by Lucy Lyons
“I don’t think he can help himself, Ray,” Goldie whispered next to me. Or maybe she shouted it, it was hard to tell over the ringing in my ears.
“Got to go, Goldie,” I gasped, just as another vision dropped me to my knees. Porter was chained to the altar naked, his toothpick legs accentuating his gaunt, starved frame as he shivered on the stone table. My brother had been muscular and strong when I left Baton Rouge, but the boy on the table was emaciated and covered in sores, as though he’d been ill for a long time, the life draining from his body.
The vision felt different than the last dream, the scents more vivid, the cool of the cave raising the hair on my arms like it never had in real life when I’d laid my sacrifices on it. Then again, they’d been deer or boars that I’d chased down under the full moon, not crippled teens or helpless human children.
I couldn’t call out to Porter, but was forced to watch as Miriam drew on his thin body with a tar-like substance with a sharp, foul odor that stung my nostrils, coating the sores with the thick paste and chanting over him as he screamed and writhed from pain. His wolf called out to me, the poor creature trapped forever in a human body howled and in the madness of the vision I saw its steely eyes staring at me, demanding justice for its host.
“They’re killing him, draining his life,” I gagged on the smell that still clung to my nose. “Porter’s dying, right now, and I’m going to him.” I glared at the wolf in front of me as Goldie helped me to my feet. “Ray, is it?” he nodded and I breathed deeply through my mouth, working to slow my racing heart and regain my equilibrium. “Ray, I’ve got to go, and I will go through you if necessary. You aren’t strong enough to keep me, so step aside.”
“I think a light breeze could knock you over right now, son,” the big wolf replied and startled a laugh out of me.
“Maybe so, but the magic is also driving me forward. If anyone could understand that, I’d expect it’d be your crazy vampire/fairy/shifter clan to be the ones who would.”
I panted and rolled my shoulders as the vision pressed against my shields, demanding to show me more. Ray stepped toward me, either to stop me or steady me, but I never got to find out which. The moment he was within arm’s reach, I grabbed his wrist and the vision flooded over me, sweeping him along as I was dragged back to the cave. Porter was gone, and another young man, captive and starved long enough to be nothing but flesh hanging from a broken frame. He’d been beaten so badly Miriam didn’t bother to bind him, but tended his wounds, painting them in the terrible ichor and chanting over him as though she could save him.
“Help us, King of the wolves,” she murmured, and I felt an agony unlike any I’d experienced prior. In an instant, I was by the boy’s side, staring down unseeing into the deep hollows that held clouded, blind eyes. Shock rippled through me and I released Ray. He tumbled back from me, scuttling backward on the floor until he’d put almost the entire foyer between us. “Is that your brother?” he gasped, but I shook my head.
“No, that was Miriam’s son, Alcide. He went missing a few weeks ago,” I explained. “Never having experienced anything like this before, But I think he’s almost used up for whatever dark magic they’re doing, and Porter’s next.”
“You got some bad hoodoo on you, alpha,” he sighed as he struggled to his feet, brushing off Goldie’s offer of assistance. “But you’re right. Ain’t no waiting for the vampires when magic that bad is crawling up your backside.”
Silently, I agreed with the new wolf. It was the first time I’d heard a wolf from this strange pack offer to handle wolf business without the vampires, and it suited me just fine not to wait until dark to stop whatever Thaddeus was doing to the people I’d seen. Especially if I could stop him before he got to my brother.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Ray offered his truck to us for the trip, but had to stay behind and guard not only the human servant to his vampire master (and that was a difficult thing to hear), but to protect his baby from our pack, should we fail and the Baton Rouge wolves seek retribution against my new friends.
Goldie texted the wolves to tell them where we were headed, and about thirty seconds after she hit send, just like magic, Steven and Marcos appeared in the doorway behind us, armed and loaded with a bag of weapons each.
“Nick said you might not be able to wait, Orson,” Steven explained. “We’d have been out here sooner, but the lady Dominique wanted to hear what you guys were talking about first. She’s pretty pissed that strong magic got in here because of you.” I shrugged and blinked against the headache that was blooming behind my eyes. Far as I could tell, I had bigger fish to fry, and the last thing that I had time or energy to care about, was some vampire’s servant being mad that I didn’t appreciate the hospitality enough.
“Well, I jumped through your hoops to meet the Fae and ask for their help and they weren’t interested,” I reminded him. “I guess I just don’t have the time or patience to wait and see if a vampiress hiding in the middle of a region known for killing the undead creatures on sight, will sacrifice her own safety for the good of my pack.”
Steven tossed me one of the bags and led the way down to the ally where they’d parked the rented SUVs. “We’d better get this done and get back, or grab a big ‘W’ for the team, or our asses are toast,” he declared as we peeled out from behind the buildings and headed toward Highway 61.
The drive was a silent, tense ninety minutes with a short break to refuel both the car and ourselves in Gonzales, where we picked up Whataburger and a couple sodas loaded with caffeine to calm the pounding in my head. None of the others seemed to have much to say, other than Steve asking me to repeat the instructions on how to get out of town and where to park the rental so we didn’t attract attention. I was too busy trying to understand what parts of the vision were real and which were the inexperienced and fearful reimagining of my brain.
“You’re afraid the soul-sickness is attacking you with fake prophecy because it can’t come out in your wolf, aren’t you?” Goldie asked as we gathered branches to help hide the car we’d parked in the trees from passersby.
“You saw the vision, Goldie, is it real, or is the soul-sickness finding another way to attack me?” I shook my head, “no, this is something else. Something magical enough to share it not only with you, but with that other wolf, the vampire’s pet.”
“Ray is no one’s pet, Orson.” Her tone held a warning that made my hackles raise and I growled low in my throat at her.
“You’re on my land now, Goldie. Do not forget who is alpha here.” She bristled, but backed down, her eyes more hurt than angry as she moved away from me, and closer to the others. I cursed at myself and finished my side of the vehicle and backed up and checked our work. It wouldn’t stand up to close scrutiny, but it might prevent someone who wasn’t looking for us, to start.
“It’ll do, Orson, all we need is a little time to get closer without being noticed,” Marcos assured me. His grip was tight on my shoulder as he leaned in to add in a voice so low it was barely even a whisper. “Be wary of the queen, she will go to great lengths to build her kingdom again, and she is more powerful than you could ever imagine.
Considering the magic I’d seen in my visions and the power I’d felt from the clans, the possibility of something that made them pale in comparison sent a chill down my spine. Marcos nodded, apparently satisfied that I’d taken his warning to heart, and exchanged a glance with Steven before rejoining Goldie and Ray.
I led them into the woods headed toward the ritual cave, keeping us downwind and urging them to stay low and avoid setting off any of the waterfowl that made the cypress trees and the mossy undergrowth their homes.
My pulse raced as I snuck onto my pack’s land like a spy. The trees were still the ones I remembered from my earliest memories, but the land felt like it had forgotten me, or maybe abandoned was a better word. The breeze didn’t speak to me, and the trees no longer felt like friends. I was blind to any hidden dangers, and leading Goldie and her fr
iends into the fray without the ability to warn them.
Half a mile out from the ritual cave, I smelled a different kind of danger, and halted, my beast awakened by the scent of death and decay. I waved the others back and inched forward, trying to better sense where the smell was coming from, when a set of jaws loomed up and an alligator far larger than any natural animal lunged at me.
I rolled to the side and leaped for the lowest branches of a tree and dropped on the weregator’s back and punched him in the head with one hand while I held on for dear life with the other arm wrapped around his neck as far as I could reach.
“Damnit to hell, Daryl, what’s wrong with you?” I hissed, trying to subdue him without using power that would alert Miriam or the pack.
Under me, the gator snarled and hissed like a true alligator would, and shook his sinewy body back and forth trying to shake me off. I stopped hitting him and plunged my fingers into one large eyeball, wrenching and pulling it out of the socket until it flopped on his cheek and his hissing turned to pained gurgling. I felt the fist coming at the back of my head and managed to roll to one side, off Daryl’s scaly back and out of the way of his brother’s ham-fist as it rocketed toward me again.
“Poole, why are you on pack land, and what the hell you doin’ attacking me? I’m about the only friend you got in the Baton Rouge wolfpack.”
Poole paused in his attack and held up a hand to me before circling his younger brother’s head and examining the eye. With a grunt, he pushed it back in place and spat on it, rubbing the saliva over it to speed the healing process. I knew the gator’s, and some wolves, could heal with their spit, but seeing him fill his palm with it and smear it over Daryl’s thick eye ridge was still enough to churn my already upset stomach a little.
The eye stayed in place and the gator shimmered and changed form in seconds, leaving Daryl kneeling nude in the dirt with one eye still swollen and red as it healed. “Thought you was dead, King,” Daryl muttered, and Poole, who I’d never heard speak, nodded in agreement. “Fucking hurt, popping my eye out like that.”
“Skoll tried to kill me, and failed, Daryl. Unfortunately, I was forced to kill the wolves he’d unlawfully created too. I didn’t want to kill you too.”
Poole nudged his brother and jerked his head behind him toward the clearing in the trees where my pack danced and sang under the full moon, and the cave beyond that was haunting my waking thoughts like a foul nightmare that I couldn’t wake from.
“There’s bad juju in there, King. Ole’ Poole smelled it first, death and fear. Never smelled so much terror on this land before.” The way he worded it made me wonder where and how often he’d smelled it elsewhere, but wisely, I chose to keep that question to myself. The gators were a violent clan, loners who fought amongst themselves as much as they picked fights with every other creature they thought they could best. Our relationship was based on my keeping Thaddeus from preemptively murdering the lot of them, and in return, they’d stayed out of our borders so he didn’t have a reason to try.
“I know, Daryl. Poole’s got a good nose for trouble,” I said, and Poole’s lined face split in a gap-toothed grin at the compliment. “But I gotta take care of this myself, son. You know how that goes.”
“I smelled that brother of yours a few nights back, wondered what he was doing out here with you gone and all.” I stiffened automatically, and Daryl glanced at his older brother before continuing. “I reckon you gotta do what you gotta do for family.” Poole nodded again. “You know how to reach us if you need. Poole likes Porter. He’s nice to him in town, always stops to talk to him when everybody else just walks away.”
My throat tightened so I couldn’t breathe past the fear as I thought of the Porter I’d seen on the slab in the cave. I nodded and coughed, reaching out to shake Poole’s hand, the only direct communication I knew how to have with him. As he grasped my hand, I felt his desire to help, even though he couldn’t speak. I nodded to him, thinking fast as I heard Goldie approaching, her irritation and fear rising off her in waves. The brothers both smelled it too, at least the fear, and Poole shifted, his hand becoming scaly and clawed before it slipped from my grasp.
Goldie burst through the underbrush, her mouth opened to chastise me, when both alligators hissed and raced toward her, moving impossibly fast on their stubby legs and webbed, clawed feet. Cursing louder than I should’ve, I grabbed the gator that was Daryl by the tail and swung him into his brother, knocking them both off their attack course and putting me between them and my mate.
“You best come out of those scales and introduce yourselves to my wife before I kicked both y’all out of Louisiana for the rest of your unnatural lives, boys,” I growled as I heard the other men crashing through the trees to get to us. “Our mission requires secrecy, and between you and those idiots coming up behind me, we might as well run up a white flag and march into camp right now.”
Even in his reptile form, Poole had the good sense to look embarrassed. He shifted back to his lean human form and dipped his head toward Goldie in an awkward, bouncing bow as he gathered up the loose coverall he’d slid out of as he had changed. Shyly, he held his dirty clothes in front of him and stared through stringy hair at Goldie while I held back Steven and his mate, and Ray bounded up to us through the brush in the form of a charcoal and black wolf that stood almost to my shoulder on all fours.
The wolf braced, stiff-legged standing between Goldie and the rest of us, his grey-whiskered lips curled back over his fangs. “Stand down, Ray, Daryl,” I warned, and Poole side-stepped in front of his brother, who knocked him over, swiping at the back of the man’s knees with his broad reptilian snout. In a shimmer, Poole was back in his beast-shape and spun around on his brother, snapping his jaws and growling.
“Guys, come on, please,” I groaned. “We could really use your help, please just simmer down a minute and help us do right by our laws. Your laws.”
Daryl turned his big head and blinked slowly at me, and Poole smacked him with his tail, earning a hiss before the younger man shimmered into human form and stood proudly naked, leering at Goldie.
“Watch it, Daryl,” I growled. “We both know who would win in a fight.” Daryl pursed his lips and folded his arms across his chest, not to hide, but sizing me up in a way he hadn’t since we’d battled as kids.
“Do we? Word is you ain’t got the chops anymore, King,” he snickered. “I been hearing rumors that y’all got some problems keeping it . . .furry.”
“No, Daryl. For once, the rumor mill’s let you down,” I countered. “The problem is, that I’ve been having a hard time not killing people. Went looking for a cure when I almost tore out my kid brother’s throat.”
I could tell he knew I was sincere, and his eyes flew to his own brother before meeting mine again, this time with a compassion I knew was hard to find in the swamp. The brothers had lost their parents young, to the constant wars between their people, and Poole hadn’t spoken since. They’d become inseparable, staying together when other alligators would’ve carved out their own territories, and because of it, they’d become the most powerful reptiles in the bayou, chasing off shifters who would’ve caused my pack trouble with no end, had they stayed.
“You got control of da beast now, King?” He asked in a quiet voice, and I nodded.
“For now. But there’s a sickness in my pack, Daryl, and it’s my job to excise the tumor, you know that.” He agreed and handed Poole his mechanic’s coverall as the older brother shimmered into human form, watching his brother carefully. “I wouldn’t turn down a little help from a friend when things get violent, though. Somebody’s got to get Porter to safety, him not being able to walk and all.”
Poole tapped his chest with his palm and pushed his shoulders back. “Poole says he got your boy,” Daryl drawled, “but he’s not the only one they been doing they magic on. We’ll get who we can, but I think you’re gonna need more than what you got here to stop your alpha.”
I almost told him about the v
ampires, but hesitated and chose my words more carefully. “We got more help coming from a way off, but they’ll be here. Daylight’s wasting though. We got to get moving, before the wind changes or a patrol comes through and stumbles onto us.”
Daryl shook his head and scoffed. “That alpha of yours keeping a tight rein on his wolves lately. No one gets to leave the clearing, unless they go into the cave. We walked right up to the edge of the trees, no one dared say ‘boo’ to us.”
My gut clenched and I fought to take a proper breath. I tried to imagine the kind of power that would keep two dozen wolves from fighting back, waiting for their turn to die. With a glance at the others, I continued the way we’d been walking, pausing to shake Daryl’s hand. Neither of us said a word, but I could feel the shifter’s excitement. It wasn’t often he got to hunt wolf, and I knew no matter what happened tonight, I would have to answer for the blood he’d spill. I only prayed that the price for saving Porter was one I had the ability to pay.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The sun was already beginning its descent when we reached the south edge of camp, making sure the breeze was still in our favor. I crouched as close to the clearing as I dared and watched my pack as they milled around the far edge of the grassy space, listlessly lying in the sun as they gathered together as far from the cave entrance as they could, while staying in the clearing.
“Why don’t they fight back?” Goldie whispered, her voice equal parts anger and annoyance.
“Did you fight your alpha when he abused you, Goldie?” I didn’t mean to hurt her with the question, but I felt her body stiffen and she shivered, pain and hatred stabbing into my head. “Exactly. You can be mad at me all you want, but what you’re seeing is likely exactly what Clay and his people saw before they freed you. A pack with a violent, sick alpha that was dysfunctional, terrified, and weak.”