SWNOVELS Chapter 27
JAX
With the battle raging out on the property, I stole a few minutes to check on Audrey. Sophie stood outside and gave us privacy. She told me Audrey had important stuff to tell me. She definitely does.
Since dropping her off with the medics, I hadn’t really had a chance to let the fact that she’s a shape shifter sink in. Now, it is and I can't be angry about it until I find out why she lied. I have a feeling this isn't a regular lie.
I slowly walk into the tent and the medic is checking her bandage. She pulls down her white t-shirt and turns her head to me.
I wave and walk slowly to her cot. The medic leaves and tends to another patient. I sigh and sink down onto it. Leaning on my knees, I lace my fingers together.
“How are you?” I roll my head to her.
“I’ll live.” She mumbles.
I nod. “Why?” I circle a finger around my face.
She sighs and rubs her palms together. “I admired you…and you had something I needed.”
“My mace.” I say as I look to the floor.
“I’m sorry, Jax. I needed your memories. When I saw you last, I needed to refresh your DNA to tap into the plans for the mace.” She says as she mirrors my posture.
“You used me.” I mumble.
She nods. “I did.”
I sit up. “Who are you? I know the Oaklands aren’t shape shifters.”
She glances at me. She looks straight ahead and heaves a deep breath. “My name isn’t Audrey Oakland. It’s my adopted name.” She turns to me and looks me in the eye. “My name…is Annie Ferguson.”
I chew my lip and cinch my brow. “Jesse.”
She nods. “My father…though he doesn’t know it.”
“How come?” I question.
She smiles then turns away. “When I was born, I was a twin. My brother, Nathaniel. He’s very special. So special, my mother protected him at all costs, to the detriment of myself. My father had past and my mother remarried. With money being tight, my step father couldn’t support us all. He told my mother to choose. Of course, she couldn’t. My step father chose for her. Since I wasn’t anything special, I was packed off and sent to an orphanage.”
“Rey…” I whisper and watch her tell her story.
“It’s fine. I spent years there. It was OK until I got caught stealing extra food. The cook tried to beat me and I shifted. I beat him senseless. After, I feared for my life, so I ran. I wandered the country for a while until I ended up in Oxford. My mother found me begging outside a store, disguised as a 16 year old blonde girl, and took me home. I adopted the look and they adopted me. Then I met you.” She turns to me and smiles.
“How old are you? I know Jesse’s old as fuck.” I ask.
“105 this spring.” She gives a half smile and turns away.
I rub my nape and blow out a breath as I process this hot, older women. “Ok. So I get how you got to me. How does the Mace figure into this?”
She turns her head to me and looks me over. “Remember when I told you Sophie was found in a warehouse?”
“Yeah.”
She shakes her head no and points to her chest.
I spin on the bed and my brows stitch up. “You?” I lean to her and whisper.
She nods. “I came back to find you. I wanted to apologize, instead the town was being destroyed by lycans. I fought them as best I could. They marched on the pack house and they tore me down. When they found out what I was, they tortured me. They tried to convince me to join them. I refused.”
She turns and places her fingers in a prayer pose at her lips. A single tear falls from her eye. “They suppressed my shift and…um…had their ways…several times. Vinnie showed up and tried to say the pain would end if I joined him. Again, I said no. He answered back with more beatings and taking his turns. After, they left me for dead.”
My chest feels tight as I listen. My heart hurts and my blood runs hot as I think of what Vinnie did to her.
She glances at me. “I don’t how I picked myself up after that, but I did. I made my way back to Chet and vowed to kill them all. All the lycans. I didn’t care who they were at first. When I heard my parents were murdered, I knew I needed to be a bigger threat. I couldn’t do that without finding my strength and grounding myself so, I spent some time on Brynja Mountain. I stumbled upon a rock. One I have never seen before. After research, I discovered the Jaxtium and its properties. I used my parents inheritance to build Horizon and create the Black Mace, but I knew I wasn’t strong enough to carry the mace. I needed someone stronger.”
“Me.” I conclude.
Her eyes meet mine. “You.” She taps her fingers together. “You were the strongest person I knew.” She squeaks. “To lose an entire family and still take up Alpha. You are lot stronger than me. In a way, you shielded me from my pain and for every lycan I killed, I felt you were avenging me somehow. It was sick. I know that now. I’m so sorry.”
“I can’t say that I’m honored, Rey. I don’t even know what to say, but I think I understand. You were hurt bad. I get that. I just wish you trusted me with it, instead of hiding it from me. And using my face? You could have destroyed everything for me. You get that right?” I throw a leg up on the bed behind her and fold my arms in my lap.
She turns to face me. “Yes. I know. I truly am sorry and I understand if you never want to see me again. I know you said you wanted to stand under the moon, but knowing this, I will not fault you for refusing. Just…I hope you believe me that I will be hanging up the mace after this.”
I rub my nape and think. This explains so much. The behavior. The lies. The determination to push me away. She was using me as a shield. A shield against me because it’s exactly what I’ve been doing my whole life. Keeping people at arms length and pushing those who got too close, away. Her trust issues, were my trust issues. She was being fueled by my rejection, hatred and revenge. The problem was when I found Audrey again, she was the only one I wanted to let in and she backlashed because of my shit. I could have saved her multiple times had I not been such an asshole and turned this into a gender thing. Clearly, she can handle her own, but I hope going forward, she can learn to lean on me a bit, too.
I lick my lips, take her hands and rub them with my thumbs. “I won’t be refusing anything, Rey. You fucked around almost died. I think as far as lessons go, this is a big one. The fact that you told me all of that tells me you want to be open to me. You want my help. I’m willing to try if you are. Right from scratch. Like we just met, only we know everything about each other and there’s no secrets. Would you like that?”
She smiles as her eyes glass over. “I would. Very much.”
“Ok. So, once the shit out there is done, we are going home and having a real sit down. We're laying it all out on the table. We'll go from there.” I lean to her and pull her head to mine.
“Ok.” She smiles.
“I love you, Audrey. I always have and I always will.” I kiss her softly then pull back. “Um…hold back on hanging up the Mace though. I think he could useful.” I smirk.
“You think?”
I nod on her head. “Yeah, and…I want that mace.”
She laughs and I grab her head in a hug. I drop a kiss in her hair and just sink into the feeling of her alive in my arms. Almost losing the person you love, changes your perspective in so many ways. If this happened when she first got here, I’m sure my reaction would have been a different, but I feel like I’ve grown a bit. I know more about her and have a better understanding of where I come from. She did that for me.
From now on, I’m easing up. Starting with something I should have done decades ago.
First…let’s kill off the rest of these lycans.
****
I meet Sophie outside.
“Everything OK?” She asks.
I pick up my mace. “Everything’s perfect. Let’s spill some blood.”
I thump my mace on my hand and Sophie twirls her mace. “I’m game.”
“Don’t die.” I eye her.
“You either.”
We break into a run and the battle rages like an angry, bloody ocean.
We skid in the blood soaked mud and in perfect sync, swing upwards and catch two lycans under the chin. Our spikes tear into their jaws and blood flies into the air like fountains.
I spin around and catch a lycan in the gut. I pull back and his side rips out, spilling his organs all over the ground.
Sophie jumps in the air, throws her mace and it torpedoes through the lycans, slicing them as her spikes spin. She throws her hand out and it doubles back, spilling more blood before she catches it. She jumps and slashes her mace down the front of one and up the front of another.
I kick a foot into the head of one and he falls I jump and slam my mace into his roaring mouth.
“VAMPIRES!!”
I turn and west side of the battle turns black. Like a rogue wave, the Vamps appear out of nowhere. They spring from the ground, arms out and black coats flapping behind as I watch them soar over my head and land in the battle.
‘SWITCH TO STAKES!!’ Finn links.
The whole war seems to come alive as the vamps grab us and throw us to the lycans. Wolves are tossed back and forth. Eddie leads an areal assault of his 50 boarders. They throw stakes to the Vamps that present their chests.
‘Remove heads or hearts to drop them!!’ Griffin instructs. He kicks his metal soccer ball and it explodes into a huge net which falls on a cluster of Vamps. The net become electrified and the vamps fall, flopping around and screaming. Griffin picks up the ball, eyes the wolves around and smirks. “Sic ‘em, boys.” He pushes a button and the net retracts. The second it’s out of the way, our wolves pile on them like a pack of rabid dogs. The screeching made your ears bleed as they wolves dug for hearts to rip out.
Marcus winds up and knocks Vamps heads then clubs them into the dirt. He drives the fat end of his bat through their ribs, crushing the hearts after turning brains to mush. He gets jumped and a vamp fights him for his bat. I jam my mace into his back and throw him.
“Thanks.” He huffs.
“No problem.” I help him up and we both start swinging. Flesh and bone fly out of our circle into the fighters beyond as we cut our way through them.
Marcus pulls out a ball. “RUN!”
I look behind me just as he grabs my arm and we dive for cover. I see the ball roll between the legs of the lycans and it goes off. A huge chunk of lycans and vamps are exploded in different directions.
He throws more as we back up.
‘INCOMING!’ I link out to anyone who’s around. In a wide semi circle, lycans and Vamps are thrown out of the fight.
‘IT’S PHOENIX!’
“Marcus, MOVE!!” I pull him out of the way just as a rolling wave of massive wolves and super wolves storm the fight.
We look at each other. “I want in.” We both say at the same time. We ditch our weapons, scramble off our asses and jump. We both shift and our wolves land in the mess.
The Vamps hiss and growl and lycans let out demonic roars.
Finn is slashing and tearing and Noah is throwing his metal basketball. It runs through the battle like a circular saw. It flies down then up. It banks back and drops, spilling guts and severing heads as it heads straight back to Noah.
Marcus rips off a vamps head and barks.
I turn to the empty part of the field. I see Vinnie, holding his back and limping around a barn. I look to Marcus.
‘He’s mine.’