Shattered (34 page)

I saw them then. Four kids in
cages like bunnies, with needles in their arms, were somewhere in this room. It
was the four kids I’d thought were dead.

“You’re right,” I said. “Four
children are here.”

“They’re behind something.
It’s muffled.”

He ran to a closet that had
just looked like any ordinary closet before. It was locked. Nate didn’t seem to
care. He yanked the doorknob off and made a hole in the door. From there, he
ripped it off of the frame.

Behind unassuming cardboard
boxes was a stack of cages. Nate knocked the boxes over, and the kids jumped
back. Nate ripped two cage doors off with his hands at once. The other two, I
sent flying into the room behind us. I touched them without trying to convince
them we were the good guys and sent them to Pop.

“Why do they hide the kids?”
I asked, as we ran back into the room where the poor men were still floating
lifelessly.

I answered my own question.
It wasn’t common knowledge among Kamon’s hunters that the gruesome testing on
magical children occurred.

On our way out, Nate thrust
his fist into a wall. He, or Boyd, looked incredibly pissed. Even with anger
fuming off of him, he lifted my arm gently, like it was the most precious thing
in the world. While he viewed the time, twenty-three minutes, I wished my dad
were here to see this. Well, not here
here
, but present to see Nate be Nate with me.

The radio on his hip cut in with
a sudden burst of white noise. “All units,” a deep voice said. “Please proceed
to the chapel. He’s finally here.”

We stared at the radio for
too many seconds, then at each other for another lifetime. He was here.
He
could only mean Kamon. Who else was
important enough to announce?

Nate and I were about to find
our way to the chapel when I sensed more lives in the hospital to save. Kamon
did not turn everyone he’d captured into hunters. Some were here for more
horrifying reasons. I sensed they were battling unnatural diseases. They were
test subjects for Kamon’s discoveries.

Fast cures
, I felt. That was his goal. Kamon was trying to find human ways
to heal as fast as magic could, like from cancer or heart disease. The healthy
part of his brain wanted to remove those threats from humans and find ways for
our bodies to destroy cancer cells in a day or for our hearts to renew
themselves without transplants.

I guessed this was what
happened when Satan turned out to be a genius.

A memory intruded of Remi’s face
after our fight the night she’d drugged me. I’d busted her up in several
places, but by the time she and Liam had come back for us, her wounds were
healed. So whatever he was doing really worked. He’d really found a way to speed
human healing.

We ran into a room, and I
touched the older woman lying in bed on her side. She didn’t see or hear us.
The disease she was carrying for human science had taken her sight. At the very
least, I found a little peace in the fact that she wouldn’t get blown up in
twenty minutes.

Nate and I cleared out every
room on the hall, saving twenty-four more captives.

There were some lives in the
hospital we couldn’t save. We quietly slipped past most rooms in the Triage
section without going in. They were wounded hunters awaiting Kamon’s expedited
healing services. We left nineteen of them in there, lying in hospital beds,
waiting to benefit from the pain of others.

Back on the main hall, we
picked up the pace, running and trying to beat the clock. Nate stopped suddenly
and changed our direction. His nose was in the air.

“I smell medicine,” he said. “Lots
of it.”

We opened every door on the
hall, finding laboratories next to broom closets, high-tech machines in one
room, then mop buckets in the next. Finally, we used the dead hunter’s ID card
to get into a freezing cold room.

“Do you think this is what
he’s working on?” Nate asked.

I nodded slowly, my eyes
scrolling over pill bottles, plastic bags of serious-looking medicine, and
racks and racks of syringes.

“Miracle drugs,” I said, as
soon as I felt it.

“Well,” Nate said. “…we have
some people who may need this. God only knows what he did to those kids. Let’s
clear it out.” He started yanking things from shelves and out of freezers and
laying them at my feet. As I sent them to Pop, Nate piled more while saying,
“Thank you. We’ll take this. And this. Thank you very much.”

I glanced down at the watch
once we’d cleared half the room. “Twelve minutes,” I said.

He nodded, and we bolted out
of the room. He led the way out of the hospital wing and back into the dirty,
ancient part of the castle. The halls were abandoned. After every turn we made,
we found ourselves alone and in the dark, letting our senses lead us to the
chapel. I closed my eyes and wondered where the hunters were.

In my mind, I saw his followers
wearing black robes with wide hoods in a narrow hallway. I imagined two robes
like theirs draped across my arm. The action took more strength than I’d
imagined it would and left me feeling winded. I didn’t have time to catch my
breath.

I tossed Nate a robe, and we
pulled them over our heads just as we reached the back of the line of hunters
waiting to enter the chapel.

We suddenly found ourselves
in a sea of black robes.

The crowd murmured about
their master’s tardiness. Apparently, Kamon was never late. It terrified many
of them. They were sure his late arrival meant someone was in trouble. Rumors
spread quickly about
who
had done what and what
punishment they’d see tonight.

Another rumor floated down
the hall: the guards at the entrance of the chapel were still not letting
anyone in because Kamon wasn’t ready to start.

The delay suited us for now. Chris
shuffled through the crowd with her head down, touching the backs of those she
felt should be rescued. A second before each of them disappeared, their bodies
went limp from her forcing their brains to sleep. I held them up to keep down
suspicion.

“No cutting,” a woman said,
as Chris slipped past her. Neither of us answered, and after we’d cut ahead of
a few more hunters, the woman gave up on stopping us.

When we made it within view
of the chapel guards, I saw the terrified captives in the clutches of the hunters.
I pointed to the nine adults and one trembling little boy, and Chris nodded.

The line started moving.

“Enter quietly,” a guard
said.

Behind me, a hunter
whispered, “Finally. What the hell? I have like a million things to do tonight.
Got my eye on this witch that just moved into the apartment across from me.
She’s so obvious. And also so clueless. It won’t be hard to get proof. She’ll
be a good offering next week.”

The hunter he was talking to
chuckled lightly. I wanted to turn around and inform them that they wouldn’t be
doing anything else tonight or next week or ever, but then the guard stopped
the procession.

“Hoods off,” he said. “I want
to see you.”

Both of our hearts sped.
Christine’s was as loud as mine, and she was panting hard.

“Afraid?” I whispered. She
shook her head. “What’s wrong?”

“Tired,” she said.

“Let’s go home.” She shook
her head again. I knew she wouldn’t leave without those prisoners, so I didn’t
fight it.

Hoods were yanking off of
heads fast, and the guard ushered the hunters he’d seen into the chapel. The
captives were getting further away from us.

“Find your places quickly,” a
hunter said. “If you are out of rank and we see you, you will spend the night
in a cell. Are we clear?”

“Yes, Travis,” they answered.

Chris grabbed my hand and took
us out of the hall. We landed in the balcony overlooking the chapel. I took a
deep breath so I wouldn’t faint from panic when I saw the watch. Seven minutes
to go.

Chris fell to her knees, and
I met her on the floor. I peeked inside of her wide hood and frowned. Her nose
was bleeding, and her hands were trembling.

“Baby.”

“I know,” she said.

We couldn’t afford for Chris
to get tired right now. There were still people to save, let alone our own
lives that were at stake.

“We could try to make it to
the door if you can’t get us out,” I said. “I can run.”

“I’m okay. I just needed to
catch my breath.” She twisted her fingers through mine and wiped her nose on
her sleeve. Much slower than we’d moved this entire time, she took us from the
balcony to the bottom floor of the chapel.

Kamon’s followers were mostly
in place on their knees, and the more distinguished hunters in red robes took
their places in front of them. We weaved in and out of the crowd, kneeling and
standing, moving, and kneeling again, just to blend. Chris touched and rescued
more people as we worked our way to the prisoners. With each one, she walked a
little slower and slumped a little lower. She’d pushed her mind and body too
far.

It took us three minutes to
make it to the row of new captives. The little boy was sobbing. A woman next to
him kept stroking his hair. His mother, I assumed.

We kneeled behind them. The
hunters on our row murmured and complained about us pushing them over. Finally,
the most distinguished hunters walked in–the triplets. One of them stood
to the left of Kamon’s throne, one to the right, and the other right behind it.
Then heels clanked against the marble floor in the silent room, announcing
another hunter.

Remi.

She entered the chapel alone,
dressed in leather pants and the smallest bra ever made. She’d gotten more
tattoos, more vines leading up her back and around her stomach. From here, I
could read the sad words she’d inked into her left arm:
Forever His
.

At least she would die with
the love of her life tonight.

She took a surprising seat,
right on the arm of Kamon’s chair.

“Those who willingly enter
his quarters, let your voice be heard,” a hunter said.

“I willingly come,” his
followers answered.

“Greet me,” Kamon said, as he
marched down the center aisle.

Christine stretched her hand
to the trembling woman in front of her just as the crowd said, “Hail, Kamon. We
assemble today to show our undying loyalty for making us whole, our commitment
to learning your ways, and our devotion to your cause.”

Right hands shot up into the
air, and the woman Chris had touched disappeared. Her captor didn’t notice, too
caught up in worship.

“And to you, Julian,” they
said. “We pledge to avenge your death, but stray from your flawed path.” Chris
touched a man, the one next to him, and two more women. Kamon sat on his throne,
and I yanked the little boy closer. He was out of Christine’s reach. The hunter
next to me noticed and gasped.

“To you, Kamon, my Master, my
Lord, you have made me what I am. Without you, I have no home. No life. I am
nothing. Please accept my humble praise.”

I grabbed the hunter to my
right and squeezed his throat until he no longer had the ability to rat us out.
Chris sent the little boy to Gregory, her nose leaking like crazy, and crawled
to the rest of the prisoners.

“I accept,” Kamon said. “Who
has something for me?”

The hunters with offerings
looked to their sides and found no one there. Just as Chris sent the last of
them to Gregory, a hunter screamed, “Intruder!”

The triplets raced to the
commotion, and Chris grabbed my hand.

“Carter!” Kamon yelled.
“Bring her to me!”

I dropped my shield so Chris
could take us home, but the triplets made it to us first.

My powers were fading fast. I
needed a bed, I needed to sleep,
I
needed to get us
home. But Carter Yates had me by the hair, and his brothers had Nate. He hauled
me down the center aisle that his father had just strutted down. And Nate was
wrestling on the floor with two of the copies, barely holding his own.

Remi met Carter in the aisle
and helped him pull me to Kamon. I closed my eyes, trying to find my strength.

“Quiet,” Kamon yelled. Now
there was only my heartbeat and the sounds of Nate’s fight. I heard metal clanking
on the ground eight distinct times. The rings, I sensed. He’d taken off the
rings.

An animal growl confirmed
that. Nate had shifted.

 
Kamon’s hand squeezed around my neck, and
the watch showed only two minutes until we would all
be
blown to bits.

In my fur, I was unstoppable.
Too fast for the copies or the hunters around us trying to help. I never
would’ve imagined I would find more strength in this form. I’d thought I was
cuddly and lovable before Devin trapped my mother in that circle. After, I
thought this fur made me a coward, made me run from things, from her. Not
today.

I sunk my teeth into one of
the copies. Bones, tissue, and blood filled my mouth. It took me a second to
realize it was his neck in my mouth and another to unclamp my jaw. He had no
hope of ever recovering. Half of his neck was gone.

“Will!” the other screamed.

He leaned over his brother
and applied pressure to the wound. It was no use, but it distracted him long
enough for me to get to Christine. She was on her knees in front of Kamon, her
eyes closed and face relaxed like she was sleeping. Or dead.