Born of Fire

Escape

He wheeled Charlotte into the living room and lifted her onto the large sofa. Sadie had cried herself to sleep in Rochelle’s arms and snored softly.

His daughter looked up at him with concern and weariness etched into her pretty face. He heard Brooke’s bug bouncing and grinding through the gravel on the long driveway.

He sat down near Charlotte’s feet and put a shaky hand on her ankle while he waited. She was staring blankly out the window; he could only imagine how she was feeling at the moment.

Brooke let herself in and to Darren’s relief he heard another set of footsteps. His Alpha led the witch into the living room and the large man bent to kiss the top of Sadie’s head before doing the same to Charlotte.

“Did you catch her? Is she coming back for us? What is she? What are you?” The weakened Charlotte tried to prop herself up, but grimaced and laid back down. He’d forgotten she had seen Ben change.

“I didn’t catch her, but she won’t try to bother you girls again. I’ll explain the rest later. In the mean time, I need you to let my friend Brooke here take a look at you.”

He motioned to the witch who had just finished rubbing her herbs onto Sadie’s forehead, ears, and eyes. She whispered a short enchantment and walked over to sit by the teenager.

“Hi, Charlotte, is it? I’m just going to rub some of my herbs on your head and eyelids. Don’t worry, I won’t get it in your eyes,” she assured the girl, who raised a shaky hand to cover her eyes. She regarded the strangely dressed woman suspiciously. “I made this myself, it’ll help you feel better. I promise it won’t hurt you.”

The girl hesitated for a moment then nodded at Ben’s reassuring smile. She folded her hands over her chest as the witch repeated her enchantment and Charlotte closed her eyes and relaxed into a deep sleep.

Darren wanted to hear what happened to that thing who killed his daughter, but he wanted to ask the witch something before she left.

“How are your healing abilities?”

The witch glanced at him and laid her hand on the girl’s forehead before turning to face him with a pitied expression.

“None at all, I’m afraid. My oldest son has a moderate Healing gift, but he’s been unable to use it at will. His enchantment abilities are shaky at best. Regardless, the Council forbids us from Healing humans unless it’s to protect our secrets. I don’t want to risk their wrath.” Charlotte was looking grey and dangerously pale in spite of her glares and temper. There was no denying why he was asking.

“I understand your wife lost her job recently and your house is close to being foreclosed on,” Ben pointed out to her.

“You’re saying you’ll help with that if my Brady manages to heal this girl’s cancer?” She looked hesitantly at the girl and took in a deep breath.

“I’m saying you won’t have to worry about finances for quite a while.”

“We can work under the guise of an alternative natural therapy. Do you think you can convince her parents to try it?”

“At this point her parents will try anything, her prognosis isn’t good,” he walked over and ran his fingers over her bald head, tears of grief shed from his eyes. Darren had never seen his Alpha so emotional. He hadn’t realized the extent of his feelings for the children.

“Tell me where to go and I’ll take them home. I will make sure their parents aren’t too worried,” Brooke assured them.

Darren stayed on the couch as Ben and Rochelle took the girls to the witch’s car. Now that he didn’t have the girls to worry about, his mind drifted back to his sorrow over Kenna.

The desire for that monster’s blood and death mixed with grief stirred the beast within. He spent so long suppressing the tempest and bought those years of peace with his submission. He wrangled the fury inside of him and tethered it with thoughts of revenge, lest the beast burst forth. He needed control if he wanted to take this thing down. While thoughts of tearing the thing to pieces taunted his mind, he feared it wouldn’t work. He wasn’t even entirely certain she could be killed.

“Daddy,” Rochelle whispered softly behind him. He could feel the thick cloud of worry and fear she carried with her as she threw herself into his arms.

He caught her and held tight as if the embrace alone would keep her safe.

“It’s okay to let yourself hurt, Dad,” she encouraged him. “I’m grown up now, you don’t have to hold it all in for me anymore.”

Her words tugged down the walls he erected to protect himself from the emotions he kept hidden and wept there with her in his arms.

Ben walked in briefly while they stood there crying together but left the room without saying anything. He looked ready to cry too. Most shapeshifters weren’t bothered by displays of emotion and handled pain easily. Wolves especially found pain purifying and tears cleansing. He wondered if Jacob and Khal would feel uncomfortable seeing a grown man cry, but he didn’t really care.

He pulled away and dried his face with the back of his hand and checked his hand belatedly for soot. He’d forgotten he had already washed his hands when he treated Charlotte.

“We need to do something about the witch,” Ben said when Darren and Rochelle walked into the kitchen. He was sitting at the table with Jacob and Khal and they looked ready to kill.

Both Jacob’s and the Alpha’s eyes were red, too.

“I still have the dagger.” Jacob pulled the ancient weapon out of a holster at his waist.

“How do we get close enough to use it?” Ben pulled out the seat next to him and motioned for them to take a seat.

“I want to be the one to kill her,” Darren said.

“All right,” Ben said sternly, “but Rochelle goes to the safe house with the rest of the pack.”

“Now wait just a minute,” she protested angrily. “That b***h killed my mother. I have just as much a right to go after her as any of you!”

“I’m not in the mood to be challenged, pup.” Her alpha glared at her, but she didn’t back down. Darren felt proud of her, but only a little worried. He knew Ben wouldn’t hurt her badly, but he didn’t want to risk her taking revenge on him either. Things had the potential to get carried away and he didn’t want the pack to get caught up if things went downhill.

“This isn’t about you, Benjamin, this is about my family. If you want to break me apart later, fine. I’m not leaving my dad.”

“What do you say, Darren?” Jacob asked.

“I want her safe, but she’s right. She has as much a reason to fight as we do. I just ask that she not hunt this thing alone.”

“ A lot of good that would do with the whole mind control crap,” she said. “I’ll humor you if it’ll help you feel better.”

“Khaled and I will take the first hunt. The rest of you get some sleep. You need time to grieve,” Ben ordered.

Darren reluctantly agreed, he knew his Alpha was right. Besides, maybe the rest would give one of them the time to plan.

Darren tossed and turned on the extravagant covers in Ben’s guest room. He wanted to sleep, mainly so he could avoid the ache that settled deep in his gut.

He thought about how quickly he became friends with Kenna and her easy-going nature. He thought about their plans to paint his miniatures together, go bowling, get comics, and a million other things they talked about over the last few days. He hadn’t known her long, but she had taken a place in his heart before they even knew she was his.

His, she most certainly was, though she had clung to that misplaced guilt. He didn’t know how he would have felt about her if he’d known about her before meeting her, and at this point it no longer mattered.

That evil b***h who birthed her and gave her to him and taken her from him, he wanted to make her pay. How do you kill an unkillable being? He wracked his brain to come up with a solution and it hit him. He thought of an apple tree half a day’s drive north and his heart began to beat rapidly. He knew how to kill the Phoenix.

Darren lay still as he listened to the Guard fall asleep in the next room. Rochelle tossed and turned fitfully on Ben’s bed. She was wide awake and her supernaturally sensitive ears would no doubt pick up any noise he made trying to sneak out.

He got out of bed and walked deliberately to the bathroom, careful to keep the sound of his footsteps even. He first turned the water on in the shower, then opened the window. Hopefully, she would assume he opened it for ventilation. He was still covered in soot and smelled of smoke, so it wouldn’t be terribly unbelievable that he would want a shower.

He paused at the windowsill and looked out into the starry moonlight night and thought back to the many times it was his daughter tried sneaking out of the house. It was ironic that now he was the one climbing out the window and the idea brought out a quiet chuckle.

He shook his head and sobered again as he peered into the shadows of the brush and trees surrounding the house. The witch was out there somewhere and he had no clue where.

He didn’t have that feeling of being watched, so he gathered his courage and heaved himself onto the window sill, leaned over and dropped gently onto the dirt below. Thankfully, he was on the ground floor, otherwise Ro might have heard.

He crept around the house to avoid the master bedroom window in case his daughter chose the wrong moment to look outside and made his way through the brush toward old Marie’s house.

His heart stopped in his throat and he had to reign in tears when he caught sight of the charred home. He crouched behind some thorny mesquite trees and watched the area for movement or signs of life.

His heart pounded in his chest like thunder when he dashed toward Marie’s little geo. The driver’s side door had no handle and the backseat door wouldn’t open though it was unlocked. He walked to the side of the driveway and picked up a large rock that lined her rose garden.

He braced himself and muttered a little prayer as the glass shattered loudly beneath the force of the rock in the back seat on the driver’s side. It was louder than he anticipated and he held his breath and listened. The crickets had stopped chirping when he broke the glass, but started their song again when the racket didn’t repeat.

He slid through the new opening onto the glass-littered back seat. Unfortunately, glass wasn’t the only thing that resided back there. He coughed at the smell of animal refuse, apparently more than a few animals had accidents on the floor and seats back there. Blankets and several sweaters were shoved into the back trunk area.

With the clutter and the small size of the vehicle, it took a bit of uncomfortable maneuvering for him to reach the driver’s seat

On top of that, the seat barely slid back and he was a pretty tall guy. He would have to drive with his knees scrunched up into his ribs. He had to curl up on his side with his head in the passenger seat in order to hot wire the damned thing.

It didn’t occur to him until he was getting situated that he could have reached through the broken window and opened the driver’s door from there.

He groaned at his stupidity. The stress of the situation was messing with his head and he wasn’t able to think clearly.

Thankfully, he had good night vision and it didn’t take him long to get it started. He rested his head on the steering wheel for a moment and gave a growl of frustration. That had taken far more effort than he had hoped for.

With another growl, he put the car into reverse and made his way slowly down the drive to the main road where he finally turned on the lights. He was less than a minute from the freeway when he slammed the brakes and narrowly missed hitting the person who stood in the middle of the road.

He sat there shocked and unable to move at the sight of Kenna standing naked and blinking to shield her eyes from the headlights of the car.

A strangled sounding sob escaped his throat and he somehow made it out of the passenger side door. He rushed to her and gathered her in a tight embrace and kissed her limp hair.

She looked up at him with a confused expression and her legs gave out on her. He scooped her up and cradled her for as long as he dared.

“Kenna,” he said, over and over. Just saying her name as he held her salved the wound her absence left in his heart.

She shushed him like a child and rubbed his shoulder weakly with her fingertips. He was so tired of losing people.

“I’m going to take you somewhere secret, sweetheart. We’re going to make that Fire b***h pay.” He told her and she fainted in his arms.

Kenna woke and pushed herself up to her elbows and gave a moan of irritation when she saw her least favorite beach in the world.

“Not another fever dream,” she grumbled and sat up. She ran her hands through her hair and paused, despair gripped her heart and she clutched her bare chest in search of her wound.

“Oh crap,” she cried. “I’m dead. I’m dead.” She looked around her in panic, as if the beach or sky itself could provide answers. She dropped her face into her palms and struggled for breath through her panic.

“Dead people breathe?” she wondered aloud. She shed one panicked tear then pinched her leg painfully.

“Snap out of it,” she said in an effort to calm herself.

“Okay, I’m dead. Now where are those pearly gates?” She stood and glanced down at her naked body. She wondered if dead spirits didn’t need clothes, much like Adam and Eve before the snake. She turned and looked all around for signs of Saint Peter or even another spirit.

“I always thought Corvin would be the one to greet me,” she muttered disappointedly. He played a significant part in raising her and often told her he loved her like a daughter. She lived with him and Jacob for the first ten years of her life until he died out in the field. They were examples of selflessness on a daily basis, even sharing one of the two tiny bedrooms in their little house so she could have her own room.

“Oh,” she said as realization dawned on her. She couldn’t even ask them for confirmation. How had she not thought of this before?

“Oh well, too late now.” She pushed that thought away to focus on the situation at hand; funny what you think of at times of great stress.

“Purgatory! This must be purgatory!” She exclaimed happily. “Now all I have to do is find Saint Peter and convince him I’m supposed to be in Heaven.” She giggled madly and felt like she was going just a little insane, but that was to be expected if one died and found themselves in purgatory.

She marched toward the mountains, intent on climbing them to search out Peter or the gates. She stood at the base and glared at the steep incline.

“He’s probably not up there anyway,” she said, and walked along the beach to the left of the mountains. She found a little pass to the side of the mountain and found a clearing surrounded by stones made of the same crystalline rock as the mountains. It was filled with boulders large and small that surrounded a circular open space in the center. It reminded her a lot of Stone Henge. She was going to examine the area in the middle when she heard voices from the other side of the circle. She darted behind one of the boulders and crouched, wondering if these were angels or other spirits.

Four men entered the area and spoke in a language unfamiliar to her. They were certainly beautiful, like all the angels she had seen in the paintings at church. They were even dressed in white and silver. She contemplated approaching them. Maybe they knew where to find Saint Peter. Then she realized she didn’t know exactly what demons were supposed to look like. They might be beautiful too, for all she knew. She waited to see if she could get one alone. She might have a chance against one demon on her own, but she didn’t know if she could take on four.

Her legs started to ache from being crouched back there for so long. Thankfully, three of them bowed to one man and walked back the way they came. He rapped his knuckles lazily on one of the boulders and yawned. She gathered her courage and stood, careful to move slowly when she approached him. She cleared her throat and he looked up in surprise. He brandished a sword made of fire seemingly out of thin air. Perhaps literally out of thin air and pointed it toward her. He spoke in that foreign language and she lifted her hands as a sign of peace.

“I don’t understand a word you’re saying, but I’m going to speak in soft tones so you don’t try to stab me with your fire sword thing,” she said with what she hoped was a kind and welcoming voice. He relaxed his stance but kept his sword pointed at her. He sneered as his gaze travelled over her naked body and the bulge appearing at his crotch helped her decide he wasn’t an angel.

“Well, you’re obviously not the person I’m looking for, so I’m going to go.” She tried to back up slowly but swayed on her feet. She caught herself on the rock and blondie started yelling at her in gibberish.

“I just need a minute,” she said and lifted a hand as a signal to stop. Apparently, he didn’t understand her signal because he took it as an invitation to charge her with his fire sword thing.

She flung herself to the side and he missed. His sword bounced off the boulder and sent chunks of various sizes clamoring to the ground. She rolled to her feet and grabbed one of those larger rocks. He swung at her again but she knocked his hand away and kneed him in his bulging crotch. He fell to the ground and she brought the rock down on the back of his head.

She flung her rock to the ground and ran back toward the beach. She felt light headed and the ground swayed like the waves of the ocean around her, but she managed to stay on her feet and keep running. She collapsed on the spot where she kept arriving and let out a sob.

“I want to go home,” she cried to no one in particular this time. She didn’t care who heard her, as long as her prayer got her home. She wrapped her arms around her for warmth as the cold seeped into her skin. She stood to shield her eyes from the changing light that blinded her. The lights broke into two and cut through the darkness surrounding her. She let her hand fall and stared into the headlights that slowed on their approach and let out a shaky sigh of relief.