Vorare 2

Vorare 2
  “And?” Ethan demanded.
  Higan’s voice eagerly rambled out before the beta could answer. “I didn’t lie. It should’ve worked. The scroll said it would.“
  What scroll? I didn't catch any at the scene.
  Tyler mocked with a laugh beside me. “Should’ve? That thing out there is working?”
  Higan’s eyes darted wide to me instead. “It was supposed to force them out. The Melbringers. Not… that. Not this.”
  I didn't like the way his eyes were probing into mine like he expected me to suddenly understand him. Neither did Ethan, as his authority pushed through the air. The werewolves grew more tense, and Higan gritted his teeth.
  The beta beside him pushed on with a tremble in his voice. “He brought the scroll. And a glass eye. He told us it was from the old 'pack vaults.'”
  He lied about where he got it from, too. I thought.
  My necklace hummed again against my collarbone, so I reached to caress it. The shape of my mother’s old magic burned under my ribs. It had been doing so since the parking lot.
  Ethan breathed out cooly, “Go on.“
  The beta’s eyes shifted to the open window where the storm rumbled in coils over the rooftops. His throat bobbed as he forced it out. “We set it up like he said. Drew the lines in the old gas lot and laid the eye in it.”
  He choked, the memory searing through his words. “When it started to grow, we thought that was right. But then werewolves started… getting sucked in it. It ate some of us bones and all,” he paused to catch his breath.
  I swallowed down, realizing why their numbers had dwindled. Those who were probably my classmates. I wasn't sure how to feel about that.
  He couldn't continue as his face fell. The female werewolf that resembled Tess came forward to finish narrating. “The Melbringers came. They tried to use the mess, but the thing didn’t care. It ate them too,” she choked out.
  She dragged a sleeve across her bloody lip. “We tried to circle the thing, but that obviously didn't work out well for us.”
  Higan’s laugh was hoarse and raw in his throat. “And now it’s bigger than all of us.”
  “Funny you're laughing given you caused this,” I jabbed at him.
  My fingers itched to touch his face and burn the cold into his skin.
  “Where’s Abigail?” Khalid’s voice cracked through the tension.
  The beta flinched. He didn’t have an answer.
  I tried not to panic, so I faced one of the moonstone wolves instead. “Where?”
  “The last we saw her,” a brunette answered curtly, “she followed the Melbringers into the woods.“
  My chest burned as my wolf furiously pushed up against my ribs. I strode over to the counter to face Higan directly, looking down at him. “Don’t tell me you gave them the scroll and the eye.”
  Higan’s face twisted. A boy again, but a coward too. “I didn’t know it would—”
  I snickered at his poor attempt to justify his reckless actions. “Yet you do it anyway.”
  “You don't need to put it like that,” He swallowed as his eyes dropped to the scattered floor. So much for an Alpha.
  I didn’t waste another breath on Higan. There’d be time to decide what to do with him once this town wasn’t on the verge of being gnawed clean from the inside out.
  However, there was someone else here who could shine light on our situation.
  My shoes cracked on the glass as I moved to where Lorcan stood guard over Becca’s limp form.
  “Wake her,” I ordered him flatly.
  Lorcan’s brow arched, but his hand slipped to the ivory knife at his belt without protest. He spun it once between his fingers, then crouched. He drove the blade right through Becca’s upper arm, neat and precise. It oddly pleased me.
  Her body jolted violently. A hoarse snarl ripped out of her mouth, echoing off the half-shattered walls. She gagged around the scream as her head slammed back into the broken tiles behind her.
  “Fuck you, Harlyn,” she spat before she’d even seen me properly. “Is it not enough that you keep cutting into me like a slab of meat? Cause I sure damn hope it is.”
  “Becca,” I growled, stepping closer for my shadow to swallow hers. “Look at me.”
  Her wild eyes snapped up, and in the same minute, they moved past my shoulder to land on the slumped figure of Higan behind me.
  Her laugh rang too loud in the stale air. She casually leaned her head back against the wall,unbothered by the bloody smear from Lorcan’s cut still dripping down her sleeve.
  “Oh, you found him.” She cackled, half-choking on her own breath. I missed her calculating coldness. This was much more annoying. “Tell me, Higan. Do you feel powerful now?”
  Higan didn’t answer. He didn’t even look at her. It was comical because they had been dating before. Something told me there was more to the dynamic.
  I crouched down to pull her chin back to face me, knowing well enough the frost in my fingers would bite. Her grin twitched, yet it stayed.
  “What is it?” I kept my tone so leveled it hurt my own ears. “The thing outside. Name it.”
  She let her lips curl wider, baring the tips of her teeth like a feral dog pretending it was civilized. “You're still asking things of me, bestie?” She shifted just enough to catch Higan again in her sightline. “I guess your mate wasn't much help.“
  Ethan growled a resonant warning, and Lorcan took a stance with the ivory knife. “Becca.”
  She stilled before rolling her eyes.
   “Vorare.” She said finally with so much nonchalance that made my skin crawl.
  No one spoke for a heartbeat. Even Khalid’s restless pacing cut dead. Why? Because no one knew whatever the fuck she meant.
  I kept my grip locked on her chin, pushing the cold to her jaw. My patience was wearing thin, and she was proving to be more useless. “Explain.”
  Becca breathed out. “Vorare, dear. The Eater. The only male sorceress Gaia ever blessed or cursed, depending on whether you enjoy watching every living thing rot from the inside out.”