Fifth (A Cinco Series Book 1)

by Kit Lane

  “What about you three? What if someone tries to attack you?”

  “We’re gonna hunt on Aunt Ruth’s grounds. She owns all the forest around here. They’re protected by Fae wards.”

  The two men left the bedroom, and I felt their excitement at getting a chance to go wolf for a while. I wished I could run free. The house, as lovely as it was, was starting to close in on me.

  I walked back to Matt’s bedroom. He was sleeping in his wolf form, curled up in a tight ball, his tail over his nose. His fur was patchy and the skin raw. Ronin assured me Matt was healing quickly, but he still looked in bad shape to me.

  Aunt Ruth was sitting in a wing-backed armchair beside the huge bed, engrossed in a book. She smiled as I entered the room. “You’re awake. You look better now.”

  “I feel better,” I admitted.

  “You sit with the alpha and I’ll get Kay to send in some food.” She stood and smoothed down her pale yellow linen skirt.

  “You can tell he’s the alpha?”

  The alpha/beta question was still a source of tension between Matt and myself, and within the Cinco. Yet Matt still insisted I was the alpha.

  Aunt Ruth gave an enigmatic smile. “Wolves place too much significance on hierarchy. He’s been the alpha for a long time. His wolf will not give that up easily.”

  “I don’t care about being alpha,” I insisted. I sat next to Matt and gently stroked his fur.

  “Yet you give the Cinco orders like you were born to it,” Aunt Ruth said. “There’ll come a time where you’ll challenge the alpha once too often.”

  “Then what will happen?”

  “You will fight him for top position.”

  I stared at her in horror. “I don’t want to do that.”

  “You have no choice, Alex. It is the way of wolves.”

  “I’m not a wolf!”

  “You’re half wolf. We don’t know what your powers are yet.”

  I was happy to have no powers, but I didn’t say that to Aunt Ruth. I just wanted my world to go back to the way it was when I catered for people and hoped to expand my little business.

  “Fuck!” I dropped my head into my hands.

  “What’s the matter?” Aunt Ruth asked, concern sharp in her voice.

  “I have a party booked for tomorrow night. I’ve got to let them know I can’t make it.”

  Aunt Ruth shook her head. “You can’t call them.”

  “But—”

  “I’ll deal with it. I have a catering firm I use when I’m in your area. Give me the details.”

  “You don’t use me?”

  That hurt.

  She came over and hugged me. “You get to the stage of being able to cater for the Governor and the President, and I’ll use you.”

  “Oh.”

  Maybe I wasn’t there yet.

  Trying to piece together enough information without my phone and laptop took the rest of the afternoon. Aunt Ruth let me use her laptop, but refused to let me sign into any of my accounts. Matt woke long enough to shift, drink more broth and fell back to sleep again as a wolf. Like the others, he seemed more comfortable in his wolf form when he was relaxed.

  Finally, I had the information Aunt Ruth needed for the company to take over the event. It was going to hurt me financially to be away from the business. I might not survive it.

  “We’ll get you a manager,” Aunt Ruth said.

  “I’m not in a position to pay a manager.”

  Aunt Ruth gave that enigmatic smile again and left the room.

  I flopped down next to Matt. “What the heck did that mean?”

  Matt snored and rolled onto his back, all four legs in the air.

  “You’re no help,” I informed him.

  He let out a long snort.

  Chapter 28 - Ronin

  I strode away from the house as quickly as I could, the others almost running to catch up. She was overwhelming me with her scent and her physical attraction. If I didn’t get away I was going to make love to her, and I knew she wasn’t ready.

  Someone grabbed my arm and I turned, ready to fight.

  “Whoa, dude.” Lee put his hands up. “What’s biting your tail?”

  I gritted my teeth so hard my jaw ached. “Nothing.”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  I sighed. “It’s Alex.”

  “What’s she done this time?”

  He sounded so sour it was my turn to raise an eyebrow. “You don’t like her, do you?”

  “You like her too much,” he retorted.

  That was true, too.

  “Let’s forget her and run for a while,” Kyle pleaded, already naked. “My wolf needs to be free.”

  Lee and I glowered at each other and then I nodded.

  “Sure. It’ll do us all good to feel the earth under our paws.”

  Kyle was gone before I finished the sentence, a flash of gray in the trees. Lee followed him as soon as he was undressed, a sleek dark-gray wolf who ran with a speed I envied. My wolf pleaded for me to follow him. I couldn’t deny him, I needed to feel the wind in my fur. I shifted and shook out my coat, stretching out before I ran.

  I was going to have to speed up to catch Lee and Kyle, being a heavier build, but it was good to be running again. I snaked through the trees, following their scent. My human rested in me, letting my wolf take control.

  Scents from the forest flooded my nose, firing my senses with the joy of being wolf and hunting.

  “The Fae asked us to hunt the older animals,” Kyle said. “There’s an old buck ahead.”

  I sensed the frustrated undertone, but we were in her forest and she’d given us a gift to be allowed to hunt.

  Kyle was off before I could respond, and Lee and I followed him. We’d been hunting together for years, and we worked as a team, bringing down the deer, being careful to avoid his magnificent antlers. We stood over the buck as his breath slowed, and I said a prayer of thanks to the deer and the Wolf God for providing us with the food.

  “The Fae will collect the kill as we hunt.”

  If I was a human I would have frowned at Kyle. “They are following us?”

  “They are our guards,” Lee said. “The forest is warded but Aunt Ruth is taking no chances.”

  We all called her Aunt Ruth now.

  Kyle stiffened, his attention caught elsewhere. “Rabbits!”

  He was off and once again, I got the thrill of the chase. By the end of the afternoon, we managed to replenish the meat supply, and had worn ourselves out with an intense run through the forest.

  “Matt’s gonna be so annoyed he missed this.” To my right, Lee gave me a wolfy grin as we loped back to the house.

  I grinned back. Our alpha loved nothing more than a night’s hunting after the stresses of student life. “He’ll be back out with us soon.”

  Then a scent crossed my path and I slowed, sniffing to catch it again.

  “Carrion,” Lee said.

  Kyle stopped in his tracks. “We should check. If there’s something dead that we didn’t hunt, the Fae needs to know about it.”

  I agreed, and we headed in the direction of the stench of death. It became a lot stronger as we entered a glade, still lit by the late afternoon sun. We approached the dead animal, and carrion birds flew away, squawking angrily at us for disturbing their meal.

  My heart sank as I noted the delicate features of a little wood nymph curled up as if trying to fend off her fate. I shifted into human and the others did the same. She was beyond any help I could offer. “We need to get the Fae here.”

  Lee focused for a minute. “I’ve told Alex. She’s going to tell Aunt Ruth.”

  Aunt Ruth materialized by the little wood nymph a minute later; anger and sorrow chasing over her face. “Raelie. This can’t be.”

  Her face crumpled in grief and she wept, her strength deserting her in her loss. We stood by her, silent sentinels unsure what to do.

  Finally, Aunt Ruth looked up at me. “You found her like this?”

&
nbsp; “We’ve not touched her,” I said. “The birds—” I stopped. She didn’t need to know.

  Aunt Ruth waved a hand. “This is impossible. No one dies in my forest that I don’t know about. Not a single creature. I know them all.”

  It could just be a coincidence, wards failing and magic needing to be renewed. Or it could be something much more than that.

  “Do you want us to carry her back to the house?” I asked gently.

  Aunt Ruth didn’t seem to see me for a moment. Then she focused on what I’d said. “I’ll take her.” Her expression was grim. “Time’s up, my wolves. We’re under attack.”

  I nodded, just as grim. We knew it would happen sooner rather than later. I’d hoped Matt would get more time to recover. “We’ll leave as soon as we get back.”

  “Let’s talk back at the house.”

  She and the young wood nymph vanished in a haze of light.

  I took a deep breath. Lee, Kyle and I shifted and huddled close, needing a moment of touching before we ran back to the house. Our joyful time in the forest had been snatched away, and now we were going to have to run again. We leaned into each other, Lee and Kyle’s solid weight making me feel connected to the Cinco.

  “Ronin?”

  Alex’s concerned voice filled my head.

  “Yes?”

  “Are you on your way back? Matt is about ready to explode.”

  “We’ll be there,” I assured her.

  Lee chuffed and we took off at a run. Now we had to face our alpha and an uncertain future. Deep joy.

  Chapter 29 - Alex

  The second Ronin had asked me to tell Aunt Ruth about the wood nymph, I knew our time to recover was over. I wished Matt had been asleep, but he was awake and chowing down on more broth when I took the mental call. He knew from my face something was wrong, and when I told him, the broth was forgotten, and he was up, hunting for his clothes.

  “Go tell Aunt Ruth and get back here,” he said, his voice muffled as he pulled a T-shirt over his head.

  “Is it serious?”

  He seemed as if he was about to shout at me, then he took a deep breath. “You have to understand, Aunt Ruth is a Fae, and Fae are in touch with the world around them in a way we aren’t. Nothing happens in her forest that she doesn’t know about.

  “But she didn’t know about the poor wood nymph.”

  “Which means either her magic is failing or—”

  “Someone is using stronger magic.”

  He nodded, his face hard. “Go tell her now.”

  I didn’t hesitate. I took the hallway at a run, calling for Aunt Ruth. She appeared beside me.

  “Alex? What’s wrong?”

  “The wolves have found a dead wood nymph in the forest.”

  She vanished. Not a word, nothing. She was gone before I drew a breath.

  I turned on my heel and ran back to Matt.

  He was stuffing clothes into his backpack. “Get packed, and then help me pack for Ronin, Lee and Kyle.”

  I studied him carefully. That was the first time he’d been on his feet for almost a week. Matt turned to see me watching him.

  “Did you hear me?” he barked.

  “I heard,” I said. “You sit. I’ll do the packing.”

  It wouldn’t take long. None of us had brought much. I’d been wearing Aunt Ruth’s clothes.

  Matt grumbled under his breath, but the moment I left the room he collapsed onto the bed. I wasn’t sure how I knew that, but I did. It was like I was always aware of them now wherever they were. I ran to the bedroom I slept in with Ronin. We’d been storing our bags in there and sleeping in Matt’s room. There were at least ten bedrooms in Aunt Ruth’s house, yet we’d all slept together, surrounding Matt as he healed. After the first night I didn’t question it. Four wolves make warm bed companions and they all slept in a puppy pile, while still taking care of Matt’s injuries.

  The bags were ready in five minutes and I took them back to Matt. He sat on the bed, his face pale, and his arms wrapped around his middle. I dropped the bags and knelt at his feet, staring up into his face. I saw the pinched look and the lines of pain around his mouth and eyes, and cursed myself for not noticing sooner.

  “What hurts?” I demanded.

  “It all hurts,” he admitted, when I questioned him a second time.

  I took one of his hands. “You should stay here. You’re not strong enough to run.”

  “We’re stronger together.”

  “I could push you with one finger and you’d fall over.” He blustered, but I knew the truth. “Matt, you can barely stand. You’d be hopeless in a fight.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me. “I know that tone. You’re thinking of going solo. Don’t you dare. If you think you’ll survive on your own against the Elders, you’re mistaken.”

  Damn, he knew me too well. “You need the rest of the Cinco to help you heal. They’ll be searching for five of us, not one woman on their own.”

  “We’re staying together. I’m a shifter. I’ll be back on my feet soon enough.”

  I threw my hands up. The alpha was a stubborn idiot! “What happens if we have to run? I mean, really run. You can barely walk. You guys stay here and help Aunt Ruth protect her people and her property. I’m going to slip out the back way.”

  “There is a back way?”

  I stood, picked up my pack, and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “There’s always a back way.”

  I was out of the room before he could protest again.

  “Quinto, get your butt back here,” he roared.

  It was surprisingly hard to go against my alpha’s wishes. Every cell in my body cried out to obey and rush to be by his side, but I forced myself to walk away. I was right to do this. Now I just needed to escape before the others found out.

  Chapter 30 - Matt

  I sent out the call to the others before she’d even cleared the room. Within five minutes, a sleek gray muzzle nudged the door open and two wolves entered. Kyle was missing.

  “She’s gone,” I said.

  Lee shifted from wolf to human. “Kyle is already on her trail.”

  Ronin shifted too, already wearing a worried expression. I’d seen that too much. Completing a Cinco was meant to be a joyous time, not one of constant stress and fear.

  “She thinks she’ll manage better by herself and we’ll be safer without her.”

  They made scoffing noises in the back of their throats, and despite my worry, I smiled. At least they felt the same way.

  “Have you seen Aunt Ruth?”

  I wasn’t surprised when they both shook their heads. The Fae had her own issues if her magic was failing. I sent out a call to my hunter.

  “I’ve lost her trail.” Kyle oozed frustration and anger. He hated it when he lost his prey. “I’ve circled the house. I can smell her, then she’s just gone. And I can’t pick up any other trail.”

  I growled and the others looked at me. “Kyle can’t pick up her trail.”

  If I hadn’t been so annoyed I’d have queried why Ronin and Lee had the expression of proud fathers.

  “She said something about going the back way.” I told Kyle.

  “There’s a back way?” Unknowing, he echoed my question to Alex.

  “I’ll find Aunt Ruth. Maybe she’ll know.”

  “I’ll keep searching,” Kyle said.

  I scrubbed my hands through my hair and winced at the tangles. I really needed to clean up. “We have to find her.”

  “Even if we don’t find her, that doesn’t solve our problems with the Elders,” Ronin said.

  “It might make them more willing to negotiate,” Lee said.

  I focused on him. “Negotiate what?”

  “A return to our old lives. If we give up any idea of completing the Cinco. We have a home, and school to finish. I didn’t go through three years of study to give up now.”

  I hated to say it but Lee had a point. Before the attack, I’d been so focused on keeping the Cinco together, I hadn’t co
nsidered what we were doing to our day-to-day lives. I guessed I thought we’d fix the problem and life would go back to normal. That’s what I did as alpha, fixed problems. Since the attack, I hadn’t been conscious enough to consider the Elders might not want us back.

  Ronin butted in before I could answer. “You’ve gotta be joking. They nearly killed Matt and you’re worried about school?”

  Lee jutted his bottom lip out. “They attacked Matt because we were protecting the daughter of a traitor. I want my life back. She goes, problem solved.”

  “You selfish bastard!”

  Ronin launched himself at Lee. I wasn’t sure who was more shocked. Me or Lee, who went down under a flurry of fists.

  “What the hell?” I shouted at Ronin, but he was too wound up to hear me.

  Ronin, the shaman, the peace-maker, straddled Lee and attempted to smack his face, but Lee was still a shifter and stronger than he appeared. He fended off Ronin’s attack with only a few blows landing.

  There was no way I could wrench Ronin off without doing myself more damage, so I did the one thing I’d never tried before.

  “Stop!”

  Ronin and Lee froze. Interesting, the alpha voice did work.

  “Get the hell off, Ronin,” I said wearily.

  Ronin climbed off Lee but he still glowered at him.

  Lee just looked shell-shocked and he touched a finger to his split lip. “What the hell just happened, Ro?”

  “She’s our Quinto. We are Cinco. We support each other, love each other. We don’t quit when the going gets tough.” He stabbed a finger at Lee. “One minute you’re saying we’re a team, and the next, you want to see the back of her. Make up your mind.”

  Lee sprang to his feet, his fists clenched. “I’m not the only one who feels this way. Kyle does too. You just want to get your dick in her.”

  “What if I do?” Ronin snarled. “It doesn’t change the fact you’re rejecting the one chance we have to be complete.”

  “Guys, enough!” I was tired of the bickering and the tension. Lee had a point. I just wanted things to go back to the way they had been. Both of them turned their scowls on me but I ignored them. “Lee, go and find Aunt Ruth. Do we need to move out now or have we got time to prepare?” He hesitated, but I stared at him pointedly until he chuffed and left the room. Then I turned on Ronin. “What the hell, Ro?”