Ecstasy Untamed (Feral Warriors #6)(50)

"How do you unmark a Feral Warrior?"

He glanced at her, frowning. "You don't."

Her face went cold. "But, what if you hadn't brought them into their animal, yet?"

"It doesn't matter. Once we're marked, we're marked. If we aren't brought into our animals in a couple of years, we die."

Oh.

Hawke squeezed her hand, misunderstanding her dismay. "We'll catch them, Smiley. We'll get to the bottom of this. I feel certain the Mage are involved. They're always involved when things go wrong these days."

And things couldn't have gone much more wrong than the Ferals turning against their own. Except she hadn't turned against them. Why? Maybe she wasn't really marked. Maybe she'd just contracted some kind of strange disease. Right. What were the chances?

Minutes later, Hawke pulled the vehicle to a stop on a narrow residential road between a pair of large homes nestled among the trees, parking behind a Porsche.

"Isn't that the one Kara, Olivia, and Delaney took?"

"Yes, it's ours. If we've got badly injured Ferals, they're going to need Kara's radiance. Lyon would have called for her the moment the coast was clear. Wait here." He reached for the door handle.

"You might need me."

He gripped her hand, pinning her with his fierce gaze. "The battle's over, but the draden will still be swarming. I mean it, Faith. I'm just going to help get the injured into the car. Stay here. Promise me."

"Okay. I promise."

His fierceness dissolved, and he kissed her, a quick, tender brush of lips. Then he slipped outside, closing the door behind him. In moments, the shadows swallowed him as he ran into the woods.

Faith pressed her palm to her forehead. Part of her wanted to run after him anyway. Even without a battle to fight, he could lose control and shift. But another part of her never wanted to go outside after dark again. Especially not here, where the draden numbered in the thousands. The tens of thousands.

Lights appeared behind her, visible in the outside rearview mirror. As she watched, a vehicle pulled up directly behind Hawke's. Then another behind it. Humans? Her pulse began to race. Or Maxim and the other new Ferals?

The lights went off. She waited, tense and worried, watching out her mirror. But nothing happened. No one opened the car doors in her line of vision. She turned in her seat, looking back. The car behind her appeared empty. How . . . ? But then she remembered Melisande. Ilinas wouldn't have to open the doors and run into the woods, would they. They'd simply appear there.

As the minutes ticked by, she became more and more restless, more agitated. What if Hawke was struggling not to shift? What if he needed her help, and she was too far away?

Finally, she saw him leave the woods, helping Lyon carry some kind of animal. More than a dozen men and women ran for the cars as the draden swarmed, most carrying injured animals of one kind or another. Several climbed into the two cars behind.

Fox opened the back hatch of Hawke's vehicle while Hawke and Lyon laid what appeared to be a legless brown bear into the back. Grizz? They slammed the hatch closed, then ran to the driver's side, where Fox and Lyon attacked the draden covering Hawke. Hawke opened the door and slid inside, slamming the door closed behind him. Two draden flew at Faith and she lifted her arms to ward them off, but Hawke was quicker, stabbing the beasts before they reached her, then turning to kill those still attached to him. As he plucked them off himself, a shimmer of lights on either side of the car had her whirling in time to see Fox shift from an unnaturally huge fox back into a man. He and Lyon dove in opposite doors at the same time, and she realized they must have shifted to release the draden, then shifted back to get in the car.

As Hawke started the ignition and took off, they killed the last of the draden who'd flown in with them.

She looked at Hawke in question. "How bad?"

"Bad, but the only one who's died so far is Eigle."

So far. Eigle was one of the new Ferals though she couldn't place him.

Fox made a sound in his throat like a low growl. "Croc bit Jag through the middle. Tore him in half."

Her jaw dropped as she turned to meet the gaze of the new fox shifter. "But he's still alive?"

"Barely. The blood loss and the organ damage are . . ." His bit off as if unable to find a word that described it. "If he lives, he'll have to regenerate from the waist down."

"Kara's giving him radiance in the car," Lyon added. "She's trying to keep him alive while they race him to the best healer in the area."

Faith felt ill. Poor Olivia. It was so clear she and Jag adored one another. "The others?"

"No one else is in danger except Paenther." Lyon's jaw turned to rock. "His skull was crushed. Several of the others are missing arms or legs, but they'll grow new ones."

Hawke squeezed her hand. "Everyone's meeting at the Georgetown Therian enclave. Their healer, Esmeria, is the finest there is. We'll join them there once we drop Grizz in the prison."

Faith turned toward the front, shaken that the new Ferals had caused so much damage yet infinitely relieved that they'd failed in their quest to actually kill any of the true Ferals. So far. The group remained silent the rest of the short drive back to Feral House, but as they drove into the long circular drive, Lyon spoke.