“Maybe they did,” Ellin said. “Maybe it was a test.”
Wesley didn’t look at her, didn’t want to see the emotion that crossed her face, to watch her recall the torture she’d been subjected to with Brendan. But he was sure that was what she was thinking of, as his thoughts went there too. There, and to the other attack, when the men who weren’t shadows, who were merely of the Seven, had blasted and torn their way into Council. The faint scars lining his neck itched, but he resisted the urge to touch them, because now they were covered with new wounds, fresh cuts and burns that redoubled the fear those other memories held.
He had been lucky. Brianna had given him a gift, the ability to feel the shadows attack and the power to fight back, but that wasn’t what had saved him and Ellin. It had been sheer luck.
“How many more do you think there are?” she whispered into the glass.
“I can think of at least one,” Wesley offered. The man from the shadows had been more than a minor threat. He was not like the others. Wesley had felt the power surge from the dark-haired man, a power that reached out, searching the air around him. He could have been wrong, might have mistaken the sensation with his newly recovered gift, but Wesley would have sworn that the man was drawing energy from Brianna. His gaze found the lawn again, the narrow distance between Emily and Aern, and he reexamined the bond between them.
“That’s enough!” Kara yelled from the hallway behind them. Ellin didn’t turn to watch, but Wesley glanced over his shoulder as she fought with the men who were trying to subdue her. “I said leave me be,” she shouted, jerking her arm free of one of the men only to stumble at the lack of support. Her hair was a grubby clump of brown, half singed by fire, half coated with mud. She had been smashed, battered, and tossed across the lawn, and Wesley wasn’t certain she was even capable of thinking clearly in that condition. Her leg crumpled beneath her and the second man wrapped a hand under her arm. “I just want to sleep,” she whimpered, head lolling forward. “Just let me lie here.”
Most of those who’d been changed by Brianna had been on the front lines and were injured at least as bad, if not worse. Wesley and Ellin had come out with only minor damage, as had Rhona, who had apparently been warned to stay back. It was fortunate, given that a tree had crashed through the pillar of one of the outbuildings he’d been assigned to. But Aern had ordered all of them in, sending the rest of the Council men to carry in the bodies, charging them with cleaning up the destruction left behind by the fight. Suspiciously, no one had shown up to investigate the disaster. The Council building was relatively secluded behind its many acres, and they owned most of the bordering properties, which were only accessible by private drives, but still, not one car had driven by, not one call to inspect even the noise, let alone the strange fire storm and ensuing blast.
Wesley had not seen either of those, distracted as he was by his own battle with the seventh shadow, but he had heard. The men were in awe, still whispering oaths of fear and amazement. No one had been left standing, save Aern and Brianna. The concussion she’d released had negated every other energy within striking distance for that instant. Wesley wished he could have been closer, could have felt it himself, experienced it through his ability. It hadn’t reached the shadow whom he and Ellin were fighting, but something had given the woman pause. It was enough, and they had capitalized on it in the best possible way.
Wesley was barely sixteen, and even though he’d had a life full of experience, full of torment at the hands of Morgan, full of the fighting that had torn through Council and the Seven Lines, there had been a definite stab of guilt at their killing stroke. Neither of them wanted this, even if Ellin did have a desire to tear apart the shadows in revenge, even if she had been a part of those other battles. They weren’t born killers, they didn’t want any of this. But it appeared even what should have been a lethal blow wasn’t enough to earn them the title, because the shadows weren’t dying so easily. They were hanging on, lying in the dirt of the Council lawn, clinging to the last strands of life that kept them on this earth.
Embracing their power.
There was another noise in the hallway—the halting of footsteps—and Wesley looked back to see Logan, indecision on his face as he spotted the pair by the window. Wesley nodded, and Logan moved toward them. Ellin turned at his approach, both waiting for some news or inquiry. Evidently, he had none, for he simply stopped before them, glancing briefly out the window at Aern and the shadows, hand sliding into a pocket and then out, palm gliding over the front of his shirt.