Branches of the Willow 3 (18 page)

“Should we bring her back to her sister?” Mikael was the one to speak out loud, and he wasn’t looking at the others. He was watching me for my answer. I tipped my head down and back up again, deliberately signaling a yes to him. They could both rot together in the locks.

My father, being the astute man that he was, looked at the void he must have seen where I stood, and back to Mikael again. “She’s here?”

“Yeah.”

“Damn it, Jess.” My father growled out. “You shouldn’t have to see that.”

“She wants us to bring Clarissa back too.”

“Can you hear her?” Asi asked.

“No. I can see her though.”

“What of John Freedman?” Asi asked, looking between the void where I stood and Mikael.

It was my father who answered. “He’s dead, as is his number two man. The rest of the pack can choose a new leader and fall in line, or we can come back and scatter them to the wind for their betrayal.”

I nodded in agreement with my father. “Jess agrees with you.” My father smiled as Mikael told him that. Dimitri strolled up behind them with a man who was bound and gagged.

“That’s my girl.” My father smiled slightly, before turning to face Dimitri. “What’s this?” He motioned towards the bound man.

“Hunter.” Dimitri stated simply. “I thought you might want to have a word with him when I found him trying to slink off into the shadows over there.” My father looked towards Asi. “Can you take care of that until we get back?” Asi nodded while Jameson St. Marks put his command voice to use, and told what remained of the Freedman Pack, in no uncertain terms, that we’d be back to take care of business if they didn’t get themselves together, and fall in line. He then gathered his pack, and my mate, and they all got ready to come home with their prisoners.

“Get some rest now, Jess.” Mikael said to me as they all started walking by. My vision dulled as the gray mist settled in, signifying the end of my vision. When I woke, I hadn’t expected anyone to be leaning over me, so when a face was within inches of my own, I let out a blood curdling scream.

I was greeted with a similar scream in return as the face backed up. My eyes adjusted, and I realized it was Ashley. “Holy shit, Jessica!” Ashley was clutching her heart. “You almost gave me a god damn coronary.”

“Me? Why in the hell were you all up in my face like that?”

“I was making sure you were breathing, you idiot.” Ashley popped down to sit on the floor in front of my Papasan Chair as my mother came running in the room.

“What is going on? Are they okay?”

“They’re all on their way back, mom. Sorry, Ashley scared the crap out of me when I woke up.”

“Likewise.” Ashley said without hesitation.

I told them both what happened, and my mom went to alert the rear guard that they needed to have two cells readied. Truth be told, we only had four cells on pack lands. It was rare that we had a crime here worthy of needing to hold a werewolf captive, but once upon a time, when my grandfather ran things, he had needed the extra cells. I was thankful for his forethought, since we were about to have three occupied.

I wasn’t sure what to make of the fact that a Hunter had been captured, or what it took to contain one. I figured we would need to double up on things if we were bringing the enemy home though. I was lost in thought, wondering what was going on with the Hunters, the dark ones, werewolves going crazy, witches meddling in affairs they should leave alone. It seemed odd to me that things had gotten so far out of whack from the norm for each of our groups.

“Are you sure they’re all okay?” Ashley grilled me, touching my arm to pull my attention back to her. “You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”

“They are all fine.”

“You said you think Asriel killed Malachai. He didn’t get hurt, did he?”

“Not a scratch on him, Ash, I promise.” I stood up on shaky legs. Staying in the vision had taken a toll on me. I wobbled off balance, but righted myself almost immediately.

“You need to eat.” Ashley looked at the clock on the wall. “Mikael’s going to kill us if he finds out we let you stay knocked out so long.”

“He didn’t seem thrilled about me being there,” I admitted. “I’m sure he’ll read me the riot act when he gets back.” We walked downstairs to the kitchen. “Mom, did you tell the guards that one of the prisoners is going to be a Hunter?”

“Yes, I did. They’re going to put him in the reinforced witch cell instead of the normal ones.”

“That’s good.

THE LOCKS

My father and Asi both went at the Hunter for three days straight. They grilled him, hurt him, played nice with him, and even called Serena to watch the proceedings and give her two cents on what was happening. The man would not talk. Clarissa and Annabelle were useless, and had to be kept separate from one another. Annabelle blamed Clarissa for running off with her mate, and him ultimately dying. Clarissa thought she was just being loyal to the true king. It was like turning on Lifetime and Spike Television all at once, and letting the network’s shows duke it out. Drama, action, drama. It was exhausting.

“I’ve had enough. It’s time to take the women to the locks, at the very least.” I looked up at my weary father, who wasn’t getting near enough sleep, and my best friend’s mate. I had heard enough complaints from Ashley about Asi not making it to their bed with any energy to spare, and I was tired of our people being exhausted by this mess. “In a way I feel like this was their plan all along. The joke is on us, because they’re making us all miserable, and a little crazier than normal.”

“I second that motion.” My mother said, prompting some chuckles from around the table.

“Beyond our little prison drama fest, we have seventeen former captives of the King to deal with, and that needs to be taken care of soon, or the meeting hall is never going to smell right again.”

“That is no joke! We should burn it down, and start fresh. Some of those ladies are rank!” Ashley wrinkled up her nose. She looked around the table then, when no one spoke up. “Oh fine! I volunteer. You all owe me, so I’m collecting my debt now. I need Evan to stay behind with me to help out with transitioning the women.”

“Why do I need to stay behind and help out with women things, exactly?” Evan piped up.

Ashley rolled her eyes, and held up one finger. “Number one, you’re little lover girl in there will be devastated if I try to move her, and you aren’t there to hold her hand.” Evan huffed, Asi and Mikael laughed, and Ashley continued. “Number 2,” she held up another finger. “I don’t speak Romanian, Czech, Polish, or whatever the hell else you guys have to translate in there. I need someone to do that for me.” She held up one more finger. “Three, Evan is their hero for rescuing them in the first place, and he’s the only male they trust around here.” She smiled at him. “And four, I’m not doing this shit alone, and I know Jess is going to want to make the trip to the locks, which means Mikael’s going to go. Asi’s going to go, because Jameson is going to order him to, so that leaves you!”

I smiled at Ashley, and then looked at Evan. “Okay, so, that’s settled. Sierra is all set to help out too. I had a talk with her, and she’s been going over and working with the women, trying to figure out what they want to do from here. Some are still in their mating prime, and will likely want to go to packs as part of the Immersion Program. I don’t think it matters if they’re Ancients or Lessers, either way it introduces new blood into the mix.

“When we get back from taking the prisoners to the Locks, Mikael and I will be escorting Brian and Nicholi to the Daniels Clan.” I looked around the table at all the watchful eyes of my family and friends. “When all that is said and done, I am taking a damn vacation, and putting my feet up somewhere. I don’t care if it’s just on the couch at home.” Mikael’s head shot up from across the table, and he was beaming at me. That was all I wanted. He hadn’t been smiling a whole lot lately, and with everything going on, the most that we would see each other during the day was when we had these meetings and sat around the table to discuss what was happening. I missed him, and it was evident that he missed being with me just as much.

“Make sure Avery knows that those two guys you’re taking to him served us well. Brian and Nicholi both did a fantastic job when we skirmished with John and his second. Nicholi is the one who took John down. It will go far in endearing that man to Avery, and I have a feeling he’s going to need all the help he can get.” My father chuckled. We all knew that Nicholi had an ego that was bigger than he was. He rivaled the De’Lune Brothers when I first met each of them. That was saying something.

“What are we going to do with the Hunter?” Mikael asked, glancing back and forth between me and my father.

“We haven’t been able to get anything out of him. Even with the witch’s help, we are sitting dead in the water, so I say we cut our losses there.” My father spoke candidly.

“Are you talking death sentence or Locks?”

“I’m willing to go with either, so long as he is gone.”

“We’re already making a trip to the Locks. We might as well pack him in there too.” I suggested.

“That might turn out to be a crueler fate than death. I’m not sure how the others inside the Locks will deal with a Hunter being tossed in among them.”

“I don’t know. Can we put some sort of tracker on him, so we can see what happens?”

“Jess?” Mikael sounded almost disgusted. “The chance that this guy is going to be torn apart is far greater than anything else, and you want to watch that?”

“No. I’m betting his skills and instincts will keep him alive a lot longer than you think. I want him to have a horrible time of it though, and then I want to have a way to track and locate him, so we can haul his ass out of there if we need to.”

“I guess we can try it.” My dad shrugged his shoulders. “It’s not something we’ve ever even thought about. Honestly, it might give us some insight into how many people we still have down in the Locks to begin with. Hell, it’s been three years since we’ve put anyone in there.”

With that settled we got the three prisoners ready for transfer to the Locks, and took the two hour journey to get there. It wasn’t at all what you would think when imagining a prison. The Locks were built with super natural beings in mind. An old missile silo was the basis for the Locks closest to us. The Silo itself was built to a depth of 147 feet underground. The Locks were retro-fitted with a slide shoot that dropped the prisoners in at a level around 125 feet below the surface. The rest of the silo’s upper levels were closed off under poured concrete over rebar, and each level on the way up was lined with silver. The shoot itself was also lined with silver, making the 125 foot drop into the abyss below a painful one.

The prisoners were knocked out during transport. As karma would have it, we used the same drug cocktail on them that they had dosed me with to knock me out when I was taken to Sophia and Zach. While the Hunter was still under, we tagged his clothing with several cameras, and implanted a tracking device in his right thigh. I suddenly felt like I was stuck in a spy movie where werewolves were working to save all of mankind. It was a ridiculous notion, but there you have it. It was the best idea we had, and our only chance at appeasing our curiosity about what happened once a prisoner entered the Locks.

As each of them woke up, we put them in the shoot, and let the bottom drop out. They literally rode the tube down to the safety floor. It was the top level available to the prisoners. The food and supplies were delivered three floors below that, so whoever was still left down there, most likely hung out around that area. Prior to dropping the prisoners down, we made a supply drop. It was our way of giving the newbies a head start to find a safe place to hide. Asi brought a remote viewing unit with us, so we could watch the video feed while we were on location. As soon as we dropped the Hunter, the video showed him shooting through the tube at a rapid pace, slowing only at the end when the shoot turned and back up one floor to spit the prisoner’s out after slowing them down a bit. When I first heard about the shoot in the locks, as a little girl, I had asked my dad if I could go ride it. Of course, I didn’t realize it was lined in silver, or that there could be a mob of murderous, scary-crazy shifters down there waiting to feast on my bones. Zach had told me about that later. His uncle hadn’t spared him those horrible details, and Zach, shared them with our entire class. We were eight at the time.

We watched the quick descent that the Hunter made. It really did look like a fun ride for him. Apparently silver had zero effect on hunters. It did spit him out quickly at the end. We watched him fly up into the air, and then land with an umph on a mattress. He shook his head to clear his brain of the drug-induced fog he was no doubt still under, and then he got up and started looking around. It didn’t take long for him to find the door that would lead him to the lower levels, but once he moved beyond the door, the level of metals in the walls started made it impossible for us to keep a signal open. The video feed cut out just as we saw him approaching two men, and then the signal on his tracker was lost as well.

“Damn.” I shouted out my disappointment.

“Well, it was worth the shot. At least we know that they’ve made a comfortable landing spot for those coming down, because the mattresses weren’t there before. We also know there’s at least two other men down there.”

“Are we ready for these two? They’re waking up.” Mikael moved both women forward toward the tube.

Clarissa started moaning as realization set in. “No, please, don’t do this to us.” Mikael didn’t waste a minute, he put her straight into the tube, closed the lid over her, and pulled the lever that dropped the bottom out, and opened the shoot up on each level for her to pass through. We could hear her screams coming echoing back up the tube as she went. The silver was burning her, and like a dumb ass, she was letting it get the best of her. It would alert the others below that a female was being sent down.

Annabelle was next, and she pinned me with her murderous stare as Michael shut her into the tube. “No matter what we did to you, it couldn’t compare to what you do to me when you pull that lever.” She spat out.