by May Dawson
I’d never been in there, but I’d heard about the dockside bar where the pack used to ‘recruit’ unsuspecting women. That was before Arthur challenged his brother for alpha, in order to protect the community from his own pack.
“They were friends. How lovely.” I swallowed the sudden lump in my throat. “Who’s the man, Lex?”
“They’re trying to track that down right now.”
“Because he looks familiar,” I said, and my voice came out thin. “He looks like the witch from the Day.”
“Winter?”
“No,” I said. “The other one. I don’t know his name.”
I’d called him Indy in my head. Winter thought he was my father, but suddenly I wasn’t even sure which cursed warlock from the Day was my father.
Assuming that it was Winter, I’d meet my father for the first time, on council orders to betray him, alone in a cemetery. This was all so screwed up that it made the Jerry Springer show look like a classy place for a family reunion.
“Hey.” Tyson called from the front door.
“We’re here,” Lex turned his head to call over his shoulder. While he was distracted, I reached up to tuck my hair behind my ears with trembling fingers.
Maybe Tyson was right. I’d been so furious with him because I was sure he was wrong. Suddenly I felt incredibly stupid, and not for the first time that night.
“Are you okay?” Lex asked, running his hand over my arm.
“Yeah,” I said, giving him a smile that I hoped was convincing. “You know me. I’m resilient.”
Lex hesitated, studying me.
“I’ve got to go train with Tyson,” I murmured. “Would you let me out of the bathroom, Lex?”
He stepped back, moving to one side of the door. “I didn’t mean to trap you.”
Judging from the way my body responded any time Lex was near me, first love was the ultimate trap.
Chapter Eleven
“I’ll keep watch outside,” Lex said. “If I call, you guys knock the magic off, ASAP. Got it?”
He glanced at Ty, sympathy in his eyes for both of us. The way he looked at me made me feel as if the floor was falling out from under my feet all over again. Lex thought we might be brother-and-sister too.
Ty nodded, meeting Lex’s gaze, but his eyes fell when he turned to me. He carried a pair of practice swords, harnesses slung over his shoulder. “Are you sure this is a good idea? I’m worried we’re going to break something.”
“You need stress to practice your magic. Getting yourself under control is a bit more pressing than the possibility we break a lamp.” My voice came out harsh.
Tyson’s real source of stress was being near me, and we both knew that. It hurt my feelings, and apparently when my feelings were hurt, my tone went full-bitchy. I’d have to work on that. Maybe.
I snapped, “Give me a sword.”
As Lex let himself out, the front door closed with a click. Ty and I were trapped in here with each other.
Ty sighed and gripped the wooden blade of the sword to extend it toward me. I grabbed the hilt and tested the sword in the air, but it felt as perfectly weighted as my regular sword. Clearborn had gotten us all new, better practice swords.
“When your magic starts to take control, you need to be conscious of it,” I said. “Feel how it changes your heart rate, your breathing—”
“I don’t feel it until it’s too late,” he said.
I exhaled. His self-loathing for having magic at all was so painfully apparent. I was in no mood for Ty’s bullshit, or for my own, for that matter.
“Try,” I said shortly.
He held his sword lightly, not expecting to start yet. When I rapped his wooden blade with mine, he almost lost his grip. He rushed to catch the hilt tightly, raising the sword into a fighting stance.
“Ready,” he said, raising his eyebrows at me.
His handsome face made my heart hurt when he looked at me like that. The jerk.
I ignored his attempt to take control with our usual sword commands and lashed out at him again. He parried my thrust. Our swords clashed together over and over again as we circled each other. The living room felt too small, too confined, to hold the two of us.
“We missed you in the library today,” I said.
“I had work to do during prep.”
I pursed my lips. “Priorities, I guess.”
He paused. “Maddie.”
He could keep his Maddies to himself. I slashed at his legs, but he whirled behind me, getting inside my defenses. His hand pressed my shoulder and I stumbled forward as he shoved me. I raised my sword in the ready stance, my cheeks heating.
“You’re sloppy tonight,” he said.
“You want to know what we learned? About fated mates? Since you weren’t there?” That was what would stress him out and bring out his uncontrolled magic, if anything would. A simple sword fight with me wasn’t a stressor.
He heaved a sigh. “Sure.”
God, I hated when he humored me.
“There’s never been a recorded case of mates being closely related,” I said. “Not more than distant cousins.”
He nodded, but I could tell he wasn’t convinced. As the two of us kept parrying back and forth, sweat shone across his brow.
“Fated mates are supposed to have this feeling when they see each other,” I said. “Not always certainty. But something… familiar. Safe.”
I’d never forget the first time I ran into Tyson. Jensen and some of the other guys had desperately hoped I wouldn’t come to the academy. Tyson had promised me that he’d be my friend. He’d been shirtless, sweaty, sexy as hell. But it was the way he smiled at me that had done my heart in.
I never saw that smile anymore.
“Did you feel anything when you met me?” I demanded.
He was late blocking my parry, and my sword’s tip jabbed into his shoulder. He winced as he stumbled back, but he kept his balance as he brought his sword up, tapping my blade hard enough to jolt the hilt loose in my hand.
“You know I did,” he said tightly.
“What did you feel?”
Hurt flashed across his face. “Jesus, Maddie. Do we have to do this?”
“Why? Feeling stressed?”
“You’re using this…” His eyes widened.
“Why not?” I asked. “If things have to hurt, at least we can use the pain.”
He stared at me, coming to a stop. “You’ve lost your damn mind.”
“Maybe.” I didn’t stop, even though he had. I jumped to kick him in the chest, knocking him into the opposing wall, and I was on top of him before he had the chance to fight back. I pressed the blade against his throat, dangerously close to him, although I didn’t touch my body to his. I couldn’t stand to.
“What do you feel now?” I asked, watching his face. “Does it feel to you like it did that day? Even now?”
“Get away from me.” He grabbed my blade with his bare hands, shoving it away from his throat.
I’d take that as a yes. I stepped back into the ready, holding my sword low.
As he stared at me, his chest heaved with emotion. “You know it does,” he said, and magic sparked at his fingertips, then sputtered out. “Being near you… it drowns me. Every goddamn time.”
My gaze fixed on his hand, on the golden magic that had flittered into existence and then been lost again. When I grabbed his wrist, his every muscle went as taut as a bow string.
His magic was the one thing left that I might be able to fix.
“Your magic sparked,” I said. “Do it again. When you can call it to you, maybe it’ll be easier to force it away.”
“I will,” he said. “Let go of me.”
“I’m holding your wrist,” I said. “Even if we were brother and sister, I could hold your wrist, Tyson. You and I could hug each other, we could—”
He winced as if the idea hurt him, then shook his head.
“Am I that repulsive, Ty?” I asked softly.
�
��The problem is that you aren’t.” His voice sounded broken.
I yanked away from him, retreating a step. It wasn’t worth hurting him, not even to train.
“There’s supposed to be a bond that makes us aware of each other’s pain,” I said. “We’re supposed to always want to go to each other. I’ve been wondering if I hadn’t used my pendant that day, to call you, if…”
Tyson rubbed his hand over his face as if he were exhausted. “Yeah. If your point is that our bond is making this even worse, well. I’d be in fucking agony knowing I was hurting you anyway. I don’t need some mystical bond when I can see it on your face.”
I barely heard him because my own thoughts had just taken me over. If what I’d read tonight was right about our bond, if things went south in the Day, if they tortured me, wouldn’t my men come running to my rescue?
They’d come even if I had things under control.
They’d come even if it was a call to their deaths.
“I’m sorry, Ty,” I said suddenly, letting the sword drop to my side. “I shouldn’t have pushed you like that. It was cruel.”
“It’s all right, Maddie,” he said. He had his usual easy forgiveness, even if he’d lost his usual easy smile the past few months. “I’m never angry at you… not really.”
“That attitude is a refreshing change around here,” I said, but no matter how glib I sounded, my mind was whirling.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He started going through the motions of our usual sword drills. The blade whipped through the air with his usual speed and competence. Apparently, it wasn’t breaking the lamp that had scared him to begin with. He’d been afraid of the pain of being in close quarters with me.
I could relieve Ty’s pain.
I could protect all of my men.
“They say the bond can be broken,” I said lightly, but I didn’t feel light at all. It felt like the weight of the world had just fallen on my shoulders.
I couldn’t lose another of them like I’d lost Silas.
All I had to do was break the bond between us. All I needed was a spell.
His gaze flickered to my face from the corner of his eye, and I wasn’t sure what he saw there, but he dropped his sword as he turned to me.
Understanding dawned across his face. “Holy shit, Maddie. You were trying to convince yourself, not me, this whole time. You really think that we could be—”
As my lip started to tremble, he drew me into his arms. He held me carefully, leaning forward so nothing important of his brushed mine, but his body was still solid and comforting. He pressed his cheek against the top of my head.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, senselessly, even though he wasn’t the one who had anything to be sorry for. “I’m so sorry, kiddo.”
“When I first came here, you tried to be my big brother. I told you I didn’t need another one of those… well, I’d take it now, Ty.” My voice came out muffled, my face pressed against his shoulder. “Just don’t stop caring about me completely.”
Would whatever spell I found tear away every bond between us, even our friendship?
“I could never. I could never, even if I tried.”
I was pretty sure he’d tried.
How can the same person who hurts you be the one who comforts you?
“I’ll always be there for you,” he promised.
“I know,” I whispered.
That was why I’d need magic to untie the bond between us.
Chapter Twelve
I knocked on Clearborn’s study door that evening, but I could already hear voices inside.
He pulled the door open for me. “Come in. You didn’t bring anyone with you?”
“No,” I said, but he still glanced down the hall behind me before he ushered me in.
“How’d you manage to get away from your team?” he asked as the two of us headed across the anteroom.
“I lied,” I said bluntly. And it hurt. But there was a lot more lying to go.
I could only imagine how much it would hurt them if—when—they realized.
Inside his office, two men looked up from their positions around the room. There were twin chairs in front of Clearborn’s desk, the ones that I was quite familiar from with all the times I’d gotten into trouble. It was hard not to walk into this room without a sense of dread washing over me.
One of the chairs in front of Clearborn’s desk was occupied by a man preparing a tattoo gun. In the wingback chair by the fireplace, a man’s fingers danced rapidly across the keyboard of his laptop. He glanced at me, curiosity written across his face, then went back to work.
“Safety measure one,” Clearborn said. “Damien is going to tattoo two runes on you in clear ink. Once healed, it should be invisible to the naked eye. One will allow us to track your location; the other one will alert us if you’re in grave distress. These are fallback measures in case you don’t reach out to us as planned.”
This way, they’d know where my body was if I died. “Oh great. That makes me feel very safe.”
Clearborn gestured me to the seat. As I sat on the edge of it, Damien, a dark-eyed mountain of a man, looked me over.
“Never had a tattoo before?” he asked.
“Is it that obvious?” I always thought that when I did get a tattoo eventually, I’d be a bit drunk and surrounded by my men. Penn, Tyson, Jensen and Lex all had some ink. If they’d been with me, I wouldn’t have felt nervous.
But I didn’t want anyone in the room to realize I had any misgivings about any part of my mission. I’d already committed to walking into the Day. A tattoo was nothing compared to those dangers.
Damien looked up at Clearborn. “Where do you want me to put them?”
“The inside of her forearms should be good.”
Right here, guys.
“Put your elbow on the desk,” Damien prompted me. I did, then side-eyed him as he began wiping my skin down with an alcohol wipe.
“While the ink goes on, Javi—he’s part of the Council’s intel team and one of my pack—is going to bring you up to date on the Day and teach you the spell you’ll use to contact me,” Clearborn said, taking his seat across the desk. “You’re going to be on your own out there. If anyone follows you, it puts your cover at risk. Anything that you carry in is likely to be confiscated. Instead, you’ll need to use magic to communicate back to us.”
“Got it,” I said. I glanced at the tattoo gun again, feeling unease worm through my stomach. But I tried to focus on what Javi was saying as he rose from his chair.
I winced as the tattoo artist began; it felt like a cat’s claws sinking into my skin, if those claws were hot as coals.
While my ink went on, Javi filled me in regarding what they knew about the Day. The Day believed in a “Cure” for our werewolves, and they intended to make sure they cured—or killed—us all. Their problem was efficiency—they wanted to ‘cure’ us en masse.
But they’d almost certainly use their “Cure” on me. I bit my lip. It didn’t matter if I lost my place here at the academy if I saved my people. One girl, one wolf, was a small sacrifice to make.
“Okay,” I said. “So I find their lair, get the Cure and send back the recipe.”
“We think it’s more complicated than a lair,” Javi said dryly. “Whenever we try to catch up to Winter, he’s always one step ahead. He’s using some kind of magic we don’t understand.”
“I’ll add figuring out how to tie Winter down to my to-do list,” I promised, with a blitheness I didn’t feel.
“For the Day to believe you’re really coming to their side, they’ll want to cure you,” Clearborn warned.
I nodded, resisting the temptation to squirm. I could handle the risk. But the combination of the pain burning across my skin and the unpleasant reality ahead of me overwhelmed me.
Damien paused, the tattoo gun still whirring softly. “You need a break?”
I shook my head. I couldn’t afford to look weak in front of Clearborn-and-Frien
ds. “No.”
“If you need a break, take a break,” Clearborn told me sharply. “We’re relying on your judgment out there. You don’t need to be a hero.”
I gritted my teeth as the needle began to burn across my skin again. “I kind of do though, don’t I?”
Clearborn ignored my smartass remark, or at least, he ignored it for now. Finally, when my skin was inflamed and red across the tattooed skin of arms, Damien packed up his gear.
“Good luck out there,” he told me.
“Thanks.”
“Show me your arms,” Javi told me, sitting opposite me as Damien nodded goodbye to Clearborn and left the room.
I held my arms out to Javi. He grabbed my forearm with brusque fingers, and I started to pull away.
“Javi is going to heal you,” Clearborn said. “Otherwise, you’ll have to wait to leave until those heal.”
I raised my eyebrows—how many wolves secretly used magic?—as Javi’s fingers pressed over my skin. I hissed at the sudden pain of his fingers, but then it only got worse as his fingers dug in, as magic sparked across my skin, itching and burning. I cried out, trying to pull away, but Javi just gripped me tighter. Clearborn watched, dispassionate, as I struggled away from Javi.
Then suddenly he released me. I almost fell off the seat. But when I raised my arms in front of me, my skin was its usual shade, with no sign of the tattoos.
“Thanks,” I managed, even though my heart was still pounding in my chest from the pain.
Javi taught me a blood magic spell to use to communicate with whoever wore the bracelet he also enchanted, which he passed to Clearborn. A few months ago, I wouldn’t have believed Clearborn had warlock-shifters on his staff. Now, listening to the two of them go back and forth, it sounded as if Javi would be coming to the academy as an instructor.
“Good luck out there,” Javi said. He paused, then added, “We’ll be doing everything we can to make sure your wolf can be restored.”