A/N: Hello lovely readers...bodyandsoul here, and I apologize for the 4 day delay, but for the amount of money I hemorrage away on tuition, school has to come first. :S Anyways, here's the chapter of our little story, and even though we forecasted 10 chapters for this one, we're planning on a little epilogue for your reading pleasure, and we hope to resume this story under a new title sometime in May. I apologize for the long delay between stories, but life is a bitch on occasion. You guys have been absolutely fantastic and it's because of your amazing confidence in us that we embarked on this second story and are planning on a third. Thank you, so much, from both of us. :) And without further ado, please enjoy...

Disclaimer: We are not Kelley Armstrong, we do not own the rights to Darkest Powers and we make no money from this.

Derek must have been more exhausted from the Change than I had thought; I don't know how he had missed Mark's presence in the woods. As if sensing my moment of panic, Mark's grip on my shoulder tightened painfully and he pulled a switchblade from his pocket, the wicked blade unsheathing with a muted hiss. I couldn't muffle my gasp as he pressed it between my shoulder blades; he was really wound up, and his unnatural enjoyment had him pushing a little too hard, so that I felt a trickle of blood run down my back.

"Mark," Derek snarled, instantly switching into fight mode. I knew when he caught the scent of my blood; his eyes went feral and I could see him struggle not to throw himself at Mark in fury.

"I'm ok," I whispered, knowing he could hear me. The last thing I wanted was for him to get hurt because he didn't have his head in the fight. His eyes flicked towards me, just enough to let me know he had heard, and that he was fully in control.

"Derek," Mark replied, keeping me as a shield, dragging me with him as Derek started circling him. He sounded distracted, his already-disturbed mind further fractured by having to keep track of Derek and I at the same time. "Why are you naked?"

Wow. Despite the tenseness of the situation, I rolled my eyes. Captain of the obvious here…

"Let Chloe go and we'll deal," Derek said, maintaining eye contact with Mark as he subtly drew the circle tighter, bringing him nearly close enough to grab me.

I shuffled around with Mark at my back, analyzing my options. Derek was physically drained from the Change; they came a little easier now, but as his smooth stride stumbled, it was obvious to both Mark and I that he was in no shape to engage in a full on fight. Plus, Mark was obviously deranged; crazy people can often exhibit an almost superhuman strength, which would so not be good right now. I knew that if there was any way to get me away from Mark, Derek would prefer a flight response as opposed to a fight right now. Frankly, I was in the mood to run for my life; watching my boyfriend get injured or – I shuddered – killed in front of me wasn't really high on my interest list. And I knew for sure that Derek felt the same way.

Suddenly realizing Derek was trying to get within snatching range, Mark yanked me back; we both stumbled back several steps and I whimpered when I felt the knife sink a little deeper into my back. It occurred to me that if Mark fell and dragged me with him, I was done for.

Shit.

Panicked, I sought Derek's eyes. Oh God, this was killing him. Every single wolf instinct must have been screaming bloody murder for him to fight, to annihilate the threat to his mate, but his brain was competing, trying to keep his reason in charge. I took myself firmly in hand; if I showed distress, it would just make it that much harder for him. I could manipulate souls and re-animate the dead, I wasn't helpless, even though I had to choke back a scream when Mark adjusted his grip, jostling the sharp tip of the knife in the shallow cut it had already made.

"No, no, Derek," Mark singsonged, laughing disturbingly as he made sure I blocked as much of him as possible. Oh yeah, because Derek might have a concealed weapon somewhere on his naked body. But considering what the guy had done to Mark's brother, I could see why Mark wanted to protect himself. Not that I was okay with him using me as a shield, mind you. "We're not negotiating a goddamned thing."

"So what's this about?" I asked.

His hot breath whooshed by my ear as he laughed again. I was really hating his laugh; it reminded me of Heath Ledger's Joker…at any moment I was expecting him to ask if I wanted to see a magic trick. I had to suppress a shudder.

"Oh, she speaks," he chuckled. "Well, Chloe – what a perfect name for you, all innocent and shit – Derek here killed my brother. I don't know about you, but I loved my brother, so I think it's only fair, one dead loved one for me, one dead loved one for Derek."

"B-but Derek didn't kill your brother."

Mark snarled in my ear. "He was a fucking cripple afterwards, killed himself after six months. Derek didn't pull the trigger, but he might as well have."

I forced the fear aside, trying a last ditch effort to reason with this wacko. "Mark, you know Derek won't let you get away with killing me, right?"

"Oh, I know." He leaned down and rubbed his cheek against mine, grinning when Derek barely checked a lunge towards us. "I'll just join my brother then, but Derek…well, Derek will have to live with being the cause of not just my brother's death, but yours, too."

Derek's face closed off even more, looking like it had been carved from stone. "I'll die myself before I let you hurt her."

Mark licked the side of my face. I grimaced and jerked in his hold, trying to keep my face away from him. But then I realized his grip had altered, and the hand with the knife had drawn back. Shit. He was trying to distract Derek with my distress so he could stab me.

Fortunately, Derek's years of martial arts training were more attuned to Mark's arm moving than to my frown. I wrenched hard to one side as he sprang at Mark, tackling him neatly as I rolled and regained my feet in a smooth move.

"Derek!" All I could think about was the knife.

"I'm ok," he grunted, struggling to hold Mark's arms outstretched. "My cell- oomph!"

Mark head-butted him in the stomach and they went rolling. This felt like the fight with Liam; I couldn't even get a knife in there because I might stab the wrong person. With human weapons useless, I knelt next to a tree and – even though I felt like I was abandoning Derek – closed my eyes as I summoned.

As always, my power was a delicious yet terrifying rush through my body, but the ever-present anxiety dampened it, helped me control it. Just as I was about to reach out with it, Derek made a horrible gurgling sound and I saw him spasm as blood sprayed.

"Derek!" I screamed, but caught in the half-trance of drawing power, instead of using my physical body to run towards him, I accidentally channeled the full fury of my power towards the struggling bodies on the mossy forest floor. Protecting Derek became the sole focus of my world, and my mind blanked, acting on instinct. I felt the sick pulse of Mark's soul within reach and with a cry of pure rage, I seized it, my power almost visible as I tore it free from its mortal body and slammed it through to the afterlife.

The sudden quiet was stark, broken only by the hitch of my breathing as I opened my eyes to see Derek half-draped over Mark's motionless body.

"Derek. Derek!" I scrambled over to them, skinning my hands in my hurry to get to Derek.

"Chloe," he coughed, wincing as he pushed himself shakily up to his knees. "I'm ok. I'm ok."

He gasped with pain as I threw myself into his arms, frantically running my hands over him. "You're hurt, you're bleeding."

"Shh." He caught my hands in one of his, the other tilted my chin up to look at him. "It's just a flesh wound, ok? Are you alright?"

I just stared into his eyes, unbelievably relieved. "Uh, yeah, I think so." I twisted my head around, trying to see the wound on my back. "I don't think it's bleeding anymore."

When I turned my head back, I realized we were sort of kneeling on Mark's corpse and I shuddered when I looked down into his clouding eyes. I knew they were going to haunt me.

Derek boosted himself to his feet with a grumble for the slice on his ribs, stepped over the body with complete disregard for it and pulled me to him, wrapping his body around mine as his palms chafed my arms. "Don't look at him, Chloe. He's not worth it."

The shakes started, in both of us, but I didn't look away from Mark. "I ripped his soul out."

"What?" Derek pulled back a little; my words had been muffled by his chest.

"I killed him."

He started to shake his head, probably ready to tell me that he'd crushed Mark's windpipe or something, but I knew better. That soul had been fully alive when I'd gotten to it. "Derek, don't. I didn't know that was possible, but somehow I took a living soul out of a living body."

He pulled me tight against him again. "He was going to kill you, Chloe. Remember our promise?"

After escaping from the Edison Group, after killing Davidoff through Diane Enright, Kit had talked to us about guilt. He'd explained that there would be times where we'd have to kill in self-defense, and made us promise that when that happened, that we wouldn't torment ourselves with guilt. That promise was ok in theory, but faced with my handiwork in the form of an emotionally disturbed teen, dead by my will, I knew I'd be waking up screaming more than once in the coming nights.

"I know," I whispered, leaning into Derek's chest. "I know."

I won't go into it further, but suffice it to say that we were getting disturbingly skilled at disposing of dead bodies. Finally, filthy and exhausted, we hunted up Derek's clothes and all but fell into the car. I left the requisite phone call to Kit up to Derek and focused on getting us back to my condo, my hands clenched on the wheel the whole way. Paying attention to the road seemed unimportant, but I forced myself.

Kit was understandably upset, but after assuring him for the sixth time that we were fine, he finally agreed that we were allowed to crash at my place for the night, and that we'd get together to discuss things in the morning. I think he sensed that we – I – needed some time to regroup before facing more questions. I silently thanked him for it.

Fortunately we'd managed to cover bloodstains with clothes and strategically held arms, and no one noticed anything as we boarded the elevator and headed up.

Once inside, we stripped in silence, putting everything into a bag that we would burn tomorrow. I held out a hand, waiting until Derek closed his around it before leading the way to the bathroom. Derek got the water going, hot enough to fill the room with steam while I got towels ready. Finally, we stepped under the pulsing spray and just stood silently, wrapped in each other's arms under the water as it washed blood down the drain. If only memories could be wiped clean so easily…