Something Witchy (Mystics & Mayhem) (39 page)

Claim me?  I looked up at Nathan to find him looking beyond furious.  Oddly enough, I breathed an audible sigh of relief.  Hell, he didn’t look
guilty
.  I felt that entitled me to a little relief. 

“A soul mate bond isn’t the same thing and he knows it,” Nathan said, reaching back to pull me closer to him.  “I’m not going anywhere, Jack.  Things have changed.  If you want her, you’ll have to kill me to get her.”

For a long moment, Jack just studied him like he’d discovered a fascinating new insect.  Then, in this creepily slow way that caused another shudder to slide down my frame, his lips turned up in a smile and he shook his head, making a
tsk
ing sound as he did so.

“Nathan, Nathan, Nathan,” he crooned with a soft laugh.  “You’re going to get between me and what I want once too often, boy.  The only reason I haven’t killed you before now is that you amuse me.  But my patience with you has started to wear thin.”

And my patience was starting to wear thin with
him
.  First, he had stalked me to the point where I was considering moving to Mars just for a break.  Then, because of him, I had had my life turned upside down and my heart broken.  And
then
, just when it looked like something good might come out of the whole thing, he had to go and ruin that, too.

And last, but not least, there was Jack.  I planned to make sure he rotted in Hell for killing my friend.  Even if it killed
me
, he was going down.

As I stood there, listing all the things he had done and messed up in my head, I began to feel all buzzy again.  Before it could get too out of hand, though, Nathan reached back and took my hand.  I immediately wanted to pull away, scared that I might catch fire again and hurt him, but he tightened his grip and I felt something warm and wonderful pulse between the two of us for a second.  I felt that zing of sensation across my mark again and looked up just in time to see Nathan’s lips tilt up a little at the corners.

“I’ll tell you what, Jack,” Nathan said in a glacial tone, giving my hand another gentle squeeze when he felt me relax a little.  “For once, face me man to man.  The winner gets the girl and the loser gets a nice, shiny box and a long nap.”

“Excuse me?” I snapped.   He
had not
just offered me, his supposed soul mate, up as a prize in their pissing contest.

“You don’t really think you’re a match for me, do you, boy?” Jack scoffed, actually rolling his eyes, both of them completely ignoring me.

“I’ve picked up a few tricks since last time myself,” Nathan said.  Something about his expression caused the smug little grin on Jack’s face to slide off like melted butter.  “So, what’s it going to be, Jack?  Are you going to slither back into that hole you crawled out of?  Or do we find out just how tough you really are?”

“Your funeral,” Jack said, shrugging again as he unfolded himself from his perch against the balcony railing. 

“What are you
doing
?” I demanded frantically, grabbing Nathan’s shirt when he stepped toward Jack. 

“I’m going to win my girl,” he said, grinning at me over his shoulder.  “Be right back.”

Before I could say another word to stop him, he was already halfway across the room.  As they started to circle each other, I found a new definition for the word grace.  The way they moved was so fluid and sinuous it was like watching a dance. 

“Nice to see you’ve finally grown some balls, Nathan,” Jack said tauntingly as he tried to find the best opportunity to catch Nathan off guard.  “It’s usually your women who bear my wrath.  Guess you’re tired of burying them now, huh?”

When Nathan made his move it was with an eerie kind of calm.  He acted like he had been planning his move for years rather than minutes.  Jack’s head snapped back and he let out a grunt of pain as Nathan’s big fist caught him square in the mouth.  He jumped back with a hiss, spitting blood as he went, and I saw the first real shadows of rage cross his features.

“For every time you touched her, I’m going to take a piece of your skin as payment,” Nathan said coldly as Jack reached up to touch his busted lip.  Blood was streaming steadily from the nasty-looking wound, dripping from his chin to pool in the floor at his feet.  “For every tear she’s shed because of you, I’m going to break a bone.  And for every scream, I’m going to remove a body part, ending with your head.”

Jack’s attack didn’t have the finesse of Nathan’s.  He lowered his head and charged with a roar of rage.  Like when the demon had headed for him at Grams, Nathan just stood there and watched him come.  Just when I was sure he wasn’t going to move in time, he side-stepped and reached out, lightning fast, and stripped another piece of Jack’s flesh.  When I saw he was holding an ear, I thought I would throw up.

When Jack turned and charged him again, I saw Nathan smile coldly.  He met Jack halfway, slamming into him with the force of a wrecking ball.  Their momentum sent them crashing into the wall, leaving a crater in the plaster in the perfect shape of Jack’s body.  Even then, Nathan didn’t stop.  Jack’s howl of pain and fury was accompanied by the sickening crunch of bones breaking.  When he finally managed to shove Nathan off him, his chest looked sunken, like he’d just been flattened by a falling ton of iron.

“Had enough?” Nathan asked him, his expression so cold and furious that I was actually afraid of
him
for a second.  It reminded me of the way he had looked when I’d stopped him from killing Tyler, like he didn’t know anyone or anything else existed except for the person standing in his way. 

“We’re only getting started,” Jack said with a crazed grin.  “Is that the best you’ve got?”

After ten minutes of cracking bones and gory mutilation, though, it was clear who the better man really was.  Nathan had taken a few hits, but Jack was staggering on his feet, bloody and looking confused.  When Nathan hit him hard enough to spin him around in a circle, sending blood flying in every direction, I figured Jack would finally cry uncle.  Seriously, he didn’t look like he could take much more abuse.

The blood just about froze in my veins, though, when Jack turned around and I saw that he was laughing.  Nathan was tearing him apart piece by painful piece and he was
laughing
.  When I realized he was holding something in his hand, I knew why.

I saw it like a movie in slow motion.  I saw the carved hilt of the knife.  I saw the gleam of the blade in the bright sunlight pouring into the room from the doors behind them.  I saw Nathan’s eyes widen in surprise, saw him try to move out of the way, and knew he wasn’t going to make it.  And then I watched as it buried itself in his chest, all the way up to the hilt.

The gleaming
silver
hilt.

I started to run toward him, sheer instinct taking over, but he looked right at me with eyes so cold and dangerous I couldn’t move. 
He missed,
Nathan said in my mind, his eyes never leaving mine. 
Forgive me, love.  I need you to stay there.   I’ve got this under control.

The last syllable had barely brushed my mind when I felt that zinging sensation across my mark again and my muscles froze like they were encased in ice.  I tried to move, but I couldn’t.  I tried to scream, but no sound came out.  I stared at him, torn between shock and anger and fear as I realized what he had done.  He had used my mark to control me, the very thing he had just promised never to do.

If Jack didn’t kill him,
I
would.

“My turn,” Jack crooned maliciously as Nathan yanked the knife out of his chest and flung it across the room.

I stood there, unable to move, as Jack went after Nathan with a vengeance.  Nathan did a remarkable job of holding him off, at first, but with every drop of blood that gushed out of the wound in his chest, I saw him getting weaker.  About the time Nathan fell to his knees, I noticed the veins in his neck and arm were standing out in sharp relief—and they were black as night.  It was like some kind of bacteria had entered his system and was racing through his bloodstream like lightning. 

Like blood poisoning,
I thought, horrified. 
That’s why it won’t heal.  It’s like vampire blood poisoning!

“You didn’t think I’d fight fair, did you, Nathan?” Jack asked with a grin.  His teeth were bloody from one of the lucky punches Nathan had been able to land and I felt sick seeing that macabre smile. 

“Not really,” Nathan slurred, swaying in place.  “You’re too much of a pussy for that.” 

Still grinning, Jack bent over to pick up the knife Nathan had flung away from him and started flipping it end over end.  He looked Nathan up and down, watching as he tried to push himself to his feet only to fall again.  I knew then that he was going to kill him.  I could see it in his eyes, in the too-confident smile on his lips.  He was going to die, and I was going to have to watch, frozen like a statue, as it happened.

Then, a miracle happened.  Well, that is, if miracles came dressed in leather with lime-green hair and a bad attitude.

 “Why
are
you just standing there, Ember?”  My eyes, the only part of me that still seemed to move independently, slid to the left to find my least favorite ghost, Snake, leaning against the bed post next to me. 

Because he told
me I couldn’t move,
I thought frantically. 

“Since when do
you
do what you’re told?” Snake scoffed, wincing when Jack’s foot shot out and caught Nathan in the chin as he tried to stand again, sending him flying halfway across the room.  “It’s all in your head, babe,” Snake said, shrugging, when he saw my surprised look.  “If you don’t want to stand there, don’t.”

He was right.  Why
was
I just standing there, watching the guy I loved get the shit kicked out him? 

And just like that, I could move.  It wasn’t gradual, but like sensation came back all at once with a tingle like my foot had fallen asleep—only everywhere.  Ignoring the discomfort, I turned toward Jack and Nathan just as Jack dropped to his knees, straddling Nathan’s prone body, the silver knife grasped in his meaty fists held high.

Directly over Nathan’s heart.

“No!” I screamed, distracting Jack just as the door flew open and Tyler ran inside followed by Grams. 

That scream seemed to reverberate around us, getting louder and louder until it was the only sound left in the world.  Jack clapped his hands to his head with a roar of pain and I saw Tyler and Grams do the same out of the corner of my eye, both of them bowing under the agony of that sound.  But all I could really see was Nathan, covered in more blood than I would have ever thought a body could hold, dying as the poison in his system ate at the last of his energy.

My mind played a montage of our memories in my mind as I stared at him.  The way he’d smiled at me from the wreckage of his car the day we met.  The sadness in his eyes when I told him I didn’t care about him that day at Haven.  The feel of his lips on my throat the night he marked me.  The desperate need I could sense in him the night he kissed me and told me I would never get over him.

And he was right.  I
wasn’t
going to get over him.  I was his and he was mine.  And I finally realized that I had known that since the moment he slipped that cross over my head in my parents’ kitchen.

And I wasn’t about to let Jack’s sorry, demonic ass take him away from me.

It happened all at once.  There was no pressure, no pounding heartbeat, nothing to warn me.  The furniture began to levitate, then fell with an earsplitting crash as the windows all around us blew out in fragments of sparkling dust.  The sun disappeared like a dark cloth had been draped over it as thunderheads blew in without warning, turning the sky dark and threatening, and I felt the most amazing sensation course through me.  I could feel the electricity in the air!  It was like I had become an electrical conduit.  I had never felt anything so amazing. 

My entire life, I had felt powerless, but right then I felt like I could do anything.  I felt invincible, like nothing could hurt me anymore.  The feeling was like a drug, one I knew I could get addicted to if I wasn’t very careful.  Right that second, though, I didn’t care.  I wanted to hold on to that feeling forever. 

“Well, that’s different,” Jack said softly, his voice full of shock, reminding me I wasn’t alone.

I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror behind him and stared at the being glaring back at me.  It was like seeing someone else where I should have been.  The girl looking back at me from the mirror looked like an angry goddess or something.  Her hair was whipping around her in the wild winds that had blown in with my storm and her eyes were glowing with blue-white light.  I could see flashes of that same light, like my own personal lightning, beginning to flicker across my hands and up my arms.

“Hey, beautiful!  Catch!”

I turned toward the sound of Tyler’s voice just as he tossed something small and gleaming toward me.  I reached up and caught it automatically and felt a rush of calm and peace flow through me.  Uncurling my fingers, I saw my cross lying there in my palm, glowing brightly.  Smiling, I raised my head and pinned Jack with a look that was so vicious that he scrambled back.

 Away from Nathan. 

Away from
me
.

“You wanted me, demon?” I asked softly, sauntering toward him like I had all day to exact my revenge as I focused every ounce of power, every particle of energy, into the cross in my hand.  “Well, here I am.   You’ve stalked me and tormented me.  You’ve taken my freedom from me.  You’ve cost me my identity.  You killed my friend.  But.”  I came to a stop in front of him, close enough to touch, and was surprised to see that his eyes were full of fear.  Leaning closer, I whispered, “You will
not
take him.”

The blast of light that erupted from the cross in my palm was blinding in its brilliance.  Jack screamed like he was being burned at the stake himself as it melded to his skin and the sucking wind of the void wrapped around him.   I backed away, feeling nothing as I watched it take him, bit by flailing bit into that sickly bright light.  Never had it been so clear, so radiant, and yet so chillingly cold.