Chapter 67: Awaiting Execution

I spin on Piers, terror taking hold. "What is she talking about?" I grasp at his arm, almost causing us to go off the side of the road. Piers swears softly and shoves me away while Sage growls in the back seat, anxiety rising with mine.

"Leave off, Charlotte." My sorcerer friend's face is grim.

"You know what she means." I sink back into my seat, fear clawing at my insides like my wolf trying to escape. "Tell me." He's quiet, so quiet. I hit him with all my strength, my human strength, and he shouts in pain.

"Stop it!" He glares at me. "Just stop it."

"Tell me." I glare right back.

Piers shakes his head, running one hand in a shaking gesture over his hair. "I'm sorry," he says. "I tried to keep it from you. There's nothing you can do, not if you want to save Sage."

"Tell me." For the third time I order him, this one in a whisper.

Piers draws a trembling breath. "Your grandfather is in prison. Awaiting execution."

No. What? Why?

"He refused to declare you a traitor," Piers says, Sage groaning in the back seat. "He tried to block the pursuit." He glances at me, almost shyly. "Caine used his reticence against him, leveraged him off the throne and into a cell."

"Was there a battle?" Piers might as well have punched me in the chest.

He shakes his head, blond hair slipping over my bare leg. "Caine convinced the others to denounce Oleksander," he says.

My teeth squeak as they grind together. "Then his dethroning isn't legal," I say. "Were law dictates he can only be overthrown in battle."

Piers shrugs. "Whatever the truth," he says, "your grandfather isn't king anymore."

Oh, yes, he is. "You're certain he's still alive?"

Piers's hands slip on the steering wheel. "He was the last I heard."

Why would Caine keep Oleksander alive? My wolf latches on to logic and reason to protect me from my fear. I've put my grandfather in unspeakable danger, assuming he would be fine without me, that he would weather even this storm. I didn't think for a single moment Oleksander's position and life would be at risk.

Piers grunts softly. "He still has some time, if Maks and Isabelle have it right. A few days, anyway. Caine is waiting for others to gather."

He called a pack meeting? We didn't even do that when Oleksander took the throne. "There's only one reason Caine is calling such a gathering."

Piers doesn't answer as I savagely kick the dash of the SUV.

"We have to go back." I can barely breathe. "We have to go to Ukraine and free my grandfather." This is all my fault. If Oleksander dies...And Caine, on the throne, convincing the pack meeting he should be the next wereking...

"That doesn't matter," Piers says. "And if your little friend is to be believed, going back is the last thing we should do."

"Caine." I sob his name. "Caine will be wereking." My heart is crumbling inside me, breaking into so many pieces it will never recover, because I have done this. I have given over my grandfather to his death and my nation to a revenant who is owned by a sorcerer and a despicable witch.

"Charlotte." Piers reaches for me. "Listen to me."

But I can't hear him, there's nothing to hear. I've betrayed them all when I only wanted to save one man. The man I love.

Sage howls in the back seat, his power rippling and it takes me a long moment to realize he's not reacting to my pain. I turn toward him, heart crushed, to see him struggling, clawing at his face as his power continues to flex.

"Charlotte, control him!" Piers swerves as Sage hits the back of his seat with his full weight. The SUV tips dangerously as the front end skips across the pavement. I throw magic at Sage, trying to contain whatever is happening to him, but it's too late, I'm too late.

Sage's power explodes outward, sending the car spinning into the ditch.

Metal screams, twists sideways, sparks flying as I lurch forward and then back, head impacting the glass window before rocketing forward first then back and into the head rest. Metal screams protest, rubber bursting from the strain, the scent of charring plastic and over taxed steel an assault as much as the blows I take.

Darkness sucks away the edges of me.

The SUV thuds to a sudden halt, tipping on its side. I crash into Piers, then the roof as it turns over, then the other side. Piers hangs from his seat belt, unconscious, blood running down his face as the wreck comes to a halt. The back door wrenches from its hinges as Sage tears it free and leaps into the night.

My head aches, though my wolf is already healing me. I can't leave Piers, but Sage is out there and something terrible is happening to him. I have caused so much hurt and loss already, what's one more life on my hands?

Tallah! I throw her name at her with a pulse of magic. She catches me immediately.

Charlotte, where are you? I can feel her moving rapidly closer. Instead of answering, I show her Piers.

Take care of him. And then I cut her off, and leap into the back seat, out the door into the night. I might not be able to save my grandfather, but I'll be damned if I've come this far only to lose Sage.



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