by Lucy Lyons
“I wish there was something I could do before I go,” I admitted to Clay and Ash as they walked me toward the trees at the edge of their circle. “I don’t like leaving in your debt.”
“There is something you could do, Ash offered as we reached the trees. “The moment you arrive, kill the son of a bitch who forced me to choose between you and Goldie’s safety.” Clay held her arm but she continued. “He threatened me, and my family. I will sleep better when he’s dead.” I swallowed hard and opened my mouth to speak and closed it again.
“Just try to come back to us alive, and we’ll Goldie the same way until you two can work something out, OK?” he clapped me on the back and whispered something in a language I didn’t understand, Celtic or ancient Gaelic of some kind. Even though I didn’t understand the words, I felt the numb sensation evaporate from my body and I could sense Goldie better as she watched me leave from a safe distance.
“Just keep her safe, OK?” I pled with him, and he assured me that he would.
“When you get your brother back, bring him to us, and we’ll see what we can do with magic, that science has failed to.”
“Maybe I’ll get another crack at meeting some Fae too? Porter would be thrilled to see that he was right and they do still exist.” Part of me even believed I could make it back out of Baton Rouge alive, but I knew better. Still, it felt good to make plans for my future, like all hope wasn’t lost. I was in no hurry to admit that I wouldn’t survive without help. Thaddeus never would’ve allowed that kind of weakness.
“Deal,” Ash sniffed. She threw her arms around me and I felt her twins move against my stomach as she hugged me tight. “You have to come back, for Goldie’s sake, Orson. Be a good leader. She’s the first member of your pack and she needs you.”
I gaped at her for a moment. Clay had said he couldn’t reach her in the cabin, but I’d assumed it was because her wolf was so tuned into my pain. Now I wondered if what he’d meant was that her wolf was attuned to mine, not only as my soulmate, but as my pack, which meant even if we hadn’t been mates I’d be able to feel her pain, her joy, and her hungers if she didn’t shield carefully. It was one of the reasons a pack needed a strong leader, one who could withstand or shield against their packs unspoken needs and desires.
“I’ll do whatever I can to return to her,” I promised as other pack members crowded around me for a handshake, or one last sniff, depending on the form they were in. After a few minutes of sniffing, handshaking, and fighting my way through the crowd, I realized they were stalling, trying to give Goldie a chance to join the farewell. I also knew that she was shaken and hurt by the strength of her feelings toward me and wanted me to go, if only to give her some space to breathe.
Sensing that was enough for me. At least I could feel her again, with the remnants Caroline and Clay’s power dissipated. She wasn’t walling me out anymore, and I took that as a sign. Silently, I promised her that no amount of distance or anyone else’s magic would separate us like Caroline had, ever again.
I hefted the bag to my shoulder and took off into the forest heading west and south, looking to avoid the most populated areas as I made my way down to the Sea-Tac airport, where I’d buy a ticket to make the trip home as fast as possible. The airlines showed a few flights heading into Austin, Texas, and I figured I’d get on the first one I could after I got there.
You’re stupid for not accepting a ride from Clay, Goldie entered my mind and chided me a few miles down the road.
No, I can’t say I’m not being watched. I don’t want Thaddeus sending trouble his way for helping me. Y’all did enough already. Thank him and Ms. Ash for me, will you?
Her frustration rang through loud and clear, even though she didn’t answer. I tried to focus on the forest around me, the smell of pine and cedar and fern were clean and refreshing, without the musty smell of algae and water fungi I was used to. Perhaps my delight in the forest of the west was why it took me a moment to register the footfall behind me, maybe it was my subconscious hoping that Goldie had followed me. Either way, when the musk of wolf hit me, it was already too late to brace for the blow, and my attacker’s teeth found my shoulder as he landed on my back and drove me to the ground.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
My pack saved me from being torn apart at the first attack, but the wolf worried my left shoulder as I tried to roll over on him to stop him from tearing my arm off. I managed to drop the bag and reached up behind me, grabbing a handful of his neck scruff and jerking him over my head the second I felt his jaws release to adjust his hold on me.
Face to snarling muzzle, I recognized him as Thurl, a beta with a chip on his shoulder and a bad attitude toward any wolf younger than him with alpha power, and an appetite for cruelty, especially toward wolves Thaddeus had deemed weak. Wolves like Porter. Thurl and I had only fought once before, and he’d limped away to lick his wounds, cursing my name.
“What the fresh hell makes you think you’re gonna beat me this time, Thurl?” I scoffed, and flung my bag at him. He sidestepped it easily, right in the way of my lunge. We rolled down a slight hill as I grabbed his throat and forced his muzzle away from me and threw him into an ancient cedar, sending bark and woodchips flying where he smashed into the trunk.
He shook himself and snarled at me, snapping his jaws in warning as I half-crouched in a wrestling pose, ready to launch him if he came at me again. This time, I was listening for the rustling behind me and was ready for the second wolf that appeared from the undergrowth. He was smarter, sneakier, and with the grey on his muzzle I knew it had to be Carver, another of Skoll’s. He was happy with his place in the pack, so long as he got to crack skulls and spill blood once in a while.
“Don’t do it, Carver. Let me and Thurl handle this, werewolf to werewolf. You know you ain’t got enough power to beat me. Even if you both attack me together.”
“He’s got you there, Car. How about we even the odds a bit?” Skoll cackled from downwind of me, his voice thin and high. As a child, I’d wondered if he was supposed to be born a hyena but got sent to the wolves by accident. His love of violence was surpassed only by his hunger for more power.
I didn’t turn to face him but scoffed at his threat, keeping my heartbeat steady so they wouldn’t catch any fear from me. Carver had begun to circle closer, and Thurl was watching me cautiously as he paced just out of reach. I felt a breath of wind on my face and ducked a fist aimed at the back of my head.
The wolf was buried too deep still to call him out of his magic-induced slumber. I rolled over on my wounded shoulder, which still burned, healing almost human slow because of the werewolf saliva that had poured into the torn flesh when Thurl had worried at it.
Skoll didn’t have the power to slow healing, like his soldier did. What he did have was a powerful set of jaws and the ability to make stupid men listen and obey, even to their own detriment. He was the bullies’ bully, a favorite among even the low-brow humans who picked pockets and gave him a cut of their ill-gotten earnings.
He lunged again and I dodged, wary of the wolves that were closing in around me. It was a typical wolf hunt, except instead of a deer or a boar they were hunting, I was the prey. But I was still a better hunter, and a better werewolf than any of them ever hoped to be. Of the soldiers tightening their net around me, only Skoll knew the truth, that even if they killed me, none of them were going home. He’d just recruit another gang, make werewolves out of criminals and failures if he needed to, and he’d take the throne.
“I must be one hell of a loose end for you to come all this way, Skoll,” I growled at him as we circled one another. Each step he took pushed him farther away from me, while his wolves drew closer, tightening the noose around me, working better in concert together as wolves than they ever did as a pack.
“Thaddeus wants you dead, and I readily admit, for once I’m happy to oblige his whims.”
“How sad is it that our so-called whims as werewolves are so bloody.”
“He’s a murdero
us, crazy old coot, Orson. He knows somebody has to replace him, and you just wouldn’t stop showing off, kicking everybody’s ass, then refusing to finish the job,” he chuckled. “It’s quite the little army you’ve assembled against your king.”
“I’ve done no such thing, Skoll,” I glanced around at the half-dozen wolves who were pacing me in a ring just out of the reach of my claws. “But that’s what you told him, isn’t it? that I’d won them over by sparing their lives?”
“Oh, it’s mostly true, Orson, everything except for the part where you asked them to follow you. You’ve made Thaddeus real unhappy, boy.” He tensed and I caught a flash of movement out of the corner of my eye. He threw himself backward and his wolves lunged toward me as one. I had time to recognize that they moved too seamlessly for a pack so far from their alpha, before I was under two wolves, kicking out at the one pinning my hips as I grabbed the jowls of the other, holding his snapping jaws inches from my face.
I felt Goldie’s alarm and shut her out, but shielding myself broke my concentration on the wolf still above me and his teeth scraped painfully over my forehead as my hands slipped. I rolled, regaining my hold on the loose skin of his neck beneath the fur, and flipped us so I was bending his neck back, straddling him. I forced his head back as far as it would go without snapping his neck and growled, low and threatening, at his companions.
“This doesn’t have to happen. Let me go and face Thaddeus the way I’m supposed to, in the circle, under the witness of our pack. I will kill you all if I have to, but there’s a better way.”
“Your death is the better way, you stupid cub,” Skoll scoffed. “When we’re done with you, we’re going to go pay your little lady a visit.” He laughed his high, nasal laugh, and I saw blood in his thoughts. Clay and his pack would kill them, I was certain of that, but not before he hurt them, killed all their females. These wolves weren’t killing me for Thaddeus, they’d come looking for a territory to take over.
“Thaddeus told you to kill me, but he doesn’t know you marked these wolves as yours, does he?” I asked, and Skoll blinked. “Don’t look so surprised. I’m an alpha, Skoll, while you’re only dominant to your flunkies.”
“You can’t see inside my head,” he snorted, but I felt his uncertainty, and I grinned at him, pulling Thurl-the-wolf’s head back until he whimpered in pain.
“I can see that you planned to lead the males off and kill the females,” I growled and laughed. “Good luck with that. You should’ve done your homework before coming up with a stupid plan that was sure to fail, son.”
“It don’t matter what you see, or think you see,” he hissed. “Even you can’t beat us all at once. You’ll be dead before your mate gets a taste of real wolf.” Despite the fear I could sense in him, I feared he was right. I was good, but the magic had taken my wolf from me for the time being, and without claws and teeth to fight with and my knife in my duffle bag, I didn’t have a chance to win.
I released Thurl and he sank to the ground before slinking away as his comrades herded me back toward some rocks. Skoll had retreated into the trees and even with my preternatural sight, I couldn’t make him out in the shadows of dusk as he slipped between the trees. I could smell him, though, behind his wolves and out of danger. I growled at the nearest snapping fangs and batted at the wolves, keeping them at bay with my fists as best I could while I tried to wake the wolf buried inside me.
Not a great fucking time to be practically human, I thought to myself, digging for the magic that Clay and his people had buried so deep for me. Deep enough that I could fly trapped in a plane without discomfort, amidst all the wiring and steel of man. Too deeply to save me from my packmates, since Skoll had managed a coup either since I’d left, or he’d been working on it all along behind my back.
The snarling and snapping intensified and I barked back at them and swung, catching one of the wolves by happy accident squarely enough that I sent him flying. I heard him hit a tree with a splintering crash and Skoll cursed out the order to kill.
I swung wildly but missed, and one of the wolves managed to get behind me and latch onto my shoulder, tearing the same spot that was still not quite healed from the first injury. I swore aloud and tried to pull him over my head, but Skoll finally joined the fray and pinned me to the stone with his soldier scrabbling at my back, trying to escape as he was crushed against the rocks.
“Change already, you fool,” Skoll hissed in my face. “You’re dying either way, why don’t you fight?” His lips were by my ear when he whispered, “What, don’t want to live without your true love? I heard a rumor she preferred fucking vampires to having her own alpha.”
Without thinking, I bit his face, tearing his skin at the jaw and ripping it away from his face as he shrieked in pain and rage. I may not have been able to produce the sharp fangs I so desperately needed, but rage lent me the additional strength to damage him as a wolf could. The soldier pinned beneath me clawed at me again as Skoll fell away and the pressure on him lessened. He flayed my back and I dropped to my knees and scrabbled away from them, keeping the cliff face behind me as I tried to ignore my pain, sniffing for a possible escape.
Instead, I smelled Goldie. She filled my nostrils as her panic screamed in my head. I thought I was hallucinating, but I caught a flash of amber eyes and she was suddenly between me and the Louisiana solves, growling and showing her teeth, just as she had that afternoon with Clay.
This time, I didn’t try to calm her. Instead, I grabbed her leg and launched her off to the side into the bushes, and I limped away from the stone to put myself between her and my attackers. Don’t do it, Goldie, get back to camp, or to the club, but get you away from here.”
I prayed that she understood my human thoughts and pulled the remnants of my t-shirt away from my bloody back. I wiped Skoll’s blood off my face and tossed the t-shirt into the undergrowth with disgust. Skoll’s soldiers flanked me and rushed, and Goldie leaped over me and fought them off as best she could. I heard a feral scream of pain and waded in, throwing wolves to the sides as I searched through the sea of fur for the golden wolf.
Even in the growing darkness her eyes were bright, the color of molten gold. Those glowing eyes dimmed as Skoll, now in his wolf form, closed his canine fangs over her throat.
Something in the sight of her paws moving slowly as she weakly attempted to fend him off made me see red, and in an instant, my beast was awake and racing to the surface. I ran at them, and my wolf poured out of my body as I did, so that I kicked out with one leg as I ran and when I set it down the pants had split and fallen away and the leg was covered in thick black fur.
I howled my rage at Skoll and grabbed his muzzle in my hands, forcing his jaws apart and shaking Goldie out of his mouth. She fell with a whimper and I picked Skoll up in both clawed hands, digging my fingernails into him and elongating them as far as I could, until I heard them click together inside his trachea and lower stomach.
He howled, a thin, keening wail that his soldiers replied to with a series of barks. I dropped Skoll as one of the wolves grabbed Goldie by the hind leg, dragging her away from me into the darkness. But now my wolf was awake, and the stars and rising moon were plenty of light to see them by. I raced after the first and he dropped Goldie and ran away. I stopped at her side and made sure she was healing her wounds and carried her to the soft ferns and undergrowth and set her down, covering her with the wide, dew-dampened fronds to help conceal her while I left her side.
The soldiers were on the run, but I still hated leaving Goldie alone while she was wounded. If only you’d come with backup, I thought at her, and was rewarded with mental images of Clay and his wolves running up the path I’d been taking, only a few miles from where we were. Thank God you reestablished your connection to Clay, I silently replied as I dropped to all fours and ran full out in my lupine shape.
Belatedly, I realized the images she sent me weren’t a communication but wishful thinking on her part, agreeing with me. By then, I was surrounded by w
olves again, and Skoll was approaching me, his own wounds nearly healed.
“God, seeing you makes me wish I had the ability to infect wounds with my bite.” He rasped out a sardonic laugh and paced the same direction as I did, keeping an even distance between us.
“I, for one, and grateful for the opportunity to kill you before Thaddeus can claim your death for himself.”
The soldiers surrounded me again, and I rolled my shoulders, experimenting with moving my injury. The pain was more manageable than it had been, healing faster now that I could change form to speed the process. Skoll barked the order to attack and they rushed me as one, their teeth piercing my hands and stomach where they could reach, even briefly.
I was taken down to the ground and howled my anger, as those vicious teeth tore into my arms and legs as I flailed them trying to get back to Goldie. I was pinned to the loamy soil again, waiting for the blow that would kill me, when I sensed movement above and glanced up to see large birds silhouetted against the night sky. Vampires, I thought to myself just before losing consciousness. They really can fly.