I nodded absentmindedly, still scanning the trees in front of us. “The chances of us separating is slim, and you know it. I’m not leaving you here to fight the threat alone.”
“If this priestess wants power,” he said, crossing his arms, “she wants you. If she’s a bokor like Marcy thinks, these Made wolves aren’t cursed—they’re dead. She’s likely been in control of their minds the entire time, and if that’s the case, she’s had an agenda all along. We don’t need much brainpower to reason that she’s lured the Pack here on purpose, in hopes you would show up. And we played right into her hands.”
I nodded. “That might be true, but we don’t know anything for sure. It could be she was originally hired by the fracture pack and then decided to turn the tables when she realized how powerful her new wolves had become. Every supe we’ve encountered wants power any way they can get it. I might be the icing, now that I’m here, but there’s a possibility I wasn’t the main meal.”
“I don’t believe any of this was unintentional. She wants you,” Rourke grumbled. “The air here is thick with hate. Nothing natural would live within these boundaries. Something that evil lies in wait for their prize, even if it means waiting a hundred years.”
He was right. No self-respecting animal would live on cursed land if they could help it.
I looked over at my brother and Danny. “Hey,” I called, “time to stop worrying about the motor. Let’s get some long sticks and start moving this thing along like a gondola. We only went a mile or so before Rourke shut the boat down. Naomi and Ray should be back any moment. We’ll meet them back the way we came.”
Rourke leaned over the side and cracked a big branch off a cypress tree and placed it in the water.
Then he stilled mid-thrust.
“What?” I asked, reading his face. “What is it?”
He put his finger to his lips, his eyes pinned over my shoulder. Don’t move, he told me internally.
Marcy stifled a shriek behind me and I closed my eyes.
My back was closest to the trees. Slowly, without moving my body, I tilted my eyes upward. Right into the face of a huge python. It slithered above me, slowly descending, not making a sound. It was ten feet from my head. We wouldn’t be able to get the boat out fast enough by hand. We had to fight it.
Rourke changed his grip on the branch to hold it like a baseball bat. Stay still. When I yell, you duck. It’s only going to take one hit.
Hurry up. That thing looks hungry and more than a little possessed. There was no mistaking that the snake only had eyes for me. Its head never wavered.
As Rourke waited not so patiently for it to come, my brother crept to the side of the boat, yanking another huge branch off the nearby tree for himself and then one for Danny. “Stay calm, sis,” he murmured. “I’m pretty sure that snake is dead, but it doesn’t matter. All we need is to get it the fuck out of here, and then we haul ass out.”
The serpent was as big around as a basketball and was so long I couldn’t see where it ended. I also couldn’t rip my eyes away from the spectacle of it, almost as if it had me mesmerized. I didn’t feel any magic coming off it. I’m throwing power at it, I told Rourke, but it’s rebuffing me. Can it be an illusion? Tyler’s right—it has no heartbeat or any signs it’s actually alive.
We’re about to find out. “Now!” Rourke yelled.
I hit the floor of the boat as Rourke swung the tree branch a foot above the thing’s head with supernatural force. The branch shattered instantly as it connected with the snake, but it was enough force to send the serpent flying. As the python went, it tore out the branch it had been coiled on, so it didn’t go nearly far enough as we all would’ve liked.
It plunked in the water a measly five feet from us.
“That thing will be back as soon as it’s able,” Danny yelled, flipping the start button on and off frantically but still not getting the desired result. “Fighting a possessed python that could swallow us whole is not how I’d like to spend the rest of my day. Getting piss drunk on moonshine is a much better option.”
“Danny’s right, fighting that thing is not on the agenda,” I said, scrambling back up. Because this thing was now supernatural and couldn’t be killed easily, it was going to keep coming until it either killed us or took what it wanted. “Let’s get out of here, and I don’t care how we do it.”
“Way ahead of you,” Tyler grunted.
I glanced over and saw both Tyler and Rourke with branches the size of small trees in the water. They shoved them against the bank, their muscles bulging with effort, but we didn’t move.
Not even an inch.
Marcy had turned white in panic, her hands fisted at her sides.
I leaned over and snapped my fingers in front of her face. “I need you to wake up, Marcy. This is exactly the kind of adventure you were looking for not twenty minutes ago. Your adrenaline should be up and running, and now that our happy fun time is beginning, I need you. You can help us get out of here, just like on the plane. Can you detect any spells? Something is holding us here and we need to break free.”
She physically shook herself. “Okay, yes. Yes, okay, I’m on it!” She brought her fingertips to her temples and closed her eyes, but they snapped open after a mere second. “There’s no spell! I can’t pick up on anything. It all just feels… dead. Kind of like what happened on the airplane, but different. The plane was a void. This dead feels… evil.”