18.
Skirt in my hands, I wade up the lane to my home. I look over my shoulder every other second, feeling eyes on me. But I see no one.
I move quicker, until I see Marigold at my door, waiting for me.
My expression switches from one of paranoia to apology. I have not yet made what she needs, and tonight is the full moon.
“Marigold,” I start. “I have been so busy with the demands of the Priest, that I have yet to acquire all the ingredients I need.”
Disappointment thins her lips and her hands tighten on a folded cloth in her grip.
“Could you manage another month?”
Her eyes are downcast as she says, “Please, I can wait for as long as it takes. I do not expect to be your only patron or concern, Ella. My gratitude to you is eternal.”
I give her a brisk nod. “Priest Peter has the supply of wolfsbane,” I tell her. “Use it before the sun falls.”
It’s all I can manage to say to her, the only words I can string together as I face her sorrow. Before me, she stands like a doll. The sort that rich children carry with them. Glass-eyes, fragile, and so easily broken.
Marigold is broken.
Her husband saw to that long ago, and recently—I see her cracks in front of me. Only, the cracks come in purple marks that disappear under the frilled neck of her dress, and the over-drawn rim of her hat.
I run my gaze over the blotches of purple and blue. “He is doing it again, isn’t he?” I whisper, my voice almost carried away in the stabs of air that pass us by.
Colour drains from her face and gathers at her marked throat. She looks away, my words too much for her to bear.
Is it not vile that she carries the shame that her husband should wear?
“Did you come for the brew?” I ask. “Or for something you are too afraid to ask for, Marigold?”
Still, she won’t look at me. Her averted face confirms all—she wants moss-salve to spread over her bruises, my own concoction to steal away all those marks within the day. But I offer her something greater.
From my coat pocket, I slip out a purple phial. It is wolfsbane, one of the two I keep on my person at all times, even before my discovery of the wolf’s identity.
I part with the phial and hand it to her. “Wolfsbane,” I say. “Have your husband smear it on the door, then wash his hands after. He must be the one to do this, Marigold. Calloused hands are far better for this particular brew.”
Wearing a frown on her face, she takes it with hesitation. Still, she takes it all the same and pockets it. The wrinkles at the corners of her eyes give away her mistrust, but she does not question me.
“It’s a special brew,” I tell her. “A strong one that I had planned to use for myself. I want you to have it.” A soft smile comes to my face and I rest my hands on hers. “After your husband has washed his hands, he might feel somewhat light-headed. Let him rest the night away. Be safe.”
“Thank you, Ella.” Her voice is a hushed tone loaded with dismay. She hoped for my salves and brews to steal away her bruises. She does not yet realise that I have offered her something far grander than remedies.
I offered her the cure.
The death of her husband shall be dismissed as an accident, a drunken moron too proud to wear gloves or use a brush. No one will mourn his death. Marigold will never speak of my deceit. And I will gladly dance on the monster’s grave … If I am fortunate enough to out-live him.
Marigold sweeps down the lane, head bowed, and her shoulders hunched over.
I turn to my door, the promise of warmth and seclusion embracing me too soon.
Before I can go through the door, the rapid slam of footsteps rushes up the lane at me. I look over my shoulder and sigh a quiet sound of despair.
Johan, the hay stacker, runs up to me.
Orange hair a tousled mess, he staggers to a stop and blinks his green eyes wide. In his gloved hand, a blue phial of wolfsbane is grasped, and on the corner of his freckled lips is a smudge of jam.
“Red,” he wheezes, short on breath. “I hoped to catch you…”
He pauses to steady his breathing a moment.
Patiently, I wait, though inside I am itching to hide in my home away from the ordinaries.
“I wondered,” he says, “do you have the paste for teeth yet?”
“I have not had the time, Johan, and I am afraid I can offer none of what you need.”
“Not even the green paste for my son’s pimpled face?”
I shake my head.
“What about that sweet soap my wife likes … the one with the nuts in it? She’s down to a crumb of the last bar.”
Grim-faced, I shake my head again. “My stores are low this moon.”
Johan curses under his breath and kicks the snow. Then, he gives me a look of fading hope that flickers under my stony stare. “Is…About that, uh, the lotion…for my rash…you know where…”
“I am sorry, Johan. I will work on your order after the full moon. Given the state of things of late, I simply haven’t had the time to work on anything other than wolfsbane.” I look at the phial in his hand and add, “I’m sure you can understand such changes in priority.”
A scowl twists his face. He aims the expression over my shoulder as if to suggest his grievances, but not to offend me so directly.
“Until next week, Johan,” I say.
He bows his orange-topped head and leaves.
At long last, I push through the door to my home.
Inside, I lean my shoulder on the door to shut it, then stay still a moment. My eyes droop shut as let the familiar warmth and isolation envelope me.
The moment is brief, for I know I must soon decide what to do about Colton.
How can I bargain with him, how can I ensure my safety?
An alliance could do the trick, but they are often built on a mutual benefit. There is little I can offer him in return, other than oils for his pained body and sore bones. It isn’t enough. Perhaps—
My muddled thoughts are torn from my head.
Someone is behind me.
My eyes snap open, but not quick enough. I am not quick enough.
I’m snatched backwards, to the hinges of the door. A chest presses against my back, and the cool bite of a knife against my throat holds me in place.
Someone holds me at knife-point, and if I am horridly honest … of all the ways my life could end, this is not one I had considered.
19.
The metallic scent wafts from the one behind me and sneaks up my nostrils. I smell his work on him.
Colton is the one behind me, the one to press the sharp edge of a knife to my neck.
Slowly, I trace my fingers up my dress and try to steady my breathing.
Be calm. Calmness clears the mind.
It is easy to tell myself, but not as easy to listen.
A storm descends on my mind and travels through my body to my now-shaking limbs. My breath shudders, my fingers quake. I reach for the phial of wolfsbane in my corset, careful to move slow.
“Colton,” I say, my voice betraying my fear, hot and raspy. Broken. “This is … this is silly, you know. I wouldn’t ever speak of it. I would never reveal your truth. We … We are the same, aren’t we? They don’t understand us.”
I pull out the phial from my corset and clasp it in my clammy hand.
The blade bites closer to my throat where it pinches my skin. Warmth drips from the pinch. Droplets, the colour of what they call me, roll down to my dress.
Then, my entire body is seized with a hardness, and I cannot move.
“Stupid lass,” a woman spits at my ear. “You think you are special, different from the ordinaries, but you are one.” Her voice lowers, grows deeper into a venomous hiss. “You are a mockery of the true witch.”
The blade is so tight on my skin that blood trickles down to my dress in a steady stream—it could soon become a river.
“Who are you?” My voice rattles harder than my hand around the phial. �
�What do you want from me?”
“For you to die, whore.”
The blade drags to the side. I cry out and throw myself back.
The woman behind me grunts and stumbles, enough that I escape the slice of the blade on my throat. I right myself and whirl around. Before I can lock my wild gaze on her, a gleam of metal cuts across my vision.
I stagger back.
My hand slaps to my cheek. The burst of pain is so blinding, I drop the phial. It rolls to the door, but care not…I care only about the gush of blood from my face. It rushes down my arm.
But I see her.
Savage eyes, black hair so dark it shimmers like coal embers.
“Catherine?”
She snarls as I speak her name. Then she lunges forward, slicing the blade out at me again.
I cry out and stumble back. The knife just misses me.
I hold out my free hand, breathing hard. “Wait! Stop this! Catherine…we’re the same! You and I should not fight—”
My words are cut off with another swipe of the blade.
I fall back, boots caught on the skirt of my dress. The ground pulls out from under me and I land, hard, on the floor.
Just as she lunges at me, I roll to the door. She hits the ground beside me, a mere touch away.
Panicked, I scramble to my feet. Before I can even turn for the door, the blade whips by me. It sinks into the wood. I make to grab it—
My forehead is cracked against the door. She holds my hair and throws me to the side, as though I weigh little more than a cloth.
Catherine’s strength is her tell—she has chanted to Mother for strength.
A solid table catches me. I grunt, hands and face smeared in blood…my own and from the table of butchered animals. Though blood leaks into my eyes, I see the jar before me. Empty, other than the water trapped inside of it.
I snatch the jar and spin around just as she charges at me.
The jar shatters the moment I bring it down on her head.
Catherine staggers. Her hand reaches for the cut at her hairline.
Leaning back against the table, I kick out at her—she lands on her back.
Before she can get up, I am racing for the rear door. I don’t look back. I run until I crash into the door so hard that all the air is punched from my insides. Never have I unbolted a door so fast in my life.
I swing it open as I hear her behind me—getting to her feet, grabbing the knife.
I lunge for the outside.
A solid wall blocks my way.
My breath catches and I look up from the brown leather wall before me, to a proud face and tousled auburn hair. His dirt-brown eyes harden as they rest on me, but a burst of panic is quick to brighten them.
Colton grabs me and shoves me inside. The force of his push sends me reeling to the back of the couch. I turn my wide eyes on him. But Colton looks not at me; he looks at Catherine—standing opposite him, bloody blade in her hand.
The savagery I’d seen in her eyes collapses to something else…
Shame.
“Mother,” Colton says, aghast. “You promised you wouldn’t.”
The savagery might be gone from her eyes, but her voice is slick with it; “I cannot let you do this, son! Not with one like her—a made witch.” She spits those words as though they poisoned her tongue. “She is a mockery of my kind, of your kind. There is no pure power in her ordinary body! I cannot abide this Colton.”
Cupping my bleeding cheek, I stare at the crazed woman. Even through the spiralling chaos in my head, I wonder not only why she is so fuelled by her disdain for my sub-witch status, but how on earth she got into my home!
As if reading my scattered thoughts, she turns her sneer on me. “A real witch would know the answer to both.”
Colton blinks and looks at me, as if fully grasping that I am here, that I am injured, that his mother tried to kill me.
Brown eyes swirl with the beginnings of a storm.
I swallow, hard. Some blood bitters the taste of my saliva.
Now, I will die by witch and wolf.
20.
Colton locks his eyes with mine.
Fear freezes me in place. A cage might as well be built around me, for my muscles don’t yearn to flee—I can only stand, trapped, and watch his gaze churn.
Blade tight in her grip, Catherine takes another step forward. “Let me finish what I came here to do. Let me remove her scent from your path, her temptation away from your mind. A true wolf should mate only with a true witch. You know this, Colton. You have battled with this knowledge and disgust, and you have lost.”
The throbbing agony in my cheek dulls to an ache. My dress is stained, cheek gushing still, and there is a gash on my neck above my collarbone. Yet, I hear her words as though they are my only pain.
You have lost.
Colton didn’t come to end me last night. He does not want to kill me. My presence has lured him in, so much so that he can’t deny his wolf’s yearning any longer. Tonight, he came here with the intention of biting me.
Colton’s plans for me are mateship.
Not if I have a say in the matter. And by Mother Nature, I do.
Quick as a rat, I jump over the back of the couch and race to the front door.
Colton’s boots slam heavy behind me; Catherine sprints to cut me off at the door. One hunter to bite me, the other to kill me.
But neither of them run for their lives—their freedom. So I am faster.
I dive to the floor.
Blood makes my hands slippery. Still, I grab the phial of wolfsbane and lift it up—aimed at Colton. He stops in tracks, a metre or so from where I sit. Catherine skids to a stop so abruptly, she collides with a stand-table. Panic lights up her crazed eyes.
We are all still.
No one moves. We only share a moment of harsh breaths, rushed thoughts, and tense stares.
Then Colton raises his hands, slowly. “I will not harm you, witch. Put down the phial.”
My chest heaves with each ragged breath I take. The door keeps me upright as I sit, and the weight of my already tired arm fights against me. “I have never said this to anyone before,” I tell him. “But fuck you.”
He flinches, so small a reaction that I would not have noticed it if my gaze wasn’t pasted to his face.
“Are you so intent on killing me when I pose no threat to you?” he snarls.
“Oh, but you do. You are as much a threat to me as your crazy mother is. She wants to kill me—but you…” I shake my head. “You want to steal from me. You want to steal my choice over my life, my body. Over my corpse is when that day comes.”
Colton tightens his lightly freckled jaw.
Catherine watches, the fury burning within her shaky limbs.
I cannot hold this phial for much longer. Blood must pour from my face; a weak dizziness seeps into me and the fog returns to cloud my mind.
Colton finally looks at me. “I swear I will not bite you,” he says. “I promise you here and now, no bites shall bind us until you consent to our mateship.”
Catherine growls. She must confuse herself for a wolf. “You have lost your mind!” Her hand slams down on the table, knocking off an unlit lantern from the blow. “A made witch? Mere days ago you swore of how you will never fall victim to her like he did! Colton, you will hear me, boy.”
He does. Her voice turned so dark that it demanded both our gazes.
She points the blade at him. “A made wolf and a made witch belong together. If you do not leave her to him, I will end her, whether you abide it or not. Mark those words, for they are truer than anything you feel for this whore.”
I shove through the wooziness that drifts over me and frown. A made wolf. One who they know. One who succumbed to me.
I flinch as Catherine pulls away from the table. She moves only a step or so, but the point of the blade is fixed on me now. Confidence soars within her as my hand lowers an inch, my arm drooping. She sees that I weaken.
Grandmother. I n
eed Grandmother. Her treatment, her presence. Lest I bleed out.
“What you feel for her,” says Catherine. “Made witch or not, it is not love. You stalk her in the woods, watch her in the Square because of her smell. A mere perfume from her gifted power. A trick, an illusion. Do not be fooled by tricks, son, for you are no fool.”
Dazed, I look at Colton.
He studies me with eyes that battle with his mother’s words. Instinct and logic are at war behind those eyes. Still, he considers my death, a part of him even wants it. I see that in his eyes.
Catherine sees it too.
A proud smirk slips over her lips and twists her cruel face. Her grip is tighter on the blade, confident, and she moves toward me.
Colton turns his cheek.
At first, I think he looks away to avoid watching my death, to grant his mother permission to end me. Then, I trace his gaze to the rear door.
The door is wide open, still. A man stands there, a dark silhouette of thick furs and coats. A man whose midnight eyes glitter from even afar.
My shriek rips through the house and tenses everyone. “Dante!”
Blood drips into my eyes but I blink it away. My hand drops to the floor, and not a second after, Dante has barged into the house and drawn his sword.
It happens so fast. All of it jumbles in my mind like scrambled eggs.
Across my home, I see a flash of yellow in Dante’s eyes—it’s gone before he whips off his cloak and the sword winks at me. Colton’s back is to me, but I see his fingernails—growing longer, darker, coarser. His growl is so deep it shudders the floorboards I slump on.
“Dante,” I urge, though my voice grows weaker. “He’s the wolf—”
Catherine flies at me.
She uses the distraction. I’m too weak to move, to jump from the path of the blade coming down at me. With a cry, I ram my fist up and shove the phial into her mouth. Then I kick out my feet—my boots smack into her stomach and send her reeling.
Catherine crashes into the table; they both collide to the floor. The shatter of the phial is unmistakable. It breaks in her mouth. It is the only sound I hear before her wails fill the house.
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