"Help comes in many ways. I am most willing to guide you out of here again. That qualifies as doing my part."
Dismissing the twit, Evalle turned to Storm and kept her voice calm. "We're going to leave."
He dove at her, lips pulled back and fangs ready to crush whatever part of her body they latched onto.
Evalle flipped the kinetic field back into place at the last second and Storm smashed up against it, sending vibrations through her arm that couldn't hurt any worse if a Mack truck had rammed her defensive wall. Her shoulder ached and now she had serious concerns about getting out of this place alive.
Her skin chilled even more, but she couldn't blame it entirely on the atmosphere in Mitnal. She stared into Storm's glowing red eyes and saw no humanity there. No one at home who would recognize her. Her heart squeezed with one painful beat after another. She was losing him.
Or had already lost him.
Her head screamed at her that this was a lost cause.
Tzader and Quinn would be dragging her away if they were here.
Nadina waited in smug silence, ready to claim victory.
You can do no less for him than he would do for you, whispered through Evalle's mind. That same voice had popped in and out of her head over the last few months. The most recent time had been when Evalle lay dying while linked to Tzader.
That female voice had apologized for not being there for Evalle as she grew up locked away in a basement like a caged animal and Evalle was pretty sure the spirit had been responsible for Evalle and Tzader surviving.
Was that her mother who had died in childbirth?
She'd find out one day, but it wouldn't be today.
If he is yours then no one can take him from you, the voice said, then withdrew from Evalle's mind.
Damned straight. Evalle squared her shoulders and told Storm, "You don't belong to Nadina. You never did and you knew that your whole life until now. She tricked you, but you are mine and I am not leaving here without you if I have to drag you back through that bolthole."
"No!" Nadina shouted. "He's mine and if you try to harm me he will rip you to pieces."
Turning to her, Evalle said in a deadly quiet voice. "He won't touch me. I'm his mate and he knows it. Now it's time for you to fulfill the rest of your deal so I can take him home."
"You'll never get out of here without me."
"I don't plan to try. You made a deal. You know the consequences of crossing me and my witch friend." Nadina didn't know who Adrianna was, and Evalle wouldn't give someone this evil any kind of edge by revealing Adrianna's name now.
Nadina's face ruptured with fury. "You think you know everything. I never put all my eggs in one basket. Storm had a purpose, which he fulfilled by coming to Mitnal of his own free will. Look at him. You have lost."
"You bitch."
"Not me." Nadina laughed. "He did all this to keep you safe and now he doesn't even know you."
"He'll just have to learn me again, because we're leaving here with him."
"Have you forgotten the oath? I said Storm had to be in human form-and not turned fully into a demon-to cloak and take out of here. You agreed to that. Now that he has been turned he will be a demon forever."
"He will not."
"Then make him shift back into his human form," Nadina suggested.
Evalle eyed the jaguar who showed no sign of being interested in anything she had to say. "Storm? Please shift back to your human form."
"Don't you understand?" Nadina's voice was picking up confidence with every second that the jaguar remained in place. "Storm will not change back, because the blood rules him. He has embraced his destiny. You should accept it and I will take you back. He would want that."
It couldn't end this way.
But Evalle now understood what she hadn't when they'd made the oath. She speared Nadina with the fury bubbling inside her. "You were banking on Storm being stuck in jaguar form by the time we reached him, weren't you?"
Nadina shrugged. "One could only hope."
"I don't care." Evalle was past the point of wasting energy on worry. She was taking Storm home and she didn't give a flip if it was on two feet or four paws. "We're ready to go. Open the bolthole, Nadina. That seems to be all you're good for."
Nadina smiled as if she were the only one who knew the secret handshake. "I can't open the bolthole right here."
"Why?"
"Hanhau has me bound in such a way that I must always enter and leave at the same spot. Why do you think we entered in the middle of the demons? If I had alerted Hanhau I was coming to Mitnal, he would have cleared a spot. And do not accuse me of breaking my oath. I will take you back through the original bolthole, but I have no way to cloak that jaguar from Hanhau to sneak him out."
Evalle ran through the oath in her mind. This bitch had tricked Storm and now she'd outplayed Evalle and Adrianna. Unbelievable. But Adrianna had covered Evalle's ass by making Nadina tell Evalle how to open a bolthole on her own. "You know what, Nadina, fine, stay here if you want, but I have that chunk of hair you lost and I'll scatter it all over this place if you aren't going to hold up your end of the deal. I'll keep one strand for the minute you step back into the mortal world and I own you." Evalle had no idea what she'd do with the crazy woman at that point, but the threat had a nice ring to it.
Shock washed the anger from Nadina's face. Her eyes glowed with a wild stare. "You must go and leave him here. This is where Storm belongs."
"No."
"Give me that hair."
"No."
Nadina started wringing her hands and talking to herself. "Hanhau will know the minute Storm is gone. I cannot be left here without Storm. He has to stay and protect me."
Whoa. Was Evalle hearing this right? Had Nadina boxed herself into a corner? "Let me get this straight. If I open a bolthole and drag Storm through it-" Evalle paused at the mental image of Storm's jaws locking on that arm and ripping it off. "Hanhau shuts down Mitnal and you're stuck here with the crazy demon ruler?"
Nadina's hair shot straight out away from her head and she kept muttering. "He'll make me do ... I cannot let Hanhau ... He'll give me to all the demons... No, no..."
Evalle couldn't wish that misery on someone more deserving, but Storm still needed this witch to get his soul back. Dammit. "Look, Nadina, just work with me to get us out of here-" While Evalle was trying to figure out how to take Storm out then come back to bring Nadina out, the crazy witch flipped a gear into nuclear insanity.
Nadina's wild gaze slammed into Evalle's. "You cannot have him."
"I'm not leaving him here. He's going with me."
"Hanhau will make me pay." Nadina shouted, "If I cannot have Storm, you will not either, and you're not leaving me here to suffer Hanhau."
That threat had barely registered in Evalle's brain when Nadina turned on Storm who roared at the witch doctor, but he clearly couldn't attack his master.
Nadina didn't have that problem. She pointed at Storm and spewed a string of words that Evalle had no chance of comprehending as bloody stripes whipped across storm's skin. Evalle dug out the hair in her pocket and waved it at Nadina who looked at it for all of a second and flicked a flame from her fingertips that caught the hair on fire. The hair on Nadina's head started to flame at the same time, but Nadina swiped her hand over it to squelch the blaze.
Evalle slung the rest of the burning ponytail away.
The possibility of being left here as Hanhau's bitch had just trumped the oath Nadina had given Evalle.
Adrianna had been partly correct in thinking the penalty Nadina would pay for breaking her oath with Evalle only mattered if Nadina left this place.
What she'd missed was that Nadina had to be sane enough to realize she was breaking the oath. Evalle watched as Nadina's model-beautiful face began to age before her eyes.
Storm went up on his hind legs, falling back as as blood poured from the wounds Nadina continued to inflict.
Evalle threw a kinetic blast at Nadina,
slamming the witch doctor up against the wall. Nadina turned on her, bony fingers raised with nails narrowing into sharp points. She howled and raked her spiked nails from top to bottom.
White-hot pain sliced down Evalle's chest and arms.
Storm rolled to his feet, dropped low and shoved up hard, but was he going for Evalle or Nadina?
The witch whipped a hand in Storm's direction, snapping bones in his legs. He fell to the floor in a heap, howling with pain and anger.
Evalle shoved up a wall of power to give her the sixty seconds she needed to shift her body into something that could defend him. Her jeans and vintage shirt ripped everywhere as she released her beast that grew four times her size, extending her arms that filled the room with blue-green feathers over the wings and body of a gryphon. Adrenaline rushed the change. Her head warped and twisted into the golden head of an eagle and the lower half of her body flowed into that of lion.
She rose up on her haunches, spreading her wings and curling the talons on her front feet.
Nadina's mouth gaped open in horror.
Now who was the biggest bitch in the room?
Confidence gone and only a mindless monster left in the place of Nadina, she tossed off her cloak and called out, "Storm, protect your master!"
Storm pushed up on one front leg that had already healed, then he straightened the second one. Massive muscle bunched and moved beneath the glistening black coat. He looked at Evalle's gryphon form and shook his head as if not sure what he was seeing.
But he was healing fast and ready to fight. Red burned in his eyes. He roared in reply to Nadina's call for help then swung that deadly gaze at Evalle.
Her stomach fell.
Please don't fight me, Storm. Don't make me hurt you.
If she didn't fight him, demon or not, deep down she had to believe he'd never survive killing her. Of course, that would only happen if he ever recognized her again.
When he lunged at her, she caught him with her claws, fighting him off and getting gouged as badly as she had to be hurting him.
Her worst nightmare had come true.
Storm had turned into a demon and attacked her.
Nadina jumped into the fray, using her majik to stab Storm, driving his rage over the top. He clawed at Evalle over and over until Evalle shot a blast of fire at Nadina that singed what was left of the witch doctor's medusa-looking hair.
Storm bit down on Evalle's paw then yanked his head back with blood dripping from his lips.
His eyes still glowed, but shock widened them.
Had he recognized her blood? Did he know she was his mate?
The emerald that had done nothing in all this time, now hummed with energy in Evalle's chest and shone brightly through the gryphon feathers. Her heart thumped a crazy jig.
She tossed Storm away as carefully as she could and he landed on all fours, spinning to take in her then Nadina.
The witch doctor ordered him, "Kill her. Now!"
Storm just stood there, confused and panting.
Evalle had been so intent on Storm, watching for a sign of recognition that she had failed to keep an eye on Nadina.
Nadina shoved one hand of long, pointy nails at Evalle whose gryphon arched up, swinging back and forth with her wings flapping. Evalle clawed at the air to make whatever was stabbing her over and over stop.
Storm took one step, then another, but he was headed for Nadina with an unholy look in his jaguar eyes.
As he leaped, Nadina howled a curse at him and her other hand turned into a blade that plunged into his chest.
Evalle screamed, a loud wrenching sound that was half eagle and half woman. She flapped her wings hard, driving her down to the witch whose majik was still ripping into Evalle.
Nadina paid no attention to Evalle, focused only on killing Storm.
Evalle grabbed the witch doctor's head in her ginormous beak and ripped it off, flinging the bloody ball against a wall.
The pain in Evalle's chest eased. She landed on the cave floor and tottered to keep her balance.
A headless body flopped to the ground.
Realization of what she'd done slammed Evalle in her chest.
No, no, no!
Even with Storm dead, he and his father still had no souls. They had no way to rest forever. Evalle wanted to kill that witch all over again.
The jaguar stirred, jerking Evalle's attention to him.
Storm?
But he couldn't hear her telepathically.
Relief and misery battled in her heart. He was still alive, but she'd killed Nadina.
Snapping out of his daze, Storm's gaze whipped over to Nadina's head that still rocked back and forth where it had landed. The foul smell of blood filled the air instead of her nasty licorice scent.
He swung his attention back to take in Evalle standing over Nadina's lifeless body and the jaguar let loose a long sound so forlorn and painful Evalle couldn't breathe.
She'd just killed the last hope he had of ever getting his soul back and, in that moment, he might not recognize her but he understood the loss.
A chorus of howling out in the large room answered Storm.
Okay, that just screwed any odds for a clean escape.
Bad news flash number two? With Nadina dead, Evalle had no cloaking and no idea if she could definitely open a bolthole on her own. Did she have to go back out in the middle of that open area to do it?
That was not happening.
Then there was the problem of trying to get a demon jaguar out of here, one that had survived attacks for the last two days in this place and currently had his head lowered, snarling and panting viciously.
She gambled and changed back to human in a rush, which she found out quickly was not the way to do it. Her body twisted and snapped, forcing muscles to wind back into smaller, tighter shapes and bones to shorten. She fought for breath and squeezed her eyes to stop any chance of tears. She had only seconds to get through to Storm, who still eyed her with murder glaring in his eyes.
Snatching the robe off Nadina, Evalle yanked it on and tied the string as she talked. "Listen to me Storm. I'm sorry about Nadina."
The growling picked up volume and his lips lifted to expose razor-sharp fangs.
Not the best time to discuss the witch doctor.
Evalle moved ahead. "I know you're in there. Come back with me. I think I can open the bolthole. You may not like me right now, but you hate Hanhau. You can't stay here."
Howling was racing toward them.
Storm stalked her, moving slowly forward, one paw at a time.
Had killing Nadina snapped the last thread he'd held on his humanity?
"Please, Storm. Come back with me."
He took another step.
The screaming demons were close to his den. The first one raced in and launched itself. Before Evalle could raise her hand to deflect the attack, Storm shot up, meeting the threat in mid-air. They fell into a tangle of snarls and clawing. Two more demons came through the narrow passage.
She ground her teeth against the pain and forced herself into battle form that raised the cartilage along her arms and powered up her body. Lifting her hands, she was ready.
But there was no way out of here if she couldn't open that bolthole.
First she had to stop the demon running at her. He stood upright and spikes stuck out of his head like a horned Mohawk that continued down his spine. With no reason to hold back now, she unleashed her kinetics and blasted him against the wall, crushing his skull. The second demon was the bear with the wild hog head. Sharp tusks jutted out eighteen inches beyond the thing's snout.
The eyes of this thing and the demon she'd killed were brilliant red. Like mega wattage.
Had Hanhau just super-charged his herd?
Evalle caught the tusks and dropped down, hanging from them so they didn't spear her. She held on as the thing shook her back and forth. One of his clawed paws struck out at her side and gouged a wound.
She could only keep this u
p for so long before her strength would give out, especially after changing into a gryphon and back so fast.
Her arms were quivering.
Let go and try to use kinetics against him?
He'd stomp her first then stab her with a tusk.
Her shoulders were dropping closer to the floor. The minute she hit, the demon would know he had her.
A flash of black jumped on top of the beast's back. Jaguar jaws clamped the hog's neck and ripped once, then again. The hog beast's wild eyes rolled, searching for what attacked it. It screamed and jumped around trying to shake that black jaguar off, but Storm held on, taking the demon to the ground.
Evalle scrambled to keep from getting trampled.
Thankfully, it fell sideways or it would've crushed her. She staggered to her feet, wiping sweat out of her eyes in spite of the frosted breaths rolling off her tongue.
Where were the other demons?
Not that she was inviting them in, but why weren't they swarming?
When the hog took its last breath, Storm stood on top of it, roaring over and over, louder each time until the walls shook.
Now she got it.
They were terrified of Storm.
These three had thought they'd heard Storm being attacked and come to finish him off. What had Hanhau promised them if they were successful?
A demon treat?
Evalle looked around at the carnage. This was it. She had to convince Storm to leave now or it was never going to happen. Waiting for the most dangerous demon in Mitnal to finish warning off the rest against even thinking about attacking him, Evalle reached into the pocket of Nadina's robe and dug for anything that the witch might have held onto that would open a bolthole.
Empty pockets. No majik wand or artifact to insure an exit route.
Storm quieted and turned to her, not a flicker of emotion anywhere in those eyes.
She'd gotten used to the yellow eyes on Storm's jaguar, because he'd always been in there behind them. No sign of the man behind the glowing red gaze.
Licking her lips, she tried to swallow against her dry throat. "I'm going to try to open the bolthole. I want you to come with me. Please."
Still no sign of acknowledgment.
Was Storm in there?
Evalle held her hands out to the side just as Nadina had and called up the words again, repeating them louder the second time. Energy sizzled and smoked then burst into an archway.
"It worked." Maybe it was wearing the witch's robe? Evalle laughed in surprise, but the sound had a hysterical edge. Much more of this and she'd need measurements for a straitjacket.