Unleash The Moon (The Preternaturals Book 6) (27 page)

Z slumped over Fiona, and it was done.

Tam turned toward the shaking, skinny guy whose
magic had been bound. “You are going back to the hub city. You get
to live. You’re welcome. You will tell them that we will not
negotiate with them. If we see them near our borders, we will kill
them. We have access to all the demons in the demon dimension. We
will not be defeated any further. They will leave us alone, and we
will leave them alone. They can’t have everything. They can’t have
everyone. They most certainly can’t have us. Do you
understand?”

“
Y-y-yes.” The guy stumbled back
when she released the energetic band that held him
captive.

It was hard to believe he was a magic user. He
seemed new, far too new to have been sent on this mission. He
wasn’t foolish enough to try to use his powers now, not while so
outnumbered with the bodies of his associates at his feet.

“
Do you think he’ll make it back?”
Noah asked as the lone survivor scrambled off the way they’d
arrived.

“
I’ll send Henry to find out
later.”

“
What about the bodies?” Sydney
said. They couldn’t just leave them there. Fiona and Z should be
buried properly.

“
I’ll take care of it tomorrow
after I’ve rested,” Tam said. “We’ll have a memorial service for
the witch and the panther.”

“
Do you remember them from when
you were a pup?” Sydney whispered.

“
Bits and pieces,” Noah said. “She
made good grilled cheese.” He started to lead Sydney back toward
town.

Anthony approached the two of them, wiping blood off
his face and trying not to look like a total sociopath while he did
it. He side-hugged Sydney and kissed her on the cheek. “Come see
your mother tomorrow, okay? I’m sure she’ll be back to normal in a
few days, but you should come by.”

“
Okay.”

He looked over at Noah, his face going dark. “If you
ever hurt her…”

“
Oh my God, dad. Noah won’t ever
hurt me.”

Anthony dragged his finger across his own throat,
his eyes cold and dead as he continued to threaten her mate. “I
will put your head on a pike if you do, boy.” Then before either of
them could respond, he disappeared into the woods.

Cole and Jane fell into step beside them. Jane
looked perfect as ever. It was hard to tell if she’d been injured
and had already healed, or if she was covering injuries with a
demon glamour. Cole had a gash in his side that still sparked with
magic but was slowly closing. It might have killed him if he wasn’t
fully immortal like Jane.

Cole clapped Noah on the back. “You need electrical
and Internet at your place?”

“
Yeah,” Noah said. It was still
awkward between the two of them. The time and distance would take a
while to close. “And running water would be nice, but it’s not
necessary.”

“
Speak for yourself,” Sydney said.
“I’m not pooping in the woods.”

Cole winked at her. “We can’t let the princess poop
in the woods.”

Jane shot Sydney a look that
said,
I told you he’d come around.

It was only then that Sydney realized their pack
wasn’t there. And neither was Cole’s.

“
Where are the wolves?”

“
We voted after you left with
Fiona. We didn’t want to risk them or anyone we couldn’t protect.
It’s why we brought the demons in,” Jane said. “We didn’t want to
give the humans the satisfaction of casualties.”

That plan had almost worked.

Jane and Cole left them and went back toward the
hive. The entire group was going off in their own directions.
Sydney wondered if once the wards were up they’d ever have the
bonds they’d had so many years ago before all this.

They’d won. She should feel happy, but all she felt
was tired. And it was still hours until the sun would rise.

Noah tugged on her hand. “Come on, Sydney. The world
just changed. We’re free.”

Epilogue

A year later.

Noah sat at a long table on the roof of the
penthouse next to his mate. The Cary Town Luxury Apartments were
fully redone—almost back to their glory days from decades earlier.
The pool had water. The elevators worked. And they’d managed to
restore the cherry wood paneling in the lobby and hallways, much to
Sydney’s delight.

That had been Anthony’s project. Who knew the
vampire was so attached to paneling? Though perhaps it had been an
excuse to spend time with his daughter to build a relationship that
wasn’t based on keeping her under lock and key.

Jane and Greta were conspiring near the pool—Greta
in her cat form and Jane mimicking it. They meowed at each other
even though Noah was pretty sure Jane didn’t speak Catonese. Dayne
was on the other end of the roof speaking with Luc and Anna,
unaware that Cole’s mate was about to try to fool him with her
shapeshifting disguise.

Anthony stood next to the grill making burgers and
grumbling loudly about it.

“
Make mine rare,” Noah
said.

The vampire king wrinkled his nose at the meat as he
flipped it. Charlee brought out more meat patties, and he growled.
He didn’t do menial labor, and losing his former position as Master
of All He Surveyed, wasn’t sitting well. But there was no longer
any excuse he could give for why he had to be such a control
freak.

After Tam had made sure the new borders and wards
were secure—with several layers of magical security redundancy—Cole
had come in and added his own brand of high-tech security to the
mix.

As rumors spread, therians and vampires without a
home began to seek refuge again in Cary Town. Cain brought gold
he’d been hoarding in a cave in his dimension to create commerce as
the city began to grow and flourish again.

At Noah’s suggestion, a large tree house was built
in the place of a previous park, standing as a memorial to Fiona
and Z.

Cary Town was not without its logistical problems in
the absence of a human population. To deal with the lack of humans
to feed from, therians who were given shelter in the city were
required to donate their blood to a vampire.

Therians weren’t thrilled, but there was so much
wildlife in the Cary Town forest and so much protection in the city
itself, that becoming a vampire meal seemed better than the life
they’d left behind.

Tam’s message had indeed been delivered by the
scrawny guy, and no one from the hub city—let alone an army—dared
venture near their borders. It didn’t mean they never would, but
for now there was peace.

It was full dark, and the whole gang was on the roof
now. With the new wards and their city returning to life, they’d
all come back together—for the first time feeling as if they were
all on the same side. Even Hadrian, the vampire from the church,
had joined them. His shy mate, Angeline, clung close to him.

The stories of the past were still told about this
spat or that one, about one of them torturing or trying to kill
another of them, about being on opposite teams, and about being on
the same team only for expediency. They’d each been the heroes of
their own stories and the villains of others. But for the first
time, they were all truly united. Somehow along the way they’d
found friends. They’d found family. And most importantly, they’d
found love.

About the Author

Learn more about my other books at:
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Unleash The Moon
is the 6
^th
and final book in
The Preternaturals
series. Watch out next
for my upcoming dark paranormal serial in Spring 2015.

Full List of Books in
The
Preternaturals
series:

Book 1: Blood Lust

Book 2: Save My Soul

Book 3: The Catalyst

Book 4: Life Cycle

Book 5: Forbidden

Book 6: Unleash The Moon

Thank you so much for supporting my
work!

Acknowledgments:

Cover Art: Robin Ludwig at
gobookcoverdesign.com (I think this is my favorite cover design so
far! I said this exact thing about the last cover, but I really
mean it this time. She’s gotten so good I’m going to make her redo
my earlier covers. Robin, I’m just kidding, don’t read this! Look
over there! A puppy!)

Digital Formatting and moral support: Tom (I
love you more than Starbucks.)

Editorial Assistance: Karen and Michelle.
Thanks for getting it back to me so quickly. And Karen thanks also
for helping brainstorm with me for the title! Without you I would
have yet another title (I’ve got two between two pen names) that
had the word “Blood” in it.