Rogue Breed (Rogue Huntress Chronicles Book 2)

by Thea Atkinson

  "You left your post." My voice was as cold as a blade's edge.

  He shuffled his feet.

  I glared at him as I dragged my gaze from Olanna's now unremarkable state of undress, and trailing it along to each of the shifters who looked the most fierce. They stood out like sore thumbs in the timid group clustered about, their fists clenched, some of them already gripping a weapon of some sort.

  "I need you to sweep through the property," I said. "Someone untied our favorite captive while he was left unguarded."

  I let the collective murmur build just long enough that the guard stepped forward. I expected him to apologize or beg for mercy. He did neither, and I wasn't sure if I was impressed or irritated by that until he spoke.

  "He was dead when I left my post."

  Dead. That was impossible. "He couldn't have been." I walked up to him and stood toe to toe. He looked down at me, but just by an inch. "He was just in my room very much alive and almost just killed our young friend here." I looked at Alma pointedly.

  The way he shifted his shoulders beneath his shirt made me think he wanted to argue but I stared into his eyes until his gaze fell to the floor. Olanna put a hand on his shoulder. I flicked my gaze at her, tired and annoyed that she might put us at risk without thinking about the consequences of what she was doing. I found myself searching her throat for signs of a bite. She wouldn't be the first human to crave renewal of the virus again when it began to wane. I found nothing but smooth skin and with a sigh, spun on my heel and faced the others.

  "We need to search the property. We either missed one of those hunters or we have a new threat of them."

  "There's always more of them," the scrawny, club-footed girl said from somewhere behind me.

  The words had a chilling effect on me. I looked around the room at the women gathered there, all of them under my protection. I nodded silently to Rena who was clenching the pistol from the dead huntsman's stash, and she motioned to the three shifters who were already morphing into their wolf selves. They moved like smoke through the doors and down the hallways. If a sweep of the property proved that there were no more hunters here now, what guarantee was there that they wouldn't come back? Someone had untied the captive. That someone had to be somewhere near.

  I slid my gaze over the rogue. Dara would take her in and do what she could for the girl and what were a few hunters to a poor shifter who needed sanctuary? Yet, something disturbed me about the girl, and a wolf shifter paid attention to instinct.

  I watched the remaining women also eyeing the girl from the corners of their eyes.

  Their acceptance of her into the pack, however tentative, was uncomfortable for them. Even so, I could see the struggles going on behind the eyes of the women who looked at her. They might have mistrusted the way she looked, but she was one of them. As a shifter run off from her pack or fled because of violence, they struggled with the desire to take her in over their warring primal sense of fit or fittest. They had seen violence--some of them plenty of it--but it wasn't the threat of danger that made the women wary, and I knew it. This wasn't some simple bond mate coming after his partner. It was something more, and now none of them was safe.

  They might want to take her in, but fear kept them from giving their consent wholeheartedly. I couldn't truly say I blamed them. They had found a sanctuary here, and now it was just another vulnerable place.

  That meant I had to make the final decision, and it needed to benefit everyone no matter how inconvenient it was.

  "We should all move closer to the mansion," I said finally. I couldn't divide my time between my pack and these women if it was going to be under constant threat from something unknown. Dara's homestead was not reachable by road and it was remote enough, purposefully so, that for now, its isolation made it a liability under the circumstances rather than a strength. Better that they come closer where the entire pack could watch over them. "You'll be safer back at the mansion. There's plenty of room for everyone."

  I mentally counted out the shifters that stood around me, clustered like grapes on a vine. Some of them trembling just as much. Ten of them. Not counting Rena or Olanna. I eyed the scrawny looking female who had challenged me earlier. "Start packing," I said to her. "Only things you need, and get ready to go."

  She shrugged as though it was a foolish order. "What things do we have?"

  It was a good question. I imagined most of them had run here with just the clothes on their backs. "Then pack what you think you want," I said. I waved my hand at the bookshelf. "Books, magazines," I trailed off ineffectively. "I don't know," I said. "Just grab whatever you think you can't leave behind." I spun on my heel and snagged the club-footed girl by the arm. She had some explaining to do, and before we so much as left this place, she would spill those beans.

  Once back in the familiar bedroom, where the air mattress and bloodied sheets sat next to the crumpled body of my attacker, I pushed her down onto the edge of the bed. She was short enough that she had to scoot herself backwards, her feet left dangling at least an inch off the floor. I watched the twisted one nudge itself behind the heel of the unaffected foot.

  "What the hell is going on?" I demanded. "And don't spare the details."

  THE BOA OF A CHILL

  The girl made a small moue with her mouth that made her look like a petulant child and not a shifter. The way her shoulders sagged as she tried to reach the floor with her feet only added to the image. Rather than making me feel pity, it made me angry.

  "Spill it," I said.

  "I don't know where to start," the girl said.

  "Start with your name," I said, pacing in front of her. "Start there."

  The girl squirmed on the bed as though even the thought of giving her name made her afraid. "My name is Alma." I noticed she was still favoring her ribs and every action was done with mincing, awkward movements.

  "And?" Clearly this was a girl who was going to have to be coaxed the entire way. I didn't have the patience for that. Nor the time. "This is going to go awfully slowly if you make me ask you questions at every turn."

  The girl sighed. "I come from a pack out in the Appalachians. It's a nice place," she said. "Lots of trees and woods to roam in. At least it was."

  "You were run off?"

  "Escaped."

  "From the men out there I suppose," I said.

  She shook her head but wouldn't meet my gaze. Instead, she let the fringe of sandy hair fall into her eyes and ended up peeking up through it.

  "Like I said, there's more of them. An entire family. They've been hunters for generations with a hatred for anything supernatural."

  I thought about all of the centuries I had lived and all of the hunters I had killed so I could keep doing so. They had always hated supernaturals. There would always be hatred. Like Jesus had said of the poor, hate would always be with us.

  "And what's so special about these hunters that make them different than any other?"

  "You saw them," she said. "They're fanatics. They kill first and never ask questions."

  We had taken the invaders down easily, just Jeb and I. Pretty good work, but easy work when it came down to it.

  "They didn't seem so frightening to me."

  "Those were just advanced scouts," she said. "The rest of them will be coming."

  The rest of them. The mere words sucked the air from my lungs. All the more reason to get her and the rest of the shifters back to the manse and the community at large where it was safe. The sheer number of us should give the hunters second thoughts. I watched as the girl fell backward onto the bed, her hands over her eyes. There was a long drawn out silence as I waited for her to finish. I ended up striding over to the bed and sitting down next to her. I lay gentle fingers on her forehead. Stroked her hair back off of her temples. Such delicate features. Almost beautiful if you could see past the wan skin and sickly pallor.

  "You're safe with us," I said. "Same as the rest of those who come. We'll protect you."

  She peered betwee
n two fingers. "You don't look very happy about it."

  I shrugged. "The women seem a little ill at ease with you. That's all."

  "You don't know them well, do you? Whole and healthy shifter women who had to flee their packs to come here. We know about this place. Even up in the Appalachians, we know about Dara. You would lay your life down for them, I suppose, but would you have done the same had you seen me straightaway?"

  "I thought that's what I just did."

  She mumbled to herself, and again I squinted at her, this time with a bit of pique. The venom in her words, the self-pity that revealed she was no doubt used to being outcast, was no excuse for trying to make me feel guilty. She didn't know me. How could she accuse me of hesitating to help her when I'd just made sure she was completely safe.

  Despite my urge to fire back at her with equal venom, I waited for her to pull her hand away from her eyes. I lost patience when she didn't and gripped her wrist to do it for her.

  "If Dara's sanctuary is so well-known," I said, "then you would know all are welcome. I've pledged my protection. That hasn't changed because of a few hunters. If your pack wouldn't protect you, Beo will."

  "You've got it all wrong," she said. "Those hunters killed everyone in my pack. All but me." She rolled onto her side, facing away from me and pulling her knees to her chest."

  Dread balled itself into my stomach. Dead. All of them but her. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled uncomfortably.

  "So they're after you?" I said leaning over her torso to see her face. All that showed was a filigree of hair and the batting of very long lashes that caught in the strands. I tried to sweep her hair aside to see her face but she pulled away. I sighed, frustrated. I hated talking to someone when I couldn't see their face. So much of a person's true feelings leaked out through expression. It was one reason Jeb always surprised me. He was a master of his expression. And I dearly needed to see this girl's face.

  "Alma," I prompted. "You're saying they want to end your line, so they're after you. Is that right?" I sighed. I didn't have time to be so damnably patient and kind. It wasn't my expertise. All I could think was it was such a lot of effort for one timid shifter who would no doubt die on her own anyway or get run off from any pack she sought sanctuary with. "What's so damned special about you that they can't just let you go? You're just one shifter." I didn't add that even a human would recognize that a deformed wolf would never mate. The line would end with her anyway.

  The girl nodded and rolled over to look at me. I noticed she pulled at the tails of her hair so they crossed over her throat. "It's because of what I can do."

  Those words made the bile in my throat rise. Something in my belly quivered with premonition and anxiety. Despite it, and maybe because of it I forged ahead, needing to hear the answer.

  "And what can you do?"

  She blinked at me. "I can see pieces of the future."

  I hadn't been expecting that. A giddy sort of relief made my lips twitch. She obviously thought I should believe her fortune telling tendencies--if she did have them--were enough to send a band of hunters to annihilate her entire clan.

  "Pieces," I said, still trying to process through the ludicrous thought as it warred with the practical mindset of an assassin's reason.

  "Yes, pieces. Just glimpses, most times without context and sometimes time frames get mixed up."

  "And that's reason enough to want you and your whole pack dead."

  She sighed, resignation in her voice. "You don't believe me."

  I tried to read her expression through her hair. Someone certainly wanted her dead, but she wasn't being honest about why. In truth, I would rather think they wanted her dead because of a vendetta against supernatural beings than because of some mystical ability.

  Vendettas I understood. Claims of mystical abilities made my teeth ache. I felt my jaws clench right then with the pain of impatience.

  "Listen," I said, losing all interest in tact. "I understand you feel guilty. I would too if a hunter family targeted my pack because of me. But it's not your fault. Hunters hunt. They kill. If they came your way it was because they were coming there eventually. Now they're here and we have to deal with them, do you understand?"

  She nodded and I was surprised at just how quickly she accepted my scolding tone. Just like one of those abused shifter women outside the door who always felt as though it was their fault they had angered their mates. So willing to accept the blame. My heart hurt a little as I looked at her.

  Then I remembered her words from before, the ones that had sent a chill down my spine and sent me to check on my brother and I got the same chill, but this time it wrapped around my throat like a boa.

  "Who did you mean when you said. 'he's dead?'"

  A look crossed her face that made me think she didn't want to answer, and to her benefit, that was the moment Rena chose to barge through the door. She was sweating and out of breath. I imagined she had charged around the property with extreme prejudice.

  "Empty," she said. "No one here. If they were, they're gone." She eyed Alma on the bed and scoured her with an appraising look. "You seem to be getting better. One more shift should do it."

  "She's fine," I said. "If she can stand, she can walk, and if she can walk, she can leave with us." I pursed my lips. "No one in the house or near the grounds, you say?"

  Rena shook her head. That didn't make me feel better. Now if someone was out there, he could be waiting anywhere. He could have reported back to his clan for all I knew and the rest of them would run over the grounds like water through a coffee pot.

  "Well, that nails it," I said. We couldn't wait any longer. "Make sure the others are ready; we aren't waiting till morning." Rena mumbled that it was smart and then left, closing the door discreetly behind her.

  I looked at Alma, watching the way she twisted one hand inside the other and I asked the question I really wanted to know as though it were a bandage being torn from fragile skin.

  "If what you say is true and that you can see the future, are you seeing my brother dead?" My stomach clenched as I waited for the answer.

  "No," she said.

  I deflated like a balloon. "Good," I said. "That's good. And how do you know?"

  She finally pushed herself up against the headboard with her knees tucked under her chin. She looked up at me with a glassy stare, almost as though she were looking through me. "Because shifters exist hand in hand with magic – some sort of gift from the gods or from the universe, I don't know. You have to admit it's magic that lets us be the way we are. But every so often, there's a shifter who can access that magic. The gifts come in all forms. Strange and unpredictable."

  I swallowed convulsively at the dreamy way she spoke. I didn't have a hard time accepting the way I was, but something about feeling tied to magic made it all seem very unreal. I shook my head, I didn't like the sound of magic. I would rather a foe I could fight with my hands and feet and teeth. Magic was something ethereal. Something for the other world. It had no place in mine.

  "Magic," she said. "It's a powerful energy if it can keep us hale for generations, help us heal. But it can kill us too. And he will most certainly die unless we can stop the magic from coming."

  She blinked twice and looked at me with owlish eyes. I was so shocked that we'd come right back around to the same problem, that I couldn't do any more at first than blink back at her.

  "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" I finally said.

  The girl shrugged. "You need me here. He needs me. That's why I came. Because without me, he is dead."

  "He who?" I demanded, not patient now, not kind, only aggressive and stern.

  "I don't know him," she said. "But he has eyes like ice and a warrior's soul."

  Jeb. Dear sweet god, she meant Jeb.

  ALL'S WELL FOR THE PERFECT LITTLE MAN

  It took me a few moments alone to collect myself after her declaration. I found I had to leave the room and find a quiet corner in the back of the garden. I
t smelled of sage and lavender there, and it should have calmed me, but all I could think was the girl had just named the man I loved a dead man. And he was out there alone somewhere, seeking answers for me.

  I told myself he could take care of himself. He was a warrior. He was prepared as a boy scout and as deadly as an adder. I didn't have to worry, but worry I did. I felt guilty too because we had to leave. For the good of my pack and these women, I had to leave him behind and hope he would have the sense to find me back at the manse.

  We were sitting ducks on the property without the gated mansion and its guards, with just a dozen female shifters as frenetic as a red squirrel running out of nuts before spring. I didn't want to leave without Jeb, but I knew he would find me when it was time. Most of the group, thought the best bet was on fours to cover as much distance as we could, but I knew the journey would be difficult for some and we'd end up shifting to two feet because they'd exhaust themselves. Better to do that later as we found our way deeper into the woods, saving our energy for any threat that might appear.

  After the wolves dressed for the walk--which in most cases meant something loose that could be stripped off quickly--we set out on foot through the woods back to the mansion. I knew the trip was hours on foot, perhaps even close to a day for some of the women who might not have been in the same kind of shape that I was. For that reason, I made Rena pack baskets of bread and food from the larder. When we exhausted it, we'd shift and run the rest of the way as wolves. Much faster and much safer.

  I imagined Jeb's voice in my head with his constant mentions shifters just didn't prepare themselves well. I smiled to myself as I thought how proud he would be that I remembered the need to feed them as they trekked through the dense underbrush and stands of old trees. I'd even made sure to pick up a bag full of green apples from the bowl on the counter before I left, so I could leave it in our little hollow for him to see. If he found the pile at our spot, then he'd know I was okay.

  As far as I knew, the hunters had no idea either Jeb or I existed. The only ones who had met us were dead and the comrades they might have left behind just knew Dara's place held a rogue wolf with mystical powers. They might want to execute every shifter they found at the homestead, but there was no reason for me to believe they knew about the mansion or my pack. We should be safe but I didn't want to take chances by having a rogue pack of wolves meandering through the forest wasting their energy when they might need it to flee. The only concern I had now was to make sure neither Jeb nor Dara stepped into a waiting ambush upon their return.