by Tracy Wolff
But it doesn’t matter. I’m only twenty feet from my goal, and they’re all too far behind to catch me. As long as Cole hasn’t suddenly learned to fly, I’ve done it. I’ve actually done it.
I’ve mentally celebrated no more than five seconds, though, before I realize I’ve made a giant strategic error.
I lost track of Delphina.
And she’s a lot closer than I thought, blindsiding me just as I stretch out for my flight to the goal line.
She hits me full-on in the side with all her strength and velocity, and it knocks me out of the air. Even worse, I hear—and feel—the stone of my wing crack.
118
Stop Dragon my
Wings Around
I manage to hold on to the comet for no other reason than I’m in such agony, every muscle in my body is contracting in an effort to protect the rest of me from further pain.
And this time when I plummet to the ground, I can’t do anything about it but scream.
My right wing is obviously cracked—I haven’t seen it yet, but the trauma has me almost blacking out—and I can’t fly straight, no matter how hard I try. I can’t fly at all, to be honest, and my only hope of not shattering when I hit the ground is gliding my way down on air currents. Quickly.
It’s not easy and it’s not pretty but it works, and that’s all that matters. But thirty seconds have passed by the time I’m on the ground, and I have to get rid of the ball or the vibrations will nearly destroy me. Again.
I think back to Nuri holding the comet for five minutes before Ludares kicked off, and I’m in awe of her. Thirty seconds for me, and I would sell my soul to set it down right now.
I throw it up in the air and pray—just this once—for a small break. I can’t fly anymore, so if Delphina gets it, I’m totally screwed. Then again, I’m probably screwed anyway, considering I’m now stuck on the ground with Cole, who’s barreling toward me like the hounds of hell are after him.
Delphina doesn’t get it, which is surprising. Then again, the way she’s flying around in wavering circles at the moment hints at the idea that that last hit was as hard on her brain as it was on the rest of me. On a different day, with a different Trial, that might make me sad. Right now, I’m just glad it means she’s out of commission for a few seconds.
Cole’s racing straight at me—and the ball—in werewolf form, and I’m closer and know if I run, I might just beat him to it. So I change to my human form on the fly and race for the ball.
I manage to snatch it right out of Cole’s open jaws. I hit the ground running, but a quick look behind me shows that not only is Cole hot on my heels, so is everyone else…except Delphina, who is still doing her best impression of a cuckoo clock.
But Quinn, Violet, and Cam have finally managed to find their way out of the whirlpool I left them in and are now chasing me like their entire reputation depends on bringing me down.
That may be true, but my entire life depends on me not letting them, so I put everything I’ve got on the line. I grit my teeth as I pass thirty seconds with the comet. The ball is so hot that it feels like I’m burning the skin right off my hands. But I can’t get rid of it, can’t give it away any more, either. My energy is flagging, I’m bruised, battered, broken, and I don’t have much more fight in me.
This is it—I know it is. I can feel it in my bones, can feel it in every part of me. This is my shot to win, and if I don’t take it now, then it’s probably never going to come around again.
Which means I’m not giving up this ball, no matter how much it hurts. No matter how much I have to sacrifice to hold on to it.
And I run.
When I’m about ten yards from the goal line, I glance behind me—not the least bit surprised to see six pissed-off paranormals barreling down the field after me. Lucky me, it looks like the birdies have finally stopped circling Delphina’s head because she is back in the game as well.
Which means, winning this thing just got much, much harder.
I’m so close.
But so is Cole.
I need to shift back into a gargoyle so the sadistic fuck doesn’t kill me with his sharp teeth or claws. But what if my wing is so damaged, the pain causes me to falter? Even a second’s delay is all Cole needs to have me in his powerful grasp.
I’d read in one book that shifting can cause some shifters to heal or partially heal as the magic transforms their body, not physiology. So there’s a chance, a very, very small chance, that shifting could actually give me an advantage against Cole, too—I could get my flight back.
And so I decide to risk it. I shift.
I almost pass out with relief as I realize my wing has healed itself, and I launch into the air. It’s not the best liftoff, as the comet is now so painful, tears are leaking down the sides of my stone face. But I’m only five yards from the finish line and flying.
119
Gargoyle Girls Do
It with Grace
I barely make it a few feet before I feel something score my back, and the pain is excruciating.
Sharp talons wrap all the way around my arm, then sling me toward the ground with such force that it’s impossible for me to right myself.
The ground rises up to meet me as my stone body slams into the earth, the comet trapped beneath one of my arms. My head is turned toward my goal, and I almost weep when I realize I’m only a few yards away. So close.
Even if I could move, which I most definitely can’t, Violet sends vines from the ground to wrap around my arms and legs, pressing me farther into the earth—and the comet that’s now vibrating so fast and hot, it’s a constant mind-numbing pain.
I can vaguely hear the stadium erupt in noise, but I have no idea if they want to call a halt to the Trial or see me punished by death for daring to question the sanctity of their beloved Circle.
Simone snarls at me, goes to try to pry the ball from under my body, but Cole just laughs. “Don’t worry about taking it,” he tells her as he nods to the clock at the side of the field. “She’s going on forty-five seconds now. She’ll forfeit when it kills her.”
He turns to me, the malevolent glint in his eyes growing more evil with every second that passes. “It has to be excruciating, right, Grace? Why don’t you just let the ball go? Everything will be easier if you just give up.”
“Fuck you,” I tell him. “I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction.”
He grins. “I was hoping you’d say that.” And then he punches me full in the face.
The rest of them take the punch to mean it’s open season, and they leap on me. Quinn—now in human form—grabs on to my free arm and starts to yank it back, back, back until it feels like it’s going to snap right off.
Delphina slams her tail into my face, and blood gushes down the back of my throat, choking me. I didn’t even know I could bleed in gargoyle form, so thanks for that lesson.
Cam kicks me in the side and yells, “Payback’s a bitch.”
And Cole, Cole walks over to one of the straight, heavy rods the game uses as goalposts and uses his wolf strength to yank it right out of the ground.
I try to find a way to protect myself from a blow that can actually shatter me. I think about changing back to human form, but if I do that, a hit from Cole wielding that goalpost will kill human me.
I’m trapped, blows raining down on me, and I try to find the memory of my mother’s smile, try to find Hudson’s power, but I can’t. I can’t focus on anything except the next punishing blow to my body, the ball ripping me apart atom by atom now.
I can feel my eyesight grow dim, and I know I’m going to die.
And this time no one can save me, not even myself.
And still I don’t regret coming to Katmere. I could never regret anything that brought Jaxon into my life. And Hudson. And Macy and Flint and Eden and Mekhi and Gwen and Uncle Finn and even poor, poor Xa
vier. My friends. My family.
My only regret is that my parents didn’t live to see the life I’ve made for myself here. They would have loved my people as much as I do. My father would have loved Jaxon’s protectiveness and Flint’s ridiculous sense of humor. My mother would have loved Macy’s sassiness and how often Hudson pushes me to stand up for myself.
It’s as I remember my mother, my laughing, smiling mother, that an image shimmers before me, so clear that I can almost reach out and touch it.
My knees. My knees hurt so much. Scraped so badly by the concrete that a few trickles of blood are running down my leg and seeping into my pretty pink socks. Tears are falling down my cheeks now as I ask my dad why he didn’t catch me before I fell. And I can see his heart break that he wasn’t there for me. He should have been. But he wasn’t. He leans forward and pushes a strand of hair behind my ear and tells me he’s sorry, that we can try again later. He’ll catch me tomorrow. And then he’s reaching down to grab my hand, to walk me and my bike home. And I am so sad.
I didn’t learn to ride my bike today. Instead, I fell down. I wasn’t strong enough. I couldn’t do it. My knees ache, but that feeling that I’ve failed my parents, that I’ve failed myself, hurts more than any scrape ever could. I look up to see if my mom is ashamed of me, too, but she’s smiling down. Her eyes twinkling with unconditional love.
“You’ve got this, honey.” She takes my hand and squeezes, then darts a quick look to my dad to encourage him to step back and give me room. “Now, get up. Get up, Grace.”
And she smiles at me. A smile so filled with love, so filled with confidence and hope and warmth, that I feel it explode inside me, envelop me in its strength and power. So much power, sizzling just below the surface. Waiting for me to touch it. To take it.
To use it.
And that’s when I know. When I recognize what this is.
This power lighting up every cell in my body isn’t just mine.
It’s Hudson’s.
And it is ungodly.
120
Fee, Fi, Fo, F*ck
I don’t know how Hudson knew I would need that memory at this point, right now, more than I’ve ever needed anything in my life. Not just his power but my mother’s confidence in me, too. Maybe because he understood just how battered and broken and weary I would be coming into the end of this Trial. Or maybe because, after all this time trapped in my head, he just understands me.
I feel the ground rumble beneath my cheek, and I know Jaxon is doing everything he can to break down the barrier and get inside to save me. I hear Macy shouting spells, each one hitting the barrier like ringing the gong of a bell. And I know if Flint were here, he’d use every ounce of strength he had to burn the magic of the protective spell away.
But I don’t need them to save me, not this time. Thanks to Hudson, I’ve got this. Even if no one on this field knows it yet. Because Hudson is the only one who gave me the strength to pick myself back up again.
Even if it meant giving up the very essence of who he was. For me. A girl who spent the last two weeks hating him. Who was at one point willing to take from him that which he willingly gave.
I take a deep breath, let the power flow through me. And realize that he didn’t just give me some of his power. He gave it all to me.
And can I just say—holy hell! I knew Hudson was powerful, but I’m used to powerful. I was mated to Jaxon, after all, and in the world I come from, it doesn’t get much more powerful than that…or so I thought.
But the kind of power Hudson has? The kind of power that’s coursing through my body right now? It’s like nothing I ever could have imagined. Like nothing anyone I know could possibly imagine…even Jaxon.
I’m barely skating along the edges of it, and it feels like more than I can ever possibly hope to wield or contain. What would it feel like to have all that inside you? To know you could do whatever you wanted, whenever you wanted?
For a second—just a second—all the bits and pieces of what Hudson has told me over the last couple of weeks during our myriad conversations come together in my head.
Jaxon definitely got it wrong. Because if Hudson had really wanted to commit genocide, hell, if he really wanted to kill everyone, he wouldn’t have wasted his time with only using his gift of persuasion. I see it now, what he’s really capable of. With a mere thought, his enemies would have been turned to dust. Not just one. Or ten. Or even a thousand. All of them.
And now I can’t help wondering if the only reason Jaxon defeated Hudson is because Hudson let him win. Because I know, without a doubt, all I need to do is think of something and it will, quite simply, cease to be.
But I don’t have time to ponder this as Cole snickers and crouches down next to me, the goalpost still clutched in his hands like a child’s security blanket—more proof of just how weak he is.
As if I need more proof. I can’t believe this guy is alpha. He’s pathetic—I just never knew how pathetic until right now.
“I can’t wait until I’m done with you.” He sneers. “You don’t belong here. You’ve never belonged here. Foster’s just too chickenshit to admit that. But I’m not. I’m going to do everyone a favor and take care of you once and for all.”
Then he leans down to whisper in my ear. “And then I’m going to take care of Jaxon and Hudson. This is the time—can you feel it? Neither of them is looking quite like their old selves, are they? I have to admit, I was surprised to see Hudson was back. But hey, gives me a chance to kill him myself for the mess he made of my plans last year.”
He nods to the others to get out of the way. And then he lifts the goalpost, preparing to deliver the blow that will guarantee an end to the game and likely an end to me.
In the background, Nuri’s whistle is blowing loud and sharp, but Cole isn’t paying any attention to it. And neither is anyone else. Which is fine with me. Because now that Hudson’s power has spread all the way through me, now that I can feel it in every single part of me, I know exactly what to do. Because no way is Cole going to touch a hair on Jaxon’s or Hudson’s heads.
Not after everything they’ve done for me.
Not after everything they’ve been to me.
“They could destroy you with nothing but a thought,” I hiss at him. “But by the time I’m done, they won’t have to.”
And so I dissolve the vines holding me to the ground with nothing more than the whisper of an idea in my head. I plant one hand on the ground and stagger to my feet, the agonizingly painful ball still clutched in my hand and Hudson’s power flowing through my veins. It mixes with my gargoyle, grows even more powerful…then touches on something else deep inside me. Something I can feel but don’t yet have a name for.
It all mixes together as I finally stand tall, ignoring the bruises and the small, broken pieces of me that litter the ground around us.
Cole’s smug smile falters as he looks at me, but I don’t know why. Probably because he’s not used to anyone standing up to him, least of all the little human girl he’s been messing with since the day she got here.
The little human girl who has turned out to be so much more than any of us ever expected.
Something akin to fear flashes across his face. But then the witches rush to his aid, wands raised as the three of them hit me with spell after spell.
But I’m in my gargoyle form—imbued with a vampire’s power—and every spell they throw at me just rolls right off. Delphina hits me with an icy blast so powerful that it should chip a few more parts of me away—or at least rock me back on my heels. But it does neither, and as I take a step forward, I realize that the foot I’m looking down at doesn’t belong to me. Or at least not normal-size me.
Because with every single spell they send my way, I’m growing larger.
With every chunk of ice Delphina spits at me, I’m becoming taller and stronger, my stone becoming more and
more impenetrable.
This is Hudson’s power? I wonder as I take a second step forward.
This is what he can do?
But something inside me—my gargoyle or Hudson’s power or some weird amalgamation of both—whispers no. Whispers that what’s happening right now is something else entirely. Something no one has ever seen before—but it doesn’t give me a clue about what it is.
Delphina hits me with one more blast of ice, right before Violet and Cam and Simone stand together, faces frightened and wands raised. I don’t know what they have planned, and I don’t care. All I want is to get to the goal and end this game once and for all.
But together they cast a spell that has long red ribbons flying through the air at me, wrapping themselves around me, binding my free arm to my side and the arm cradling the ball to my chest.
I don’t know how they could possibly imagine for one second that these flimsy bindings would hold me, magical or not. I rip them away with barely a thought and keep walking, as the ribbons disintegrate into a million pieces of confetti that flutter and float around me.
And that’s when it happens, when Cole and Quinn launch themselves at me. They are back in their werewolf forms, growling and snarling and clawing as they try to grab on to any part of me that might actually hurt. Any part of me that they imagine might bring me down.
But I don’t have time for them. I don’t have time for any of this pettiness anymore, and I wave a hand to shoo them away. They fall to the ground, whimpering and nearly formless, and I realize that simple wave of my hand has broken nearly every bone in their bodies to slivers.
They’re crying when they change back to human form to help mend their bones, but I don’t pay any more attention to them. As long as they don’t bother me, I won’t bother them.