Page 78 of The Reveal
Exactly the scene I saw laid out in my head.
“Winter,” Maddox murmurs, urgently. She’s crouching next to me, but her eyes are on the scene in front of us. The scene I’ve seen so many times in my head that seeing it in living color, scent, and sound feels unreal. “Stay here.”
“No problem,” I assure her.
Ty growls at her, and I have no trouble interpreting it.Hurry up.
I try to stay upright, gripping on to that tree, as she lunges forward and shifts in midair—
Then she’s a blur of teeth and fur, and she and Ty streak straight into the dark heart of the ritual.
At first it seems like there are too many cloaked figures to count. I get the overwhelming sense that they are not quite human, though they are shaped as if maybe they were. Once. I force myself to focus and try to count them, whatever they are. At some point I realize my vision is doubling and that there are only thirteen.
This is not excellent, but it’s a far cry better than twenty-six.
There’s a split second when the werewolves move in like death while the figures dance and chant, waving those nasty-looking blades in the air, entirely unaware.
I have the feeling that moment is burned into me, that splayed-out instant only I see.
Then the next moment comes, and it seems that there are suddenly werewolves everywhere.
I know there are only two of them, but I have to keep reminding myself of that. Because if I didn’t know not only how many there are, butwhothey are, I would think there were a great many more.
A whole damn pack.
Ty is astonishing. It’s amazing to me that anything that large could move the way he does, sleek and too fast to believe, like a terrifying wave of singular mayhem.
He’s all claws and teeth, tearing through the cloaked figures with a vengeance.
Maddox is no slouch herself.
She smaller, so she’s faster and, to my eye, more vicious. She goes for the throat every time, and she doesn’t miss.
The pain in my head shifts somehow, or maybe I’m finally used to it.
Then again, it could be something else.
It sounds like a whisper at first, though I don’t get the sense that I’mhearingit. Not with my ears.
Yet I know what it is. A beckoning. An invitation.
I look around, blinking against the clamp of pain—however dull in comparison—and I see the figure, bound and still on that flat stone altar.
Then I suck in a sudden, ragged breath, because she’s looking right at me.
Not dead.
Not yet.
Her eyes are wide and glazed, there’s blood all over her face, and her mouth is open wide like she’s panting.
Or screaming.
I force myself to my feet. I make my way toward her, doing my best to stay out of the way of the cloaked figures and the furious werewolves battling it out before me. I figure they’re giving the cloaks and blades a lot more to worry about than I could.
Besides, it seems to me as if the moon itself is leading me along, guiding me.
Making sure I keep going, no matter how much every step hurts.
