What the fuck did that mean? Peter wasn’t sure he cared. Not when his mate was up there, along with Cade, Mara, Eli, Regulus, and Livie. Bounding up the steps four at a time, he found all of them together on a landing, with no door to be seen. Eli pressed his hands to the stone.
“They’re behind this wall. But it’s spelled like nothing I’ve ever felt before.” Staring back at Regulus, he arched his brows. “Well, mate? Want to go at this together?”
“I want nothing of the sort. But we have no choice.”
Eli pulled off his shirt and stared down at the markings across his chest. Several of the symbols started to move and twist, and he called on two of his elements.
Earth and Air.
“Earth and air must once more pair.”
Fuck. Peter hoped this was what Paddy had been talking about. Regulus drove his shoulder into the stone again and again, shaking the wall with each impact, and together, the two started to chip away at the last barrier between them and their destiny.
* * *
Mara
Screaming. She was screaming. Her arms ached, and when she tried to rub her eyes, she realized why. She wasn’t in the cell anymore.
The ritual space was illuminated with hundreds of candles, and Mara lay on the altar, her arms chained over her head. In the middle of another contraction.
Her cries echoed off the walls, and as she writhed, desperate for a break from the pain, horror washed over her. She was naked, her ankles bound in such a way that her knees were bent and a thick, woven cloth covered her belly and draped over her thighs.
This was all wrong. She should have been with her mate. Her family. Warm and protected and safe. Not lying on hard stone, about to be slain so the Thirteen could use her child in some demented ritual.
“Drink,” Celia said, appearing close to her head with a bottle of the green liquid.
Even though she knew she shouldn’t, that they were drugging her and the baby, the control they had over her was too strong, and Mara choked down half of it before the practitioner pulled the concoction away and rejoined the semi-circle of witches behind her.
The room shimmered, but the pain started to fade, though whether from the end of the contraction or the drugs, Mara had no idea.
“We call upon earth, air, fire, and water,”the practitioners chanted in unison. “Find your home within this child, and let the power of the spirit consume you.”
Consume? Consume what? Me? The baby?
Mara tried to pull at the chains, but her body wouldn’t listen to her, and another contraction drew a scream from her raw throat.
The entire structure started to shake, like an earthquake deep underground, and across from the practitioners, the stone wall started to crumble.
Was she dreaming? The witches didn’t seem to notice. Or care. But then a low, feral growl—followed by another and another—drowned out the chanting, and Mara blinked hard.
Cade. Livie. Peter. They were here. They’d come.
Magic flared, so bright it hurt her eyes, and the urge to push was almost overwhelming. Livie’s wolf let out a yelp, and Peter, only a dark streak as he raced across the room, took down one of the men in black and ripped at his throat, only pulling away when his muzzle was dripping with blood.
A ball of yellow light hurtled over Mara’s head, hitting Livie, and she collapsed, starting to shift back into human form as Eli burst into the room.
Fire shot from his hand, turning one of the robed men to ash before her eyes.
Do something!
Mara fought against the Thirteen’s control, the drugs they’d given her, the total and complete exhaustion of a labor that she could hardly remember, but knew had been going on for hours.
Cade’s wolf landed next to her, canines bared.
“Run,” she managed. “Trap...”
Her mate snarled, his steely gaze locking with hers. The pure love and devotion in his eyes pulled a sob from her throat. There was no way he’d leave her, and as much as she wanted to escape, to spend the rest of her life with him—and their baby—her hope was fading by the second.
