Filed to story: The Healer and The Wolf PDF Free
Unfortunately, the plants I hadn’t sent were still entirely under his thrall. They surged up over the vines, wrapping down into them with the intent to tear.
That wouldn’t do at all.
Brow furrowing, I focused on that fizzing, sizzling magic within me and the plants I affected. I let it grow, bloom, even feed back on itself until it was spilling out of me again and across any plant it touched. Across other plants thatmyplants touched.
Wonder cascaded over me as I gained control over the new plants. It was a mass of organic wonder, and I told it all tosqueeze.
For one brief, blissful moment, I could feel Frederick’s bones creak under my control. Could it really be so easy? Was I really about to bring him down? It seemed like it would be even easier than Alric.
I probably should have known better.
Right when I really felt like I had the most solid grip on the brother, his head jerked to me, and his eyes went wide.
“It’s you! You’re doing this!”
Uh oh.
I didn’t reply. I needed to react as quickly as possible. I squeezed my fingers together, my nails biting into my palm as I imagined those plants crushing him with all their strength.
Maybe if Frederick had only been a plant manipulator like me, I would have bested him. Unfortunately, he was awarlock, and that meant he had a whole school of magic spells I would never even know about.
He sent out a burst of that magic, and a blinding, white-hot pain surged through the network of foliage. The next thing I knew, fire blasted out of him, reducing all the plants binding him to ash. It was hot enough that I threw out my arms to shield myself even from this distance. However, that distance shrank rapidly as he practically teleported over to me. He moved so fast through the battle that one moment I blinked and then he was a few feet away from me.
Shit.
I called upon all the plants around me, creating a defensive barrier between the two of us, but he raised his hands and flicked his fingers downward like he was swatting cobwebs out of the air, then all the plants settled to the ground.
“Itisyou!” The strangest thing was that he looked happy rather than upset. Actually, he looked downrightecstatic.Something definitely wasn’t right.
Was it a trick to disarm me? I didn’t want to take the chance. So, I ignored the broad smile that crossed his features and tried to wrestle back control of the plants. They stirred, shimmering with the same feeling inside me, but before I could issue any order, Frederick shook his head and snapped his fingers, and theplants ignored me again. Clearly, I was outclassed. Not exactly a surprise, but I had hoped that some of the shifters?-
As if they could hear my thoughts, a wolf leaped onto Frederick’s back while a coyote shifter went for his ankle. The warlock whirled, sending the wolf flying away, but that left enough of an opening for the coyote’s teeth to sink into his designer pants. Frederick let out an angry curse before waving his hand. A crackle of green light rippled through the air before the floor beneath the coyote suddenly turned to liquid and it began to sink in.
It didn’t take a genius or a battle strategist to figure out that he was going to make the floor solid again to crush the coyote, so I quickly reached for the plants that had slackened under his control and had them rip the coyote out of the mire, depositing him a few feet away. I tried to press, using the sudden slack in the warlock’s concentration, but I took too long to redirect them after helping the coyote. Frederick moved at an unnatural speed again, and then suddenly, he was in my face. His hot breath fanned across my skin, and every muscle in my body locked up.
Despite my repeat run-ins with the brothers, I’d never actually been so close to one of them. I could see the individual pores on his nose, could smell the sandalwood in his cologne. My heartbeat rushed in my ears as I wondered if I had inadvertently caused my own death.
He looked so thrilled to see me, his eyes traveling up and down my body-not in a lecherous way as that action would usually suggest, but as if he had been reunited with an old friend.
What the fuck was going on?
“You look so familiar,” he said, and to my horror, one of his hands came up to caress my ponytail. “But you can’t be her. That’s impossible.”
Her?What was the man on? I had gotten the distinct impression that most magical folk had some pretty severeresistances to most inebriation, so whatever had him thinking he knew me had to be some really powerful shit.
But he didn’t seem high as he slowly caressed my face. If someone had told me such a thing might happen, I would have told them I’d slap him silly or try to slit his throat with a thorn. But now? I felt a bit paralyzed. The entire situation was so unexpected that my brain couldn’t quite figure out what to do about it.
“I watched you burn. I know I did, my little plant pet. So stubborn. All you had to do was?-“
He didn’t get the chance to finish his sentence, because a howl came from incredibly close by, and a shadow moved in the corner of my eye. That was the only warning I had before Leo leaped onto Frederick, snapping his jaws closed around the warlock’s arm that had been touching me.
As soon as he landed, he began to shake his head in that way predators did to rip off full limbs. Although I was still more confused than anything else, I banished the strange shock that had come over me and latched on to every single plant that would listen around me. They all surged as one, the vines sporting massive thorns that could impale a man.
I had to admit, I agreed with their idea.
I sent them racing forward, and they reached Frederick right as he grabbed one of Leo’s ears, his hand crackling with a deadly, green energy. I couldn’t let whatever he was brewing go right into my mate’s head, so without so much as a beat of hesitance, I ran him through.
Although I was several feet away, I could still feel the force of the plants as they pushed through Frederick’s chest and lifted him up, up,upoff the ground. He let out a gurgling scream. It was truly horrific in a way I would have thought I’d gotten over since the auction, but I clearly hadn’t.
I didn’t ease the pressure. I wasn’t stupid enough to think that impaling him once would take down a warlock who had spent his life taking advantage of every other type of magic user and shifter in existence for his own gain.
Thankfully, I wasn’t alone. Leo jumped up, scaling the pillar of thorny vines until he was at the warlock’s feet. Sparing what little power and control I had left, I made a platform of leaves and vines so Leo could be face to face with one of the men who had tried to destroy his pack. And although I didn’t want to watch, I kept my gaze steady as my mate let out a truly pained and feral howl before opening his jaw wide enough to encompass Frederick’s head from the top of his skull to the bottom of his chin.
And then he bit down.
It was horrible. It was bloody. My stomach flipped at least a dozen times, and bile rose in my throat, but I pushed it down. Frederick was dead, and I could feel all the plants I wasn’t controlling in the room go still, as if they were confused and waiting for direction.
“No! You can’t! You can’t do this!”
Right. The battle wasn’t over yet. Tearing my gaze away from Frederick, I let his body drop to the floor as I looked for his brother. Sure enough, the last surviving son was beginning to rise up through the floor, his face pale and full of horror.
If he was anyone else, I might have felt bad for him, but all I could think of was whether his victims wore that same expression before he ripped their lives, their ability to consent, and their very minds away.
Raising my hands over my head, I sent all the plants toward him, the green wave quickly snatching him up. But like Frederick, he didn’t make it easy. He sent out blasts of magic, trying to knock them away. I gritted my teeth, my feet beginning to slide off the floor as I was dragged along with it. I still didn’tunderstand the symbiotic relationship I had with plants, but I knew I was losing this particular tug-of-war.
“Leo!” I cried, but he was already on it. Him and pretty much every shifter still capable of battle. The tide had most definitely shifted as they all raced up to the warlock. The eagle shifters flew directly to him, slashing and biting at his face before wheeling off and turning around to do it again. The coyotes raced up the leaves that were unfurling for them, while many of the wolves used the furniture to leap up and bite at the man’s dangling feet. For once, we were dealing with a brother who couldn’t summon shield bubbles to surround himself.
However, he was still very capable of summoning lightning.