Wolf Tracks - Bianca D'Arc Page 0,67
when the ward fell, but on the magical plane, she saw a catastrophic failure as evil succumbed to good, the sacred lavender breaking the line and collapsing the field. A moment later, she heard a scream of outrage from inside the building.
She ducked in quickly and found a place of concealment. She wasn’t quite ready to confront anyone just yet. First, she wanted to find Jim and Calum and see what was happening. Only then, could she decide what she could do to help.
*
Otalla screamed as the ward came crashing down. Jim felt it and wondered who had caused it. He had a sneaking suspicion Helen might be involved, which meant she was either in the building already, or about to enter. He’d run out of time to play with these morons. It was time for action.
While Otalla screamed, Jim acted. He sprang at Buford, who was closer, going straight for the man’s throat. The momentary distraction of having the ward fail was just enough opening for Jim to catch the bastard by surprise.
There was no mercy. No offer of repentance. Jim knew it would do no good to hesitate. This pair had shown their true colors in every act he was aware of, including most recently, what they’d done to poor Calum. For that alone, they deserved to die.
Jim killed Buford clean. One slice with his new Bowie knife, and the man was down on the floor, bleeding out. Otalla surprised him, though. Instead of a magical attack, she launched herself at him physically, scratching at his face and clamping onto his back, screaming like a banshee right into his ear.
Then Otalla bit him, breaking this skin, and licked at his blood. At that point, Jim lost track of what was going on. Otalla was doing something… Something magical…
Helen heard the uproar from the next room and knew the time for caution was at an end. Something was going on in there, and she had better go in and see what she could do to help. She entered, taking a quick look around. She saw the wolf in the cage. The door was open, but the wolf was so weak, he was unable to move.
Then, she saw Jim a few yards farther away. A man was lying on the floor, unmoving, blood pooling all around, practically at Jim’s feet. A woman was clinging to Jim’s back, screaming obscene dark magical words, her mouth wet with blood.
Jim’s blood.
Helen’s stomach turned, but she knew she had to act. She stepped fully into the room and used her loudest, most authoritative tone.
“Stop!” she ordered, holding up the remaining lavender as a shield before her.
Helen walked closer, advancing steadily, showing no fear. Her goal was to get between the woman and the wolf in the crate, so she couldn’t hurt the boy anymore.
“I said stop,” Helen repeated, letting the ancient words flow from her lips. Words she had learned alongside her magical siblings, taught by their mother. Words passed down for generations from the old country, meant to quell and banish the forces of evil.
High German poured from her lips. Words she had never spoken in a real-life situation like this. Words she had practiced and memorized, then tucked neatly away, never to be used. Only, she was using them now, and they seemed to be having quite an effect on the woman whose lips still glistened red with Jim’s blood.
Helen would have to purify Jim’s blood after this, she knew. That woman was evil, and she’d no doubt injected some of her poison into him with her bite. Sickened by the thought, Helen nonetheless pressed on, reciting the ancient formula and repeating the words that weakened the evil woman.
The woman dropped off Jim’s back, unable to cling to him any longer as her power fled from her being and melted into the earth, never to return to her. It seemed to be affecting her hair as she writhed in what looked like pain. The long hair on her head had gone from a lustrous black to dull gray and then to a sickly white. Helen couldn’t see her face, but the skin of her hands also appeared to be wrinkling in a somewhat nauseating way.
Helen repeated the ritual words for a third time, moving closer with each step, though careful to stay out of the weakened woman’s reach, lest she try some sort of physical attack, like she had with Jim. The woman was on the ground now, her head down as