years trying to forget, but if we're doing this now, let's do it quickly. Dru killed Jonathan."

The wave of furious whispers from the crowd surprised Axton only in how little real shock there seemed to be in it. There were mistrustful glances, but not a single person seemed to be incredulous at the suggestion.

How long had each and every one of them longed to be free? How many years had none of them dared to do it alone?

"Helen," Dru said swiftly. "Oh, sweetheart. You've been feral for a long time, but how could you even--"

"No, you
told
me," she said, finally looking at him, raising her head. "You confessed years later. You thought enough time had passed. You thought I would understand. You thought that I wouldn't--"

"This is crazy," Dru laughed. "She's crazy--"

"Crazy with
grief
," Leander interrupted, "because her new partner murdered her beloved husband--"

"Shh," Illais said, making a small shushing gesture at Leander. "There's no need."

Dana stood rooted to the spot, chest heaving with every struggling breath. The tears still threatened, and he seemed to be on the verge of hyperventilating.

"I am
not
crazy," Helen said, eyes flashing.

"Well--" said someone in the crowd. "In all fairness, for the past few years, she's been--"

Helen glared.

"I mean," someone else said reluctantly. "That's a fair point--"

"No!" the short werewolf that had pushed his way to the front earlier shouted suddenly. "She's right!"

"Frank," Leander said. "Do you have something to add?"

"Dru did it," Frank blurted, "Dru did it and I
saw
it and Helen I'm so sorry--"

"You knew?" Helen asked, and the surprise made her grief fresh. "But I asked you, when I started to suspect--I
asked
you..."

"I'm sorry," Frank said. "I'm sorry, I didn't know what to do, and if Jonathan couldn't beat Dru, then I didn't think I'd stand a chance--"

"Enough!
Enough!
" Dru shouted, the bite of a werewolf growl echoing at the end of his words. He went on, low and fast and furious, "Yes, I killed him. Is that what you want to hear? I killed him in a fair fight and leading this pack is my
right
--"

Dana surged forward, but Leander caught him by the arms and held him back.

"Easy," he murmured.

Dana, chest heaving, gave no indication that he'd heard, except that he did stop.

"I'm the leader here, and if Ilias is here to challenge me for my pack, he won't find it an easy fight."

"I have no interest," Ilias said again.

"Then it's time for you to leave," Dru snarled, teeth bared. "Take the human with you, I don't care. Leave us or--"

Dana broke free of Leander's grip and lunged forward as he was changing. Dru went down when Dana tackled him, and they writhed around in a horrible, twisting, shifting mass of limbs, snapping and growling.

"Axton," Ilias said. "Separate them. Please."

Thrilled to launch himself into the fray, Axton threw himself forward, teeth at the ready. Yet duty overcame bloodlust, and instead of helping Dana rip open Dru's throat and then turning on Dana afterwards, Axton wrestled his way between the two wolves. Dana and Dru gnashed their jaws at each other, but Axton was faster and could whirl around and bite both of them quickly. There hadn't been enough time for either Dru or Dana to finish shifting shapes, so they settled down to human forms in tattered clothes.

Axton allowed himself to admit that he'd probably nipped harder than he strictly needed to. Both of them were bleeding slightly.

Whatever. Father hadn't requested he be
gentle
.

"I think the widow should get to pick the punishment," Ilias said. "Any objections?"

Axton shook himself and looked at the assembled pack. They were staring at him with wide, surprised eyes.

"Um," December said faintly. "No?"

"Death or exile?" Ilias asked softly.

Dana took a step forward, ready to shout, but Leander elbowed him in the ribs.

Silence, silence, silence. It rang in Axton's ears.

Helen bowed her head.

"Helen, I
love
you," Dru said. "Don't you see, that's why I had to--"

"I'm sorry," Helen said.

"Everything I did, I did for love of you," Dru pleaded, "everything. Jonathan never loved you like I do, Helen. We had some good years there, just let yourself remember--"

"Dru, don't," Helen said, "don't.
Please
. It's far too late for that."

Axton's pulse quickened. Who would have to be executioner?

"Exile," Helen whispered.

Dana let out a wounded sound, and Axton saw him sway slightly, like his knees were threatening to give out.