Dawning of Light (31 page)

Finn pushed away his own selfish thoughts and focused on her. He stroked her hair, silently encouraging her to continue.

“I think that’s what happened. And my parents knew. They
knew
.” She clutched at his shirt, her eyes full of unshed tears.

“Why do you think they did it?” he wondered out loud.

Cecilia shook her head and then sighed and leaned against his chest. “I don’t know. The only thing I can think is that my leaving the coterie must have triggered it somehow. Their zealotry certainly increased after I admitted to leaving and meeting up with that human boy during my fifteenth summer.”

He banded his arms around her again, squeezing her almost too tightly as he struggled with his own emotions. “I’m so glad they didn’t break you. I’m so glad you refused to let them change who you are.”

She pushed away from his chest and offered him a watery smile. “As I recall, the person I am generally drives you insane.”

“Cici, that’s not true. I lo—”

Abruptly, her magic flared again, and she clutched at his shirt, fisting her hands. Her eyes were wide, her body tense.

“Olivia,” she cried out. “He poisoned her. And my mother—he killed my mother. And Samuel.” Her eyes filled with tears.

“Samuel?” His name hadn’t been on that list Finn found.

She nodded, as the tears spilled onto her cheeks. “Just because he wanted to mate with me.”

Finn’s entire world crashed down around him. His hopes, his dreams, his desires, his love. It all crumbled and broke into little pieces at his feet. At Cecilia’s feet.

Samuel. She was crying over Samuel. He’d been killed because he wanted to mate with her. What the hell happened? After that incident at the beach house, had she chased after him, informed him that the answer was yes?

She wanted Samuel.

She didn’t want Finn.

“Tell me everything you know,” he commanded as they trudged across the snowy, dark landscape.

Cecilia struggled to keep up. He’d helped pull the iron manacle off her wrist, helped her up the stairs, and helped her pull on her magic to break through the wards that had been guarding the basement door, but he’d done it all with a mechanical precision, a determination devoid of emotion. As if he was simply doing a job.

Cecilia Duty.

What happened? One moment, he was cuddling her in his lap, and she could feel his erection pressing into her backside. Her own highly inappropriate thoughts—given the situation—were intermingled with his own. She could
feel
it. His emotions were nothing but positive. He wanted her. He would have been willing to have sex with her right there in that god-awful basement, had she provoked him. She had even wondered if she could lure him into doing it shifter-style, thus sealing them together forever. She had certainly wanted that.

Badly
.

But his emotions had switched off, as abruptly as the artificial sunlamps, just before they left the basement. What went wrong? Why was he suddenly so cold?

Once they were standing in her parents’ kitchen, he directed her to stay put and didn’t bother to lecture her on following directions. He just slipped away into the darkness, not even looking at her before he disappeared.

He returned a few moments later and declared they were alone, and Cecilia thought,
Are we ever?
Alone, separate from one another. Whatever closeness they’d had in that basement, whatever she thought his surge of emotion might have meant, she’d been wrong. Clearly. Finn was closed off to her now. She could not sense his emotions, other than a firm determination to keep her locked out. It was almost enough for her to wish they were in that dreaded basement again.

Almost.

Damn it, something had happened down there. That surge she’d felt, it had been so…warm and…and loving. Sincere. Honest. Stark, as if he had intended to lay his emotions bare, to offer them up to her for…For what? What had she honestly thought he was going to do? Ask her to mate with him?

Not a chance.

That had been her own emotions talking, her own hopes and dreams and fantasies. Finn thought she was a convenient fuck, nothing more.

Remember?

“Tell me,” Finn said again, his harsh tone cutting through her internal musings.

“Finn, I’m not the enemy here,” she started, but he ruthlessly cut her off.

“I can’t come up with a plan to save us if I don’t know what the hell I’m up against,” he snapped, and she pursed her lips because damn it, he was right.

So she did the same thing he did, she turned off the emotions and focused on the reality of their situation. In a monotone, she told him about seeing her mother being attacked out on the lawn and rushing to rescue her, only to realize it was a trap.

“You should have gone to a guard or Tanner instead,” Finn interrupted.

“Tanner had gone to find a healer, and I assumed the guards would come running at any moment. Only they didn’t, because Cedric had drugged them all with a sleeping drought.”

“Then you should have waited for me.”

“Normally, you’re there, hovering about me, whether I want you there or not,” she snapped back. Her nerves were frayed, her magic was weak, and her ability to block her emotions from him was slipping. She felt as though she was quite literally being pulled through a ringer. She was utterly exhausted.

He abruptly stopped and swung around to face her. They were still in the woods, about to walk along the base of the cliff toward the stone steps leading up to the beach house.

“Goddamn it, Cecilia, stop trying so fucking hard to keep me out. All you’re doing is wiping yourself out. I get that you were in love with Samuel, okay? You don’t have to hide it from me. But I need you to focus right now and worry about mourning him later.”

He turned away, but Cecilia reached out and grabbed his arm. Magic flared when she touched him. He looked at her glowing hand and then lifted his gaze to her face. His eyes were also glowing, so brightly they could be beacons for ships during a storm.

“In love with Samuel? What in the name of the lights are you talking about? Did you forget that he drugged me in his own misguided attempt to get me to mate with him? And by the way, I’ve been sleeping with you—not him. He had been throwing himself at me, and I refused him and slept with you. How could you possibly believe I was in love with him?” She smacked his chest for emphasis. “Honestly,” she added with a huff of annoyance.

Finn stared at her, his eyes still glowing, his mouth slightly ajar, a stunned look on his face. “You aren’t in love with him?” he asked, sounding as if he did not quite believe his own words.

“Oh, for the love of the light,” she shouted, and then she grabbed a fistful of his hair in each hand and pulled him to her. Their lips crashed together, and magic flared again as pent-up emotions and passion and revelation all clashed and swirled together, twisting round and round until it was impossible to decipher which emotion belonged to whom, who felt what.

Which, she supposed, was just as well, since for the moment, they seemed to be in sync.

Finn wrapped his thick, powerful arms around her, crushing her to him, holding her as if he never intended to let her go. His mouth slanted over hers, his tongue warring with hers for dominance, demanding she match him in intensity. She pushed him back against the cliff wall and practically tried to crawl up his body in her attempt to get closer to him.

“Finn,” she murmured when he pulled his lips away and trailed hot, wet kisses across her cheek to her neck. He found her ear and bit down, just hard enough to cause her to exclaim as the pleasure-pain sensation shot straight to the apex of her thighs. “I need…”

“Shh.”

She realized he’d stopped kissing her. Cecilia blinked dazedly. “Huh?”

“Shh. I hear something.” With his arms still wrapped around her, he twisted her around so that her back was to the cliff, then he turned around so that his back was to her, as if he was protecting her.

Cecilia leaned to the side, so that she could see around his biceps. “What do you hear?” she whispered.

He didn’t answer. Instead, he grabbed her hand and dragged her deeper into the woods, following the wall of the cliff until he found a niche that was large enough for both of them to fit, and then he wedged her into it and stepped in front of her. She opened her mouth to speak, but he lifted his hand, and she knew he wanted her to be silent.

And then she heard it. The sounds of people, shuffling toward them through the snow. Cecilia shrank deeper into the niche in the cliff wall, the memory of Cedric slicing off Samuel’s head pressing into the forefront of her brain. Finn glanced over his shoulder, a question in his eyes, but she shook her head. She wasn’t mourning Samuel; she was afraid of what could happen to Finn and herself. Cedric had gained a great many followers, she suspected.

Voices drifted toward them. “Too freaking heavy.”

“That’s because you’re a wimp.”

“If I’m such a wimp, how come I’m still alive? There’s seven of us back there who aren’t.”

“You got lucky. We all got lucky. This guy is one mean son of a bitch.”

“Ken shouldn’t have provoked him by telling him we intended to kill the monster-spawning princess.”

Someone grunted. “Damn it, I need a break.” There was a loud noise as something was dropped to the ground. “Lights above, this shifter is nothing but muscle. And it’s damned heavy when he’s passed out cold.”

“Tanner,” Cecilia whispered, her nails digging into Finn’s biceps. But she knew he had already figured it out. She could feel the anger and hatred coursing through his mind, his body tense, prepared to attack. She pushed soothing magic into him, but he slapped her hands away.

“Don’t,” he said, his voice tight with determination. “I’m not going to act rashly. But I am going to kill every motherfucker over there.”

“Finn, you can’t do it alone. You can’t—”

“Halt!”

The shouted command pulled both Cecilia’s and Finn’s attention. She could not see who it was, through the clusters of trees, but she recognized the voice. And then the other, speaking immediately afterward.

“You sons of bitches!” a female voice shrieked. “That’s my pack master!” A scant second later, a great roar filled the air. Before Cecilia had time to react, Finn was gone, charging through the underbrush, shifting into a tiger as he ran. It was a breathtaking sight to behold. She scrambled out of her hiding place, hurrying after him.

She came upon the tail end of a small, bloody skirmish. By the time she reached them, Lisa had slain three, Dane had taken one down, and Finn slashed his massive black claws across the throat of the fifth lightbearer in the group. Not a single one had reacted swiftly enough to summon a sword or bow and arrow. Lisa and Finn shifted back into human form and began to methodically check to ensure each one was dead, while Dane dropped to his knees next to Tanner’s unconscious form, and the king of the lightbearers stepped out from behind a thick tree trunk.

“Uncle Sander?”

“Cecilia, dear.” He opened his arms, and Cecilia obediently stepped into his hug.

“What are you doing here?”

“Olivia wasn’t feeling well, so Tanner sent me to seek out Dane, while he went to retrieve Alexa. Dane and Lisa and I were making our way back to the beach house when we came upon a terribly grisly scene.” He shuddered and closed his eyes. The king of the lightbearers did not tolerate violence well.

“Seven dead lightbearers,” Lisa said, stepping up behind the king. “We followed the trail of blood to here. What the hell did they do to my pack master?” she demanded, glaring at Cecilia.

“How on earth would I know?” Cecilia protested.

Finn stepped between them. “Leave her alone, Lisa,” he growled. “We’re all on the same side, remember?”

Lisa frowned and fell silent. Cecilia dropped to her knees next to Dane and whispered, “Is he—”

Dane pursed his lips and shook his head. His hands cupped Tanner’s face, which was covered with bruises and various bleeding cuts. He wore a sweater that had been half torn from his body. What was left was soaked with blood. There was a gash across his chest, another on one arm that was gaping and profusely bleeding. His hair was matted and soaked with blood. The knuckles on both hands were torn and bleeding.

“Cedric did this,” Cecilia murmured to herself. Of course, Lisa and Finn, with their enhanced shifter senses, heard her.

“What do you mean?” Finn asked. He stepped up behind her, staring down at the unmoving, badly beaten body of his pack master.

“Who?” Lisa asked.

“Cedric?” the king repeated, frowning. “Cedric who?”

“My brother.”

The king shook his head. “Cecilia dear, you must not be feeling well. Cedric is dead. Twelve years ago. It could not be—”

“He didn’t die,” Finn said, cutting him off. “He faked his death. He’s been living in his parents’ basement for the past twelve years.”

“But how…? Lacey and Gerard, they need to…”

“They know. They’re involved.”

“That’s screwed up,” Lisa added her two cents. Then she frowned. “Don’t lightbearers need light to live? Like, a lot of light? How the hell has he been living in a basement?”

“Artificial sunlight,” Finn explained. “He’s the Chosen One, the bastard who’s been causing all the trouble these past few months. And he’s been trying to kill Cecilia.”

“He said he was only trying to warn me,” Cecilia added.

“Yeah, the same damn way they claimed they were trying to warn you when they almost killed you by locking you in the basement? Don’t you dare feel any sympathy for them. It doesn’t fucking matter that they’re your family. They’ve been trying to kill you for twelve goddamn years. Thank the fates you’re too damn stubborn to die.”

His speech was so impassioned, the entire group, with the exception of Tanner, who was still unconscious, stared at him. Finn turned away from their inquisitive looks.

“I found a list,” he said. “All of us are on it. Even you, Dane. Which I suppose makes sense, since Lisa and her pups are living with you.”

“I’ll kill every last one of the bastards,” Lisa growled.