Blood Instinct (32 page)

T
uly screamed
at the exact moment Sophia caught hold of her, spinning her away from the attack as both Jessie and Eden lunged simultaneously at the morphed lycan.

They took it to ground quickly but the struggle to keep it there intensified.

‘Come on,’ Sophia said, grabbing Tuly’s hand, knowing the young lycan was more than capable of matching her pace.

‘What’s happening, Phia?’ her panicked little voice asked.

‘We’re under attack, my sweet,’ Sophia said, casting a glance over her shoulder to where Jessie and Eden seemed to have finally got the upper hand. ‘The bunker’s under attack again.’

She and Eden had returned to the bunker in the midst of it, the rucksack plastered to her back, psyched up and ready for Leila to perform the spell – to lose her serrynity.

She needed it gone. She needed to show Jask it was gone.

The jury was still out as to why Caleb had relented and given her what she needed. The jury was most definitely still out as to what he planned on doing from there. But the fact was, she’d accomplished her mission, and now she needed to focus on finding Leila amidst the chaos; on actually getting the spell performed. It could
not
fall apart at the last hurdle.

She wouldn’t let it fall apart.

But right then it felt as though she was ten feet off reaching for a toppled vase already heading towards a marble floor.

Solstice was soon by her side, a sword strapped to her back. She scooped her daughter up in her arms. ‘We don’t know how many there are. They’re coming from all angles.’

‘Are they our own?’ Sophia asked. ‘Has the pack started morphing?’

‘No. We don’t think so. Two of the external doors are damaged.’

‘How many have we lost?’

‘It’s impossible to tell. As many of the pack as possible are getting behind closed doors. Others have headed down the east tunnel.’

‘Jask and the others aren’t back?’

‘No.’

Her heart pounded painfully. He had to come back.

He
had
to.

J
ask burst
through the door from the tunnel, Blackthorn’s dense, cold dusk air immediately filling his senses.

The ground felt like a springboard beneath him, his four limbs carrying him at twice the speed of two, the chill of the breeze burning his eyes. The increased power in his thighs made leaping effortless, Jask clearing obstacle after obstacle, running up and over chain-link fences as if they were horizontal, rebounding off walls to increase his momentum as, instincts charged, he hurtled back towards the bunker.

‘
L
eila
! Alisha!’ Sophia yelled as she raced through the corridors with Solstice close behind her.

‘Phia, we need to get you to safety.’

‘Not without my sisters. LEILA!’

Solstice caught hold of her arm. ‘It’s not safe out here. Let Eden and Jessie track them down,’ she said, dragging Sophia in the opposite direction. ‘Your priority is protecting yourself and that little one inside of you.’

But Sophia jolted to a standstill as they passed the corridor to her right, as she saw the outline of a figure knelt on the floor in the shadows, her back to her. Saw the glint of auburn hair.

Sophia stumbled forward out of Solstice’s grasp. She felt as though she was treading through three foot of snow as she edged closer, each footstep bringing a greater sense of horror as she realised Leila was indeed cradling someone as she had suspected.

Someone whose limbs lay lax and lifeless.

As Sophia drew level, as she looked at the torn, bloodied mess in Leila’s arms, everything around her evolved into a high-pitched whistle, the floor suddenly swaying, Sophia having to slam her hand to the wall to steady herself.

She swallowed two painful gasps of air then collapsed to her knees beside the ruined, broken body of her little sister.

She stared into Alisha’s lifeless eyes, then to Leila, taking in her ashen face, the tears soaking her cheeks, her whole body trembling, the shock profound in her elder sister’s eyes.

But despite the pain of grief coiling in her stomach, her own light-headedness, her own reluctance to leave their little sister behind, Sophia took a firm grip on Leila’s upper arm.

‘We have to go,’ she said. ‘We have to get to safety.’

Leila finally made eye contact with her, as if dragged back from whatever horrors had trapped her inside her own head.

Sophia held her bewildered gaze. ‘We have to go
now
. They’re everywhere. I have what we need, Lei. I have what we need.’

Sophia forced herself to her feet, tugging Leila up with her. With two arms around her, she tried to guide her reluctant sister backwards. ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry to do this, but we have to go. We
have
to.’

She turned around for help only to see Solstice facing away from her, her sword poised, Tuly back on the floor and clutching her mother.

There were three of them ahead. Three morphed lycans at the end of the corridor. And, behind her, there was a growl.

Sophia snapped her head over her shoulder to see another bringing up the rear, its head lowered, its lips drawn back from its gums.

‘
Shit
,’ she muttered.

Moving in front of Leila, Sophia instinctively spread her hands to protect her sister, to back her up against the wall. To protect her from seeing what it might do to their sister’s limp body.

She heard Leila grappling at the door handle behind her. ‘It’s locked,’ she whispered, her voice laced with panic. ‘The door’s locked.’

Solstice pulled a pin from Tuly’s hair, pushing her behind her, using all three of them as a shield.

‘Either of you girls pick locks?’ Solstice asked, holding out the pin.

‘Me,’ Sophia said.

She lowered herself to a crouch as she backed up against the door, her hands trembling as she placed the pin in the lock, her attention flitting between that and the approaching lycan that had bypassed Alisha, the other three still motionless down the other end of the corridor.

As she struggled frantically with the lock, she dared to look at the lone morphed lycan who was now less than six or seven feet away.

But it wasn’t looking at her – it was staring at the other three. Its head was lowered, its teeth bared, its shoulders hunched. It had either already claimed ownership, warning the other three to find their own, or…

The lock clicked; Sophia turned the handle. She pushed Tuly inside first then Leila before she dared to look left again.

Sophia clutched the doorframe as she felt Solstice trying to shove her inside, her voice a distant echo.

Because Sophia recognised its eyes.

She
knew
the lone morphed lycan who stalked towards the others, who was indeed territorial over his find, but for an entirely different reason than what she’d first suspected.

It was protecting them. Protecting her.

Jask.

S
ophia flinched twice
as the morphed lycans hit the door, the growling and snapping and thudding beyond wrenching her stomach.

Solstice kept her back to the door, barricading anything from entering, her hand gripping the handle.

Sophia’s hands trembled as she struggled to get the syringe needle beneath her skin – to get the sample of her blood needed for the spell. ‘I’ve got to help Jask,’ she said, finally able to draw some. ‘I
have
to help him.’

‘Eden and Jessie are out there; they’ll find him. They’ll help him. As will the rest of the pack,’ Solstice insisted.

‘What if they don’t?’ Sophia flinched at another thud against the door. She handed Leila the syringe before marching over to Solstice. ‘We can’t just leave him out there!’

But Solstice remained blocking her way. ‘Listen to me! This is not going to help Jask. You even attempt to go out there and you’ll be a distraction. You could end up getting him killed. He wants you in here – safe. Let him do his job.’

‘It’s three against one out there! What if he’s injured? What if more have found him?’

‘Sophie,’ Leila said, grabbing her sister’s upper arm, her gaze as direct as her tone was firm. ‘I’ve already lost one sister tonight. I’m not losing another. You listen to Solstice. You let Jask do this. You want to help him then save his young. Save yourself first.’

Sophia stared back at her, at the sister she’d already inflicted enough pain on over the years with her impulsiveness, her negligence, her hell-bent missions.

Except this was Jask.

But Solstice was also a solid wall of lycan to try and pass. And Tuly, little Tuly, stared up at all three of them as if her world was already falling apart.

Sophia glanced back at the door, back to where the sound of the stand-off beyond, of the fight, was growing ever more distant; to where Jask was getting even more distant from her.

Her heart was tearing in two. She clenched her fist against her lips, tears of frustration already trickling down her cheeks.

Because without the spell, she was dead anyway. Or Mini J was. Or both of them.

She let Leila guide her to her knees in front of her.

‘Cup your hands for me,’ Leila said. ‘Keep them together as tight as you can.’

Leila pulled the open book towards her, her lips moving silently as if she were rehearsing what to say as she scanned the lines of text.

‘Okay,’ she said after a few moments, her tone laced with tension, her red-rimmed hazel eyes bright with tears as they locked on hers. ‘This won’t take long.’

She wrapped her hands around Sophia’s and clutched them, capturing her gaze from the door again.

‘As soon as you hear me say “now”, all you have to do is part your fingers and let the blood trickle out into my hands, okay?’

Sophia nodded. ‘How will we know if it’s worked?’

‘The blood will evaporate.’

Leila let go of her hands to reach for the four syringes of blood: one syringe of Sophia’s, one of her own, one containing Caleb’s – which she’d witnessed him withdraw from himself – and the syringe of Leila’s original serryn blood.

What they
hoped
was the syringe of her original serryn blood.

‘Here goes,’ Leila said, this time only meeting Sophia’s gaze fleetingly before she took a steady breath.

She’d never seen her sister perform a spell before. Leila had always refrained. Non-practising, she had focused instead on learning the texts. But she had clearly picked up more than enough along the way from the ease with which she slipped into the almost silent muttering of a language Sophia didn’t understand.

Sophia tensed her cupped hands as Leila emptied each syringe in succession into her palms.

Head down, Leila’s chant continued as she then cupped her hands beneath Sophia’s.

‘Now,’ she heard her sister whisper.

Sophia carefully parted her fingers, the blood she’d held in her hands trickling down into Leila’s. Still Leila didn’t move; still she didn’t raise her head.

In the couple of agonizing minutes that passed, the noise of the scuffle outside had almost entirely disappeared.

Sophia flinched as Leila collapsed to the floor. She lunged forward, her heart pounding, her hand flat to her sister’s neck, searching for a pulse. ‘Leila?’

Solstice moved in alongside her. ‘She’s breathing. I can hear it.’

Sophia grabbed her sister’s hands – both free of blood.

It had worked. It had to have worked.

Her heart pounded harder. She stared back across her shoulder at the door.

Without giving it a second thought, she ran for it, sweeping up Solstice’s discarded sword in the process.

‘Phia!’ Solstice cried after her as she swung open the door.

The corridor was empty. But there were blood trails – smatters of blood trails disappearing left.

He could be wounded – lying somewhere wounded. Three against one. He would only need to be down for a few moments and they would gain the upper hand, alpha or not.

It was baiting at its worse.

Baiting.
Because this was no accident. The morphed lycans had been sent in there. That many lycans all showing up in the same place at the same time was too much of a coincidence. This had been the final stage of Sirius’s plan for the night: to wipe out the bunker.

Her
pack.

The bastards had killed her sister and now they were going after Jask.

Sophia ploughed outside, heading left.

‘Phia, you can’t do this!’ Solstice cried out after her as she half-stepped into the corridor. But she knew Solstice wouldn’t leave Tuly behind, or risk the corridors keeping her with her.

‘And what do I do without him?’ Sophia shouted back over her shoulder. ‘What do any of us do without him?’

Sword grasped in her hand, she swung right, following the trail.

J
ask knew
they were leading him to isolation, but with it he was leading them away from Sophia, away from the others.

They were forcing him down the darker tunnels, to where man-made tunnels converted to rock – the underground caverns beneath Blackthorn. They were isolating him ready for a final attack.

These were not regular morphed lycans. These were something else. They took none of the usual cues. They responded to none of the usual warnings. They had a language of their own.

They were also stronger than any other morphed lycan he had encountered – even stronger than him. And brutal like no member of his kind he had ever come across.

His chin hit ground, the force wrenching his neck as two of them pounced on his back, pinning him down, tearing at his ear. He growled and snapped at them, finding the strength to flip one off him before he rolled with the other down the rocky slope to the cave floor below.

Once he finally had it pinned he knew he had no choice. There was no relenting with these ones. They were fighting to the death.

And now so was he.

He plunged his canines deep into its flesh and tore, ripping out its throat, his face bathed in blood as it instantly fell limp beneath him.

Jask stepped away from it. He turned to face the other two, but they were already preparing for more, dead comrade or not.

This time they took him down hard, both of them plunging their canines into him with a vice-like grip as they rolled with him again, taking it in turns to tear at his flesh in the process.

Jask fought with every ounce of strength he had left but the moment he shook one off, the other would plunge its canines in deep again.

One eventually ripped his hind leg open, the other taking a chunk out of his back, his neck.

Jask knew he was bleeding out. Bleeding too fast.

He stumbled a little, swaying as his blood pressure dropped drastically. Through blurred vision he could see, could sense, them circling him again, backing off only to let him suffer for a few moments as they prepared for their next attack.

These were the killing machines the Global Council had once hoped to create to patrol the streets of Blackthorn.

But these lycans were without honour, without restraint. They weren’t trained to control their instincts but to deploy them in the worst possible way.

And these
enjoyed
it. Just as they were enjoying the wait before the final kill.

They circled and circled, knowing Jask was weakening with every passing second.

Until they lunged from both sides. Their canines locked deep into his flesh as they shook their heads, worsening the tears, weakening him more, savouring the final moments of torture.

But he couldn’t die. Not yet. He wouldn’t allow himself to die until he had finished them.

Because they had seen Sophia enter the room. They knew where she was. Where Tuly was, Solstice, Leila. They’d go back for them, of that he was sure.

And he wasn’t going to let that happen.

He would die to prevent that from happening.

But with the greatest willpower, his legs still eventually caved beneath him, his blood loss too great. Jask flopped onto his side, the rocky roof almost seeming to breathe above him.

Somewhere in the distance, a shard of light broke through the drain above – whether moonlight or artificial, he didn’t know, but it let just enough light in to let a few sections of granite sparkle above him.

His eyes blinked away the tears of pain as he was transported to that riverside Sophia had spoken of, somewhere in a field or in a wood, Sophia laughing, and a child laughing too, tiny splashes echoing all around him.

His
young.

His and Sophia’s young.

His family.

As he felt canines plunge into his throat for the final kill, he growled for everything he was worth. With a final burst of strength, Jask coiled. He flipped the morphed lycan on its back before he returned the favour, tearing straight into its artery with one intention: to kill it outright.

The morphed lycan squealed – and stilled beneath him.

Jask looked over his shoulder. The final one stood with its back to the underground river, still snarling and growling as Jask turned to face it.

He limped towards it, almost losing his balance again as another limb threatened to give way beneath its torn exterior.

He knew the signs. He knew there was no coming back. He knew if he did it, he wouldn’t have the strength to survive in there.

But burning in agony, using all he had left, his instincts to protect his own overwhelmed his self-preservation. And he leapt.

S
ophia skidded
to a halt when she saw the increasing amounts of blood on the floor. Her heart pounding, her breathing ragged, she clenched the sword and picked up her pace again, following the trail all the way to the rocky underground river.

Weakly lit by the drain grids above, she searched the virtual darkness for any signs of him.

Like the night she’d left the shelter to pursue him through the estate, her heart nearly left her chest when she saw the heap on the ground ahead. But she recognised straight away that it wasn’t Jask.

Nor was the second lycan body she came across.

She started to run, her feet pounding against the rock as she raced along the length of the river.

And she slowed as soon as she saw the figure on the rock in the distance. A figure lying face down, half out of the water, the current sweeping past him and pummelling his body.

On
their
rock.
Their
private island.

His human-like form was only semi-returned, but the golden hair was impossible not to identify.

And the current threatened to take his limp body with it at any moment. Deep into the caves; deep into the darkness.

‘Jask!’ she screamed at the top of her voice. ‘Jask!’