Rhyannon Byrd - Primal Instinct 04 (40 page)

As Molly squeezed her hand and told her to be careful,
Olivia pressed a hard, quick kiss to Jamie’s cold cheek, whispering that she
loved her and would be right back. Then she turned and made her way through the
swirling battle as quickly as she could, heading toward the trees where she’d
last seen Aiden. Following the sounds of their grunts and snarls, Olivia
reached them just as the two fully shifted Casus got hold of Aiden’s arms and
trapped them behind his back.

“Kill him,” Josef spat out, wiping his bleeding mouth
with the back of his hand.

“No!” Olivia shouted, and all four heads whipped
toward her, their faces revealing various levels of surprise.

“How sweet,” Josef murmured, his mouth twisting with a
snide smile. “The little human’s come to watch you die.”

“She has a Marker,” Aiden snarled, his muscles bulging
as he strained to break free from the two monsters holding him. “You won’t be
able to hurt her.”

Josef shrugged. “I can still take her prisoner. Sooner
or later I’ll find a way to get the Marker off her. And then she’ll be mine.”

She could see that Aiden was seething with fury, the
tendons in his neck sticking out in stark relief as he growled, “You stay the fuck
away from her!”

Returning his attention to the Casus, Josef said,
“What are you waiting for? Gut the bastard.”

“No! Wait! Don’t hurt him!” Olivia screamed, rushing
forward and falling to her knees. “Please! I’ll go with you. Do whatever you
want. Just…just don’t hurt him!”

“Get the hell out of here, Olivia!” It was clear from
the savage sound of Aiden’s voice that he was beyond furious with her.

Taking the Marker from around her neck, Olivia held it
out to the Casus on her open palm, offering it up to him. “Here, you can take
this,” she whispered, shaking so hard that her teeth were chattering. “You can
have it. Just…let him go. Please!”

“What are you doing?” Aiden roared, and though she
wasn’t looking at him, her watery gaze focused purposefully on Josef, Olivia
could hear him struggling to free himself. “Put that bloody Marker back on!”

Watching her carefully, Josef walked toward her. “You’re
playing a dangerous game,” he murmured.

“No game,” she told him, her voice breaking from the
tears that were pouring down her face. “I swear. Here, take it. Just…just let
him go.”

Josef came closer, and a low snarl rumbled deep in
Aiden’s throat. “I’m warning you,” he growled. “Touch her and you’re going to
pay for it.”

Ignoring the guttural threat, Josef took the Marker
from Olivia’s hand, his eyes glowing as he reached down and stroked his
gnarled, claw-tipped fingers against the side of her face. “You’re not very
clever, are you, sweetheart? Still, I didn’t travel all this way because I’m
interested in your intellect, now, did I?”

With tears pouring from her eyes, Olivia forced
herself to hold his stare, the terrified look on her face one she didn’t have
to fake. Turning his back on her, he began walking toward Aiden, and she could
hear the smile in his voice as he said, “I can’t decide whether I should kill
you now, shifter, or keep you alive long to enough to watch the fun your little
human and I are going to have together. Do you have a preference?”

“Go fuck yourself,” Aiden grunted, and Olivia could
hear Josef chuckling softly under his breath as she moved slowly to her feet.
She was careful to keep her head down, lest the monsters holding Aiden looked
up and saw her intentions written all over her face. Josef was still talking,
his voice low and taunting as he began to describe in vile detail all the
things he was planning to do to her. Reaching into her front pocket, she curled
her hand around the cross that Molly had given her, pressing it against her
palm in the way that Kellan explained it had to be done in order to release the
Marker’s power. The pain was instantaneous, the blistering sensation radiating
from her hand into her entire arm so excruciating, it was as if she’d reached
into the heart of a fire. She ground her teeth together to keep from screaming,
and knew she had to act quickly, before the others noticed what she was doing.

Only a handful of steps separated her from Josef, and
as she pulled her hand from her pocket, Olivia sprinted toward him, aiming for
the base of his neck, just as Kellan had described. A sizzling, crackling noise
filled the air, accompanied by Aiden’s roar of shock…as well as Josef’s
outraged cry of pain. He tried to twist away from her, but a scorching ball of
flame engulfed her arm, and in the next instant her hand sank deep into the son
of a bitch’s body, locking her into him. His skin instantly began to blister, a
hot, molten glow of crimson and orange burning beneath its surface, and Olivia
turned her head away from the gruesome sight, her agonized screams blending
with the horrific sounds tearing from Josef’s throat as the pain in her arm
intensified. His tall body jolted and shook with violent spasms, wrenching her
shoulder as she fought to keep her balance, and she was thankful that he was in
his human form, since she never would have been able to reach her target if he
had fully shifted.

Praying that it was going to be over soon, Olivia
struggled to breathe as the flames grew hotter, the stark sound of the Casus’s
cries echoing painfully through her skull. Just when she was sure she was going
to lose consciousness, his body finally exploded in a powerful, bone-cracking
blast, the force of it knocking her clear off her feet.

She could feel the air rushing past her body as she
soared over the ground.

Could hear Aiden’s choked cry of horror.

And then there was nothing but a blessed, silent
darkness.

AS OLIVIA SLOWLY CAME TO, she realized the blast had
knocked her a long way from where she’d been standing. She also realized that
the roaring in her ears was actually Aiden shouting at her as he crouched over
her body, checking for injuries.

“What were you thinking?” he demanded in a rough voice
the instant she lifted her swimming gaze to his grim, blood-spattered face.

She shook her head, wincing as she tried to sit up. “I
don’t know. It was the only thing I could think of.”

“Here,” he grunted, offering her his hand, so that he
could pull her to her feet. He gripped her shoulders, waiting for her dizziness
to pass, then let go of her, shoving his fingers back through his hair so hard
that she winced for his poor scalp. “Is your arm okay?”

Olivia nodded, surprised to find that there wasn’t any
lingering pain, considering how badly it had hurt when the Marker had gone into
weapon mode, creating its Arm of Fire. Somehow she’d retained her hold on the
cross, and she slipped it over her head.

“How did you even know how to use the Marker like
that?” he asked, forcing the words out through gritted teeth.

Looking around at the smoldering piles of ashes that
littered the ground, she coughed, then managed to say, “Kellan explained it all
to me during the drive today. At first, I was worried Jamie might accidentally
hold her cross against her palm, but Kell said her hands are too small to make
it work.”

He let out a sharp, explosive sigh. “Olivia, look at
me.”

“Yeah?” she said, lifting her gaze back to his
beautiful, angry face.

“I can’t believe you took that kind of risk.” The
words were hoarse, thick, his eyes burning with a look of pure, savage fury.

“I had to do something, Aiden. They were going to kill
you.”

He stiffened, his narrowed gaze boring deep into her
eyes, as if he was trying to read her mind. “And why the hell would that
matter?” he rasped.

“You’ll have to figure that out for yourself.” She
sighed, looking around again. “What happened to the other Casus? The ones who were
holding you?”

Scrubbing his hands down his face, he said, “The blast
knocked us all to the ground, and they weren’t so lucky against me when it was
just the two of them.”

“Where are their bodies?” she asked, noticing that
fresh claw marks were torn across his arms and chest, his shirt completely
shredded.

“I hid them,” he muttered, jerking his chin toward a
thick cluster of trees.

Olivia shivered, glad the monsters’ bloodied corpses
were hidden from her view. God only knew she’d already seen enough blood that
evening to last her a lifetime.

“We need to get back to Jamie,” she whispered, filled
with a sudden sense of urgency as her thoughts finally began to clear. “I had
to leave her with Molly when I came after you.”

Walking over to the spot where Josef had been
standing, Aiden quickly reached down, snatched up the Marker that the Casus had
taken from her and slipped it into his pocket. Then they rushed through the
trees, back toward the path, and found Aiden’s friends fighting what looked to
be a losing battle. Though there were Casus bodies littering the ground, all of
them slowly transforming back into the shape of their human hosts, too many of
the creatures still stood, more bloodthirsty than ever.

“Stay close to me,” Aiden commanded, taking her hand
as they began working their way through the surging press of bodies. Olivia
nearly wept with relief when she spotted Jamie crouched against the craggy
outcropping of rock, flanked by Molly and Hope, who were both holding guns and
firing bullets at any Casus who tried to come near them. Jamie’s beautiful
little face was completely blank, like a doll’s, until she spotted Olivia and
Aiden coming toward her. The little girl blinked, and then her lower lip began
to tremble, just as her small body was suddenly racked by violent tremors, and
even with her human senses, Olivia could tell that something was wrong.

“What’s happening to her?” she gasped.

“I have no idea,” Aiden grunted. “But she’s throwing
off power like crazy.”

They wove their way through the battle as quickly as
they could, trying to reach her, but when they were no more than ten yards away
from Jamie, one of the two Casus who’d been fighting Kierland caught sight of
them. With his bloodied jaws gaping, the monster turned suddenly and began to
charge. Aiden shouted for Olivia to run as he released his claws and turned to
face the quickly approaching Casus, its open mouth revealing rows of sharp,
jagged fangs. Knowing Aiden could handle the monster on his own, Olivia was
trying to make her way around Kellan and the two Casus he was fighting when one
of the bastards slammed into her as he reared away from a lethal slash of the
Watchman’s claws. Losing her balance, Olivia hit the ground. Hard. Her head
spun from the impact, until a high-pitched cry suddenly filled the air, jarring
her back to awareness, the sound so sharp she wanted to cover her ears. For an
instant everyone stopped fighting, while the strange cry filled the air,
becoming louder, sharper. And then it stopped.

Everything was silent. Still. And then the most
bizarre thing began to happen.

“What the hell is going on?” she asked Aiden, unable
to believe what she was seeing as he quickly pulled her to her feet. The Casus
had turned on one another, their heavy gray bodies rolling over the ground as
they tore at their brothers with their muzzled mouths, ripping their gnarled
claws through tough, leathery flesh. And it wasn’t just the Casus. Even the
Death-Walkers were fighting amongst themselves up in the sky, slashing and
biting at one another, the sounds they made reminding Olivia of screeching
alley cats. “Why are they doing that?”

“I don’t know,” Aiden muttered, looking around, his
gut cramping with a fresh surge of worry when he realized what was happening.
“Oh, shit,” he rasped. “I think it’s Jamie. She’s doing it. Somehow she’s
making it happen.”

“What?” Olivia gasped. “That’s not poss…” Her denial
died as quickly as it had started when she turned and saw the same thing that
had snagged Aiden’s attention. Jamie was standing on her feet, her small face
deathly white, while her dark eyes shone like twin beams of blinding light. And
some kind of strange, fiery blue glow seemed to be burning from inside her
body, radiating out through her skin. Hope and Molly were both trying to reach
for her, but it was as if they were going up against an opposing force that was
pushing them back, keeping them away.

“Everyone get across the bridge and up to the house!
Now!” Aiden shouted, knowing they needed to get out of there while they still
could. Grabbing Olivia’s hand, he ran toward Jamie, the power emanating from
the child nearly knocking him to the ground. Gritting his teeth, he refused to
go down. He snatched Jamie’s glowing body up into his arms and crushed her against
his chest. She trembled against him, then threw her arms around his neck,
hugging him tight as he started running, pulling Olivia along behind him as
they all raced across the pedestrian bridge.

Jamie’s body was no longer glowing, the power pulling
back inside her, which meant that any surviving Casus or Death-Walkers might
very well start coming after them again. Pounding up the path toward the house,
the group finally made it to the sprawling lawn that wrapped around the
building’s wide, circular moat. Ian was up ahead, shouting for everyone to
hurry, and their whoops of triumph blended with groans of pain as everyone made
their way across the ancient drawbridge that spanned the moat.