Wild and Free (The Three #3)(135)
Yuri took hold of Aurora’s elbow and trailed up the rear.
After some trudging, the witches stopped at a bank of trees and looked back at them, which was when Yuri knew that was where he and Aurora were to stop. He tugged gently at Aurora’s arm and she came to a halt beside him.
“Careful, Mom,” she called.
“Always, sweetheart,” Barb called back.
“Love you,” Aurora went on.
“Same,” Barb finished.
The witches moved into the shadows.
Yuri looked through those shadows and saw the house. Not a hovel, not a mansion. It was nondescript, old, established, comfortable looking, alone in the middle of nowhere, and not something that would catch attention.
Not that it would, having a lane off a narrow rural road that meandered half a mile to the house.
It was several minutes after the witches disappeared when Aurora whispered, “Okay, I’m a little freaked.”
He’d known this since she’d visited his suite, but he was pleased she had the courage to admit it.
He slid his hand down her forearm to catch hers and murmured soothingly, “Calm, button.”
Her hand spasmed in his, and still whispering, she asked, “Button?”
He looked to her. “You. As cute as.”
There was no spasm of the hand at that. Her fingers simply tightened their grip and didn’t let go.
Yuri returned the gesture even as he returned his attention to the shadows, listening, feeling.
“Anything?” Aurora asked after more minutes passed.
“No.” He squeezed her hand.
More minutes passed.
“Anything?” she repeated.
“No, my sweet,” he murmured.
More minutes passed.
“Any—” Aurora began just as a shaft of violet light shot from a window of the house and pierced the dark sky, straight to the heavens.
And that was when it hit him in a wave so violent, it knocked him back on a foot.
Fear.
And agony.
“No no no no no,” Aurora chanted, and he knew it was strong enough, she’d felt it too. Then came a terrified, tormented, “Mom.”
“Fuck,” Yuri bit out, took the van key from his pocket and turned to her. “Back to the van. Get in, start it. You get a bad feeling, go.”
“Yur—”
He caught her at the back of the neck with his vampire speed, bending and yanking her to within an inch of his face.
“Go,” he growled.
He let her loose, and maddeningly, as she was wont to be, she didn’t run as he instructed, and this time, he didn’t find it charming.
Her voice dripping with fear, the rest of her reeking of it, she asked, “What if they haven’t gotten the protections down?”
“There’s little time, Aurora,” he warned.
She latched onto his arm. “What if they haven’t gotten the protections down? You’ll burn, Yuri.”
“Then be prepared to stop me from doing that if I make it to the van and I’m on fire,” he replied. “Now, go.”
“But—”
“Go!” he thundered.
She wasted a precious second, then turned and ran.
Yuri ran the other way.
Toward the clashing covens.
He was far faster.
Within an instant, he was at the door, and without hesitation, he burst through.
What he didn’t do was burst into a ball of flame.
What he did do was take in the state of play which, unfortunately, was grimmer than he’d suspected.
The coven that guarded the implements was not formidable.
It appeared they were invincible.
He dashed over Jane’s dead body, sensing and speeding toward Barb, who was hanging upside down at the top of the stairs, her frame contorted in unnatural ways, her face twisted in agony, her mouth opened in a silent scream.
He located the witch spelling her, made it to her in a millisecond, snapped her neck in less time than that, and Barb was falling.
Before she hit the stairs and broke her neck, Yuri caught her, raced out of the house, and dropped her to the grass by the side of the van.
“Mom!” he heard Aurora shout from inside the van.
He also heard her moving.
And last, he heard Barb beg, “Help them.”
Yuri caught her anguished eyes, jerked up his chin, and sprinted back.
When he arrived, in short order he found Jane was lost. Jordana was as well. Ruby was still fighting, and apparently losing, until Yuri dispatched the witch she was battling, then grabbed hold of her and deposited her back at the van before he went back to the house.
He then dispatched six of the opposing coven, and while doing it, saw that eight of Barb’s coven were gone.
He vaguely felt the blast of a spell and knew he was under attack. He slayed the witch who’d spelled him only to feel the blast of another spell. He dealt with her too before he heard something that made his blood turn to ice.
“Yuri, watch out!”
He was hit with another spell that deflected as he turned to see a witch with her hand up, a ball of red and blue fire floating in her palm, her aim: Aurora.
In a flash, the warm gush of blood spraying his torso, the witch’s body was at his feet, but her head was in his hands.
Then Aurora screamed and shoved both hands forward. A shimmering wall of undulating white and glittering vermillion and silver burst forth, moving through him, and Yuri looked over his shoulder to see a ball of deep blue slam against it and ricochet back, hitting the witch who threw it, making her immediately burst into flame.