by RJ Blain
Silver Bullet
Witch & Wolf Book 4
RJ Blain
Silver Bullet
Witch & Wolf Book 4
by RJ Blain
Nothing was worse than waking up as a squirrel. Not knowing where she is, why she's a squirrel, and why she should be in Georgia comes a close second.
Vicky does know several important things. First, she's not supposed to be a squirrel. Second, two-legger males are intriguing creatures. Third, she likes one particular two-legger male more than the others, and she means to keep him.
Finding her true self is only the beginning. Vicky must hunt those who have taken her friends and ruined her hopes for the future so she can reclaim what is rightfully hers.
Finished with being a victim, Vicky will do everything in her power to put an end to Basin once and for all, even if it means she must make the ultimate sacrifice and bite a silver bullet for the sake of her family, her friends, and the rest of the supernatural world.
Copyright © 2017 by RJ Blain
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
For more information or to contact the author, please visit http://thesneakykittycritic.com.
Cover Design by Rebecca Frank (Bewitching Book Covers)
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Contents
Foreword
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
About the Author
Magical Romantic Comedies (with a body count)
From Witch & Wolf World
Other Stories by RJ Blain
Witch & Wolf World Reading Order
Foreword
It’s been a long road. The adventure began with Inquisitor, and it ends here—for now.
Next year, I will release the first book of a sequel trilogy entitled Wolf Hunt. Unlike the first four books of the Witch & Wolf main series, Wolf Hunt follows the story of one character. (Hint: While he’s not the main character, Desmond plays a rather substantial role in these stories.)
This trilogy, which I’ll release at a rate of one book a year, will be the end of the Witch & Wolf series. By the time the final title, The Edge of Midnight, releases, I’ll be finished with writing the other titles I’ve promised.
Karma and Jake’s story will conclude in License to Kill, and Sean and Andrea’s story will conclude in Dual Nature.
Dustin will be featured in several anthologies and a standalone novel, and I suspect, long after curtains have closed on the Witch & Wolf world, he’ll be making appearances in my newsletter for fans to enjoy.
I have a few more Richard and Nicolina short stories I wish to tell, and I have a few Jake and Karma stories waiting in the wings as well.
The short stories and novellas will be given to my newsletter subscribers before being released for publication.
Thank you for reading.
Chapter One
I missed Samantha. Samantha would’ve known what to do, what was going on, and why I was stuck in a tree.
She also would’ve known why I was a squirrel.
She had known a lot of things. There were only four things I knew for certain: my name was Vicky, I missed Samantha, I was supposed to be in Georgia, and I wasn’t supposed to be a squirrel.
I couldn’t remember the details, but with sickening certainty, I understood Samantha was gone and wouldn’t be coming back. The brand of her loss cut deep and left scars time hadn’t healed.
Digging my tiny little claws into the tree branch for a better hold, I chittered curses at the world.
A squirrel, a real one, stared at me before scampering down the tree and taking off through the forest. I found its fear of me amusing. Shaking my head, I struggled to focus my attention on the facts.
My name was Vicky, and I wasn’t supposed to be a squirrel.
Unfortunately, I had no idea what I was supposed to be, but a squirrel wasn’t it. I chittered my annoyance. The sound was wrong, and I didn’t even know what was wrong about it.
Knowing my name and having the knowledge I wasn’t supposed to be a squirrel didn’t do me any good. That left me with Georgia. I groped for scraps of memory but remembered nothing. I paced, twitching my bushy tail while regarding my surroundings with disdain.
Snow dusted the forest, and a cold wind rustled through my fur. I wrapped my tail around myself and shivered.
A single fact asserted itself: a chill wind blew in Georgia during the winter, but it didn’t often snow. Had I lived there once? The details slipped away. I clung to the bark eyeing the ground far below.
The real squirrel had made it look so easy. Another flurry of chitters burst out of me, a curse at myself for having gotten stuck in a tree, and another one for having forgotten everything of use—assuming I had known anything of use. Had I?
I really missed Samantha. She’d known everything.
The certainty she wouldn’t return hurt, and I wished I remembered why. She’d been important to me, and the wrongness of remembering nothing spurred me into skittering towards the tree trunk. A brisk, metallic scent filled the air, and my nose twitched. More snow drifted through the bare branches, blanketing my fur.
I shook it off, chattering complaints at the cold and the wet. The first squirrel had had the right idea. When in doubt, diving down the tree trunk and stopping before I smacked face first into the ground seemed wise.
I mastered the diving down part with flying colors. The stopping part gave me problems. I hooked my front claws into the tree bark, and they stuck far better than I expected. Failing to find purchase with my hind paws, I flipped and crashed onto the ground, landing on my back.
My breath whooshed out of me, and I twitched from the impact. Claw by claw, I freed myself from the bark. I rolled over with a low groan, shaking my head before staggering upright.
The real squirrel mocked me with its chittering cries. I bristled, turning my ears back.
My ears weren’t as mobile as I thought they should be. I wanted to pin them back, but they didn’t swivel much, which angered a wave of squeaks out of me. My tail didn’t do what I wanted, either. The fact it was so large and bushy pleased me, but I couldn’t figure out how to lash it from side to side, forcing me to settle with unsatisfying twitches.
Maybe my tail didn’t impress me all that much, but the other squirrel turned and ran up a nearby tree, cursing at me before it scrambled into a hole far above. For a moment, I was tempted to chase after it and test out my teeth on its scrawny neck.
Instead, I turned and scurried away in search of Georgia.
With no idea how to get to Georgia, I wandered, hoping for some clue to help me reach my destination. My scattered mem
ories gave me the impression Georgia lacked snow, and if I headed south, I’d escape from the cold.
I didn’t like the cold. Something about the snow, the frigid bite in the air, and the wind saddened me, filled me with longing and loneliness, and made me miss Samantha even more. No matter how often I thought about her, I couldn’t remember what had taken her from me.
Something—someone—else was missing from my memories, too, but unlike Samantha, I couldn’t remember who or why they were important to me. Unlike her, nothing substantial remained, although I had the impression he was a male—no, not just a male, but a man.
I understood the uses of a male, but the distinction between a male and a man puzzled me. I certainly didn’t want a male squirrel. I wasn’t supposed to be a squirrel, and I certainly wasn’t going to lower myself to bearing squirrel young. I shuddered at the thought.
Was a man a male of the appropriate species? If I discovered what a man was, would I learn more about myself? Was I searching for any man or a specific one?
I didn’t know, and it frustrated another storm of chitters out of me.
As though winter’s ire was stirred by my souring mood, the cold intensified, the skies darkened, and the snow fell harder. The wind whipped it into white clouds. Dismayed, I took shelter near the trunk of a tree. I clutched my tail in my paws and held it close, relying on it to keep the worst of the weather off me.
Maybe I couldn’t remember why I didn’t like the cold, but the storm gave me plenty of reasons. Snow froze to my fur in clumps, and while hiding my face in my tail helped, the wind nipped my nose and bit at my lungs when I breathed.
By the time the snow eased to swirling flurries, it had deepened enough I had to hop to venture through it. While I didn’t know what or where Georgia was, it had to be better than the wintry forest.
Maybe I’d find a man in Georgia and he'd know what I couldn’t remember.
Maybe.
Where the forest met dark ground dusted with snow and slicked with ice, the world became a busy, noisy place. I took shelter beneath the bare branches of a bush, staring at the obstacle blocking my path.
I recognized the death traps speeding by as cars, and I associated the memory of vehicles with countless animal carcasses left rotting along the roadside. How did I know? Had I once driven one?
It didn’t matter; if I got hit, I would be flattened.
Why couldn’t I remember anything more useful? Who I was and why I needed to go to Georgia would’ve been a good start. Knowing what—and where—Georgia was would’ve helped, too. Knowing how to get there would’ve solved most of my problems. Chittering my annoyance, I watched the road and waited until there were no cars before darting across. I made it, sighing my relief.
On the other side of the road, snow-encrusted grass crackled in the wind, gleaming in the fading sunlight. I flicked my tail, considering my options. Roads led somewhere, but I couldn’t remember how to make the pathways cutting across the land reveal their destinations.
While the fields and forests were safer, the road and its many cars would take me somewhere. Unlike the grass, the roads triggered memories. I considered my choices, but only for a moment.
Where the road went, I would follow.
To my dismay, I discovered the road was long, winding, and bitterly cold. The sun dipped below the horizon, night fell, and the asphalt continued with no end in sight.
I spent the night huddled in a ditch where the wind couldn’t reach me, curled in a tight ball so my tail could protect me. Hunger cramped my stomach, and when I slept, it came in fits and bursts. Every sound disturbed me, and the cars, without fail, frightened me awake. Near dawn, I clambered up the slope and chittered insults at the departing taillights.
I disliked cars almost as much as the cold. My hunger intensified, and my fragmented memories failed me once again.
I had no idea what squirrels ate.
Standing on my hind legs, I regarded my paws and chuffed. While I had claws, they didn’t seem right for hunting, and that knowledge angered me even more.
Why did I know my tree-climbing claws weren’t suitable for hunting, yet I didn’t know what I could eat? A frustrated scream burst out of my throat. With every piece of memory I managed to catch, I uncovered more questions I couldn’t answer. What drove the cars? Were they my species? In the darkness, I could barely make out the flat streak of the road. I kept to the shoulder, using the lights of passing vehicles to guide me.
When the predawn gloom brightened to day, the road emerged from the forest and neighboring fields and entered a noisy, smelly hell. Snow drifted across the asphalt, and the cars crammed together, parked in long, snaking lines. Horns blared, and the sound hurt my ears. Instead of trees in the distance, buildings rose towards the sky.
I eased away from the road to keep a safe distance from the trapped cars while I studied the skyline.
Recognition hit me hard.
I approached a city, and the cars were stuck in traffic. Excitement coursed through me. Who—or what—lived in the city remained a mystery, but if I got closer, maybe I’d remember more.
The snow brought traffic to a halt, crippling the city and its strange two-legged occupants. I scampered along a path safe from the reach of the vehicles. Real squirrels lived in the city, too, and they chittered their anger when I infringed on their territory.
Their aggression made me want to bite. My hunger gnawed at me, fraying my already worn temper. Most of the squirrels who showed aggression towards me were male. They were smaller than me, their fur a dull gray compared to the red of mine, except for my paws, which were black.
I had no idea how far I’d ventured into the city, but there were no forests, and the trees lining the streets didn’t provide enough shelter to protect me from the loud noises and choking fumes.
A squirrel lunged out of one of the snow-ladened trees and charged me, squealing its fury. I ached, I hungered, and a small, gray squirrel dared to interfere with me?
I took out my frustrations on the male, tearing at his fur with my impotent claws while he snapped his teeth at me.
I closed mine around his throat and bit down as hard as I could before shaking my head. When he ceased fighting me, I dropped his body into the snow drifting around the tree rising from the middle of the sidewalk.
While I found the taste of blood intriguing, I also hated it, and I dipped my paws in the snow and used it to clean the mess out of my fur. Squeaking my annoyance over the waste, I regarded the squirrel’s tree.
Maybe he had food I could actually eat. He didn’t need it any more. I spiraled up the trunk in search of what the other squirrel had been guarding. Near the top, I found a knotted hole where a branch had broken. Bits of fluff, twigs, and scraps of cloth were stuffed inside.
It stank of male squirrel, and sneezing my disgust at the smell, I wiggled into the den. I barely fit, and I tore apart the nest searching for food. Buried at the bottom, I discovered a stash of nuts and seeds. I grasped an acorn, glaring at it before putting my teeth to work breaking into it.
My squirrel body seemed to like what I choked down, but I didn’t. I ate until I couldn’t handle the thought of another swallow. The overwhelming smell of male squirrel drove me out of the nest. When I slept, it would be somewhere warmer, safer, and a lot less offensive to my nose.
The sense of rightness about the city started as a warmth deep within and strengthened with each hopping step I took. When I strayed, the warmth cooled, rekindling when I changed directions and moved on. I had no idea what was happening or why, but I had no other options.
The warmth kept the winter chill at bay, and as the snow continued to fall, the life in the city ebbed. The two-leggers hid in their buildings of stone, brick, and glass. While I heard squirrels chittering and screaming their anger at my presence, they remained high up in their trees.
If any of them bothered me, I’d kill them like I had the other squirrel. I should’ve felt some guilt over killing another of my kind, but I
didn’t.
I wasn’t a squirrel, not really, and if he’d left me alone, I wouldn’t have snapped his scrawny neck.
I decided I’d no longer worry about stupid squirrels and focus on more important matters. The two-leggers intrigued me. While I’d been able to identify things about them, the most important details slipped away. I remembered some specifics. Some two-leggers carried bags they called purses. The jangly bits others held while shuffling through the snow to their parked cars were keys. The buildings of glass, steel, and stone weren’t homes, dens, or nests, but places two-leggers gathered in big colonies to do the things they thought were important before returning to their nests.
Their nests interested me far more than their other gathering places. Would I find a man in a nest? Was a man a pet of the two-leggers? Could he be a two-legger?
I stopped long enough to observe the two-leggers braving the snow. They bundled up in thick, fake furs, and in their voices, I heard their complaints. I recognized the words they spoke, but none of them evoked the sense that I’d found a man.
Chittering at the two-leggers got me nowhere; either they didn’t understand me or they didn’t care about a squirrel, not that I blamed them for that.
Squirrels annoyed me, so I probably annoyed the two-leggers.