“How long are we staying here?” she asks when she reaches us.
“As long as we need to. We have to figure out how they were doing this to the shifters. The enhancement. If we don’t take it apart down to the studs, somebody else will pick it up where the Covenant left it.”
“It will not happen again.”
I look at her. She is gazing at the woman on the cot.
“Lillian?”
“I went down to the lower holding cells with Reese a few minutes ago,” she says. “We found the hybrids.”
Sienna’s hand tightens on mine.
“How many?” Darius asks.
“Fifty bodies.” Lillian’s voice does not waver. “All drained. My missing friend, Lissa, was the third one we pulled out.”
Violet makes a small sound. “Oh, Mom…”
Her mother holds up her hand, her voice rough. “Don’t. I’ll be fine.” She looks at the witch again. “The way she dropped them, I think she had every one of those enhanced shifters tied to her. All of them. One witch, holding the working that kept their bodies stitched together. The healing. The strength. Those wounds closing under the dark sheen. It was her magic running through every one of them, every minute of every day, for years.”
“That isn’t possible,” Darius says carefully. “No witch can hold that many threads at once.”
“She didn’t. Not on her own.” Lillian’s mouth tightens. “They were feeding her from the hybrids in those cells. Untapped wells of magic in bodies that had never learned to use it. They hooked her into them like pipes into a reservoir, and she pulled the magic through and into the shifters. The hybrids died slowly. She lived only because they kept replacing them.”
The tent spins around me, and my voice does not sound like my own. “For how long?”
“At least a decade. Probably longer.”
“Goddess.” Sienna’s voice is low, her forehead finding my shoulder.
“It explains the disappearances,” Lillian goes on. “It explains why every dead body we have found is so aged. As the magic is sucked dry, the hybrids’ youth vanishes.”
“And…Violet?” Darius says slowly.
Lillian’s eyes meet his. “That’s why they wanted her. A bonded hybrid is not merely a well; she is an infinite source. The bond with her mate keeps refilling her faster than they can drain her. They could have run a hundred enhanced shifters through my daughter without killing her.”
Violet has gone very pale against Darius’s side. “They would not have killed me.”
“No,” Lillian confirms quietly. “They would have kept you. For the rest of your life.”
Nobody speaks.
The witch on the cot draws in a long, uneven breath. Sienna’s head turns toward the sound, and her hand comes out of mine.
“Lucas.” She is bending over the cot.
I move closer.
The healer has come back to the witch’s side, his palms a warm gold over her ribs. His mouth is set in concentration. Along minute passes. The gold deepens, fades, deepens again. The witch’s breathing eases. Her eyelids twitch.
The healer sits back on his heels.
“Her tongue is mended, Alpha. Her legs, as well. Both of them, though the bones knitted around what was already crooked. She’ll walk, but she’ll favor the left side.” He wipes his hands on a cloth from his belt. “Be careful with her for the next few days. She has nothing left in reserve. Whatever she did when she dropped those shifters, she has paid for it twice over.”
“Understood.”
He gathers his satchel and leaves us.
