The water swished like a wave pool, and at the exact same moment hundreds of gaping mouths opened up to face the starlit sky.
Shit, this doesn’t look good. My wolf agreed with a howl.
I took a few more steps backward as one solid chord of sound pierced the air. A single shrill note, beautiful in its intensity. Like a high note in a choral number, perfectly pitched. It went on for three beats and ended abruptly as every single head slipped below the surface at once.
Not even a ripple remained.
There was no evidence there had just been an army of supernatural beings beneath the surface. What was that? Did they leave? My wolf growled, as unsure as I was about what had just happened.
“Thanks,” Danny panted, coming up to me, his body still healing from the damage from the fall. “In my shape that thing might have been able to take me and gobble me up.”
“You would’ve had it handled,” I said. “They’re like jelly out of the water. Come on. We have to get out of here.” I slowly morphed my body back into my human form as I took a step forward. “We have to start climbing.”
“Jessica,” Danny yelled. “Watch out!” His hands reached me an instant too late.
The Scorper had wound itself around my foot, all its barbs digging in, easily piercing deeply into my ankle. The sting burned like molten lava, blinding me with its intensity. Scorching-hot coals raced up my leg, infesting my body with its poison spell in an instant.
I fell to the ground.
Then the thing was miraculously off my leg. Someone was lifting me. There was yelling and screaming.
“It’s going to be okay. Do you hear me?”
Tyler?
Danny’s calm murmurs floated over me, but were replaced by a horrid screeching inside my brain. My whole head ached, quickly filling with a thick, orange haze. It enveloped my wolf. She was fighting, working hard to clear it, but it wasn’t easing. The haze just kept getting thicker.
I was transferred into a new pair of arms. “You must stay strong.” Naomi’s voice echoed in my ears like thunder, her mouth right next to my ear. I latched on to it like a lifeline. “I am taking you up the mountain. You have had Selene inside you already, Ma Reine. Use it to your advantage. She will have left antibodies in her spells, and if these spiders are her creations, you can fight them using her essence. The same essence that ran through your veins a short time ago. Find it.”
My human side had trouble processing her words, but my wolf started to howl, clawing at the ground in my mind, trying to uncover something we had buried deeply. I saw the glimmer of red as she kept digging, her paws moving quickly, the orange so thick I almost couldn’t see her. Then like a fountain, red sprang forth again, its tendrils sprouting in the air like a vicious web. My wolf jumped back, letting it flow outward.
My back arched, my spine bowed backward. The intensity of the reaction was forcing me to change. I embraced it.
Anything to stop the howling pain.
The red veins of Selene’s essence hit the orange poison, and where they met, it burned clear, making a pssst sound as each tendril seared a little more. My muscles danced under my skin.
“That’s it,” Naomi murmured. “Fight this. You must fight. Use your power.”
My body arched again, my full change coming on fast. My legs bucked, shifting, my clothes tore, and my jaw lengthened. I tried to calm myself to make it easier, but that was impossible. I knew if I couldn’t clear my body of her vile spell, I wouldn’t wake up.
This was it.
“That’s it, Ma Reine. Let it come,” Naomi spoke softly.
Tyler’s voice echoed in the background. “Step back,” he instructed. “Give her room.”
“It is within you, Ma Reine,” Naomi said, her voice getting thin and hard to hear. “Selene is not stronger than you. These things are a child’s plaything compared to your power. Eradicate the spell they carry from your being, using what Selene has left in you, and you will be free of her forever.”
Ma Reine. I finally understood.
My Queen.
18
“Jess! Jess!” Tyler yelled straight into my ear canal.
His voice was so loud it shocked me.