The ringing was back in my ears as I staggered across the ground, my legs giving out when I reached the doorway of my bedroom. I collapsed on the ground, my vision blurring more.
My body felt like a boulder had been dropped on top of me, it was so difficult to move.
I’ll rest here. For a second. Two seconds.
I briefly shut my eyes, and before I could open them, I felt my consciousness slip through my fingers.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SIX
Considine
After several more gunshots, shouts, and muffled gurgles, nothing moved in the alleyway.
Hah. That means Jade and her team did it. The mercenaries would be howling if they’d won. Stupid mutts can’t keep a secret to save their lives.
“Sounds like your team just underwent a very decisive loss,” I said.
“I already told you, Elder Maledictus, these werewolves aren’t mine.” Lady Gisila managed to keep her tone light, even though her facial muscles were convulsively tightening in the silence that had enveloped the alleyway.
She stepped off the curb and started across the street. “But, perhaps, I ought to see if anyone needs help.”
“Oh yes, I’m sure you’re justfullofhelp.” I lazily followed around behind her, crossing the street at a much slower pace to help secure the ‘uncaring’ front that I was presenting to the dragon shifter.
I turned around to look back over my shoulder at the industrial buildings behind us. Cloister backup had undoubtedly made it to the industrial part of Magiford. The sound of car engines was impossible to miss, and I was fairly certain it wasn’t more mercenaries as I could—at the very edge of my hearing range—hear the familiar crackle of the radios Jade’s team used.
“Hmm. Company,” I said, contemplatively. “Better act quickly or you’re going to get caught.”
That’s my signal to move along. It’s one thing to tease Jade’s little team, it’s another to prance around in front of so many Cloister employees. That would be foolishness—
Gisila paused in front of me. Instinctively, I twisted back around to see what had stopped her.
Jade stood at the back of the alleyway, her mask off and her hood down. She was bleeding from a wound on her shoulder—was that one of the shots I’d heard?
Her face was dangerously white, her mesmerizing green eyes wide with panic as her gaze flickered from me to Gisila. She backed into the shadows, blending in, and disappeared from the alleyway.
Does she know backup arrived?
“So that’s what she looks like,” Gisila muttered in a dark tone that immediately got my attention due to how much I instantly hated it.
The radio crackles were starting to get closer. I needed to leave but I wasn’t thrilled about the idea of leaving Gisila to poke around, especially as she entered the alleyway picking her way through it.
“What, did you think slayers weren’t human?” I asked as I reluctantly followed her.
“I’m well aware slayers are humans,” Gisila said. “It’s just so rare to see one’s face.”
“It’s a face,” I said. “Not anything special.”
“Perhaps.” Gisila wore a smile that I disliked even more than the dark tone she’d used earlier. “But having seen her face, it will certainly be easier to track her down again.”
Gisila placed her hand on the brick apartment building to steady herself as she stepped over one of the wounded werewolves, emerging from the alleyway just in time for us to catch sight of Jade’s red hair as she sprinted up a road heading north.
A car pulled up in the street behind us, and I recognized the silver haired naiad who emerged from inside the car as Jade’s boss.
“You stay here and keep chortling like a villain. I’m leaving before the Cloisters sweep this rathole,” I announced.
Gisila didn’t even turn around to acknowledge me. She instead picked up Jade’s slayer mask that the werewolf had tossed aside, then took a step towards the road Jade—wounded and bleeding—had disappeared down.
