by Helen Scott
Her Hidden Pack
House of Wolves and Magic Book Four
Helen Scott
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Also By Helen Scott
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright
1
Nina
The sun hadn’t even crested over the trees yet when we were up and dismantling the camp. In fact, it was barely even lighting the sky enough for us to see what we were doing. We’d all been shocked that the tent and everything was exactly where we’d left it. Some of it was destroyed from the fight and the weather or animals, but most of it was still intact. It was a lucky break, one that we’d needed. Badly.
This time, we weren’t leaving it behind though. We’d packed it up and were taking it with us, no point in leaving it behind and littering the forest, plus it was going to be our home for the next however long while we searched for the oracle. I just hoped we could find her before the Shadow Forest pack found us. I really didn’t want another showdown with them.
As we began to move through the forest toward the top of the mountain, which seemed the most obvious place for the oracle to be, I wished I could experience the area as my wolf. I could feel her closer to the edge than before, like she was interested in what was going on but still wasn’t willing to take the leap and leave the cage within my mind.
Micah was walking next to me as we weaved through the trees, and I appreciated the company, but I wasn’t the one that was still recovering from my injuries. Sure, the bullet wound to the stomach I’d taken a little while back was still tender in parts, but that was expected with silver poisoning. It was Blake and Tate that had been injured the most recently, and I could tell from how they were walking and their speed that they were both still recovering, whether they wanted to admit it or not.
We were all tired and extra sleepy after the tension of the last few days. Who would have thought that staying in a hospital would be the least stressful thing?
When we emerged into a small clearing, a caw sounded and I raised my head, shielding my eyes with my hand as sunlight finally hit us full force. A large crow sat on a branch toward the top of a tree looking down at us. As I looked around, the scent of lavender caught my interest. Hadn’t the oracle said something about that when she was giving me that weird prophecy?
I paused and sniffed the air. The guys were watching me, I could feel it, but this wasn’t the most unusual thing I’d done recently so they could get over it. I turned in a circle and waited for the scent of pine. I couldn’t find it though.
If I could find the lavender, then maybe that would lead me to the pine. What had she said after that? I remembered lavender and pine clearly, but that was it. Was there something about fruit? Ugh. Maybe if she’d told me when I wasn’t already stressed, I would have remembered better.
“Everything okay, beautiful?” Micah asked.
I nodded. “I just…” had a dream where the oracle told me some weird shit, and now I’m worried it was more than a dream. “I think we need to go this way.” I pointed in the direction of the lavender scent. If I could get closer to that, then maybe I’d find the pine.
Roman was looking at me quizzically but gestured for me to lead the way, which quelled any questions the others may have had. In some ways, having an older mate was good since it kept the younger ones in line, and I especially liked it when he deferred to me on things. I grinned at him as I stepped in front and began to follow my nose.
“You know, if you just wanted to get some lavender, you could have just said.” Blake nudged me, and when I looked over at him, he gave me a wink to let me know he was kidding.
We were a strange bunch in some ways. All of us were bonded together, though the bond the guys felt for me was different than what they felt for each other, which to my understanding, was more of a brotherly, best friend kind of bond, and yet we still knew little about each other’s pasts. We’d chatted about it some in the recent days, but for the most part, our bond outside of the immediate sexual nature of it came from shared trauma. It didn’t escape my notice that I was the cause of their shared trauma either.
“There’s something about lavender that makes me think we’re going in the right direction,” I said quietly.
“Why’s that?” Tate asked, stepping up to walk on my other side.
“It sounds stupid, but I had a dream…” I could feel the flush creeping up my cheeks as the words left my mouth. We were in hostile territory, and I was putting stock in a dream.
“Dreams can be powerful and full of meaning,” Roman said quietly from behind me.
I paused and looked at him over my shoulder. “What makes you say that?”
“The pack I grew up with, that my parents were part of, had some unusual practices, some of which were related to dreams. They weren’t just regular dreams but ones that were almost prophetic. There was a ritual that we did on every full moon, and a different one on every new moon, that was supposed to grant us glimpses of our future. Mine was always murky, like I was running through a storm. The only time it cleared up was a few years ago, when I did one in honor of my parents. Then instead of stormy, it was all white and glowy, but there was still nothing hinting at my future. That doesn’t mean that the thing was a failure, most of my old pack just said I wasn’t doing it correctly or I wasn’t focusing enough, that kind of thing.” When he stopped talking, I felt a little taken aback. He rarely talked about the pack he grew up in, and now that he was, I could understand why. I was sure if he told some of the shifters in the pack he and Micah were in together, they would have mocked him and his traditions. Even if they were good-natured about it, that kind of thing could make someone clam up and not want to share again. I knew, since I’d experienced it firsthand.
“I’d love for you to show me some time,” I said as I reached back and held out my hand.
Hope glimmered on his face as he took my hand in his and squeezed. “It would be my honor.” There was a shyness to his voice that I wasn’t used to hearing from him. My only hope was that showing him that I accepted his past, however different it may have been from mine, would give him enough courage to open up about it even more.
Though I hated to break the moment, I turned and continued following the scent of lavender. Eventually, we broke through a line of trees and undergrowth into an entire field of lavender. Ok, field might be a little too strong a word to describe what we’d stepped into, but still, it was the last thing I’d been expecting.
I waded into the purple-colored tips of the herb and opened my arms as I turned to look back at the guys. “Isn’t this incredible?”
They nodded, each of them regarding me with slightly different expressions, ones that I was choosing to interpret as “Isn’t she adorable” and “How did I get so lucky” and the like. I tipped my face toward the sunlight th
at was streaming into the little patch of heaven and closed my eyes, basking in the warmth and feeling more like a snake than a wolf in that moment.
As I bathed in the sunlight, I felt a breeze pick up and the scent of pine filled my nose, like someone had just chopped down a damn tree. Hope built in my heart that we might finally be on the right path. We needed to make some headway on this or it was going to start to feel like we’d never find her.
“Who the hell are you?” a woman’s voice called from the other side of the clearing.
My eyes snapped open, and my gaze locked on to her. She looked kind of like the woman in my dreams, but her eyes weren’t gray and she didn’t look as old as the dream woman had. “We don’t mean you any harm,” I said putting my hands up with my palms facing out.
“Like you could harm me,” she said with a huff and swung her basket around as she continued to harvest some of the lavender. “Shifters. Always think you’re the be-all and end-all, but you’re not, are you? I’ve got more power in my pinky than any of you can ever hope to wield.” She waved a pinky in our direction for good measure.
“Are you a witch?” I asked, suddenly wondering if this was the witch who had helped Jax make the old potion, the one that was supposed to force a mate bond.
“Of course I’m a witch. Not a bloody vampire if I’m standing in the sun, am I? Are you lot getting dumber as time goes by?” She glared at us and picked another few bunches of lavender.
“Sorry, I’m not very familiar with the supernatural community,” I said, lowering my hands.
“You don’t have to apologize to her, angel. She’s the one that’s being rude,” Roman said as he stepped up next to me.
“You’re the ones on my land, so yes, I’m being rude. You have no right to be here.” She wagged a finger at us as though we were naughty children, but then she stopped and stared. “You’re not from the pack that lives in these woods, are you?”
“No, ma’am. We’re just trying to find something,” Micah said as he stepped up on my other side.
Her eyes narrowed as she took my mates in. “Interesting bond you have there, young lady, or should I say bonds?”
I wasn’t sure what to say so I just watched her. The guys took their cues from me and stayed silent as well, all of us regarding her the same way she was looking at us.
“I see you and your mates are injured. If you would like, I can fix that for you.”
“We’re healing,” I said, brusquely.
“Not very quickly. Silver poisoning for two of you, an infection for one, among other injuries.” She tutted at us like a mother hen. “Not taking very good care of yourselves, are you?”
“We’re trying,” I replied with a sigh. “There’s just…a lot going on right now. You could really heal us completely?”
She nodded with what was almost an eye roll, as though her abilities wouldn’t be taxed in the slightest from healing us. I couldn’t help but look at the guys, who all shrugged, but when I got to Roman, he was just watching the witch. I nudged him with my elbow, and when he looked, I raised my eyebrows in question. I knew I didn’t need to explain what I was asking.
“How do we know we can trust you?” Roman never broke his gaze away from me, even though it was obvious he was talking to the witch.
“If I was going to hurt you, I already would have. You’re a bunch of lost pups that need help getting back on their feet, and I’m not one to kick a dog when it’s down.” She paused, and I looked from Roman to her. Once she was sure she had my attention, she continued, “I’m going back to my cabin. You’re welcome to follow and I can fix you all up and feed you if you’re hungry, but I’m not going to twist your arms to get you to do it. It’s up to you, just like most things.”
She sounded cryptic at the end, and I couldn’t help but take a step to follow her. Roman’s hand landed on my arm as though he didn’t want us following, but her offer was too good to pass up. We needed the kind of healing a witch could provide. If I hadn’t suspected she was the witch that could lead us to the oracle, I would have been more wary, but to have things line up the same as what the oracle said in my dream… It was too much of a coincidence to ignore.
“Trust me,” I said quietly enough that I knew she wouldn’t be able to hear.
Roman sighed but nodded. When I turned back around, I found the witch watching us once more, holding her basket higher so it was tucked in the crook of her arm. “Do you want a snack? It’s a long walk back to my cabin.”
I nodded. If she was a true witch, she could poison me, but I doubted she would. She reached into her wicker basket and pulled out a small bright orange globe and tossed it to me. I caught it, feeling the firm texture in my hands.
“Just don’t eat the top bit with the leaves,” she said before tossing one to each of the guys. Once we were all equipped with our apple-shaped orange globes, she began to walk away.
I tentatively bit into the flesh and was surprised by the rich, tangy, sweet flavor that exploded over my tongue. It was silky and sweet like a mango but also firm and tangy like a bell pepper. A moan of pleasure almost escaped me as I took a bigger bite and enjoyed the flavor.
“What is this?” I asked around my mouthful of the fruit.
“A persimmon. You ate it without knowing what it was?” Roman asked, completely baffled by my actions.
The caw of a raven overhead drew my attention away, and I knew that my dream hadn’t been just a dream, that all the signs were there, which meant we were on the right path to the oracle. Now we just needed the witch to tell us where the oracle was, if we could get her to trust us enough to do so.
2
Nina
As we walked, I devoured my new favorite fruit and tried to work out how to get the witch on our side. There was a small path that was carved through the trees, letting us know that this was a path that she regularly walked. It wasn’t big or fancy, but it was clear of debris under foot and there weren’t any branches in the way as we followed her. Birds chirped and sang in the tree branches overhead, clearly not bothered about our presence since we were with the witch.
“Are you born a witch?” I asked. The question just blurted out of my mouth, and though I wondered if I should be embarrassed, the woman in front of me just chuckled.
“Something like that, yes.” A little grin flashed across her face before she clamped down on whatever it was that she was feeling.
“How do you learn your, um, spells?” I didn’t know what the correct terms were when it came to witches, but if someone was going to help me, I felt sure it was the witch in front of me.
“It varies from coven to coven. My sisters and I taught each other. We each have our own specialty.” The way she said it made me think that there was more to that statement than I could possibly understand. Was it always like this with witches? Them talking cryptically to amuse themselves, while the rest of us just felt confused? Or was this witch just so lost in her own mind that she thought I understood more than I did?
“Do you sisters live with you?” Roman asked. I knew he was thinking of our safety. We might be shifters, but against witches and their powers, we may as well be teenagers thinking we knew everything but actually having no idea. Though I wasn’t anywhere close to being a teenager, I still had no idea what I was doing most days, and my life hadn’t exactly been predictable of late.
The witch shook her head. “No, we’ve been separated for some time now. Hopefully, we’ll be reunited soon though.” Again, she sounded like there were multiple meanings to the statement. If she wanted us to know though, she’d surely tell us, not just leave us guessing.
“You sound like you miss them,” I replied, hoping to get more information from her as I walked a little faster so I could catch up with her. There was something about someone barely answering my questions and walking on so they had to talk to me over their shoulder that rubbed me the wrong way. It was almost like she didn’t think I was good enough to have a proper conversation with, even though s
he was willing to answer our questions. I pushed the feeling away. I was probably reading too much into it.
“I do. We’re three of a kind, birds of a feather and all that.”
“Not to sound rude or anything but why are you offering to help us? Don’t you want anything in return?” Blake asked from right behind me, making me jump. I should have heard him approaching, but I’d been too distracted by the witch and the mysteries and secrets she clearly held.
The witch stopped in her tracks, and I almost ran into her. Oh, now she was willing to stand and talk. The jealous side of my brain wondered why she was willing to stop and chat with Blake but not me, even though I wanted to get to her cabin and get patched up so we could move on to the oracle. There was just something about this woman that made me want her attention.
A great round of caws went up from what could only be crows or ravens in the canopy of the trees. I hadn’t even realized they were there. The little songbirds I’d been enjoying listening to, but the ravens? They’d been silent until that point. They seemed to sense something, a shift in the witch’s mood, or maybe our scents were carried to them by the wind that suddenly gusted past us. Either way, it seemed like they were shouting directly at me. It reminded me of the ravens that had landed on the man’s shoulders in my dream. The ones that saw too much.
I couldn’t help but glance up. I expected rows of them to be staring down at me, but I couldn’t see a single one. There were only shadows, which may or may not have been birds. Still, I searched the canopy for a glimpse of beak, the gleam of an eye looking down at me, or a ruffle of feathers and saw nothing.