Alpha Asher by Jane

Chapter 212 

We left that day for the safe haven, not bothering to pack or say goodbye to our families. 

It didn’t matter that I was on the verge of passing out, not when the place we promised would remain safe had been attacked. There was no more time to wait. I needed to use my magic to protect them, and I needed to do it now. 

Asher gave me enough of his blood to keep me standing up right. The only pit stop we made before peeling out of town was to pick up Tristan and Giovanni. Now that the sun was finally setting, they could safely leave the house. 

I cried out with relief when Giovanni  passed two blood bags into my hands and  quickly tore into them. It wasn’t nearly  enough, but it would have to be. 

We were just under a mile away and already I could tell something had happened. Smoke lingered in the air, crisp and heavy like someone had started a very large bonfire. Even coasting down the main road, the gouges in the forest were visible. Trees were knocked down  and bushes trampled into the dirt. It looked like a pack of very large beasts had charged through at full force. 

I wasn’t at all prepared for what I saw  when we arrived. 

There wasn’t a single part of me that thought the safe haven would survive an attack without any damage, but beyond all reasonable belief, I had clung to the hope that the damage would be minimal. 

We rolled down the main road intersecting the town slowly, giving me plenty of time to scour every single shred of damage the witches had done. 

From the number of houses that had scorch marks licking up the sides, it was clear Ember had been here. 

So many of them were crumbling, halfway torn down with families hiding inside, clinging to the shadows as the last hints of sunlight faded. 

It grew worse as we neared the center, so  much worse. 

Bodies were lined in neat rows, covered in white sheets stained grey with ash. There weren’t many, perhaps only a dozen, but it didn’t matter. Those twelve carried the same weight as a hundred as a thousand, would. 

The sidewalks and street were streaked  with black marks, kissed by Ember’s  flame as she pillaged the town. Cars were turned over, some halfway crumpled and smoking. The stench of burnt motor oil hung in the air, mixing with the scent of  death. 

Tristan cursed, and Giovanni made a  sound of agreement. 

“Fuck, my mother and father are here.” 

I craned my head to stare at him in the 

back seat. If we weren’t surrounded by so much carnage and death, I might’ve  laughed at how absurd he looked  crammed in the backseat with Giovanni. 

“Is that a bad thing?” I asked.  Giovanni snorted. “If you think Tristan is  unpleasant, wait until you meet his  mother.” 

I glanced at Tristan, waiting for him to snap or explode on Giovanni, but instead he actually nodded in agreement. 

There was nothing to say that would ease their discomfort. In truth, I wasn’t too worried about Tristan’s family or what opinions his mother would have. Seeing  what happened here with my own eyes, it outweighed everything else. 

Asher’s hand grazed my own, his fingers sliding in between mine. I glanced away from the carnage and into his eyes, not realizing how close I was to plummeting until I felt his presence glide down the mate-bond and into my troubled mind. 

‘It doesn’t matter how many times they destroy this place. We will rebuild.’ He promised, his eyes severe and set in  stone. 

More than anything, I wanted it to be enough, but it wasn’t. 

come to a stop. The slam of car doors. was

brown curls flitted

into Giovanni’s  arms. She tangled her fingers in his hair and

to approach. I imagine we all had the same expression on

to the  community center that served as a sort of Town Hall. Children clutching ash stained stuffed

the safe haven we’ve heard so  much about?” A refined and almost

between the two of them. Tristan made a sound low in his

said as a warning

the woman with soft blonde hair and an  upturned

a single curl on her head that was out of  place. Clearly she’d gotten here long after the fight

festering pool that I did not have

the obliviousness in her voice as flimsy as her

barely spared her a

cleared his throat. “Considering you’re on her land, why don’t you show some goddamn

baritone, I tuned out everything else. Tristan’s mother’s reply was shrill and fell on deaf ears. One after another, emotions impaled me in the chest. The longer I assessed the damages, the more I realized how long it would take to restore this place to

work reduced to rubble in  the

her bird chest. Her voice lowered to a whisper that wasn’t nearly quiet enough to be an actual whisper. “Think about your sister for Goddess

Asher through mind-link, feeling him stiffen

woman said was  meaningless, and empty words were not worth

the  same facial features as Tristan. His hair  was much darker, but his deep-set eyes, angular nose, and pouty lips were identical. The little girl was the spitting image of Tristan’s mother, only younger

flitted from person to person, he was observing everything carefully. They clung to my face the most, and I

They didn’t have to invite you here, and you didn’t have to come. It wasn’t like this

oblivious or had a talent for ignoring the things she found unimportant, because she didn’t seem to notice

sound apart from her nasal whine faded into white noise, crackling in my ears like the vicious flames that had eaten through over half of the houses here. The rough asphalt beneath my feet vanished,

in time, an observer to  the damage and death the witches had  caused, all with Tristan’s mother  bleating

her lips at her son. “Not very safe, is it? What a pity. I was so hoping we could live here, but I won’t risk your  sister’s life when it’s clear this

he wasn’t looking at

“Lucinda.” 1 

assumed was Tristan’s  father approached. His hand was on his  wife’s shoulder, but he wasn’t

calm down. The  shadows are reacting to your stress…’

voice trickled down the mind  link, but it was faint, muffled by white noise like everything

attention, it  seemed darker than normal. Many of the streetlights were destroyed, but

million little eyes hit my skin one-by-one.

there they were. There were thousands of them, perhaps even more. Within every nook and cranny, crawling over every piece of this earth that the moonlight failed to reach, the shadows writhed. They crawled beneath

slithered across the  ground and circled around my feet, whispering sweet words of vengeance and

tongue is not one of them.” Tristan’s father said in  a calm voice, one without the disdain and malice his

scowled at her

tirelessly on this place. No one cares about it more than we do. Seeing it like this is not

ice. Her lips twisted and puckered, deepening the

few tendrils of shadow got too close for her liking. “Honestly, your father couldn’t control those things

cracked as my  head snapped in