CHAPTER 47

*Can you undo this somehow? Do you have any of this control he mentioned?* I begged my wolf. I could feel her tremble in her fury, some deeply buried anger rising until we felt more feral than sane.

*Not this,* she told me as we strained against the roots, fighting, but every moment just caused them to tighten until we were struggling to breathe.

*What he's saying.*.. I trailed off, afraid to ask.

My wolf struggled through her emotions, some of which were rising up to drown her. *I don't remember...I can't remember...*

*It's okay*, I reassured her, because now was not the time to worry about it anyway. We needed a way out, a way to fight back.

I closed my eyes and pulled my focus to our other senses, reaching out for anything that might help. Anything we could use.

The werejaguar was invisible to us, even standing right next to us we couldn't scent him, and though he was too close to be able to mask his shuffling entirely it was muted enough that we had to concentrate on it hard.

But there was part of him that wasn't masked. Something my wolf stilled when she sensed. In his pocket was a phone. Probably Darius' phone that he'd used to send the pictures and pin to. She could sense the electronic field.

She'd been practising as well, and with the practice brought sensitivity, enough that we could vaguely sense the werejaguars own electric field, the type that all biological bodies produced.

Across the yard Daruis moaned.

"Your friend is rather annoying, have I mentioned? Every damned time I have him on the edge he pulls back and I need to go hurt him again. I don't really enjoy hurting people, you know. Prefer a nice clean kill."

Right. That's why I was strapped to the ground while he went on a villain monologue.

My wolf wasn't listening any longer, she'd honed in on the phone, almost in arms reach, if I could move my arms.

*Can we use it?* I asked. I felt her frown, as much as a wolf could.

*I don't know that shutting it off would help the situation much.*

*Could you make it ring, maybe, or buzz like when I get a text?*

"Now, I wasn't quite prepared for this scenario, I'm embarrassed to say. Not outfitted with any way to keep you sedated for our lovely trip home. That's sad for you, would have been much more pleasant. The only other option I have is to get you into the same state as your friend over here. Weakened to the edge of death, your body too exhausted from healing to fight. It's sad, as I said, but we've all got to do what we have to."

He rose from his crouch beside me and walked back to the stool, picking up the knife he'd laid down. It was a wicked long knife, thick, almost like a machete. My wolf growled inwardly as he left her range. She was trying something, reaching and pushing, but I couldn't tell what. My own focus was on the blade. It gleamed in the light of the moon as he made his way back toward me.

My heart fell to my stomach. Pain, when in the heat of battle was one thing. This...what he was going to do...tears sprung up beneath my eyelids. I didn't think I could handle this.

Not again.

And a sudden memory gripped me of a very different place, a cage on a stone floor, and a man and a knife. A scalpel. Wolves didn't take well to anaesthesia, but it wouldn't have mattered, because my tormentors never used it anyway.

My stomach heaved in panic and I struggled and fought against my bindings, despite it being useless. I was no longer thinking, just trying to escape.

My wolf, too, lent me her strength our jaw elongating, our teeth suddenly sharp as we snapped and tore at the root holding our head in place. She was panicked, but not to the degree I was, her focus still intent on...I couldn't even remember because all I could think about was the way the blade would feel slicing into skin. One incision after another, the pain as it dug deeper, into muscle and bone. I knew that pain, it was burned into my very being and I couldn't do it. I couldn't and...

Something popped, an explosion of sorts and the front of the werejaguar's jeans lit on fire, an intense white, burning fire. The scent of chemicals filled the air.

The werejaguar screamed, the knife fell from his hands, forgotten as he scrambled at the fire trying to pull the phone out of it's pocket.

*What did you do?* I snapped at the root, our combined strength breaking it at last. Or maybe it was because our new friend was distracted, screaming as the front of his jeans melted into skin, damaging everything beneath.

Served him right. Pervert.

The first root gave way, allowing for us to twist around just enough to get to the next.

*I gave it more. There was a small spot where the electricity concentrated on. I sent it everything in that man's body and some of ours. It couldn't hold it all.*

She'd exploded the battery. Something I'd heard about in all those cautionary tales, but hadn't really thought possible. And she'd done it using the electricity from his own body.

Shit, that really sucked for the werejaguar.

He was on the ground now, desperately trying to douse the fire with dirt. Lithium, it turned out, burned like a motherfucker.

I growled my intent. Letting my eyes go luminous, letting my fury and absolute anger show on my face. As soon as I was free he was a fucking dead man.

He glanced at my struggles, alarm suddenly wild on his face. An arm shot up and more roots mobilized, only this time they didn't come for me, they surrounded him, closing him off in a solid impenetrable ball.

After the second root the whole network was weakened and we squirmed out, as I realized we'd done something else new. My hands were still human, and the rest of my body, just my jaw and teeth had shifted. Something I'd thought impossible.

*Nevermind, get the wolf and let's get out of here, I don't think we're going to get to the cat. He's still too strong.*

I hesitated, because I wanted this kill more than I had wanted anything for a long, long, time. Even vengeance for my parents. He'd opened up something inside of me. Something very very dark, and it was a little frightening. But my wolf was suffering too, she'd felt the memory with me, and she was trembling at the reality of it.

I let go of my astonishment of our new development, and I pushed away the new knowledge of Thostchild, and everything else the werejaguar had said. Then I buried, very deep the feeling of certain knowledge that I'd been tortured before, and I ran to the post.

Tears filled my eyes when I got there.

He was so bad. So, so bad. There was a second knife, not as scary as the one my new friend had been using next to the post. As gently as I could I cut Darius down from where he hung, feeling his legs give way as his weight settled onto broken bones.

He cried out, his face a mess of torn flesh, his eyes still closed.

He was heavy, and there was no way I was going to get him all the way back to the car without doing more damage.

"Raven?" Bobby's voice called at the edge of the yard site. He'd come through the forest in the same general direction I had. He looked around, his pale skin glowing in the moonlight, his eyes wide saucers. "What the actual fuck?"

Which was about the only sentiment that this night needed.

"Just come and help me, we need to get out of here before our feline friend puts out his crotch."

"What?! What is even happening?!"

"Bobby!" I shouted, trying to limp my way toward him. I had one of Darius' arms strung around my shoulder and he sagged off my right hand side. I pulled him along, but I could feel the damage I was doing with every step, and he couldn't take much more damage.

Thankfully Bobby came around from his stupor and quickly took Darius' other side.

"You went on about people in trouble and werejaguars and I thought you were fucking with me," Bobby said as we moved forward together. "I mean they're not even real..."

"Oh they're real. Vampires too, and probably a bunch of other shit we aren't aware of."

"Well fuck me."

Yeah...fuck me too.