“You got it—”

  “Guys.” Idrissa was breathless as she hurried up. “We have a problem.”

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Cohen’s already on the move.”

  “Did you call him?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “No one called him that we can tell. But he and his men are gearing up and rolling out.”

  “Do we know which direction he’s headed?” I asked, my pulse hammering now. This wasn’t part of the plan. We were supposed to have the element of surprise. To make him wonder—and come to us only when we were ready. To keep him guessing.

  “Into these woods,” Idrissa said grimly.

  “Seriously? Do we know if anyone tipped him off?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “No spies. None that we can tell, anyway.”

  I bit my lip. “Okay.” I shook off the feeling of dread, determined to make this work. There was no turning back now anyway. “Fine. We wait for him to come.”

  “What do you want to do about his men?” Idrissa asked.

  I looked from her to Kai. “Stick to the plan. Take another team with you. Draw off as many as you can, and use the traps we laid out.”

  She nodded. “You got it. Si, you still up for this?”

  “Lead the way.”

  Idrissa and Silas hurried off, and Kai gripped my hand. “It’s going to be fine,” he whispered fiercely. “We’re together and I’m not letting you go.”

  I nodded, unwilling to imagine any other future except the one where this all turned out okay. Together, we stepped to the boundary line and waited.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  I felt them before I saw them. The energy spikes. The way the magic inside me reached for them. It was like Kel had said. I felt her blood once, but now, I felt theirs too. Calling to me. To it. Like a perfect match. Through the trees, I caught glimpses. Bodies. Decked in protective gear. Cohen’s militia. Every single one of them looked ready for a war.

  When they emerged, my eyes zeroed in on the weapons they carried. They’d brought more firepower than they had even the last time they’d come. The night they’d shot me and then dumped my mother at my feet.

  Now, she was tucked behind the front lines of the pack. Weak and dying but safe from Cohen’s grasp. No matter how much she’d hurt me or anyone else, she didn’t deserve what Cohen was capable of. No one did. The only reason I’d sent for her at all was because, if making my promise right didn’t save her life, at least she wouldn’t be alone when she died.

  I tried hard not to imagine what that would feel like.

  Instead, I focused on Cohen as he emerged from his side of the forest. The men flanking him had fanned out, guns drawn. Several yards from where we stood, Cohen stood, and my skin prickled at his casual acknowledgment of the line that separated his land from ours.

  “Ash, Kai, what a surprise,” Cohen said in a voice that made it clear it wasn’t. He wore a vest and protective gear on his chest but no gun that I could see. He was that confident.

  “You knew we were here,” I said.

  “Thanks to you,” he said.

  “Me?” I looked down, noting the way he’d glanced meaningfully at my chest. My fingers brushed over the scarred skin where he’d shot me, and his eyes narrowed.

  “What did you do?” Kai asked.

  My fingers touched the raised skin that still hadn’t quite healed from the wound the bullet had left behind.

  Cohen looked way too smug, considering his attempt to kill me had failed that night. Now, his reply was cut off by the sound of voices coming through the two-way strapped to his belt. Muffled words, casual at first, then more urgent.

  “…disturbance, sir. It looks like a small team of wolves who— Shit! Adams is down. And Smith—wait, don’t go that way! …traps!”

  Cohen looked at me, his brows arching. “It seems you’ve prepared a welcome party for us.”

  “Just in case it wasn’t clear how we felt about you crossing our borders uninvited,” Kai told him.

  “What’s the damage?” Cohen asked.

  The man on the other end of the radio didn’t answer right away. When he did, it was with a note of defeat in his voice as he said, “Tripwires, a couple of bear traps. They’ve got the whole woods booby-trapped, sir.”

  “You want to play with human rules, you get human consequences,” I said.

  Cohen laughed. “I don’t think you quite understand how to fight fire with fire, little alpha girl.”

  As if on cue, the men behind him raised their guns and pointed them at us.

  “Besides, that’s one team. Where are the rest of your security patrols?”

  My certainty melted into dread.

  “Tell your men to lower their weapons,” I said with a confidence I didn’t have.

  His smile vanished. “Tell yours to stop leading us into traps.”

  “The traps are on our side of the line. Honor the treaty, and they’ll be fine.”

  “Is that why you lured us out here?” he asked. “To remind us of the boundary lines.”

  “We didn’t lure—” I began, but Kai stopped me.

  “This ends today,” he said.

  “Does it now?” Cohen eyed the rest of our group. “Twenty years later. Almost to the day.” His eyes landed on me again. “How do you propose we finish this?”

  “Call your coven,” I said quietly. “Tell them I’m ready to return the magic.”

  His eyes lit with undisguised victory. “I see spending time with your mother had the desired effect.”

  I seriously considered punching him in the balls.

  Idrissa appeared at my side. She faced off with Cohen, arms folded. “You may want to wipe that smug-ass look from your dictator face,” she said. “And check in with your teams.”

  His eyes narrowed. “My teams are fine.”

  “Are they?” she challenged.

  Cohen broke eye contact first and motioned to one of his men. “Check in,” he ordered.

  We waited while the guy fired off a radio message that went unanswered. Cohen huffed and pulled out his cell. He dialed a number, and we waited.

  When he hung up again without an answer, Idrissa flashed a predatory smile. “Problem?”

  “What’s going on?” Kai demanded.

  “This asshole thought he could use our own distractions against us,” she said. “A delivery van parked outside the Throttle just exploded.”

  “What?” I demanded.

  “No one was hurt,” she added quickly. “Oh, and your six-man team is now surrounded by a dozen wolves.” She looked back at Cohen. “You can call them off or I’ll tell my team to consider this an act of war and respond in kind.”

  Cohen glared back at her, but in the end, he grabbed his radio and gave the order. Idrissa made a call and verified with her own team and then gave me a nod.

  “They’ve surrendered,” she said.

  Cohen looked ready to lose it, and I felt better that we’d at least been able to stop whatever he’d planned next. Still, even after everything we’d done last night, he was one step ahead.

  “Bring them here,” I said. “Everyone gets a choice. Whether they deserve it or not.”

  Cohen started to mutter about “useless lupin,” and Kai snarled.

  “Call your coven,” I said. “I won’t do this until they’re all here.” I glanced at the men behind him, who still had guns raised at us. “And get rid of the weapons. No one gets their magic back while they hold a gun.”

  Cohen looked like he wanted to argue, but in the end, he gave the order and made the call.

  For the next hour, he waited with his men, and Kai and I stood with ours. Silas and Presley returned with the team they’d intercepted. Several were bleeding and limping. Cohen ranted and threatened to retaliate, but I knew he was bluffing.

  He wanted his magic, and he’d do anything to get it. Even stop trying to kill me for five seconds.

  Finally, the rest of the coven began to arrive.

  Cohen drifted closer again, and I concentrated on where his feet landed. He had to cross the boundary line. Without that violation, the banishment wouldn’t work.

  “You think you’re here to beat us,” a voice called out from our side, “but you’re still going to lose at the end of the day.”

  I turned and found Warren near the front lines. His bruises had mostly healed, but his animosity toward Cohen remained unchanged. His lip curled at the sight of the coven leader, and they both took a step closer to one another.

  My pulse sped.

  This was it.

  The distraction we needed.

  Cohen smiled smugly back at him. “Here we are again, old man. Feels a bit familiar, doesn’t it?”

  Warren tensed, and for a moment, I worried he’d do something rash, but he remained perfectly still. Perfectly in control as he told Cohen, “Not so familiar for us. But it does speak to your competency that it’s been two decades and you still haven’t destroyed us like you wanted to.”

  “Who says I haven’t?” Cohen shot back. “How is forced retirement, Warren? Treating you well? Or is it more like two fists to the face?”

  Cohen’s eyes gleamed, and Warren’s hands fisted.

  I stared, trying to figure out how Cohen had known about the fight in the first place.

  “You’ll know the answer to that soon enough,” Warren told him.

  Cohen didn’t react to the insult. Instead, he looked at me. “Speaking of fists to the face, I trust your mother is well then.”

  I ignored his comment and glanced at the crowd of hexerei that had assembled behind him. “Is the entire coven here?”

  “They are,” he said.

  I frowned. So far, I hadn’t seen Kel, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t here. For all I knew, he’d kept her at the back out of distrust. Or because he was planning something against us.

  “Tell them to come closer,” I said and waited while they gathered around. Most looked dubiously at where Cohen stood so close to the line that divided our lands.

  “What are we doing here?” someone asked, and I could see their uneasiness at being drawn into some kind of fight.

  “I’ve asked you to come so I can return what belongs to you,” I said, and a hush fell over the crowd. Eager eyes stared back at me. “I made a vow to help you get your magic back, and today is the day I keep that vow.”

  Cohen snorted, but I ignored him.

  “Cohen will use his magic to cause harm,” I went on. “And he’s going to order you to do the same. But I’ve learned something about being a hexerei. And it involves a vow of your own.” I searched the faces as I said, “To wield magic is to swear an oath to the elements. To Mother Nature herself. To do no harm unless harm is inflicted upon you. All I ask is that you remember that vow today. And that you leave here in peace with your birthright. If you don’t…” I pinned Cohen and each of his men with a cold stare. “The war that your coven leader started two decades ago will be won on this very land. Blood will spill. And loved ones will be lost.”

  Some of the stares turned to the already-wounded hexerei Presley and Silas stood guard over.

  “I don’t want that for any of us,” I said, “But it’s up to you.”

  “We came here for our magic,” Cohen said. “Not a lecture from a lupin about how to use it.”

  “I’m just as much hexerei as you are,” I told him. “Or did you forget?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “The ritual circle is there,” I said, pointing.

  Some of the hexerei started toward it, but Kai held up a hand.

  “Before you cross, you’ll lay your weapons aside,” Kai said. “And you agree to be searched—just to be sure.” He looked at Cohen. “Starting with you.”

  “I’m not carrying,” Cohen scoffed.

  “No, but your men are.”

  Cohen grinned and then turned and signaled his men. I watched as they set the weapons on the ground and came forward.

  “Satisfied?” Cohen asked.

  “We’re supposed to believe that’s it?” Kai snorted. “That’s never it with you.”

  “I don’t need to do anything else,” Cohen said. His gaze flicked to me and, over my shoulder, to where my mother stood inside the circle of guards. “You’ve already brought the suffering on yourself.”

  Asshole.

  “If anyone’s suffered here, it’s at your hands.”

  Kel strode up, pulling her hood back to reveal a face covered in fresh bruises. “You’re going to pay for all of this,” she told him.

  “What happened?” I asked her.

  She shrugged me off. “What do you think?”

  I noted the way her own people stared at the damage on her face. They whispered to one another, and a few even took a step farther away from their coven leader. Not that he noticed.

  “Do you intend to keep your word this time, or will you let your own mother die just to thwart me?”

  Cohen’s words had me swinging my attention back to him. And how much I wished we could, in fact, kill him instead of this elaborate ruse.

  “I’ll give your magic back,” I said, “But first, I need something from you.”

  “And what is that?” Cohen asked.

  “A vow,” I said, understanding now more than ever how much wording mattered. “Swear in blood that you will never return to our pack lands after the transfer is complete,” I said. “Do this, and you can have your magic.”

  “Fine,” Cohen said flippantly. “I can just as easily destroy you from my side of the line as I can from yours.”

  Kai growled and started forward.

  I put out a hand to stop him.

  “Then you’ll have no problem swearing the oath,” I said.

  Cohen’s eyes glittered as he nodded. “All right. You may have your oath. But it will be this: Eighty-seven hexerei will step over this line and eighty-seven hexerei will leave. You may not harm us when we are at our most vulnerable. If any harm comes to us and our numbers are diminished by even one, when we leave, you will suffer times thirty.”

  Kai and I exchanged a look.

  “The same goes for you,” I said. “If any of ours are harmed—”

  “Yes, fine, thirty of ours will die,” Cohen snapped.

  I nodded. “Done.”

  “Bring my dagger,” Cohen called.

  One of the men stepped forward, and my breath caught as I recognized him. Merle. The one who had kidnapped me. The one who had put me in a cage. He handed Cohen the dagger, his hex tattoo flashing as he turned and reclaimed his place at Cohen’s flank.

  “All cross this line, and all must return. If one is lost, ten and twenty shall burn.” Cohen held the blade against his palm and sliced his skin, drawing blood. He cupped his palm to keep from spilling the crimson liquid and handed me the dagger.

  Holding the tip of the blade to my palm, I said, “No lives lost, to those who stand or any who cross, should this vow be broken, thirty for one shall be lost.”

  Then I scraped the blade over my palm until blood began to pool. I looked up at Cohen, adding, “Our treaty is made and the boundary lines will hold uncrossable by one another after this day—and forever.”

  “So agreed,” Cohen said.

  “Now, we seal it.”

  Sworn in blood,” he said, holding out his hand.

  I took it and shook, our blood joining. “Sworn in blood,” I murmured.

  Cohen dropped his hand. “Are we doing this?”

  “Kai,” I said, “the necklace.”

  From inside his pocket, Kai produced a necklace. Cohen’s eyes widened, and his smug smile slipped as he caught sight of the pendant hanging from the silver chain; a white moonstone carved into the shape of a crescent moon. The hexerei around him gasped and murmured to one another.

  “Silence,” Cohen commanded.

  I took the necklace from Kai, careful not to touch the pendant itself.

  “This is why you’ve come,” I said, holding it up for all to see.

  “That thing was destroyed,” Merle said. He glared at the necklace as if it alone were the traitor here.

  “It has been reborn,” I said, “and imbued with your magic.”

  The man looked unconvinced. But I didn’t need him. I only needed Cohen. And he looked at the necklace with unbridled hunger.

  “Here,” I said. “Come forward and take it.”

  I backed away, forcing Cohen to take the final step across the boundary. Warren had already brought him most of the way earlier, but now, with his eyes fastened on the necklace, he didn’t even notice what he’d done.

  I hadn’t been sure that Cohen’s need for magic would blind him to my trick, but watching him now, it was obvious he saw nothing except the pendant—the answer to all his problems—swaying before him. Like a moth to a flame, he followed me over the line, and his coven did the same.

  Inside the safety of the circle I’d cast, I stopped and waited for them to join me.

  When Cohen reached for the pendant, I let him have it.

  His hand closed over the stone, and power crackled.

  His face contorted as the magic hit him full force. He rocked backward, barely managing to remain upright, and I watched as his expression revealed how much he fought against what was happening inside him.

  The tattoo just barely visible where it peeked over the collar of his shirt began to glow and then fade until no ink remained. Cohen gasped, coughing until he vomited.

  The others backed away, looking ready to bolt.

  “You have nothing to be afraid of,” I called to them. “Cohen has been stripped of his coven mark. He is no longer a part of the Archer coven. The necklace was spelled for him alone, and now its power is truly gone.”

  They all stared at Cohen, who was struggling to his feet, clearly weakened and sick.

  “The magic you all came to re-claim is inside me, and I stand by my promise to return it to you now. Everyone except Cohen.”

  One by one, they all turned away from their former leader and looked at me.

  But Cohen’s expression twisted in rage as he straightened to face me. “You bitch,” he seethed. “You swore in blood. Another vow broken, and now you risk the lives of your pack.”