Crescent Wolves - G. Bailey Page 0,63

body.

Landon yells again, at a louder volume this time, and I can see that he’s putting everything he has into the song.

Samantha growls in frustration and turns back to him, but not before Shade charges across the room and clamps his strong wolf jaws onto her arm, tearing clothes and flesh into ribbons with an aggression I’ve never seen in anyone before.

I glance over my shoulder at Hunter, who is still cowering in the corner, trying desperately to transform but still having no luck.

Samantha begins to chant under her breath, her black eyes starting to glow with magical energy, and Landon’s eyes go wide for a split second before his scream is suddenly silenced, as if his voice has been plucked from his body. He puts his hands to his throat, eyes wide, and my heart sinks when I realize she must have hexed him somehow.

“Shit,” mutters Shade.

Without the distraction of Landon’s powers, Samantha is free to send a bolt of energy flying into Shade, who yells in pain and collapses on the floor, struggling to get back to his feet even as the magic sinks into him. He’s losing concentration, and a moment later, he’s shifting unwillingly back into human form, gritting his teeth in a desperate attempt to stay a wolf. But it’s no use. Within moments he’s a guy again, pinned to the ground by magic.

Landon is still struggling to get his voice back, his hands clawing at his throat as he is silenced by an invisible magic, and Hunter remains behind me, as feeble as ever.

Fuck, I think. It’s just the two of us, now.

As if reading my mind, Samantha sneers, “So much for your little harem, Brix.” Then she’s teleporting across the room to me, lifting me into the air with her telekinesis. I feel the magical force squeezing around my throat, cutting off my air supply and making me see stars. Within seconds, I’ll be unconscious or dead, and with the others incapacitated, it will be easy for her to finish us off… Or worse, subject us to the same treatment that she’s using on Silas and Brody.

Darkness threatens to close in on my vision as I gasp for breath, twisting around in midair as my body goes from vampire to human again. I’m going to die, I realize with a start. She’s going to kill me. Just like Mark was going to kill me, just like those guys at the warehouse were going to kill me.

That revelation seems to wake something up in me, even as the last of my consciousness begins to ebb away, my muscles going weak from the lack of oxygen. With one final burst of desperation, I visualize a dragon: all powerful muscles and hard scales, enormous in its size and power. I think back to the times I breathed fire, to the lesson Shade gave me on transforming, and throw myself into the image. Come on, I pray as my vision goes dark. Come on, come on, come on…

And then, like magic, the hold on my throat is loosening, the invisible hand opening ever so slightly, and I draw in a shaking breath.

My eyes open again and I look down in astonishment to see that I am no longer a human, but a dragon, my golden scales iridescent in the fluorescent lights of the laboratory. Magic is no longer what’s holding me in the air; rather, it’s my wings, flapping with enough power to create gusts of wind.

Samantha looks taken aback as she stares up at me, moving backwards a step, hesitating a little…

But that second of hesitation is all I need. Embracing the second wind, I fill my lungs with air and scream out, a jet of fire lighting up the room and hitting Samantha squarely in the chest. She shrieks as the flames engulf her, frantically swatting at her clothes as she tries to put the fire out. The distraction is enough to make her form waver, and in the instant she becomes human again, Landon finds his voice once more. “Get down!” he yells at her, his voice tinged with the siren frequency. “Surrender!” There’s a moment of futile resistance, but then Samantha is dropping to the ground, her clothes and hair still on fire as she is forced to obey Landon’s command.

I flap my wings again, sending another gust of air at her, and it’s enough to extinguish the flames, leaving Samantha a trembling, scorched wreck on the floor.

I drop back to the ground,