Unhappily Ever After

Chapter 69 - Showdown

It wasn't easy to get down the stairs with my mother-in-law slung across my shoulders, but I could hardly leave her behind, could I? Her weight pressed down against my shoulder blades as I eased from step to step. I had to work twice as hard to get the air into my lungs, for some reason, and that only added to my exhaustion.

The blood dripping from my thigh left a twisting, splattered trail on the carpet. The whole leg was threatening to give way by the time I reached the bottom and eased Maggie into a sitting position against the wall. She would have to wait there. I'd need all my concentration to deal with the flockies outside.

Wiping my hands on my jeans, I padded down the hallway and stood in the doorway, looking out at the Silver Lake fighters. They were spread into a wide ring which doubtless stretched around the entire house by now. And standing directly opposite me was Vaughan, taller than his neighbours by half a head and smiling at me.

"I'm a fair man, Llewellyn. I'll give you one chance to come quietly," he told me, arms folded across his chest. When I just snorted, he spread his hands wide, gesturing at the circle. "Don't be stupid. You're injured, and you're surrounded."

"I am surrounded by men I want dead," I corrected quietly, "and you're about to give me an excuse to kill them."

Slowly, I stepped onto the driveway and put on my injured leg until I was standing square. It took half a thought to cast my mind around the circle, ripping through each of the fighters in turn, until I found memories of Llechi in one of the older men. Of children screaming and the taste of hot blood in a tunnel which stank of earth and mist.

I tore my way into his mind. It wasn't difficult, not even with several pints of my blood in the car footwell and soaking into the gravel beneath me. I found the part of his mind that kept his heart beating, the part that even he couldn't reach, and then I stamped out the little spark of life there.

He toppled over, his body limp and boneless, and he was dead before he hit the ground. The closest men scrambled to crouch over him, to check his pulse and to panic. I flicked my eyes back towards the Alpha and let a ghost of a smile cross my lips. His fighters were muttering amongst themselves. Only a few of them could shield their minds, and none of them wanted to be next. It wasn't a death you could see coming. It wasn't something you could fight.

"You should send them away, Vaughan," I said. My voice came out a little breathless because the mind games and the blood loss were taking their toll. "This is between you and me."

"You must think I'm really stupid," he laughed. "And while we're on the subject of stupid, what are you doing here?"

He didn't ask it like he wanted to know the answer. He asked it like he knew the answer already and was hoping to catch me in a lie. So I just stood there, staring at him with my head tipped slightly to one side and my eyes icy cold.

"I just can't think, you see. What on earth could have possessed you to walk onto my territory alone and unarmed?" An awful little smirk crept across his lips. "Are you ... perhaps ... missing something?"

Screw it. I didn't have time for this horseshit. He clearly wanted me to play along, so I'd have to try that instead. I cast one more wary look around me before taking a step closer to him. "Where are they?"

"Where are who?" Vaughan asked, his smirk only growing.

"I think you know."

"Come on, now. I want to hear you say it," he said softly. "Who was in the house, Llewellyn?"

The game was clearly up, so I didn't know I was still clinging to the deception. Perhaps it was part of some futile hope that everything could still go back to the way it had been, that the consequences of this afternoon wouldn't be permanent. Of course they would be permanent. Lee and Eira were already dead, and Alex wouldn't be far behind them if he didn't get medical attention soon.