Chapter Sixteen:
Elias

 

“I notice Elders Odessa and Kipling are absent tonight,” Elias remarked. He arched a brow, looking around the table where the other Elders had gathered. The private room in Tartarus had the best view of the venue by far, and it was the only one with a conference table large enough to seat nine Elders.

Even if it did only need seven that evening.

From the floor beside him, Jace glanced up at him, tags jingling. No one had even seemed to notice he’d brought his pet werewolf. It was so easy to overlook him…

Besides, this was Tartarus, his domain, and Jace would’ve been there regardless.

“Probably having a girls’ night out.” Elder Orrin sneered.

It was typical of him to dismiss the two Council members simply because they were female. He never acknowledged that they, too, were deadly creatures. The alliance between Callia Odessa and Malone Kipling made them even more dangerous, and their unannounced absence was a conspicuous declaration — of what, Elias wasn’t yet sure.

It couldn’t be anything good.

As Council members, they were all meant to stand equal, but there was nothing equal about them. The balance of power and influence had been tipped for some time, and it was now straining beneath the weight of so much strife and infighting.

Gregory Rialto shot him a look. “You lack respect. Both of you,” he said, his voice a low growl that belied his humanity.

“Respect is earned, not given,” Elias stated, realizing how double-edged the words were a split second too late.

“Where does that leave you, Ivers?” Marcus Foss pounced on the opportunity. “The only thing you’ve done on the Council is fuck up.”

“Both of you, spare me. Hearing witches talk about earning respect?” Samuel Fleming, the usually quiet third werewolf Elder chimed in with a scoff, making himself the common enemy of all the witches in the room. Fleming shrugged, unbothered by the glares he’d earned. “You think you deserve everything because you’re born with some name,” he pointed out.

“We earn what we have,” Rialto agreed with a nod.

“By wrestling on the ground like animals,” vampire Elder Diaz scoffed.

“You’re one to talk. Gaining your position through backstabbing is hardly worthy of respect,” Adam Acker spat. The witch’s face was red with indignation, as though he was about to explode.

His words were a smidge too ironic for Elias’s taste. Adam Acker was scarcely twenty-three and barely more accustomed to his position than Elias himself. Moreover, he was only there because his father had died of a mysterious heart attack the year before.

“As Callia would say if she were here,” Rialto said dryly, “behave, children.”

Elias was the one to give him a disgusted look. It wasn’t as though that loathsome woman was in a position to give anyone advice, let alone chide her peers like they were youths.

“We did have an agenda,” Diaz said. He glanced out the window in the arena with disinterest, watching the supes in the maze hunt the human.

“If we’re done squabbling like children, then, we should get it,” Elias said acerbically, trying to bring the meeting to order before it could devolve into carnage like the one on display below. “The families want answers on Elder Palmero’s death, and they’re growing restless.” He carried on, glancing at Foss and Acker, “They’re losing faith in the Council.”

“I wonder why,” Foss said.

The way the man stared back at him made it perfectly clear he knew what kind of upheaval Elias was causing in the witch community — not that it mattered what Marcus Foss knew.

It was about what he could prove. Without answers and proof, he would get nowhere in trying to discredit Elias for playing on emotions and certain events.

“We have no leads in the case,” Acker said, as though that was a revelation.

“Yes, thank you Witch-Elder Obvious,” Diaz drawled.

Acker’s cheeks took on the same angry red color as before. “We thought that—”

Rialto suddenly shot up, so quickly his chair toppled onto its side on the floor. “Be quiet,” he snapped at the young Elder.

Acker drew breath to heatedly argue with the rude ‘wolf, but Foss hushed him with a hand gesture before he could throw a temper tantrum right there in the Council meeting.

The man truly didn’t belong on the Council.

“That’s hardly appropriate—” Foss began instead.

“I said, shut up!” Rialto snarled, his hands clenching into fists.

Fleming also rose, and the ‘wolves exchanged a pointed look.

Jace’s head shot up from where it had been resting on his dog bed.

Elias felt a chill run down his spine, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end for a tantalizing moment. He felt the bite of his own magic defenses, alerting him that the doors of Tartarus had been breached.

The magic lashed back toward him like a tsunami, only to break and be absorbed by the charms he wore to augment his skill. It was still enough force to stagger him. He was momentarily blinded, aware of nothing but the buzzing in his ears and the red in his vision.

He had wanted the alerts, but he’d never dreamed he’d actually need them.

He rose as well, seeing the puzzle pieces fall into place — the absence of the two female Council members, the attack on his Tartarus — and rage and astonishment alike enveloped him.

Jace howled with similar rage.

With a single tap of his magic, Elias freed him of the spells that prevented him from shifting at will.

The twist of magic briefly stunned his ‘wolf, but it only lasted for two frantic heartbeats before Jace’s nose started to lengthen into a snout.

Elias heard the sickening crunching of bones breaking and mending as his pet started to shift into his dangerous form. “Defend,” he snarled over the sound of all hell breaking loose.

It was as close as he would ever come to a Hail Mary, as he was all too aware he’d had perfectly good reasons to stop his ‘wolf from shifting. None of them seemed important now.

The dawning realization that Tartarus was under siege tilted the very foundation of his world. Rules and concern no longer mattered as order began to devolve into chaos.

Magic crackled all around him as he pulled a shield into place for his personal protection. He’d made sure his defenses were easy to access so he wouldn’t be caught off-guard like he had been with Nyla again. He’d never be humiliated by his sister-in-law — or anyone else — ever again. He would call upon every favor, charm, and spell, taking from others what he lacked if he had to, but he would remain the superior witch.

Smoke started filling the arena below, engulfing the stunned competitors. He struggled to see what was happening, but the dark clouds drifted up, making it harder and harder to see. Before the arena was taken from their sight, Elias saw other figures — humans — cut down the supes in the maze one by one, like they were mere clay figures.

This was all…

“Impossible,” Elias muttered.

“Obviously not,” Rialto snarled. He rolled his shoulders then set his jaw, and he started to follow Jace’s example.

Fur began to sprout along his face, above his jawbones and around his nose.

A dark blur rushed past Elias, snarling and provoking a scream from Rialto as his elongating mandible was ripped clean off, along with his jugular. It sent blood spraying across the glass window and across the conference table.

Orrin and Diaz recoiled, and it even took Elias a moment to realize what had happened. His breathing stilled.

Blood poured from Jace’s mouth as he dropped the jaw bone, and Rialto’s partially-shifted form returned to full human as death consumed him.

“Fuck!” Fleming cursed. He didn’t try to shift. It would take too long, and the pain of it would leave him immobilized. It was the curse of the werewolves. Deadly as they were as 'wolves, they could be destroyed in a heartbeat while still human — or in between.

Jace, his werewolf in all his glory, had the upper hand over even an Elder who hadn’t shifted. His teeth ripped into the forearm Fleming had brought up to protect his throat. They were good instincts, but it wasn’t enough. With purchase on the Elder’s raised arm, Jace’s claws rent at his soft underbelly, ripping out his innards like a good predator. It left the man screaming, crumpling to the ground while the witches around them gathered magic.

“Call off your fucking dog, Ivers!” Acker screamed, his voice high with panic as he grappled to find a spell that would slow down a fully shifted ‘wolf.

Even without the full moon augmenting Jace’s strength, that was no easy task. There was no stopping this, not now. His ‘wolf had started the slaughter inside of the room, and even if Elias managed to call him off, what would happen to him then? The others would see him and Jace both dead for this.

Acker went down, too, his unused magic fizzling out around him as he gurgled up blood around Jace’s shaking and gnashing jaws. He was too young, too inexperienced, and he had likely never seen a moment of combat in his life.

Elias’s head spun as Jace went wild, tearing into the witch’s throat with feral abandon, shaking and sending blood and flesh splattering this way and that.

It abruptly dawned on Elias that his ‘wolf had felled three Elders in less than three minutes and wasn’t slowing down.

Between the sight of Jace painting the room red with his fellow Elders’ blood and the defenses of the empire he’d built crumbling beneath his very feet, he was stunned into silence, into immobility.

As defense after defense was obliterated, the backlash kept him constantly off balance. He couldn’t have told Jace to stop even if he’d wanted to. Of course, with Jace being his last line of defense, Elias had no desire to even slow him down.

The two vampires saw an opening with Jace rounding on Foss. They bolted for the door, trying to put as much distance and walls between themselves and their most deadly natural enemy as possible.

Elias’s shock was starting to wear off, and he came to his senses and his sense of self. They had to see this through now, and his ‘wolf would need help. Foss was older, more experienced, and his lips were already moving as he drew magic into him. The air fair shimmered with the force of it, and Elias envied its strength.

He cut himself off from the remnants of Tartarus’s defenses tumbling down around him, allowing him more range with his own magic. The door slammed shut in the faces of the vampires trying to flee the bloodbath. If he was going to escape this slaughter without taking blame, he had to ensure there were no witnesses.

As the door slammed, Jace howled in pain. A gash tore his skin open along his spinal column. Foss was trying to render him immobile, but Jace merely doubled down.

Relentlessly, the ‘wolf forged on, running into Foss’s significant defenses and driving him back farther to the corner of the room — herding him as he continued to bite, scratch, and snarl at Foss’s shielded flesh. Foss’s magic was more than adequate, but the onslaught was proving to be too much.

Blood welled up and made the magic falter with every nip and scratch that passed the defenses he was trying so hard to maintain. All Foss could do was defend himself. It wasn’t long before his back hit a wall and forced him to push back against the ferocious ‘wolf.

Suddenly, Elias realized that was exactly what Jace was doing.

Jace, who had served as an active combatant during the Takeover, had honed his fighting skills not only against humans but traitorous werewolves, vampires, and not insignificant Corbin and Conti witches alike. He knew that to take a witch down, he had to drain them of their magic first.

A part of Elias whispered that if Marcus Foss stood no chance against his ‘wolf, he might have to put down his pet before this could turn on him in order to survive. He ignored that voice, focusing on the outraged vampires.

Diaz was the deadlier of the two, still sharp — if arrogant. He was sharp enough to realize Elias was the one standing between him and his way out. The vampire rounded on him, and Elias cast a shield to stop him, while backing himself into a corner — not unlike Foss.

At least Orrin couldn’t come at his back, though that was a moot point as Orrin came to Foss’s aid instead.

The vampire grabbed the ‘wolf by the scruff of his neck like he was a mere puppy, and snarling, Orrin threw him across the room. With a loud yelp, Jace’s body hit the window, sending cracks spidering across it in all directions.

If the ‘wolf fell down into the arena, it would all be over, and Elias cast a shield to stop the glass from shattering more. Jace hit the floor and immediately scrambled back to his feet. He changed his directive, shifting his rage from Foss to Orrin. The ‘wolf came at the vampire, colliding hard with him and knocking him to the ground.

Orrin didn’t succumb as easily as the other Elders had. He grabbed the werewolf’s jaws with his bare hands to keep them from snapping shut and ripping him apart. The vampire fought in a way that proved Elias wrong: Orrin wasn’t the less deadly of the pair. As bored as he always was with Council politics and as little as he seemed to care, he was no slouch when it came to fighting for his life.

Diaz struggled to get past Elias’s magic, but it was like trying to wade through quicksand. He would have to physically get his hands on Elias to be any sort of real threat, and Elias could hold him back for now. He didn’t want to end up like Foss, though, draining his power in an ill-fated attempt to stop a more powerful foe. He hadn’t fought in such a long time, but he had always held some combat spells close at hand.

He did own a pet werewolf, after all.

Elias growled as he summoned all of the power from the pendant Julian had gifted him. Then he lashed out abruptly, balling up the fingers of one hand into a fist — and making Diaz’s heart explode outward from his chest.

The vampire had only a moment to look surprised before his body fell into ash.

Orrin was still wrestling with Jace, trying hard to wedge the beast’s jaws further apart, to break his skull in two. Jace’s bite force was formidable, even with Foss’s spells ripping and flaying at his flesh, piece by bloody piece.

Depleted as his powers were, Foss’s spells didn’t come fast enough, allowing Elias’s ‘wolf to regenerate almost as quickly as he was torn apart. It was a painful reminder to all of the supes in the room that without silver weapons, a werewolf was practically an unstoppable killing machine.

Blood sluiced down Jace’s ribcage and splattered across Orrin, who was still trapped underneath him. It covered the vampire’s face, his eyes, making it impossible to see what he was doing. As his hands grew slicker with both his own blood as well as the werewolf’s, Jace slipped closer and closer to his target.

“Elias!” Foss snarled. “I will fucking put your bitch down!”

Elias’s rage swept up at the threat, no matter how futile. No one would put Jace out of his misery but him. He cast anew, this time a sweeping spell that enveloped Foss’s face and left him without breath. It was on the outside of his shield, but it didn’t have to breach it. Air wouldn’t reach Foss, not through the spell, and his shield would be meaningless against it.

Orrin roared with anger and pain as one of Jace’s claws managed to gouge open his chest. A second slash cracked ribs open and apart, leaving the vampire’s heart practically exposed.

Foss’s face turned red as oxygen failed to reach his lungs, and it grew easier and easier to hold that spell in place despite Foss’s frantic struggles. His concentration was simply too poor. All he could do was clutch at his throat like that would remove a spell.

Orrin’s grip finally slipped. While he tried to grab Jace’s neck instead, the ‘wolf’s jaws snapped, seizing his neck. With a twist, he separated Orrin’s head from his shoulders.

Foss fell gasping just as Orrin exploded into ash and dust, but Elias didn’t let up on the spell. As the second to last Elder suffocated in a pool of blood in the corner of the room, Jace’s attention turned to Elias…

Jace, who finally turned to face him, snarling and with blood dripping from his deadly maw.