Bloodfire (Blood Destiny) (29 page)

“Uhhh…last week, when you were in Penzance
there was one,” I lied, badly, and then changed the topic quickly by directing
it back to Alex.
 
“Anyway, what do
you mean, you tried to help?
 
I
didn’t hear what you said.”

“Blackberry bushes.”

“Excuse me?”

“Blackberry bushes,” he repeated slowly,
as if I was hard of hearing.
 
“Ispolin are terrified of them.
 
They get caught in them, or something, and can’t move.
 
I’m a bit hazy on all the details to be
honest, dude, but just get some blackberries and you’ll have it screaming like
a girl for its mummy.”

“Wow, that’s so helpful, Alex,
thanks.
 
This beach is clearly
teeming with blackberry bushes all over the place.
 
If only I had thought of attacking it with
one.”

“Alright, dude, alright, no need to get
snarky.
 
Anyway, it’s interesting
that you mention dragons cos I’m sure that ispolins’ nemeses are dragons.”

Why did it keep coming back to
dragons?
 
“Well, next time then I’ll
look for a fucking dragon hiding in a fucking blackberry bush.”

There was a feline growl next to me and I
turned to watch Staines painfully shifting into human form.
 
He clicked his jaws a few times to aid
their transformation back into human form before speaking.
 
“This is not helping.
 
We have our people to aid.”

I suddenly remembered Lucy and her bird-brained
colleague.
 
I turned round and
scanned the beach.
 
The guy was
still lying crumpled where the Cyclops – sorry, ispolin – had
thrown him.
 
I didn’t think he’d
moved an inch since then, which wasn’t a good sign.
 
One of the wolves was now beside him,
just sitting there, ears flat.
 
Lucy, meanwhile, was limping up the now semi-destroyed beach, which
looked as if someone had dug potholes all around it.
 
At least the tide would take care of
that side of things in a few hours’ time.
 
Checking that the other wolf, Anton and Staines were remaining beside
the portal, I jogged down to meet her.

She was holding her arm awkwardly and it
was clearly broken.
 
A gash on the
side of her head trickled blood and she was half bent over, clearly in a lot of
pain.
 
When I reached her, she all
but collapsed into my arms, deathly pale.
 
My fingers twitched again with heat.
 
How the hell did we let this
happen?
 
I tried to push aside
thoughts of rage at the monster’s very painful destruction and picked her up in
a fireman’s lift, slinging her over my shoulder.
 
It might not be very dignified, but at
the
moment
 
it
was the best I could offer.
 

Back at the side of the portal, I laid her
gently down on the sand.
 
Alex came
over from the guy’s body and shook his head at me slightly, then bent to check
over Lucy.
 
My body shivered with
ire.
 
I might not have liked the
werecougar, I might even have wanted to punch his lights out, but he didn’t
deserve to die.
 
I turned to look at
the portal.
 
Staines, however,
reading my thoughts, gave me a warning glance and for now I acquiesced and
crouched down to join Alex.
 
Staines
pulled out a mobile phone from his pocket and began tapping furiously at the
keypad.

“I think she’s ruptured her appendix,”
Alex said, gently poking at her stomach.

She moaned softly, and I winced in phantom
pain for her.

“We need to get her back to the keep and
call in a proper doctor.
 
Even with
her regeneration ability, she needs serious medical attention.”

We had Julia, who was good for herbal
treatments, and a few other pack members such as Larch who were fairly skilled
in first aid and basic medicine, but I doubted that they had enough experience
to help her properly.
 
One of the drawbacks of being in a pack where serious injuries were
so few and far between.

“There’s a guy in Somerset,” I said.
 
“We can call their alpha and get him
here with a couple of hours.”

Staines snapped his phone shut.
 
“There’s no need.
 
The Lord Alpha is on his way as we
speak, with our doctor in tow.
 
We
look after our own.”

Despite the seriousness of the situation,
I was tempted to stick my tongue out at him.
 
Whoopdedoo.
 
Their own special doctor, because normal
pack ones couldn’t be trusted, and their stupid lord were coming.
 
We were all saved, after all, I thought
sarcastically.

“I’ll take her back then,” I said instead,
reaching over to pick her body back up again.
 
The wolf beside the Brethren’s corpse
had shifted and was already scooping him up for the sad walk back.

“No,” ordered Staines.
 
“Anton, take her to the keep.
 
Be very careful with her.”

Anton shot me a smug glance that was
blocked from Staines’ view by Alex.
 
My teeth clenched.
 
“I am
perfectly capable of helping carry her.”

“
But not perfectly
capable of shifting to help us even out the fight,” bit out Staines.
 
“You take this mourning thing too far.
Anton, go now and don’t delay.”

Anton nodded and took Lucy from the sand,
surprisingly gentle.
 
He immediately
began a brisk walk back, although I could see that he was being careful not to
bump or jolt her.
 
Sometimes, when I
wasn’t involved, he really could be a nice guy.

Alex had tensed beside me, no doubt
waiting for the explosion.
 
I
couldn’t even get angry
at
this one though.
 
Staines was right.
 
I might have been able to stop the
ispolin from hurting the others if I’d been on my own and I might have been
fairly certain that I could have brought it down before its other foot touched
the sand if the werecougar hadn’t gotten in my way, but I was also fairly
certain that if I could have shifted, even into a sodding werehamster, then I
could have done more too.
 
Perhaps enough to stop their friend from dying.
 
I just stared at Staines, mutely.

He turned to Alex.
 
“Can you bind the portal for now so that
nothing else gets out?”

I stepped forward to protest.
 
How would we catch Iabartu if the
gateway
was
blocked?
 
However, Staines silenced me with one
look.
 
Given their grief and state
of mind, now probably wasn’t the best time to go around flexing my muscles.
 
If only I could rein in my temper like
this all the time then the world would probably be a better place.

Alex nodded solemnly.
 
“It’s only a temporary measure
though.
 
It won’t last for more than
twenty-four hours.”

“That’s fine.”
 
Staines looked towards the trees where
other shifters, including Tom, were starting to emerge.
 
When they had all appeared, and were
quietly assembled in front of us, gazing down with drawn faces at the cougar’s body
in the wolf’s now human arms, Staines spoke again.
 
I had to strain to make out exactly what
he was saying, however, because he was so very quiet.
 
“Where were you?”

Someone coughed awkwardly.
 
The remaining Brethren looked guilty.

I was proud of Tom when he chose to speak
up.
 
“We were playing football in a
field away from the keep.
 
We didn’t
realise what was going on until Boran,” he jerked his head at a large upset
looking guy, “managed to finally find us.
 
There are no words to express how we have failed you.”

“It’s not me you’ve failed.
 
It’s Thomson and Lucy who you’ve
failed,” Staines said.
 
It occurred
to me that I hadn’t even known the werecougar’s name until this point.
 
I felt vaguely ashamed of myself.

The shifters’ bodies sank even lower.
 

Julia joined them from behind.
  
Her back, in contrast to the
others’ however, was straight, and her voice was clear. “And if Lord Corrigan
had been here, he could have used his Voice and everyone would have been here
in force.
 
But he wasn’t.
 
And that’s not their fault.
 
It’s not yours either, or probably even
Corrigan’s.
 
But that’s the way it
is and we can’t change it now.”

I applauded her silently.
 
Staines looked furious for a moment and
then nodded slowly, as if it cost him a great effort.
 
“I need five of you to stay here at the
portal.
 
The mage will need time to
set up a temporary binding and you still need to guard it just in case it
doesn’t hold.”
 
All the shifters
immediately put up their hands and he pointed at five of them in turn.
 
“The rest of you, go back to the keep.
 
We need to prepare the rites in
accordance with the Way so we can transport Thomson’s body back to London for a
decent burial.”
 
He looked at me.
 
“You are local.
 
Go to the village and make sure that no
damage has been done and no suspicions have been raised.”

I raised my eyebrows at Julia,
questioning, and she nodded.
 
Fine
by me.
 
Hanging around the keep at
the moment was going to be about as much fun as sucking on one of the ispolin’s
yellowing toes would be.
 
I walked
off, without rushing.
 
Following a
sensible order didn’t mean that I needed to look like I was one of Staines’
eager soldiers.
 
I heard the others
behind me begin to move, but I continued on to Trevathorn without looking back.

Chapter Nineteen

As I walked towards the village, dodging
the huge ispolin footprints as I went, I pondered whether Iabartu had
deliberately sent both the terrametus and the ispolin through the portal.
 
If that was indeed what had happened,
then why hadn’t she bothered coming herself?
 
She’d taken the time to come through on
her own to deal with John.
 
And, if
it was the case that she was responsible for both monsters, then I was still
unclear about the reasons for why she was hell-bent on causing such havoc.
 

Obviously, she felt that her business was
as yet unfinished.
 
Had John had
something that she wanted?
 
Information or maybe some kind of object to do with the Draco Wyr?
 
If so, then he’d died rather than give
it up, meaning it must be important.
 
But then perhaps she’d achieved what she’d wanted when she killed him
and now had just left the portal hanging open, in that careless and disdainful
manner that otherworlders sometimes displayed.
 
I discarded that idea as soon almost as
I’d thought of it, however.
 
I might
not know that much about portals, and might never have entered one myself or
know the mechanics of how to create one, but I was aware that it took power to
maintain one, which is why it was so unusual that the portal on the beach was
still there.
 
Even as a so-called
demi-god, Iabartu would find a strain to leave it usable.

There were so many things that just didn’t
add up.
 
I tried to avoid thinking
about Craw’s assertion that it was my fault that John had died because it just
hurt too much.
 
I already was
uncomfortably aware of the sick feeling of guilt in the pit of my stomach that,
if I could have shifted, then I might have saved Thomson from dying and Lucy
from getting hurt.
 
Which led me on,
of course, to Alex’s revelations.
 
I
wasn’t a shifter, but was I actually a human at all?
 
It seemed that whichever direction my
thoughts took, I was confronted by horrible implications and terrible
scenarios.

My eyes stung with the threat of tears and
I swallowed hard.
 
If I was going to
get to the bottom of all this, then crying like a little girl was not going to
help.
 
Being strong and calm
would.
 
I rubbed at my eyes with my
cuff and squared my shoulders, focusing instead on how to allay any suspicions
that might be forming in Trevathorn.
 
An elephant had escaped from the local zoo, perhaps?
 
Except the nearest zoo was about 120
miles away so that was probably rather unrealistic.
 
Ummm…