The Alphas & The Heiress

Syble (Magnolia)

Three more masses drop from the ceiling onto the floor. There are now the figures of five men standing across the room from us. Incandis stands next to me as Kat tries to rally the injured guards.

The men make the first move, a fireball comes whizzing through the cave at our heads.

Dragons.

I catch the fireball in my hands and throw it back at them. Now both sides know that flames will not win this fight.

The five men rush at us, weapons drawn. Incandis and I stick together, back to back, defending against the attackers.

I throw my glaive around one of the pillars, it boomerangs back around decapitating one of the attackers.

The other four pair off, two heading towards Incandis and two running towards me.

Incandis quickly snaps the neck of one of his attackers before punching his fist into the chest of the other and ripping his heart out with his bare hands.

As soon as their bodies hit the floor five more men drop down in front of us. Incandis puts himself between the five men and me while I deal with the two men who came after me.

I get one of my attackers into a choke hold and use the glaive in my other hand to slice open his torso with the jagged inner edge of my blade, effectively turning his inner organs into outer organs.

His partner takes in the sight of his mangled body and attempts to flee from my wrath. Fucking coward. I throw my glaive at the stalactites on the ceiling knocking a few loose. He’s caught off guard when one of rocky spears lands behind him and he trips and stumbles forward onto the ground where another falling shard impales him through his back. I should leave him to die a slow painful death but it’s not just me in this cave. Incandis, Kat, and the two wolf guards are all at risk.

I snap the neck of the coward on the ground, mercifully putting him out of his misery. I look back around to find Kat and Incandis. Kat has managed to get the two guards up and over to the entrance we came from. Incandis is a few yards in front of me in the middle of the room masterfully holding off four guys.

There were five before, I’m sure of it. I look around to see where the fifth one went but the bodies aren’t adding up. He’s still alive and he’s around here somewhere. I take a step towards Incandis looking around me on high alert when the fifth attacker steps out of the shadows directly in front of me. I reach for his throat but I’m too late. He grins maliciously as he plunges a dagger into my chest.

I stumble backwards clutching the handle of the blade in shaky hands. The gravity of the situation is just now hitting me. These men were here waiting for us, in this cave. The same cave that the wolves led us to, the side of the cave the twins told my group to head towards, fighting, outnumbered, against my own kind while the wolves sit safely in a corner untouched. A seed of an idea begins to grow in my mind, inflaming me immediately. We’ve been set up, ambushed by people who I thought I could trust, who I thought I could love…and we’re losing.

The man that stabbed me has left me to die and the remaining four are closing in on Incandis.

Fuck this. I refuse to let it end this way. It can’t. My father and uncle are missing, I can’t allow my brother to be taken too. I know what I have to do, I just hope that it’s enough.

Summoning all my remaining strength I pull the dagger out of my chest, my screams echoing through the cavernous chamber. I extend my wings and I hover in the air half shifted. I channel my rage, letting it boil until the pressure is too great to contain it.

I erupt in green flames and torch our attackers with my fire. A steady stream of fire pours out from within me. They may be dragons, and they may be fireproof, but no living thing can withstand these flames. It’s my gift, and my curse.

I don’t relent my fiery breath until they’re nothing but ashes on the floor. My green flames recede, my body shifts back to human, and I collapse, smoking and bleeding onto the cold, hard, rock floor.

— — —

Kat

While the dragons battle it out, I manage to rouse the two guards and help them limp their way back to the entrance of the tunnel we entered from. Hopefully they’ll be able to make it out of the cave, and if not my brothers and Runidar will find them on their way to us.

With the guards out of harm’s way I turn back to the fight, Incandis is fighting four men on his own and Syble snaps the neck of another one before heading towards Incandis. She makes it only a step when another attacker appears in front of her seemingly out of thin air and plunges a dagger into her heart. The blade is so long I can see the tip of it exit out of her back.

“No!” I scream, the sound unrecognizable even to me. Incandis turns, looking first to me, and then to Syble. She’s shocked, staggering backwards, assessing the dagger that is sure to kill her.

Incandis abandons his fight, pushing the attackers out of his way, rushing to me and pulling me into his arms taking cover behind one of the rocky pillars. In the next moment the entire cavern is lit up in a green light and the attackers begin screaming and howling in pain.

I peek my head around Incandis and the pillar and see Syble, wings spread, hovering above the ground, green flames beaming out of her eyes and mouth like a flame thrower.

The screams stop and a few seconds later the green light goes out as Syble crashes to the ground. Incandis and I rush over to her to get a look at her injury.

There’s a dagger with a 10 inch blade by her feet and a stab wound near her heart. There’s too much blood to tell where exactly it’s coming from but I can still hear her heart beating, though it’s slow and faint.

“It missed, it missed her heart.” I say frantically to Incandis. I press down on the wound to mitigate some of the bleeding but that only causes more blood to pour out of her back.

My brothers and Runidar finally make it to us, their howls of pain and anger at the sight of their mate bleeding out onto the floor shake the walls of the cave. Runidar somehow manages to hold my brothers back, giving Incandis and me space to try to save her.

“It went all the way through. She’s been stabbed clean through. We have to get her back to the pack house now!” I shout.

“There’s no time, she won’t make it that far.” Incandis says. “Everyone, hold on to her. Now!” He commands.

My brothers, Runidar, and I grab onto her before being sucked into the void and dropped back out into what appears to be a hospital room.

“What the fuck just happened, where are we?” Ro asks, but Incandis is already out the door shouting down the hall for a doctor.

There’s a lot of shouting, people running through the halls and into the room in which we stand. Incandis rushes back in with what appears to be a doctor.

“Where are we Incandis? Who are these people?” Varian growls, demanding answers.

“I teleported us home, welcome to the grove, now get the fuck out of the way!” He shouts.

We move out of the way of the medical staff, unable to do anything but watch in stunned silence as they attempt to keep her alive.

The doctor places her hand over the wound, a golden light beams out from under her hand. “She’s losing blood faster than I can heal her. We need to get her into the O.R. now!”

The medical team transfers her to a new bed and they quickly run her out of the room without another word.

A growl tears through the room, Ro races across the room, his eyes black, claws out – a clear sign that his wolf is the one in control now. He grabs Incandis by the throat and slams him up against the wall, pinning him to the wall 2 feet off the floor. Runidar throws his arms around Varian, holding him back to prevent him from attacking Incandis too.

“Where the fuck were you?! How could you let them get to her!” Varian rages at Incandis as the latter dangles, suspended by the neck.

“We were outnumbered! Ro, for fuck’s sake, let him go!” I scream at my brother, punching and pushing his arms, trying fruitlessly to get him to release his grip on Incandis.

Ro growls threateningly before letting Incandis drop back down to the floor. Incandis takes in fresh oxygen urgently. When he uprights himself he runs his hands through his hair, his anger and anxiety is palpable. “Fuck!” He roars as he punches a hole straight through the nearest wall.

He stands there a moment longer before taking another deep, steadying breath, and turning to address our group. “She’ll be okay, she’ll be fine, but we should talk. Then I can get you guys set up in some guest rooms if you want while we wait.” His tone is calm, like he actually believes what he’s saying.

“How are you so sure she’ll be okay?” Varian spits at him angrily. Ro doesn’t say a word and I have a feeling it’s because he’s using every modicum of energy to stay in control.

“Because she’s —” Incandis hesitates for a moment, debating with himself about how to respond.

Finally he looks us square in the eye and says, “because she’s the most important person in the grove, the doctors and healers will not stop until she’s fully healed.”

He shifts his gaze to look out the window and his voice lowers to just above a whisper. “If she dies, the grove dies with her.”