Moira sets the bowl on a table that's miraculously still upright and dips her fingers in the water. When she lifts them, salt crystals cling to her skin, glowing with soft white light. She places her hand over Eliza's wound, and the scent of ocean magic fills the room—ancient, powerful, and utterly unexpected.
The bleeding stops immediately. The torn flesh begins to knit, closing enough that infection and further damage are no longer concerns. Eliza gasps in surprise.
"You're a sea witch." Finn's voice carries wonder and respect. "A true one. I thought they were gone."
"Not gone." Moira's fingers continue to work, the salt-water leaving glowing trails across Eliza's skin. "Just hidden. Someone had to watch over this place. Keep the old ways alive. The MacRaes aren't the only ones with responsibilities to Stormhaven."
She finishes with Eliza's arm and turns to survey the room. The civilians are still conscious, still staring at us with wide eyesthat have seen far more than they should. Old Tom's mouth hangs open. Sarah Thompson has her phone out, though her hands shake.
"This is a problem," Jax says quietly. He's shifted back to human, standing guard over the subdued mercenaries. "They saw everything."
Moira moves to the bar, tossing clothing to us all and retrieves something from beneath it—a large glass jar filled with water and what looks like ordinary sea salt. But the moment she opens it, power rolls through the room like fog off the ocean, thick and disorienting.
"Sleep," she says, her voice layered with ancient magic. "Dream of a gas leak, of confusion, of fear but no understanding. When you wake, you'll remember danger but not its source. You'll remember being saved but not by what."
The salt-magic spreads through the inn like smoke, touching each civilian in turn. Their eyes glaze. One by one, they slump into unconsciousness.
"They'll wake in a few hours," Moira says, corking the jar. "Confused, shaken, but with their memories softened to impressions rather than facts. It won't hold up under interrogation, but it will keep the immediate questions manageable."
"How long have you been able to do this?" I ask.
"Ten years. Since I inherited the inn and the sea witch gift that came with it." She meets my eyes without flinching. "Your father knew. Asked me to keep watch. Too many secrets pass through here."
I want to be angry that she kept this from me, from the pack. But looking at the sleeping civilians, at the tactical gear and silver bullets that speak of supernatural knowledge and cartel funding, all I feel is relief.
"Thank you."
"Don't thank me yet." Moira's expression is grim. "That magic comes from my sea witch bloodline. It's finite. I've used a month's worth of power today. I won't be able to do this again for a while."
"What about them?" Rafe nods toward the surviving mercenaries.
I walk over to the leader—the one who grabbed Eliza, whose throat I tore out. He's dead, his eyes staring at nothing. No mercy there, and I feel none. The others are alive, and they've seen everything.
I crouch beside the nearest one, letting him see my eyes shift to gold, letting him smell death on my hands. "Who sent you?"
"Santos." The word comes out choked, terrified. "Carlos Santos."
"How did he find us?"
"The summoner. He sold you out. Sold information to Santos about the Isle of Skara, about the shifters here, about you." The mercenary swallows hard. "Santos has the intel. He knows what you are. He knows where you live."
Ice runs down my spine. Fear for everyone on this island. For the humans who live here unknowing. For my pack. For Eliza.
"How many more are coming?"
"I don't know. Santos has resources. Connections. He won't stop."
I stand, looking down at the three mercenaries. They're enhanced—I can smell it now, the chemical taint of drugs or magic that let them move faster, fight harder. But they came here to kill Eliza.
"Grayson, Kian, take them to the old lighthouse." The lighthouse is isolated, defensible, far enough from the village that no one will hear screams. "Find out everything they know. Then make sure they can never report back."
The mercenaries' eyes widen in terror, but I feel nothing. No mercy. No regret.
Grayson and Kian drag the prisoners out through the back. Rafe and Jax begin the cleanup—gathering weapons, moving bodies, erasing evidence. Finn works on the physical damage, using controlled bursts of dragon fire to make bullet holes look like damage from the gas explosion Moira's memory-magic will suggest.
I return to Eliza. She's sitting on a barstool, her face pale but composed, watching me with those brown-gold eyes that see everything.
"Really," she says. "The graze barely hurts."
