Tears streamed from Bianca’s eyes, and she hated the fact that she’d caused that.
Guy rushed toward them, grabbing his woman. “I’ll take her.”
“Keep her safe.”
Bianca was forced away from her, and Lucy closed her eyes, pushing her energy into the shield for as long as we can.
“Matthew, how long do you need?” She sent the message to the Alpha.
“Five more minutes, and then we’ll be ready.”
“I’ll be ready to attack.”
“Lucy, you’re weak. Don’t do anything stupid.”
“I won’t.”
She opened her eyes, seeing everything through darkness.
“Lucy, honey, be careful,” Clarissa said.
“I can’t let them hurt my mate.”
“You’re strong, darling,” Andrew said.
“I thought you couldn’t come back to warn me,” Lucy said.
“We don’t listen to rules.” Both Clarissa and Andrew said that.
“I’m not strong enough.”
“No one would be strong enough against thirty witches and warlocks. You’ve done better than I could have imagined. You’re strong.” Andrew said. “It’s time to let go.”
Closing her eyes, she sent out the last barrier toward the force-field, and let her hands down. She opened her eyes and stood.
“Baby, we’ve got to go,” Caleb said, wrapping his arms around her waist.
“I’m not going to go. I’m going to stand and fight.”
“The pack is going behind them to attack. We’ve not got a chance if we’re in front of them.” Caleb wrapped his arms around her.
“They’re going to die if I’m not there.”
“No. This is what my father wants me to do. We’re going to follow his rules, and I’m not going to hear you fight me.” Caleb carried her toward the clock tower. “We have to go and watch.”
Lucy stopped fighting and followed him up to the clock tower. “Where’s Guy?”
“He’s joined the attack. Don’t worry, he locked Bianca where you told him to.”
Looking through the telescope, she watched the witches and warlocks attacking the shield. In the distance, she saw the wolves, in their animal forms, slowly making their way toward the witches.
Lucy screamed as they penetrated her shield. Collapsing to her knees, she grabbed her head, unable to stop the pain.
“Shut it off, Lucy. Every witch is connected to her magic. You’ve just got to learn to switch it off. Turn it off. They’re inside, and you don’t need to think about it.”
They had torn a hole in her shield, and they were working their way through each of the barriers she’d placed.
“I can’t stop it.”
“Close it off.”
She took deep breaths, and thought about the love she had for Caleb, how it felt being in his arms. The pain lessened as she thought of other things that made her happy. Getting to her feet, she looked through the telescope, and saw the pack advancing toward the witches and warlocks.
“They’re not going to win.”
“We’re going to fight. The witches and warlocks that are here, they’re the ones that want your magic. My father reached out. These only work with dark magic, not pure and good.” Caleb rubbed her waist, and she moved away so that he could look.
She pressed a hand to her stomach and tried to settle her nerves, but nothing was happening.
“Here, you’re not going to relax until you can watch.” Caleb handed her a pair of binoculars.
Lucy took them, pointing them at where the witches and warlocks were advancing. They had gotten through her first two barriers, and now they were coming for her. She saw Matthew at the head of the pack with Emma, Guy, and her parents behind them.
They were all risking their lives for her, and she couldn’t handle it.
Rubbing at her chest, she gasped as Matthew pounced, and the attack started.
She felt Caleb’s wolf tense up, wanting to be out there.
Lucy couldn’t do it. She couldn’t sit here watching as the pack that was her family, regardless of how they had treated her, fought. She cared about them.
Dropping the binoculars, she rushed down the steps of the clock tower.
“Lucy!”
“I’m not going to put them at risk, and not be with them, Caleb. You would never forgive me.” She ran out of the tower and closed her eyes, transporting herself in front of Matthew and the pack, between the witches. “You wanted a witch. I’m right here.”
She shot them with magic, sending them rushing away.
Lucy watched in horror as Caleb came charging at the other end.
Closing her eyes, she quickly arrived at Caleb’s side. He was shaking a warlock in his jaw, and the pack was back to fighting.
“Lucy, get Caleb out,” Matthew said. “Please, save him.”
She sent fireballs at warlocks and witches, fighting them as her pack fought them.
Witches and warlocks were stronger than the wolves, and it wasn’t long before she saw a fireball shot at Guy, and he went down.
“No!”
Lucy couldn’t handle it. She couldn’t see the pack die because of her.
Staring around the pack, she saw them all falling. She wasn’t going to let the only family she had ever known to die.
At her feet, a fallen warlock and witch lay dead. Their dark souls were evident in their veins and their eyes. Reaching out, she grabbed the blade that she saw within their cloak, and slit both of her wrists. Opening up their wrists, too, she connected them all through blood, whispering the incantation that bound both covens. To rid herself of magic, she had to give the ultimate sacrifice through blood. It was dark magic, and why most witches and warlocks would never do the spell. She didn’t care about her magic, and it had never defined her as a person. Lucy had lived more of her life without magic than she had actually using it.
Getting to her feet, she held onto their hands, and watched as they all connected to each other in one unique cause, to kill her. This was what bound the warlocks and witches—they wanted to kill her, and their mission would help her to kill every single one of them.
She closed her eyes, opened them, and drew to the fore the magic that she’d been given. Lucy rushed it through the connection with the witches and the warlocks.
Their enemies stood in horror as they saw what she was doing. They were frozen, and Lucy wasn’t going to stop. She was going to make sure their kind of evil was sent straight to hell.
“Lucy, baby, stop.”
“They’re dark souls, Caleb. I love you, and I won’t let you kill yourself for me.” She whispered the words that made him stay in the same spot.
“Lucy, no!”
“I’m sorry.”
She forced her magic, letting it take over. Even as it started to burn her, she kept on doing it. The magic was too much, and she’d never asked for it. She’d only ever wanted to be part of the pack, never be this magical witch whom people wanted to kill. By the end of this day, she would be human. She hoped her parents were right, and she’d still be breathing at the end of it all.
****
Caleb screamed her name even as the power had him covering his face. He struggled to watch as her wrists bled. The life of his mate drained from her, the magic being forced into her fellow witches and warlocks, consuming them by their evil.
“I love you, Caleb.”
A large explosion broke the spell that had him frozen and threw him across the ground, and he crashed into a house, gasping.
It was the house that Lucy had lived in with Adele and Kyle.
He heard Bianca screaming, and then she was in the room.
“Caleb?”
Getting to his feet, he gasped out as some wood had splintered and entered his body. “Ow.”
Getting to his feet, he made his way outside with Bianca close behind him. The houses were a mess. Windows were smashed, and roofs caved in. The devastation would take them time to repair. He rushed toward the town square where Lucy had been.
Grief tore him apart as he saw his father, holding her body.
Rushing to him, he grabbed a lifeless Lucy in his arms, and sat on the ground, holding her. “Baby, what did you do? No, no, no, no, no, no, no! This wasn’t supposed to happen. You’re supposed to be alive.”
“The witches and warlocks, they’re all gone, Caleb.”
“Gone?”
“No bodies. They disappeared into ash, and Lucy smiled and crashed to the ground.”
He pressed his fingers against her pulse, and felt nothing. “She’s supposed to come back to me.”
“I guess it’s not true, son. I wish it was. I believed she’d come back to us.”
“No. I’m not going to accept that. She’s my mate. She’s my life. Her parents wouldn’t have told her that to just die! She’s not dead.” He placed her on the floor, and started to compress her chest, and breathe into her mouth.
“Caleb, man,” Guy said, coughing.
He looked up to see his friend was holding his arm against his side. Guy looked like shit. Bianca wrapped her arms around him, and the wolf inside Caleb howled at the unfairness of it.
Breathing into Lucy’s mouth, he pressed her chest. “I’m not going to stop. She didn’t ask for this. She was only trying to save us. She gave up her magic for the pack, and I’m not just going to let her die.”
“She is dead,” Matthew said.