Blake
Malachi had planned a special party to celebrate Blake's homecoming.
Someone set up a bonfire by the lakeside and chairs and tables were arranged haphazardly around it. A few people were grilling – handing out burgers and hotdogs and veggie kabobs – and others were drinking and laughing.
A gathering of hunters is funny, Blake thought as she walked up with Hix and Josh at her sides, because everyone here is armed to the teeth just in case.
Guns and blades were strapped to ankles and thighs and waists. A few people had brought crossbows and silver-tipped whips that had been deposited carelessly on chairs and tables.
Blake herself was armed with a few blades and a gun was secured at her hip. So strange to feel the weight of that weapon on her body again after a few weeks of not wearing it.
Four days had passed since her return to Beare Lake but her arrival had been less impactful than she'd hoped. Her plan had been to come home, talk with Malachi, grab her brother, and then leave this place behind for good if she was still able.
Yet when she, Hix, and Mick arrived sixteen hours after Blake had left Sanguis Ridge, it was to an emptier community than she'd anticipated. Much had changed while she'd been gone and not all of it was good.
Malachi was gone – away on a hunt – and Josh had gone with him. Her anti-hunting brother was suddenly very committed to a hunter's lifestyle. It was only after asking around did Blake find out the reasoning.
Josh had fallen in love in her absence and then that love had been ripped away from him. He'd been home in Beare Lake while his boyfriend – Javier, the son of the town doctor – was away on a hunt to take down a vampire nest causing problems in New Orleans.
Javier hadn't come home.
It had been too much for Josh who'd been so worried about her that he hadn't even paused to consider that Javier was heading into a dangerous situation. And so when he'd come home in a body bag, Josh had been blindsided and for the first time in his life, Blake thought that he truly appreciated what it meant to be a hunter. The risk and the sacrifice that was involved.
But with Blake gone in Sanguis Ridge, Josh had turned to Malachi for guidance. Malachi, their ever fearless leader, had encouraged him to train harder so that he could better protect those he loved.
Josh had agreed and thrown himself into the training training. He'd been going out on every hunt possible as if he had a suicide wish.
When she'd called him upon her return to Beare Lake, it was to hear a voice that was darker, colder, than the voice of the boy she'd left behind. There was no joy in his tone now. Only bleakness. Even her announcement of her return had only yielded a slight warming.
The phone call though had affirmed that he and Malachi had gone to Las Vegas to hunt a djinn and would be back in a few days. So with the house empty and nothing else to occupy her time, Blake used the time to pick up the fractured, broken pieces inside of her. Shoving the shards of her shattered heart into a place deep inside of her where the sting wasn't as bad.
She didn't let herself think of Red's face; how he would have looked if she'd let herself wake up next to him, the way the green of his eyes would have been intent upon her face in the early morning sun, aglow with what they'd done together.
Blake tried not to think of Red at all, if only because it was fruitless. She would never see him again. They would never have a chance to build that home together in the shadow of a mountain peak even if she pondered if that was what she truly wanted more than anything else.
For one moment before she'd left, as she'd been lying in Red's arms, Blake had let herself think of what a future with him could mean. Endless days spent together, running through the woods, training with the other wolves, and playing soccer. Perhaps she would have even manage to convince him and Henry to restore werewolves to their former glory of hunting all that was bad and rotten in the world as they had before human hunters had taken over the job.
She had held that future close and then released it the second she'd slipped out from beneath the covers. Five days removed and that dream was like tattered ribbons on the wind. An impossibility because Blake would likely be dead soon. In fact, she'd been mentally preparing for her death before she'd even left the safety of Red's arms.
Beare Lake was so similar to Sanguis Ridge in many ways. Blake mingling around the edge of the lake – beyond which the towering trees and mountains of the Boise National Forest could be seen in all their glory – found herself missing the Colorado forest instead.
The booming echo of Malachi's laugh reached her as she grabbed a water from one of the coolers that had been lugged down to the lakeside. Condensation had gathered on the sides of the bottle. It chilled her already cold hands.
Blake hadn't spoken to Malachi yet – not since his return the previous night. She'd only seen her brother when he'd walked in the door, taken the time to hug him and hold him tight, before he'd gone off to bed.
As Blake glanced at the amassed group, she remarked that it was odd to look around and expect to see werewolves but only find hunters. Blake was almost disappointed. She kept finding herself listening for Phillip's laugh and Annalise's squeal of joy. Looking for Henry's deep thundering power and Red's carefree, quiet smile. The one that he reserved just for her.
She was a hot commodity at the lakeside party. Many of her fellow hunters kept coming up to ask about how scared she'd been and what it was like to live in a pack of werewolves. Blake kept to the answers she knew they wanted to hear – like how it had felt when she'd gotten attacked and whether it felt good to betray them with every bit of information she relayed back.
Blake refrained from telling them all of the good moments because she knew that they wouldn't understand how it felt to teach a little werewolf how to defend herself or what it was like to be completely safe in the embrace of someone she knew would protect her against all of the dangers of the world.
"How's it feel to be the guest of honour?" Hix asked as he sidled up to her.
"Just what I always wanted. Attention."
He snorted and sipped from the beer in his hand before giving a pointed look at her water. "You sure you don't want something stronger? Your brother told me that they've got some big surprise gift for you."
Blake cursed. "I hate surprises. And gifts."
Hix cracked a grin but it faded as he risked a glance around. There was no one near them. "What's up with you and Malachi?"
"What do you mean?"
"You've hardly spoken three words to each other all evening. Pretty weird considering that you were gone for weeks on end. Thought the two of you would have more to discuss."
Blake glanced over her shoulder to where Malachi was standing in conversation with Ida and Richard. He was near the fire, clad in jeans, a long-sleeved shirt and an unbuttoned black jacket. The light from the fire flickered in his pale brown eyes as he chortled at something Richard said.
"We have plenty to discuss," she said. "I'm just trying to figure out the right time."
Hix hummed under his breath as if he were about to say more but then, as if he'd been sensing their conversation, Malachi called the group to order. He climbed atop a nearby picnic table to stand above them all.
He looked at them all, smiling, and then turned directly to Blake. Malachi raised the can of beer he was holding in her direction. "To Blake," he intoned. "Welcome home, sweetheart. We thank you for your contributions. The insights you've given us will be exponentially helpful into ridding this world of werewolf scum."
The assembled crowd cheered but Blake merely offered a small, polite smile. Josh migrated over to her to clap her shoulder and grin broadly. "Well done, sis."
Long gone was the boy who had been chomping at the bit to leave this place. His grey eyes, the same as hers, had hardened into slate. They'd always been softer and kinder than her own but there was nothing gentle in them now.
"I know that the months you've spent as a prisoner and a spy within that wolf pack must have been very painful and challenging for you," Malachi added and there was something in her town that made Blake suspect that he knew that her feelings forwards Red had shifted from deception to fondness. As if he'd suspected that there was more than hatred for werewolves in her heart these days.
"We all see the scars that you've received in your quest to stay alive. No one here doubts your bravery. Which is why we thought we'd get you a very special present." Malachi nodded at a few people – Josh, Ida, Richard, and a handful of others – who turned and walked for one of the nearest houses. Blake watched them go, unease settling in her gut. Especially as her brother glanced over his shoulder and winked.
"Do either of you know what this is about?" she asked Hix and Mick who were the two nearest her. Both of them shook their heads and around Blake there were a few others, like Finn, Amir, and Pam who frowned. Yet all of their eyes widened a bit when they beheld what was dragged out of the house.
Or rather who.
"Oh god," Blake whispered.
Four werewolves. Three of them, the adults, were chained in silver with cuffs around their wrists and collars at their throats. The bindings left behind rings of blistered red as if they were being burned. Beaten and bruised, blood dried on their faces and necks and arms. The clothing they wore was torn and dirty.
Phillip and Chandra and Juliet and...trailing behind them was Annalise.
Blake's knees wobbled as her friends and the child she'd come to care for beyond reason were brought to a stop near Malachi, just off to his left. She saw that Annalise – the child unbound because they had no silver bindings small enough for a child of her size – had been given a brand. Someone had pinned her down and carved the word 'monster' into her arm. Written it with something akin to a silver scalpel and left to scar.
Blake was going to be sick.
She stared at them with horror and though she was deep in the crowd of people, Juliet and Phillip's eyes found her. Rife with fury as they saw her here, standing amongst hunters.
Phillip looked the worst of them. The right side of his face was covered in shades of black and blue, the right eye bloodshot. His blond hair was streaked with blood and through the tears in his shirt, she could see that someone had run a blade across his torso at least a dozen times.
The young warrior was half-shifted, his face contorted into inhuman proportions. Canines out, eyes lupine, nose beginning to lengthen. His fingers had elongated into sharp claws but that was as far as the silver binding him would allow him to go.
Blake looked away from Phillip and her eyes slid to her brother who was standing next to Juliet – a silver blade poised near her neck like he was going to slit it. Josh, who'd hated killing flies only months ago, seemed like he was minutes away from murder.
"Come forward, Blake," Malachi ordered, glee in his voice now. "We caught these creatures for you and thought that you might like to exact your vengeance on them. After what you've endured, you deserve these kills. It should be your blades that spill their blood. Come forward," he said again.
Blake didn't move. Couldn't. She felt as if she were rooted to the ground.
"—these dangerous pieces of filth will never be able to coexist with us peacefully," Malachi was saying. He gestured to Phillip who snarled back. "You see how they snap at us and bare their teeth. They are vermin. Abominations. They shouldn't exist!"
The crowd began to rustle and Blake was jostled. It jolted her into movement and then she was walking through the crowd which parted for her. A few of her fellow hunters smiled and whispered encouragements. There were others though whose faces twisted with hesitation and uncertainty. Like they too were not seeing a werewolf but a child.
Blake knew that hunters were used to seeing werewolves as monsters – feral beasts which attacked during the night. They were used to half-shifted creatures like Phillip but they were not used to seeing pretty little girls with a halo of curls in pigtails and beautiful brown eyes.
She stopped twenty feet away from the table Malachi stood atop of. Josh had lied and when he said he and Malachi had gone to Las Vegas. They hadn't. They'd been in Colorado. They'd stolen her friends. Members of her pack.
A gift, Malachi had called it. A present just for her. To commemorate her subterfuge and betrayals as if it were a good thing.
Malachi jumped down from the table and walked over to Chandra. He pulled a long silver knife from the inside of his coat and raked it across the skin of her forearm without so much as a blink. If anything, his smile widened as the blood began to spill and Chandra gritted her teeth – unwilling to cry out even with the pain. With the infusion of silver, the skin on her arm almost immediately began to redden with a burn. Chandra growled but Malachi only laughed.
"You see?" he asked the crowd, though he was still staring at Blake. "You see the way its skin reacts to the silver? This is unnatural! This is a monster."
Monster.
Malachi kicked Chandra's legs out from beneath her, sending the woman crashing to the ground. It was a miracle that Richard's blade didn't slice her throat as she fell. Then Malachi turned his attention to the other three werewolves. Blake watched as he grabbed Annalise by her arm, removing her from Ida's hold. The young girl fought against him every step of the way, screaming bloody murder and attempting to get out of his grasp.
Blake's fingers drifted to the gun at her hip and the blade that had been tucked inside of a sheath beneath her jacket sleeve slipped down to her hand. She stared at Annalise, praying for the girl to Shift but knowing in her heart that the child was too young to be able to do so.
Annalise managed to bite him once – hard – but Malachi backhanded her swiftly, the sharp crack resonating through the clearing, and sent her falling to the ground with a small cry.
It was that sound that broke something in Blake's chest. The sound of utter defeat, of not only fear but stone-cold terror.
"Do not be fooled by its childish appearance," Malachi preached, ignoring the girl on the ground. "It is still a monster. And one day it will grow older and give life to more monsters that will come and kill our children and take our lands and homes away from us. We have all lost family and friends at the hands of these feral beasts. But that stops today!"
Around Blake, people began to nod in agreement, began to whoop and holler.
"No longer will we allow these unnatural creatures to destroy us! We will destroy them. All of them. This I pledge to you! This I promise!"
Malachi bent down pulled Annalise back to her feet even as the young girl began to weep. He looked at Blake and said, "Your vengeance."
There was only excitement in his face. This wasn't a job for him, Blake realized. These werewolves hadn't committed any wrongdoings. There was no need to hunt them but Malachi had done so as if it were a sport.
Just like Blake's parents had been killed.
"Vengeance," Blake repeated. She released the safety on her gun and clicked a bullet into the chamber.
Malachi beamed like a kid on Christmas. He was living this up.
The four werewolves stared at her. Blake's fingers were strong and steady on her weapons as she took a step forward. One shot. A few seconds. That's all she would have. She would have to make it count.
Phillip was too injured. Chandra was down. Juliet was still standing with Josh holding her as tightly as he dared – but despite the fury in his eyes, he looked uncertain. Awkward.
And then there was Annalise on the ground. The young werewolf who couldn't Shift but who wasn't defenceless. Hadn't been since the moment Blake had begun to teach her.
They'd gone over this only a handful of days ago. How to get out of a captor's hold and let a better fighter get in between to take the hit.
She glanced back at Juliet who had gone still, the fire leaching from her eyes as she read the change in Blake's demeanor. Blake had never been more grateful for werewolf hearing in her life because she knew even the slightest whisper would catch Juliet's ear. A word spoken so softly that a human would never hear it would be known by a werewolf.
"Hands up," Blake whispered as she looked back to Annalise and Juliet's brow furrowed. Her eyes drifted to Malachi, watched as his glee turned to hesitation as Bake shouted, "Annalise, now!"
Three things happened very quickly.
The first was Juliet driving her elbow into Josh's gut. He stumbled back, caught off balance. Even a bound werewolf was a stronger than a human and Josh hadn't anticipated the force. Juliet threw her hands above her head, the chains of her cuffs rattling.
The second thing was Annalise spinning around on her knees, thrusting up with her tiny fists to connect with Malachi's groin. He doubled over and she used the opportunity to smash her hands into his nose, spewing blood. The child rolled out of the way, far from Malachi's reach, and was back on her feet in half-a-second. Just like Blake had taught her.
The third thing was Blake raising her gun and pulling the trigger. A bullet sped through the air to pierce the chain connecting Juliet's wrists. Then the werewolf was sprinting for woods, chasing after the child who had begun to run away, heading for the forest on the other side of the lake, at the sound of that gunshot.
Blake could do nothing for Phillip or Chandra. Didn't have the time to get them free. Especially not as Malachi raised his head, face dripping blood, and snarled, "What have you done? You traitorous bitch."
His eyes were wide, stunned, as if he had never thought that this was a possibility. Around them, the hunters had quieted. The celebratory atmosphere dissipated entirely as they realized that the gunshot had not resulted in death but rather the escape of two werewolves.
But still, no one moved.
Blake raised her chin. "Traitorous bitch, maybe. At least I'm not a coward who was willing to kill a child for a crime she's never committed."
Malachi glanced towards the nearby wilderness where Juliet and Annalise had disappeared. With Juliet still bound with that silver collar and the broken cuffs around her wrist, they'd be unable to move quickly until they removed the silver. For now, Blake could only hope that they managed to put significant distance between themselves and the hunters.
"After the kid and the bitch," Malachi ordered. His voice was as dark and murderous.
There was a brief hesitation and then Ida and Richard were tearing off into the woods after Annalise and Juliet. A few other hunters joined them but none approached where Blake and Malachi stood and stared at each other.
Josh was standing where Juliet had shoved him away. His eyes were wide as he looked at Blake as if she were a stranger.
"I should never have sent you in there," Malachi hissed once the hunters had disappeared into the woods. He reached for a blade that had been sheathed at his thigh and a collective sound of surprise echoed behind them. "You act strong but you're weak-minded. You don't see the big picture. That monster might be a child but it won't always be one. I'm saving us decades of work, not to mention saving thousands of lives, by exterminating them before they grow their claws."
"And what about your claws, Malachi?" Blake asked. She holstered the gun but kept the blade. "Who has to protect others from you?"
Malachi said nothing. "I protect –"
"Who? Who do you protect, Malachi? Other than yourself. Who were you protecting on the night that you killed Caden?"
The assembled crowd of hunters went still and silent but it was shock and anger that darted across Malachi's face. Out the corner of her eye, Blake saw Josh stiffen and whip his head towards Malachi.
"I assure you, Blake," Malachi started. "I don't—"
"I saw his body. He was ripped to shreds but the wounds didn't come from a werewolf's claws." Blake held up her left arm and pulled down the sleeve. Jagged red scars left from Victor's claws and teeth greeted her. "You forget that I know the kind of mark those claws leave better than anyone else here. Caden's wounds were smooth and clean. They came from a blade. In fact, they came from the kukri that you're holding in your hand right now."
Malachi sneered at her but Blake heard the murmurings of their gathered brethren. Blake knew that she was treading on thin ice. She could see the fury in Malachi's face. He was going to kill her and kill her soon before she could ruin the perfect façade he'd crafted these decades.
"The one thing I haven't figured out is why you killed him. Was it just to get to me? To send a message about what would happen if I didn't follow through with the hunt? Caden was a good kid and he worshipped the ground you walked on. So tell us, Malachi, why did you do it?"
"I loved Caden," Malachi said, finding his voice at last. "I would never hurt him."
The words sounded false to her ears. She wondered if the others could hear it. "Let's cut through the bullshit. No lies."
"I've never lied to you, Blake." He looked out at the others, still watching with their silent judgement. None of them were quite ready to intervene yet though Hix and Mick and a handful of others were watching her steadily. Waiting to see what else Blake had to say about their fearless leader.
Blake had plenty to say. "For twelve years you told me that the werewolf that killed my parents escaped. That was a lie. I remember now what you did that night, Malachi. You shot him right through his goddamned head."
"No," Josh whispered looking anxiously between his sister and their leader. "No, that's not true."
Malachi ignored him completely. "Blake—"
"You lied to me about that," she said. "Told Josh and I time and time again that you were getting close, that you had contacts who were narrowing down where that werewolf was. The only reason I went back into Sanguis Ridge was because you told me I'd finally get my chance to kill the wolf. Well, he wasn't there, Malachi. I checked. I had a fucking warlock comb through my damn brain just to learn that you'd made that kill already."
Malachi's fingers tightened on the hilt of his blade, a blank look settling onto his face. As if he'd been mentally preparing for this moment for years. "Do you remember the first thing you said to me when I met you in the hospital?"
"I don't see what that has to do with anything."
"You asked me if I'd killed the beast and I realized that you didn't remember what had happened. Not fully anyway. Before I could answer you said that if I hadn't, you wanted to do it. You wanted to kill all of them. Every monster that had ever lived."
Blake vaguely remembered it. Being hopped up on pain meds in a hospital bed, swearing to end the lives of all monsters that threatened human life. She'd been a kid, though. Eleven years old. They'd been the words of someone who was in pain and grieving.
"I'd been hunting for a long time before that, Blake," Malachi continued. "Sat in plenty of hospitals waiting to see if the victims of the monsters I hunted would pull through. Most just seemed relieved that they were alive. Not you. You woke up with a fire. It's rare for people to enter our line of work. We're underappreciated, we don't get paid, we die young...But you told me that you wanted to kill them yourself. I knew I couldn't give you the monster that killed your parents but I could train you so that what happened to you wouldn't happen to others."
"I deserved to know, Malachi. You've been holding this over me for more than a decade. Who else here have you lied to? Who else thinks they'll get to finish a hunt that you've stolen from them?"
The murmurings of the crowd grew louder but Blake only saw her brother who didn't seem to know what to do. Josh's mouth was slightly open, gaping, as he looked from his sister to the man that had taken them in.
Malachi didn't appear to care about Blake's fury. "The potential you had was too great. I knew you'd be an amazing hunter, Blake. Even as a child, your instincts were strong. You've saved hundreds of lives as a hunter. I lied but I did it because I knew that the benefits outweighed the cost."
She shook her head in disgust. "The only reason I wanted to be a hunter was to avenge my parents because I needed them to have that closure before I got on with the rest of my life. Josh and I could have had normal lives. You took our lives from us for your own personal vendetta against the Shadow World."
Malachi slowly took a step forward and his jaw and mouth tightened. "You haven't cared about the lives you took that didn't align with your vendetta, Blake. I'm trying to rid the world of evil and darkness. I thought you were too."
"Not every supernatural being is evil or dark, Malachi!" Blake flung back, the words as sharp as the knife in her hand. "Some of them are good."
"Like the wolf that fucked you?" He let out a low, dark laugh. "Don't think I didn't notice, Blake, when your updates got shorter and less informative. You went days where your check-ins were just that. When you had no information to tell us. So tell me – how many days went by before you took that werewolf to your bed? Tell me, did he howl at the moon when he came?"
"You're a bastard."
"That wasn't a denial."
"I wouldn't still be alive if they were all monsters," Blake said – not to Malachi but to the other hunters. To her brother. Some of them were looking at her like they agreed but many, like Josh, just looked confused. Blake tried to convince them. "Maybe we're the monsters. For not giving them a chance. For always assuming the worst."
"You've assumed the worst of them for over a decade, Blake. You're one of the best hunters I've ever trained. Hell, one of the best I've ever seen. Don't you dare look at me like this is all my fault. There's plenty of red in your ledger that you put there without my help," Malachi refuted.
"Maybe. But at least I'm trying to do the right thing now."
Blake noted Malachi's feet, the way he kept inching forward. The way he tried to pretend that he wasn't. No one else dared to intercept – as if they were still too confused to fully understand how close this was to becoming a full-out brawl.
Or perhaps they understood that it would have always come to this. Blake versus Malachi. Malachi versus Blake.
"What do you think is the right thing here, Blake? Killing me? Won't change a damned thing and you know it. They're going to find that kid that you sent into the woods and chop it up like it deserves. Same thing for that other wolf too. You just betrayed all of us – me, your brother – for nothing."
Blake gripped her blade tighter and knew that Malachi was about to strike. She could see it in the way his face went blank with barely concealed rage, how he angled his body with that knife ready.
Still, she took the time to say, "It's not for nothing if I take you with me."
Without a further delay, Malachi swiped at her. Blake jumped back, arching away from the blow, and then using the momentum to hit back. She went low, aiming for his leg but he'd anticipated that and went for her head. The kukri he held raked across her face but the blow was less lethal than he'd intended it to be as she'd ducked out of the way. She hardly felt the sting. It was the blood spilling into her eye that was the major inconvenience.
She rolled away and came up swinging. He aimed a punch for her stomach but missed and she reached for his wrist, grabbing and twisting to disarm him in one smooth motion. As his blade was knocked away, she aimed her own for the neck he'd left wide open.
Malachi's death sang in her blood as that blade arched downward but then someone shouted her name in warning and hard force collided with the back of her head. Blake fell to the ground, vision going dim. Black spots danced across her eyes as she met Malachi's widened, hate-filled gaze.
And then it all went dark.