Hopping out of the car was worse, not just because of the smells but because of the sounds. She couldn’t block anything out. The pounding of dozens of strong horse hearts felt like gongs going off by her head, and the clomping of hooves trotting in the ring were like railroad spikes pounding into her skull.
Doubled over, Elaine made it as far as she could, glad that Floyd and everyone else were at the main ring. The second she passed a stall, the horse in it would rear and started to whinny. That noise added to the cacophony in her brain. Beside her, as she made her way to Rainstone’s quarters, a giant quarter horse circled and kicked against the wood of the door, causing it to splinter. Elaine shuddered and screamed at all the pain assaulting her. Desperate, she rushed into Rainstone’s stall.
Rainstone was the only horse among the dozen or so not going nuts.
Maybe he had no fear instinct.
Who could even tell the rules anymore?
Sighing, Elaine leaned against the wall and slid to the floor. The hay was soft and curling up in it and trying to sleep after the day from hell was all she wanted to do. Nothing else had helped, not denial, not talking with Priest Norine. Not even stroking the side of Rainstone’s leg, feeling her patient steed’s warm body under her palm.
“Oh Rainstone, what’s happening to me?”
“You’re a witch,” a familiar voice chimed in. “A novice Wiccan to be exact.”
“Trent!” she gasped.
He stood at the stall door, as gorgeous as she’d remembered him.
Elaine didn’t want to come off as so pathetically desperate, but after the freak show of last night, she’d never expected to see those haunting tawny eyes looking back at her. It would have been better if they weren’t regarding her with such pity, but at least it wasn’t with hate or revulsion.
Trent sat down next to her and took her hand.
“I should have been more honest with you. I did this wrong.”
She blinked, not understanding.
“I don’t get any of this. I know I’m at least in line to potentially be a tribe Medicine Woman one day because of my grandmother, but I’m not a Wiccan. It’s not even a religion I’m familiar with. And why would you be responsible?”
“Because, I’m not who you think I am. I’m part of the Magus Corps, and I was assigned a couple of months ago to surveil your case and bring you into our fold. I’ve been watching you every day for weeks.”
Elaine’s head swam and it had nothing to do with her senses going crazy. Instead, she felt emotions warring with in her, both anger that he’d stalked her but also nausea that she’d been so vulnerable and not even known it. She decided to have the best of both worlds. First, Elaine leaned over and vomited in the hay. Then, as Trent leaned over to help hold her hair back, she regained her composure and slapped him.
• • • • •
Trent rubbed his cheek and stared back at Elaine, not sure what had just happened. He’d fought Knights to the bloody end, cast spells that had left him exhausted and drained for days, but he’d never been slapped by a woman until now. He wasn’t sure what to do.
“I can explain,” he said.
“Explain?” Elaine demanded, dark eyes stormy as she jumped up and rushed out of the stall.
He followed after and locked the gate behind them. She rounded on him and his wolf side made him bare his teeth a bit. He knew a challenge when he saw it.
“Explain what?” she said. “You’re some creepy stalker? That you think you’re okay because you work for some Corps or group? That you’re a goddamned liar?”
“I had to get close to you. It was the mission.”
Lying was second nature to maintaining cover so why was it hard with her. Why was everything so hard with her?
“Tell me more about this mission,” she snarled.
His wolf half was torn between arousal and matching anger. He was the alpha here and not for her to question.
“You’re magical, but you know that,” he said. “You know you have better senses than others and we both know after last night you can shapeshift.”
“Apparently I’m some werewolf freak!”
He shook his head and tried to put his hands on her shoulders, but she backed away from his touch. That tore into him deeper than any Knight’s blade ever had. Ignoring the slight as best he could, he began to pace. It gave his wild half something to do.
“You’re a shapeshifting witch. It’s very different. Real werewolves are crueler and have to fight off craving human flesh.”
“Oh Goddess,” she said, bending down and taking in deep gulps of air. “I couldn’t.”
He shook his head and steadied her, grateful she at least accepted that much comfort.
“I said that’s actual lycanthropes. We’re different. We have to use a spell mixed with a totem in order to shift to our animal forms. It’s controlled. You might not remember all of the night before, but you wouldn’t hurt a human. Witches and warlocks who change are above that.”
“Says you! I did devour some chickens. I just…why would you be watching me?” she continued, squatting low and taking in deep breaths.
He crouched down beside her and rubbed slow circles on her back.
“You won’t hurt people, promise. Second, our kind––Wiccans––have been around for millennia but we have our enemies.”
“Enemies?”
He nodded and continued.
“The Knights Templar are dedicated to eliminating every last warlock and witch. The Magus Corps fights them, but we also find Wiccans out there who don’t know who they really are. At least you knew there was power in your family, that it was inherited in your line. That’s often far more than most witches.”
“I knew my grandmother had powers or was reputed too, and I knew I was a freak.”
Trent shook his head and stroked her hair back from her face. Those gorgeous doe eyes looked back at him, so full of trust and desperation. He hated himself for botching all of this so badly and causing her pain.
“Gifted, like me. Humans are scared of us. The Knights think we’re demonic, and they want us eliminated. The best thing we can do is find the ones born to this, initiate them, and keep them safe and trained in their abilities.”
“And how do you initiate? Is there some handbook? Do I go to a school? Maybe all I need is a sorting hat.”
Chuckling, Trent kept rubbing her back.
“You’re not Hermione Granger. Each of us is born to this life, and we draw our energy from nature in all its forms.”
“I can tell, hence my ability to become furry.”
“Not all of us. We can cast the most powerful of our spells communing with the Goddess and nature. If we’re drained from a huge incantation, going to spend time in the wild refuels us.”
“So just go and swim in a spring or hike a mountain and ready to go all Sabrina?” she countered and he noticed that at least her breathing had returned to normal. Perking up his hearing, Trent noted also that her heart was steady again, like a metronome. “That makes sense but…” She blushed then, went as red as a fire hydrant. “My grandmother…older Medicine People used to have other rituals to harness energy.”
He nodded. “Sexual union is the highest form of communing with nature. It’s why you started to inherit your abilities after your first boyfriend.”
“I never said that.”
“The dossier did.”
She shook her head and glared up at him with a fury he’d seen rarely before and often only in Templar eyes.
“Spying. What kind of perverts are you?”
“We’re not,” he said, standing and pacing again, taking long languid steps in order to burn off his energy. “This is who we are. The ultimate way to celebrate nature is sexual.”
“Are you here to have sex with me?”
“I’m here to tutor you. Each of us has our own affinities and spells that work. You didn’t even realize it, but you’ve even collected a familiar for yourself, an animal who serves only y
ou.”
She grinned despite that and walked back toward Rainstone’s stall. Holding out her hand flat, Elaine widened her smile and let the horse snuffle at her palm.
“It’s Rainstone. I felt drawn to him the moment I saw him.”
“Yeah and mine, my husky Timber, is the best ally I’ve ever had. He’s back in D.C., where I was based before this.”
“I thought you were from New York?”
“I was. Anyway we can shift, but some can see the future, or manipulate luck. Others of us can control elements or read minds. There’s so much variety, but I wouldn’t trade what we are for anyone else’s powers.”
“But we’re–”
“Different, but still us and not alone anymore,” he replied, walking over to her. “Yes, helping train you…helping you learn the full extent of your powers, that will take calling on nature and sometimes, yes, intercourse. Magus Corps officers only do it with consent, but it’s part of your craft.”
“I’m sure it is. How convenient for you.” She ignored him to stroke Rainstone’s nose.
“It’s not convenient. It’s the most beautiful expression of togetherness that there is. Some of the Magus Corps have been at this for centuries, and those unions, the fully initiated ones, are the stuff of legends.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, and he cocked his head, amused at the way she showed shock so easily.
“Centuries?”
“If you have unprotected sex with a Magus Corps member, truly have that intimate a joining, that will make you immortal.”
“You can’t be more than twenty-five.”
“The immortality keeps me looking that way, but I’m young compared to the others, just fifty.”
“That’s close to Dad’s age.”
He shrugged.
“I know this is a lot to take in, and I meant to do better and find a way to prepare you, to help start your training. But even I wasn’t sure how to say ‘so you’re in line to be an immortal witch.’”
“I’m sure you do it all the time,” she said, but not sounding as sure of herself.
“No, actually,” he said, finally coming to stand inches from her.
She shuddered and he smelled her arousal even then, the sweet tang of juices flowing to her pussy. Animals calling to each other, shifter calling to shifter. Reaching down, he stroked her cheek.
“I’ve been on the front line in the battle,” he said quietly. “I’ve never initiated anyone else.”
“I’m a job,” she said flatly.
“You’re more than that, and that’s why I messed this up. I wasn’t supposed to, but I’m falling hard for you, my country gal.”
“I can’t know anything is real,” she said through clenched jaws, but she didn’t move, just regarded him with an intensity that matched her wolf form.
“Then watch,” he said, kissing her cheek and then stepping back. Unbuckling his jean jacket, he let her get a good look at the item around his waist. She reached out and stroked it and most of him wished she’d stroked an area farther south. “Do you know what this is?”
She nodded. “It’s a fur belt. That’s the most popular totem for skinwalkers.”
“Yes,” he said, reaching into his pocket and tossing her the tooth. “You left this at your place. You weren’t there when I was looking for you today. It’s how I guessed to come here. You’ll need the totem to change.”
“That’s the last thing I want to do!”
“This,” he repeated even as the fur spread over his body and his ears elongated, “is a gift. So accept it, Elaine, and run with me.”
After that, he could no longer speak, not as bones crunched, forcing him to all fours. His face stretched out and teeth erupted from the gums. His ears crawled up the side of his head. Viscera rearranged within his gut. Eventually, he was fully changed, long since used to the pain of it. It was a dull ache now, something to be borne when changing bone and trading flesh for fur or feathers. Slipping out of his clothing, he glanced up at Elaine and howled, hoping she understood the message repeated again.
Run with me.
• • • • •
The pain was as sharp as it had been the past times. That was the first thought that occurred to her. The second strongest one ringing through her mind was that she was nuts. Here she was listening to a man, no a Corps member out to recruit and, well, bed her. Here she was embracing the freak half she’d worked to keep secret. Here she was turning into a damn wolf all over again.
She screamed as the pain continued, like a million needles digging themselves under her skin and twisting all at once. Eventually that scream became the anguished howl of an animal. Then it escalated to whimpering.
Pain, run, escape.
Then she noticed the scent, the musk of another wolf. Looking up from the tangles, she eyed him. He was large, easily twice her size with huge hulking shoulders.
Elaine bared her fangs and growled.
Leave me. My territory.
The other wolf chuffed and shocked her by rolling over onto his belly, exposing all of it for her to see. Confused, she tried to remember. Before there’d been the chickens, delicious in her mouth, their blood flowing over her tongue. Then dark quiet. Now she was with horses, neighing loudly, but she didn’t want that. One of them smelled of her own scent, was hers, but not as food.
She wanted to run.
But first, she wasn’t sure how to escape the confines she’d become aware of. Twisting again, she felt her paws slip deeper into the mess of cloth and, despite herself, she whimpered.
Looking up, she found the other wolf nearing her face. She snapped at him and missed his muzzle by inches when he darted away. The wolf snorted and came close to her again, shocking her when he lay his head by hers, making sure his throat was prominent. She growled. She could have him now, kill the threat.
Except no real threat would make himself vulnerable twice over.
Confused, Elaine cocked her head at him and whimpered again.
I won’t kill you.
That wolf nodded and then helped tear her bindings with his teeth. When she was free, Elaine circled him. Taking his docile nature as an invitation, she started to sniff, but it was then the wolf pulled away. She snorted, confused by his antics. First trying to submit to her when he was bigger then refusing a good sniff? What kind of wolf was he? All she could tell was that his smell drew her in––a familiar musk she couldn’t quite place. It smelled strong of sex and power, and it called to her as a mate, made her stomach rumble. At the same time, odd things surrounded it, the artificial smells of those bald things.
The humans.
She barked and showed some fangs.
Elaine? Can you hear me?
She growled and started running from the other creature––it wasn’t a true wolf––not when sounds were in her head. Turning tail, she bolted from the barn, out to where she could see Mother Moon. Her long legs leapt over the straw and grass even as wind whipped through her fur. Paws dug deep in dirt and helped her launch herself again. After a few minutes, she craned her neck to see him, see if that strange not-quite-wolf was behind her.
He wasn’t.
Relieved, Elaine slowed her pace to a trot as she approached the woods.
But when she looked toward the nearest gathering of trees, her fur stood on end. Somehow, he had gotten ahead of her. All there was left to do was fight.
• • • • •
Trent dodged the lunge she aimed expertly at him. He’d been in many animal forms over the last decades, and part of that had included fights with other beasts and shapeshifters. With Elaine, though, she was still new. Even if she was running on instinct from the wolf side, she wasn’t used to the new body.
Her lunge was slow and rickety.
With a quick sidestep he’d repositioned around her, and clamped his jaws as gingerly as he could around the tip of her tail. She just needed to get a hold of herself, to let her human consciousness fully resurface. Communication was a start.
Elaine! Get a hold of yourself. You’re Elaine Blackhawk and you’re a witch, not just a wolf.
She rounded on him and snapped at his shoulder, but he was angled too far for her to reach.
“Rawr!”
Great, we’re making so much progress, he huffed in her mind. Elaine, look into my eyes, he said, gazing deeply into the yellow of her eyes that had replaced the soft brown tone. Remember.
She kept growling and squirming but didn’t avert her gaze. Trent kept talking to her mind, quiet and calming, just as she’d have talked to Rainstone, as he reached out to the human part of her. Finally, the great she-wolf before him stopped her frantic snapping and blinked back at him. The words that reverberated in his head were small and hesitant but at least they were cogent thoughts.
Trent?
He nodded and finally dropped her tail, glad when she didn’t lunge for him.
It’s okay.
Elaine circled and then sniffed his neck. Wide, scared eyes blinked back at him.
I didn’t remember anything!
He wondered if she even noticed how deeply she was whimpering as she “said” that. Trent would wager anything she didn’t. Leaning down, he nuzzled at her neck.
Instincts are strong when you take a form, but you’ll learn. Just center on something human like your family or you job, whatever grounds you in your civilized self.
She snorted. Like that thesis I should have worked on this week instead of answering the call of the wild?
Trent: Her Warlock Protector Book 7 Page 5