Marked (12 page)

"How
many dead?"

Jaclyn
shrugged, jostling the video feed. "I don't know. I suspect that
the authorities are still trying to arrive at a final number. By the
time I arrived they'd already started moving the bodies. I waited
until they finished loading up the body bags and then I snuck in
through the back way. I had to shock a couple of cops unconscious to
get this far, and I can hear them moving rubble around just on the
other side of that hill, so I'm not going to be able to case out any
more of the wreckage than this, but it's bad. It wouldn't surprise me
if they lost as much as half of the pack depending on what was going
on here when the bomb went off."

"Is
there any sign of where they might have gone?"

"No,
none."

"What
about any evidence as to who did it?"

"It
was obviously the Coun'hij…wait, you think it wasn't a bomb,
that this was the result of someone's power? Do you have proof that
the rumors are true? Are we really up against a bunch of unknown
hybrids with top-tier abilities who have managed to keep their powers
hidden for the last few decades?"

"Nothing
conclusive yet, but the circumstantial evidence is starting to pile
up. Alec thinks we got hacked, that the ambushes our people walked
into were just a case of phones being tracked, but I'm not so sure."

"No
offense, Adri, but I sure hope you're wrong."

"None
taken—I feel exactly the same way, but I can't afford to base
all our plans on the theory that we've seen everything the Coun'hij
has available to them. That would be a good way to get the rest of us
killed."

Jaclyn
stopped walking and panned the camera around in a slow panorama.
"There was a guy that I saw loitering nearby when I first got
here. A tall redhead wearing a black leather jacket. He looked out of
place enough that I noticed him."

"That's
not much to go on."

"I
know. You're not going to be able to track him down using Donovan's
hackers or anything, but put the word out to the rest of your people
to be on the lookout for him. They'll know if they run into him."

"How
can you be so sure of that?"

"Because
he tripped every mental alarm I've developed over the course of
almost two hundred years of fighting for my life against creatures
most Americans don't even suspect exist. Something about him was
giving off a really dangerous vibe."

"How
dangerous?"

"Dangerous
enough that I kept my distance."

"I
guess that tells me enough. Be safe, Jaclyn. Alec is going to need
your help, we all are."

I
spent several seconds after she hung up looking at my phone and the
final frame of video that she'd sent over. I'd thought the
destruction of Graves Manor was bad, but that had been nothing more
than fire—this was something else entirely, something that left
me feeling somehow unclean and cold.

"How
is he doing so far, Donovan?"

"So
far so good. His blood pressure seems to be holding steady, his
oxygen levels are good and I haven't picked up anything odd about his
heartbeat, so there aren't any overt signs that it is about to give
out."

"How
long until we can say he's out of the woods and that we don't need to
worry anymore?"

"I
wish I knew for sure. A couple of days at least, but even after that
it would be best if we could get him to an MRI machine and have a
specialist look his heart over."

"Except
then they'd figure out that he's not a normal human."

"I
suppose that's a possibility. I'm not sure how drastic the
differences in our cardiac system are when we are in human form. I
was more concerned that checking Alec into a hospital might bring the
Coun'hij down on our heads, but it seems as though there is no end of
concerns."

"Alec
was a hybrid when he was shot; there isn't any chance that he'll have
some kind of residual damage that only manifests in hybrid form, is
there?"

Donovan
opened his mouth and then closed it and shook his head. "I'm
afraid I must once again say that I just don't know. The normal rule
is that we shape shifters recover from anything that doesn't kill us,
but I've never seen anyone survive this much damage before. I'm
simply unable to make even an educated guess regarding much of
anything where Master Alec is concerned at this point."

"I'm
sorry to press, Donovan."

"No,
it's quite all right, Mistress Paige. I understand entirely."

"Well
then, I guess it's time for you to go get some sleep. What should I
be watching for while you're gone?"

Donovan
handed me his stethoscope. "You'll want to spend some time
listening to his heartbeat now to familiarize yourself with it and
then check him every twenty minutes to make sure it hasn't changed.
Beyond that, make sure he's not having any difficulty breathing and
that his color doesn't change."

As
I draped the stethoscope around my neck similarly to how Donovan had
had it just a few seconds before, the RV began to slow and then
stopped.

"Do
you know where we are?"

Donovan
shook his head. "I haven't left this room since you went to
sleep, Mistress Paige."

I
looked at Alec and sighed before turning back to the door. "I'd
better go be leader-y. You can go ahead and go to sleep, Donovan.
I'll be back here momentarily to take care of Alec."

"If
it's all the same to you, Mistress Paige, I'd just as soon stay here
until you return."

He
gave me a tired smile as I stepped out of the room.

"Why
are we stopping?"

Ruby
looked back at me from the driver's seat. "Mallory flagged us
down from inside the other RV. I think we're stopping to get gas."

A
couple of seconds later Mallory was pulling herself up into the RV.
"Where's Alec? It's been
hours
without any kind of an update."

"I
told you that we had the situation under control."

"Under
control? That's medical doublespeak. What in the hell is going on?"

Mallory
made as if to push past me, but she was the one shape shifter I
figured I had a decent chance against in a purely physical
confrontation. She was still stronger than me, but she hurt so badly
when she moved that she couldn't apply that strength very well. I
didn't give way before her.

"Mallory,
you need to stop. Ruby, you can stay; I want the rest of you out of
the vehicle. Turn on the noise generators on your way out."

Vik
shot me a look that said he was suffering from a bout of professional
concern at leaving my side. He wasn't entirely out of line
considering the way that Mallory had started shaking, but the fact of
the matter was that shifting forms would be so agonizing for Mallory
that she would incapacitate herself if she did so. If things were
headed for some kind of physical confrontation between the two of us
then it wasn't going to involve claws or fangs.

"Now,
Vik."

I
got another frown, but a second later Vik followed our nameless
driver down the steps and closed the door behind him.

"Get
out of my way, Adri."

"You
need to calm down, Mallory. You're going to hurt…"

I
was suddenly looking down the barrel of the pistol Mallory had used
less than twenty-four hours previously to execute some of the
Coun'hij enforcers that had come so close to killing Alec.

"You
don't get to tell me what to do,
Adriana
Paige
. I've known Alec
since before he was born. You are going to stand aside and let me in
to see him or I will put a bullet through that pretty little forehead
of yours."

It
was one of those defining moments, one of those exchanges that
determined who was dominant to whom. Mallory might be too
grief-stricken to realize it, but I wasn't. I could feel three
futures stretching out before me. In one I backed down, let Mallory
in to see Alec and then over time she proceeded to gain the upper
hand in the rest of our interactions to the point where eventually
she ran the show—right up until the rebellion shattered into a
million pieces.

It
wasn't pretty, but Donovan was right. Mallory couldn't hope to keep
control over a bunch of shape shifters, not in the crippled old body
Agony had left her with.

In
the second path I refused to back down and she killed me. Once I was
dead then it was still only a matter of time before the Coun'hij came
out on top. The third path was the only one that promised a chance of
survival for all of the people that I'd grown to care about so much.

I
had to convince her to back down because that was the only way
forward that offered a chance of me remaining in control of Alec's
people. Even then there was no guarantee that I'd be able to
successfully navigate the perils awaiting me, but right or wrong,
somehow I'd come to believe that I really was the best person for
this particular job.

It
was a moment of clarity that I hadn't expected. I'd always thought
that being a dominant was a matter of aggressiveness and posturing,
but it turned out sometimes dominance was nothing more than a
certainty that you were right, that if you didn't stand up to someone
bigger and stronger than you, everything you cared about would be
destroyed.

I
smiled, and even without a mirror I knew that the smile was somehow
calm and unconcerned. It wasn't that I didn't care if I died, but for
the first time in ages I wasn't second-guessing myself.

"Mallory,
you need to think about what you're doing. Pulling that trigger isn't
going to get you what you want. You pulling that trigger and killing
me will just mean that Ruby will rip your throat out."

"I'll
kill her too. I may be old and slow, but I'm not that old and slow. I
can turn and get off at least two or three shots before she'll be
able to close."

"Maybe,
but then what? How do you think Donovan is going to feel about you
shooting me? How do you think Alec is going to feel? You'll be lucky
if he just exiles you. More than likely he'll feel he has no choice
but to have you executed. Imagine what that will do to Alec—imagine
what that will do to Donovan."

"Stop
talking! You're just trying to confuse me. None of that matters if
Alec is dead."

"He's
not dead, Mallory, and I'm willing to let you see him, but you're
going to do so on my terms."

"You
don't order me around!"

I
saw her finger start to take up the slack on the trigger and then the
door behind me opened and I felt Donovan at my back.

"Indeed
she can't, Mallory, not until you decide to let her, but you should
know that Mistress Paige has my loyalty in full. Only Master Alec
stands higher in my esteem than she does. If you try to harm her, it
will be the end for us. I will fight—and even kill—to
protect her."

"I
just want to see Alec. What is so wrong with that, Donovan? I've
sworn an oath of loyalty to him."

I
could hear the pain in Mallory's voice and a tiny part of me wanted
to give in and let her have what she wanted, but the armor of my
certainty was just enough to resist the urge. The pain in Donovan's
voice was even harder to ignore.

"You've
spent nearly your whole life as a dominant, my dearest. There are
some lessons you've never had to learn. Sometimes it is not for us to
question our leaders, not in a time of war. You must trust that Alec
and Adri have your best interests at heart.

"The
question isn't whether or not your request is reasonable, it's
whether you trust Adri's judgment. I do. The last twenty-four hours
have removed any doubts I might have had, but you can't rely on my
judgment, you must come to your own decision—otherwise you'll
never be willing to live with the consequences of following her.
Above all else, loyalty is a choice."

Mallory
was still shaking with the tiny, uncontrollable tremors of a shape
shifter only heartbeats away from a transformation, but somehow that
entire time the barrel of her gun hadn't moved at all. It seemed to
take hours, but finally she let it fall back to her side. She still
hadn't stopped shaking, but I stepped forward and wrapped one arm
around her in a hug as my left hand reached down and carefully took
the gun out of her unresisting grip.

"I'm
sorry, Adri. I don't know what's gotten into me. I just feel so lost.
I don't know who I'm supposed to be anymore. I can't be the person I
was before I was injured—I'm not in any shape these days for
ruthless dominance games—and I can't be the person I was in my
cabin for the last two decades. She doesn't belong in this world.

"I
left my own personal refuge to come back here and help Alec, but he
keeps me on the outside of things more often than not. I just want to
go back to how things were."

I
handed the pistol back to Donovan and then wrapped my left arm around
Mallory so that I could give her a proper hug.

"I'm
sorry, Mallory. I wish I could promise that things were going to get
easier, but I can't. If you'll swear fealty to me and promise to keep
my secrets then I can start including you in on things that you've
been excluded from up to this point."

"I
can't swear fealty to you and Alec both."

"I
know, but I've been thinking about that. Swear a secondary fealty to
me where you only have to obey when it doesn't contradict Alec's
stated wishes and that will be enough."

Mallory
stepped back from me and wiped a tear from her eye. "Okay, if
you promise to take me to Alec after this then I'll give you the oath
you're after."

Donovan
and Ruby witnessed the oath and then I asked Ruby to step outside and
have someone fuel up our RV. Donovan led Mallory back into the
bedroom as I watched Ruby leave to go fulfill my orders.

Once
she was gone I stepped into the bedroom and put a hand on Mallory's
shoulder. "As you can see, Alec is alive, but Donovan isn't
entirely certain he's going to survive. If the worst comes to pass
I'm going to need your help keeping everything from falling apart
around us. Donovan thinks there is a chance that I'll be able to bind
enough shape shifters to me personally in the next few days to keep
the rebellion from splintering."