by Layla Nash
“I’ll call the doc. We’ll get you to the hospital—“
He caught Todd’s arm and shook his head. Evershaw couldn’t afford for the rest of the alphas to know he was ill, not when he was in the middle of getting rid of those upstart little fuckers outside the city. “Get Smith.”
“He can’t heal you,” Todd snapped. He grabbed the phone off the desk and started punching in numbers. “Fuck that. We’re taking you to the hospital.”
Evershaw caught the man’s shirt and dragged him down until they were nose to nose, and he put as much growl as he could manage in his voice. “I’d rather die. Get Smith. He can fix it.”
“You’ll die.”
“Get. Smith.”
Evershaw glared and eventually Todd threw the phone across the room and pulled out his cell phone to dial the ErlKing. Evershaw breathed a little easier, though not much, and concentrated on each inhale and exhale, each beat of his heart. Whatever it was, he would survive it. Miles fucking Evershaw would not die on the floor of his office.
Chapter 7
Deirdre
I was still reeling from Palmer’s proposal—such as it was—that I answered my phone without looking at the screen first. “Yeah.”
“Miss Deirdre, I am in need of another favor.”
I stopped in my tracks, my heart sinking. I didn’t have anything left to give, to anyone. To anyone. There just wasn’t anything left. And I didn’t recognize the voice right away, as my brain struggled to keep up with the exhaustion weighing me down. “I’m sorry?”
“There is a matter of some urgency that requires someone with your special skills.” The voice clicked in my memory and my fatigue deepened still more. Smith. Of course. The ErlKing needed another favor. On a matter of some urgency.
I started walking, glancing around to make sure that Palmer and the witches hadn’t followed me and would overhear me speaking to someone they viewed as an adversary. “I’m not sure I’ll be able to accommodate the request. I’m not—“
“You can name your price,” he said, and something about the stress in his voice had me stumble to a halt once more. He meant it. He was on the edge of panic and if the ErlKing was about to lose it... That shit was bad. “From myself as well as the individual’s family.”
“Smith,” I said quietly, shaking my head as I covered my eyes, even knowing he wouldn’t see it. “I can’t. I just…I don’t think I can.”
“Meet me and take a look at the situation,” he said. “If you still cannot do anything about it, then fair enough. I will still owe you a great deal.”
When I still hesitated, looking forward only to crawling into my bed and snuggling with Cricket, the ErlKing said, “Please.”
My heart jumped. Please. The ErlKing did not say “please.” Ever. It created layers of obligation, bonds and relationships, that set rank and status. He avoided it always, and yet... His soft voice repeated it, as if he already mourned for whatever was at risk. “Please. Quickly.”
My shoulders slumped and I fished the car keys out of my pocket. “Fine. Send me the address. I will be there as soon as I can.”
“Thank you.” The call ended and I was left gaping at my phone. A “please” and a “thank you.” I needed to play the lottery, since things like that never happened in my world.
A few minutes later, as I drove up to an old ugly warehouse in the shady district where I’d delivered a bunch of flowers to an up-and-coming restaurant, I was grateful shit like that didn’t happen in my world very often.
The sun was just starting to set, casting eerie shadows through the alleys and across the occasional pile of trash, and I thought I saw a few large dogs skulking about in the darkness of a nearby abandoned building. It set my heart beating a little faster, and made me acutely aware that I hadn’t brought any weapons other than a pocketful of charms. I could fight if I had to, but there wasn’t much that organic magic could do on the fly against determined assailants.
My steps slowed as I approached the warehouse, searching for an entrance that wasn’t creepy as fuck and looking like a one-way ticket into a windowless shed in the back of someone’s property. A tall man stepped out of the building, his dark hair askew and his eyes a little wild, flashing gold as he stared at me. “You’re the witch?”
I inclined my head, keeping my hands folded near my waist as I gripped a few of the charms. At least my bag was heavy with a useful book and a bag of herbs to use. “Yes.”
“You’re in the right place,” he said, and reached for my arm. “Come on.”
“Do not touch me,” I said as coldly as I could manage, and stayed out of his reach. “I make no promises that I can help.”
“We don’t have time.” He scowled at me, the gold in his eyes reflecting the flickering streetlight at me. But he held the door open and jerked his head for me to get my ass inside. “Hurry.”
I followed him and sidled through the questionable opening behind the bent metal door, and the thud-thud of my boots was the only sound that echoed inside. It was one of the abandoned factories, though all the machinery had been stripped out, leaving only an enormous echoing chamber lit by dicey fluorescent lights, which just made it more eerie.
The man moved at a near-run to the large table sitting under the only strong puddle of light, where three other men waited—one laid out on the table and two standing on opposite sides. Smith’s gray hair and eerie countenance turned under the light to face me, and once again I saw the outline of antlers over his head. His control slipped, and whatever caused it was not something I wanted to get closer to. My boots stuck to the stained concrete floor and I waited, looking at them.
The other man, dark-haired and with the same cast to his features as Evershaw, stepped over to me, looking just as wild as the man who’d opened the door. “I’m Todd, Miles’s cousin. Thank you for coming. Please…can you help him?”
Miles. I frowned and edged a little closer, though I avoided Todd’s helping hand as well as the gravity around Smith. Evershaw, the asshole wolf, was sprawled on the table, half naked and struggling to breathe. A strange rash crawled along his arms and torso, and his whole body trembled. I set my bag down and studied him, keeping my hands behind my back so I wouldn’t touch him. “What happened to him?”
“We don’t know.” Todd started to pace behind me, a hint of a growl in his chest, but it was worry and not aggression that animated him. “We had a couple of meetings, everything was normal, then about twenty minutes ago he called me into the office. He said his chest hurt and he couldn’t breathe, then he went into convulsions and... What the fuck is it?”
I kept the cold witch facade on. “Sounds like poison. Does he have many enemies?”
Both Smith and Todd snorted at the same time, and I glanced between them for a clue to their reaction. Smith, still looking a little wild, held his hand out, palm down, over Evershaw’s head until a green glow surrounded them both. “He is not well-liked by anyone outside his pack, Deirdre. There is a fairly long list of people who would want him dead—human, shifter, other...”
“Save his life,” Todd said. He turned to me and held his hands out, real fear in his face making him desperate. “Please. Save his life. We will owe you more than we can possibly repay.”
I made a rusty sound in my throat and shook my head. “Do not make such promises so lightly, wolf.”
I took a deep breath and pulled a few of the charms from my pocket. “Why didn’t you take him to the hospital? They could have saved his life for far less than I will ask of you.”
Smith’s green glow allowed Evershaw to breathe a little easier, and the prone man gargled about snakes, his arms dragging at a few leather straps that held him to the table.
“He’s hallucinating,” Todd said. “And if we took him to the hospital, everyone else in the city would have known he was weak. He’d be challenged, we’d lose territory, it would have been a disaster. I tried, but…he refused.”
Hallucinations. Hallucinations and a complete fool to risk his own lif
e for some point of pride. I shook my head and fiddled with the charms. All the symptoms pointed to nightshade poisoning, although there was no telling how much he ingested. “And if I save him, Smith will owe me a favor—with no limits placed upon it—as will this man,” and I nodded at Evershaw. Even if I didn’t actually want anything to do with the overbearing dick, it was good to have him in my debt. “And... ten thousand dollars.”
It was a long shot, but I needed to make some repairs around the house and a florist’s salary didn’t leave much extra beyond food and utilities. Especially since I’d heard from some bill collectors not that long ago about the property taxes owed to the city. I couldn’t even afford a lawyer to fight them off.
“Done,” Todd said, not even hesitating, and I frowned. I should have asked for more. Much more.
From the look on Smith’s suddenly more human face, he thought the same thing.
But I’d already said it aloud, so I was committed. I closed my eyes and centered myself, searching for the magic inside as well as whatever remained in that hollow, steel and concrete building. It wasn’t enough. I didn’t open my eyes as my lips pressed together and rolled in, and I shook my head. “Open some windows.”
“Windows?”
I started to explain but jerked in surprise as the crash of breaking glass erupted all around. Men and women came out of the shadows and broke as many windows as they could reach. Well. At least they followed orders. Todd gripped the edge of the table where his cousin lay, and stared at me with an unnerving intensity. “They’re open.”
“Wonderful.” I closed my eyes again and concentrated, letting the fresh air filter through the building and bring with it a few sparks of magic. It was enough, but just barely. My right hand hovered over Evershaw’s chest, the charm sliding out to rest against his skin, and the scrap of cloth flared up in a purple corkscrew of smoke.
Someone growled from the shadows but Todd hushed them, and tension crackled in the sticky air.
I found the poison where it lodged in his blood and circulated through his muscles and into his brain. It felt like belladonna, though I couldn’t be sure, and it disrupted every process in his body.
I’d gone through four more charms and was sweating profusely by the time I thought he was stable. I’d cleaned as much of the poison from his system as I could without bringing the coven in to help. My arms dropped to my sides and I staggered back a step, wishing suddenly for a chair, though I tried to hide my fatigue from the men who studied me as closely as they eyed their friend. “There.”
“He’s fixed?” Smith folded his arms over his chest, his attention still on Evershaw as the man’s eyes opened and closed rapidly.
“For now,” I said. I absently dragged my hair back from my face and wrapped it up in a bun, moving slowly so they wouldn’t see my hands shake. I’d have to sleep for a whole day to get over that much magic, even with the ten grand burning a hole in my pocket. “You should uncover who is poisoning him and how. There may be more of it in his environment or food or anywhere, and without understanding the source and the precise type of poison used, this is only a stop-gap.”
“We didn’t smell anything poisonous,” Todd said. He was still pacing, making the back of my neck prickle when his track brought him behind me, and made another lap with all of his attention still on Evershaw. “Nothing. There wasn’t any warning. What are we supposed to look for?”
I gestured at the slowly-fading rash. “The symptoms indicate belladonna. Look for small flowers in a rather dull purple shade, or perhaps green or shiny black berries. It could be only belladonna, or it could be belladonna blended with something else. Maybe monkshood or hemlock. Or it could be a chemical compound created in a lab to mimic the symptoms. Find the culprit and you’ll find the treatment.”
Smith nodded. “Yes. I could not sense any connection to the poisoner. It may take us some time to uncover the plot, but we will.”
I nodded and reached for my bag. “Good luck, then. When can I expect the payment?”
Todd stopped in his tracks and looked at me. “What?”
“I saved his life,” I said. “You agreed to pay me for doing so. Is there a problem?”
“He’s not safe,” Todd said, slow and distinct. As if hearing was the problem, rather than him changing the terms of the agreement. “He could still die. You agreed to save him. We won’t pay until he’s safe.”
Evershaw abruptly shoved up on his elbows to stare at me, his eyes wild. “Witch. You will do as you’re told.”
I snorted, shaking my head. “Hush. Go back to your hallucinations.”
He grumbled and wrenched at the leather straps restraining him, and one broke enough for him to reach for me. “Witch.”
“You’re out of your head,” I said. I wanted to roll my eyes and smack him around a little, regardless of whether he was sick or not. “And you do not give me orders, wolf. Remember that.”
“Fine,” he snarled. Evershaw roared as he lurched up from the table, the tendons in his neck standing out, and fur sprouted along his arms and shoulders as his eyes blazed gold and someone snarled from the darkness near the broken windows. “Todd, bring her back to the house.”
My heart jumped to my throat and I took a step back. I did not sign up for that. I agreed to help him, and I’d done that.
Smith held his hands up, trying to get control of the situation, and tried to shout above Evershaw’s noise. “Wait a moment. Breathe. Everyone breathe.”
I kept retreating and almost didn’t notice as the ErlKing’s fingertips drifted across my bicep and down to my elbow, and something changed. Something... shifted. Adhered. Fundamentally unbalanced my place in the universe. I drew myself up in the full spiral of my power and my voice boomed out from a place where only the darkest magics had done. “You dare.”
“You are bound,” the ErlKing murmured. “Save his life and save your own.”
I screamed in rage and jammed a hex into his chest, knocking him back so I could bolt for the door. The unbelievable bastard. The tricky, treacherous son of a bitch. Everyone yelled, growls and snarls underpinning it all, and chaos erupted with more breaking glass and groaning metal and running feet that surrounded the shadows and burst into the light. I needed to get outside. I needed the moon. I struggled to breathe and dodged an arm reaching for me. I didn’t want to fight. I didn’t want to hurt anyone, but I would.
The door slammed shut, guarded by the same burly man who’d let me in, and I slid to a halt against a massive support column. Bastards. I howled my own rage right back at them and planted my feet, ready to fight. All I needed was a small window and I could escape. I used my don’t-see-me trick and faded into smoke, ready to show those fucking animals they should never, ever cross a witch.
Chapter 8
Evershaw
Evershaw watched the battle in brief flashes of lucidity, tempered by clouds of smoke and the odd green strike of Smith’s magic, but his eyes found the witch as she fought. And she fought. Pain still racked through him with each breath, even if whatever the witch had done seemed to improve the pressure in his chest, but that wasn’t enough to distract him from the way his pack closed in around the witch. It was a thing of beauty to watch the witch dodging his pack’s best efforts to confront her, and even his most seasoned fighters hesitated to take her on. Evershaw made a mental note to toughen them the fuck up if they weren’t even brave enough to grab a girl.
Smith warned them about what she might do. He’d even offered some basic protection charms to each of his pack members who were in the warehouse, in anticipation that something wouldn’t go as planned. Evershaw felt bad about it for half a heartbeat before the pain gripped his stomach and made him curl up in agony. The witch shrieked and did something that made the entire warehouse rattle and shake, dust falling and steel groaning. Evershaw ripped his arm free from the other leather strap, irritated anew that Todd insisted on restraining him in case the poison drove him into an uncontrolled shift, and tried to free
his legs despite the waves of pain. “Catch her.”
Henry ducked one of the witch’s odd scraps of cloth as it turned into a flash of smoke and a set of darts that tore through his shirt. Todd dove at her legs and the witch leapt at least ten feet in the air, almost reaching a cross-beam far overhead, but Smith held his hands up and chanted something that made green snakes of smoke condense around her.
The witch howled with rage as she stopped short of the beam and the green smoke dragged her back down and into their reach, restraining her like his pack hadn’t been able to manage, and all the hair stood up on Evershaw’s arms. As soon as her feet hit the ground, Todd tossed a black hood over her head while Henry and another wolf bound her arms and legs. Smith released the green snakes and pulled a handful of twisted and knotted cloths out of her pockets, wincing as they ignited in his hand and he dropped them on the floor. “She was well-armed. More so than I expected. I will not underestimate her again, and neither should you.”
Evershaw swung his legs over the side of the table and stood, though he staggered with the disorientation of the smoke and poison and magic and everything else. “Knock her out.”
Smith shook his head slowly as the witch lashed out with her bound hands and started to chant, static crackling in the air, but the ErlKing gently touched her forehead through the hood. She immediately crumpled, though Henry managed to keep her from hitting the floor completely.
Evershaw swayed but stayed on his feet as he headed for the door and the SUVs that would be waiting outside. “It was the coyotes or that damn pack. Todd, figure it out. Call Edgar Chase and see what he can find. Just don’t tell him I was poisoned or how bad it was. Smith, how the hell do we keep the witch cooperative?”
The old man arched his eyebrows. “I’ve placed a geas on her.”
“A what?” Henry frowned as he looked up from throwing the witch over his shoulder, like he wondered if it might get on his clothes or contaminate him in addition to the witch. Evershaw didn’t blame him, since he didn’t know what the fuck a geas was, either.