eyes on Jenks, his thrashing slowing, then suddenly changing to something different.
His back arched and he silently screamed, eyes bulging, tendons and veins standing out on his arms and neck. A liquid popping, crunching noise came from under his t-shirt, and one running shoe tore across the seam as his foot became a whole new shape. A new kind of spasm tore through him and then he was shaking and vibrating all over.
Within seconds, his clothing was tearing apart and black hair was sprouting across newly exposed skin. His arms lengthened and his legs shortened, face erupting into a muzzle and ears jutting up from the sides of his widening skull. Less than a minute later, a monster that had to go almost five hundred pounds stood on all four legs, shook itself hard, and roared loud enough to knock dust from the metal beams overhead.
I was thoroughly impressed. Delwood the kid was imposing, Delwood the werewolf was a true heart-stopping monster.
“You should have run. I don’t think I can control him,” Jenks said to me, angry yet resigned. He had both hands on Delwood’s shoulders but the beast was too big and strong for him to slow down.
Delwood sighted me and roared again, claws scraping the concrete as he started toward me.
I almost immolated him. Self-defense right? Completely understandable. Yet I didn’t. Couldn’t bring myself to pull the mental trigger. I could, however, bring myself to pull Earth energy in shitloads from the floor below me and fling the giant wolf across the room and into the brick wall twelve feet off the ground. He stuck there, kicking and thrashing, amid broken brick and concrete, held in place by my power.
Jenks turned to me, disbelief written across his features. He glanced at my Witchwards and then back at my face, flinching a little from whatever he saw there. Caeco was frozen in place, staring at me as well. The rest of the class had scattered around the room, none of them making it very far before stopping to watch the spectacle in full view.
“What the bleeding ‘ell is going on here?” a new voice demanded, a voice I’d thought was safely home in Castlebury.
My aunt stood in the doorway to the gym, Gina Velasquez to one side of her. Gina looked shocked and my aunt… my aunt was well and truly pissed. Her auburn hair floated around her head, telling me she was holding her full power in readiness as she took in the scene before her. Then she looked at me directly, her attention completely on me, and horror spread across her features.
“Just what the feck have ye done to me boy?” she hissed, her tone more dangerous than a yell. “Declan?”
Chapter 21
I couldn’t answer her, my jaw still too fucked up to work properly. I tried though, and in hindsight, that was maybe a mistake.
“Eymmm ulllriipe” is what came out in a harsh gurgle.
She came straight across the room like an arrow, straight to my side where she reached out to grab my jaw. I pulled back just before she made contact.
“He can’t open his jaw, Miss O’Carroll. It got dislocated on Friday,” Mack said, tentatively, from his spot fifteen feet away.
“Dislocated, ye say? What kind of fecked-up nightmare are ye running here?” she said, whipping around to spear Gina with a glance. Gina flinched as I think would almost anybody when faced with a thoroughly pissed off Ashling. “Why did me nephew get his jaw dislocated, why is he beaten bloody black and blue and had to activate three of me most powerful healing charms, and just exactly why is he holding a fully changed werewolf against the fecking wall?”
“It’s complicated,” Gina said.
“Then uncomplicated it,” she commanded.
“Ma’am, you’re obviously related to the warlock,” Jenks began, but Ashling turned back around and glared in his direction, which made him pause. Then something occurred to her and she looked at me again. Grabbing my arm, she turned it till she could see the henna glyph on my right bicep, the one on my forearm and the back of my hand.
“Ye broke yer promise. Away jest a week and ye broke yer bloody promise to me,” she said, a combination of hurt and disbelief in her eyes. Then her expression hardened and turned to something else. She held my eyes as she answered his question.
“This warlock is me nephew. And thanks to this fecking shitty school, he now truly is a warlock. Eighteen years I’ve loved and protected him