by Woods, Erica
* * *
So many packs, so many potential enemies.
The human among us stood out like a drop of blood in a pool of sharks. Though we fenced her in as we moved down the hill and toward the first circle, it was impossible to conceal her humanity. It screamed with her every clumsy step.
The lycans surrounding us moved with an unhurried, graceful gait—even those pouring out from the surrounding forest, their clothes bearing proof they had not gone home after last night’s hunt. They chatted amongst themselves, laughing and joking, some snarling and issuing unlawful challenge, others stalking their enemies with a predator’s intensity.
None—with the exception of the halflings, perhaps—smelled of unease.
Humans were not welcome at the Assembly. The last one to step foot in this territory had nearly been killed in an attack despite being protected by—
“What are they saying?” Hope’s low voice broke my thoughts apart like too-brittle wood.
I paused and listened. Murmurs rose and fell, some unhurried, some urgent, some loud enough to carry—and I had not noticed.
Yet another reason why the female was dangerous. She was a distraction at a time I could ill afford to be distracted. Not when I was the one my pack counted on for gathering intelligence and finding our enemies’ weaknesses.
“Mahír fáinn. It’s Fae for feral wolf,” Jason said, beating me to an answer I had not planned on providing.
The vixen’s stubborn refusal to trust me grated on my nerves, nearly as much as the easy affection she showed the other males in our pack.
Why was she still resisting me?
Hope eyes grew big. “Fae? You . . . You’ve mentioned them before. But why do lycans speak their language, and . . .” Her plump, bottom lip disappeared between her teeth. “Why are they all staring at Ash?”
The taste of those lips would forever be seared into my mind. As would the feel of her hands in my hair, the breathless little moans she made as I claimed her mouth, the feel of her lithe body pressed against mine.
My jaw clenched with the need to curse. But when I opened my mouth, what I said was, “The fae are our ancestors, the source of all magic.” Perhaps if I helped sate her boundless, childlike curiosity, she would lose the wary distance she kept between us. But instead of sending me one of her rare, warm smiles, she did not even glance in my direction.
Jason threw an arm over the maddening female’s shoulders and leaned down to whisper in her ear. “They are staring because they suspect Ash is a feral.”
“Feral? Ash?” She glanced doubtfully over at our alpha. “Does that mean something different to lycans? Because Ash is one of the most controlled people I’ve ever met.”
A breath hissed out of me as claws dug into my palms. I looked down, dismayed to find I’d momentarily lost control of my wolf.
It’s the damned vixen’s fault!
Having her so near, hearing the reverence and respect in her voice when she spoke about my brothers while still fearing me . . .
She’s trying to drive me mad. It’s the only explanation.
“It’s complicated,” Ruarc muttered and knocked Jason’s arm away from the human’s narrow shoulders. Baring his teeth at the other male, he dragged Hope away and put her flush against his side. “And boring.”
“Tell me anyway?” The way she nestled into Ruarc made me grit my teeth and look away. “I’d like to know all I can about you. About all of you.”
Did her sweeping declaration include me? If so, she would be sorely disappointed. The only highlights of my past were meeting my brothers and watching my parents die. And not necessarily in that order.
Ruarc muttered something under his breath and took a moment to bare his teeth at a strange male passing too close to our little group. With so many of us gathered at one place, tension was unavoidable. Especially for the few packs that had a female to protect.
“What was that, old man?” Jason asked. “Afraid our girl won’t think you’re the baddest wolf here once she knows what Ash is?”
A heavy thump was followed by a grunt from Jason and a gasp from the female. I spun around, a peculiar sensation hollowing my chest.
“Jason!” Hope cried and rushed over to his side. A few males stopped to stare at the female’s strange behavior, her worry over a male not yet her mate plain for all to see. “Are you okay?” She touched the small bruise forming below his eye and was quickly pulled into a hug.
While Jason played the victim, I stood guard. My gaze swept over our surroundings, narrowing whenever someone moved too close, hunting the shadows for threats. This was no place to stop and chat. While everyone made their way toward the big stage set up at the edge of the circle farthest away from us, anyone not moving gave cause for suspicion.
I did not like the way they looked at my female.
A low growl from Ruarc, and I turned in time to watch Jason grin at him over the top of the female’s head. It baffled me how Jason always seemed to know how to make Hope shower him with her affection.
“A feral wolf is a lycan whose dual soul never settles,” I found myself saying. Anything to tear the female’s attention away from the pup. It worked, too. After running her hands over Jason’s face and shooting Ruarc a narrow-eyed stare, she turned all her attention to me.
As she should, I thought, teetering between triumph and something so furiously hot it boiled the blood in my veins. Through jaws that felt too tight, I continued, “We are not as we once were. The first natural born lycans had one soul—half wolf, half fae. Perfectly balanced.”
While Hope gaped, Jason grabbed her hand and pulled her to his side. “That is why so many lycans object to calling these forms”—he swept a hand up and down his body, tearing Hope’s eyes away from me and in his direction instead—“our human forms. Because we were originally fae.”
“But then why . . .” Hope’s eyes were glued to Jason’s body, her words coming slowly as heat filled her eyes. It was maddening. “Why do you look human?”
“Maybe the real question is; why do humans look fae?” Ash said from the back
“Is that true?” Wide eyes met each of ours before settling back on Ash. “Are humans descended from fae, too?”
Ash’s eyes lit up before he offered her a small smile. “No, banajaanh, I was only teasing.”
Her face fell. “Oh.”
“Don’t be sad, love. No one ever gets Ash’s jokes.” Jason winked at her then grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the edge of the large circle where the cover of the trees provided some measure of privacy. “No one knows why we look human. It could be magic, or it could be that we’ve lived in this world for so long, or that we’ve bred with humans. Or maybe humans have some fae in them.” He shrugged. “Who knows.”
“It’s not important,” I said, a flare of annoyance prickling beneath my skin like a bite I wanted to scratch. Females had thrown themselves at me for centuries, their touch repellent, their closeness repulsive. I had allowed few near, never felt the hunger for another’s presence or craved another’s company.
But now I did, and the female I wished to claim had turned . . . difficult.
“True.” Jason grinned. “What is important to know is how most lycans feel about their wolves. Ask almost anyone, they’ll tell you that their wolf is both a part of them and their own creature. Two beings, two souls, a mind that is not fractured but balanced. Separate but whole.” He paused and looked at Ash. On the surface, our alpha appeared calm and collected, but the full moon had hit him hard. His wolf may have retreated, but it had not gone far. “But when a lycan is born feral, the souls never attain that balance. They are too close to our ancestors, too wild and strong to be tamed.”
“Fae touched,” Ruarc grunted with his back to us and his attention on the milling lycans gathering before the stage.
Hope’s whole demeanor changed when she looked at the big, scarred male. Her face softened, her eyes lit up, and her shoulders pulled back—as though he filled her with co
nfidence.
Razor-sharp emotions suddenly wrapped their prickly barbs around my throat. I grimaced under the assault, furious at the female for forcing this horror on me while simultaneously wanting to lose myself in her softness, in her stubborn defiance and her never-ending well of gentle understanding.
The vexing human had me bewitched.
Her gaze darted to me, as though hearing my thoughts, and her regard provoked equal parts desire and volatile anger.
A blush stole over her cheeks, and she looked away. “W-why are they called ferals if all that happens is that their souls don’t have balance?”
“Remember Lucien said we used to have one soul?” Ash said and stepped closer to the female. He took her free hand and brought it to his lips for a quick kiss that twisted something in my stomach. “Well, a very long time ago, when Faerie was at war, the fae used magic to fuse the souls of their greatest warriors to those of Faerie’s fiercest predators. But the magic was volatile and so were the predators. Together, they ripped the lycans’ souls apart, fusing the wolf with this other predator and leaving the fae separate.” His thumb rubbed over her knuckles, and when she shivered, something in his demeanor imperceptibly softened. “Despite their centuries of training, most of the lycans went mad and had to be killed. The few that survived the fusing were left fighting the call of madness for every second of their long lives, forever battling this presence that was not wolf but other. And that is why they received the name mahír fáinn—feral wolf.”
“Magic? I don’t . . .” Hope’s hand fluttered to her neck, where the rapid beat of her pulse quivered beneath her skin. “But that’s not how you feel? Oh, Ash, tell me that’s not how it is for you!”
She worried for Ash?
“If I were to go mad, banajaanh, it would have happened by now.” He cupped her cheek, giving her a truth that left much unsaid. “Do not worry.”
She leaned into the touch, brows creased with concern. “But . . . how? How are you okay?”
“Time,” Ash said simply. “Many generations separate me from the first ferals.”
“Does that mean your wolf is not fused to one of these . . . these Faerie predators?”
“No one knows.” Ash’s smile was indulgent and warm as he looked down at the little female. “Some believe ferals carry the awakened souls of the old predators while others argue it is their magic that clings to us. Many think it is only a remnant—an echo of what used to be—and all fear the possibility that it is not. The only thing we know to be true is that ferals have changed throughout time. Much of the power we were once rumored to possess has been lost.”
Much, but not all.
A small, “Oh.” Then, “What kind of predators did Faerie use?”
“All of them,” Ash replied. “Chimeras and dragons. Elementals and wisps. Banshees and the magic that lives in valkyries. All the ancestors to all the magical races sacrificed themselves to protect Faerie.”
Hope’s mouth dropped open, and the sight of her tongue peeking out to sweep over her lips lit a fire in my blood.
“So now you know, love . . .” Jason elbowed Ruarc, sidestepping the sweep of the enforcer’s claws, and grinned. “That is how the lycans went from having one soul to two. Even though the majority of us are not feral, we are their descendants, and nothing can undo the damage caused by magic that powerful.”
I did not much care about the damage. My wolf and I were one, if that was achieved through some sort of balance or through our souls being merged, it made no difference to me. What I did care about, however, were the consequences of the ferals’ existence.
According to legend, the first generation born after the war—before the bloodlines were diluted—were all feral, and therein lay the reason for Rederick’s proposal and for some, but not all, of the hatred and mistrust lycans harbored for humans. Our species craved the power we had lost after we integrated into the human societies.
Not to conquer, but to defend.
Had the humans never hunted us—killing our young and our feeble—had the vampire wars never been and our species not seen such a steep decline in numbers, levelheaded minds may have prevailed. But as it stood today, murmurs that would have been silenced had things been different, grew in volume at an alarming speed.
Talk of eliminating all humans, of creating breeding programs to create ferals had long since ceased being whispers and begun being spoken of openly.
It was lunacy. Pure and utter lunacy.
The zealots failed to take into consideration the lack of ferals born into pure bloodlines—not to mention, ferals rarely lived long. If we were already so few, what would happen when the majority of new births ended in feral death?
And the wars that would spark . . . No male worth the title would stand by and watch females be used as broodmares.
What would we have done had someone come for our female? A furious growl spilled from my lips and four pairs of eyes shot to me.
“Lucien?” It looked like the female was about to reach for me, but then she lowered her pretty eyes and addressed the ground. “Did you see something?”
“No,” I snapped back, taking a twisted sort of satisfaction in the way she cringed at my harsh tone.
Good. If she is going to make me miserable I might as well return the favor.
It did not seem to matter what I did; Hope was determined to stay afraid of me. It made no sense. Had I not curbed my tongue while she lied to us? Had I not kept my temper in check and refrained from yelling when all I had wanted to do was shake some sense into her fool brain?
And yet she trembled in my presence, averted her eyes when I looked at her, quivered when I opened my mouth as though expecting the worst. She had kissed me back, devil take it! She had been on her way to trust me, care for me, and what was holding her back? A few harsh words, a couple of weeks of suspicion, an attempt to push her away before I—
My breath halted and my insides split like flesh beneath claws.
I staggered back until my head knocked into a thick trunk, a branch scraping the side of my face.
The black pit where my soul resided ached with the kind of pain I had thought myself impervious to.
That day when I’d scented my brothers all over the human, that day when a burning, seething rage had awoken in me and reminded me what hell it could unleash . . . The pain I’d felt once I’d pushed the female away had been more than heated emotions, more than the loss of my armor. It had been the beginning of a bond—our bond . . . shattering.
Dear lord.
The melodious sound of a soft voice filtered past my despair, but I could not make out the words. They came as from far away, a wave of dizziness abruptly cutting off even that.
Hope was right to spurn me. She was right to not forgive me. If my words had broken our bond—the bond I had not even been aware of—they had cut her deeply.
Deeper than I could have imagined.
Too busy raging against emotions I had not felt in centuries, I had dismissed her feelings as of little consequence—more concerned by rebuilding my armor than seeing how my words destroyed hers.
I rubbed at my throat.
Cruelty had never been foreign to me. I had suckled at its breast as a child, endured its shattered bones and broken spirit through my first three Ascensions, and used it against the demons who spawned me once I was strong enough to survive their wrath.
No. Cruelty was not an alien concept, but this . . .. this was. This biting, eroding regret.
Quickly, before the agonizing sense of loss sent me to my knees before a female who deserved better than the promises longing to spill from my mouth, I gathered all my mental strength and rebuilt as much as I could of my fortress of ice.
For once, not to protect myself, but to protect her.
Was it any wonder she was wary?
When I glanced back at my pack, I knew my face had settled into my old, impassive mask. A cold numbness had spread through my body, a numbness I clung to for dear life. “Go on,”
I told the female without a trace of emotion. “Ask your questions.”
32
Hope
My mouth was too dry to ask any of the questions whirling around my brain like leaves caught in a hurricane.
Magic.
Fae touched.
Two souls.
The words were there, small flashes caught in the tornado wreaking havoc on my mind, but I couldn’t touch them. Couldn’t trap a single one. My attention was splintered, and half belonged to Lucien.
For a brief second, I’d caught a glimpse of a pain so deep, so vast, I feared he’d drown without a lifeline. He’d stumbled back, clutched at his chest, shaking his head as though it was filled with voices that stabbed. But before I could go to him, before I could even try to help, the icy partition he used to conceal his emotion had descended.
Ask your questions, he’d said, but the ones I wanted to ask remained locked behind Lucien’s glittering green gaze, and the ones I should have asked hid behind a wall of cowardice.
An expectant silence pushed against me on all sides, but I still couldn’t speak.
“Mo chridhe?”
That voice, like rough leather and harsh gravel and a fire that could not help but burn. I shivered, my skin pebbling with electric tension that only grew when a big palm cupped my hip and dragged me against a hard body.
“You okay?”
I nodded, throwing Lucien a quick look—wanting, needing, craving . . . something—before leaning against Ruarc and tipping my chin back.
A growl, even more delicious than his voice, his mouth moving over my newly exposed skin, tasting and nuzzling while my breath caught and my thoughts kept spinning.
Wisps.
Chimeras.
Banshees.
Branches curled above our heads, bursting with life, with vibrant, green leaves that waved in the soft breeze.
Dancing, I thought, transfixed by the way they moved, the whisper of gentle sound swishing through the air in time with the wind. Transfixed by Ruarc’s wild, wild scent and scorching heat.