by Jayne Hawke
24
Amy had crashed out on our couch after we’d stayed up until three AM watching movies with the siblings. Cole joined us during the third movie. He pulled me close and wrapped his arm around my shoulders. I almost fell asleep with my head on his chest listening to the comforting sound of his heartbeat.
When I got up the following morning, Briar was dressed smartly and was butchering some waffles. They were burnt and falling apart, but she was trying. Much like when Jake used to pull out the good maple syrup, I knew she wanted something. My gut twisted at the thought of Jake. He was off who knew where. I hoped that he was safe and well.
I saved the waffle maker from Briar.
“What’s up?” I asked.
She looked down at the burnt lumps of waffle on the plate near her.
“I found a place with an opening for an apprenticeship,” she said quietly.
“And…?”
I was waiting for the bad news.
“I need a ride.”
I narrowed my eyes.
“That’s it?”
“Yea. I could walk, but I’d mess up my nice shoes. I want to make a good impression.”
“Adam can drive you later. We’re picking up his car in thirty minutes,” Cole said as he walked into the kitchen.
Briar’s face lit up.
“Seriously?”
“You’ll be joint owners and pay half of the cost each. It’ll come out of your paychecks,” Cole said.
Briar let out an excited squeal and danced around the kitchen. Cole scraped out the poor waffle maker and ignored her. His fingers brushed over mine and he gave me a small private kiss while Briar’s back was to us.
When Adam walked into the kitchen and Briar had calmed some, Cole said, “You will look after the car. It’s old, but you’ll wash it once a week and maintain it. I will cover the insurance for now, but once you’re both earning, you’ll take over payments.”
“So it’ll be truly ours?” Briar asked.
“Once you’ve paid me back for it, yes.”
She hugged Adam tight.
“Did you hear that!? We’re going to have a car of our own!”
“I heard,” Adam said gently.
“Can we help with breakfast?” Adam asked us.
“No, I’ll make everyone an omelette,” Cole said.
That was my cue to set the table and get the ingredients out for Cole. I stood near him and watched how he did it. Omelettes were something I’d never managed to get right. Cole made it look so easy though. It came together beautifully and was perfectly cooked when he served it. I’d have sworn it was magic if I thought garou could wield it.
“It’s simple,” Cole said with a smile. “Pour the mix into a hot pan. Allow it to sit until it begins to froth around the edges. Then carefully pull that edge back, and tilt the pan so that the runny mix flows into the gap. Rinse and repeat until there’s only a thin layer on top. When you reach that point, fold it over and allow it to cook for another thirty seconds or so. Then serve.”
We switched places and he stood with his hand on my lower back as I made the last omelette. It felt so natural and right having his body molded around mine. My wolf side would have purred if it were capable. He took my hand in his and guided me to move the spatula as he wanted. After all the stress I’d gone through over the years trying to make the dish, it really was as easy as Cole made it look.
Cole took the siblings off to collect the car he’d found, and that left me with the house all to myself. I put on some Kaleo and opened up the Grim to try and find some information on these blood witches. Cole hadn’t said a word about them, which made me suspicious. I wasn’t going to push the point. We all deal with emotional trauma differently.
The snide comments about my being a useless courier had dropped off, thankfully. I still saw the occasional meme about my being turned by the rogue, but they were few and far between now. A glance over at the Loxwood pack tab showed me that Cole had made profiles for Briar and Adam and added them. My heart warmed some. That meant they were officially pack.
I couldn’t keep the smile off my face as I thought about our little pack. That smile faded when I saw a photo in high resolution of a ritual blood sacrifice. It appeared to be a deer rather than a person, but the deer had been stretched into a painful position with its legs spread to four corners. A circle had been formed from its organs. Glistening intestines had been carefully placed in a perfect circle with the heart at the peak of the circle. I zoomed in and sketched out the symbols that had been carved into the heart. Every little thing was a potential clue.
25
I needed a change of scenery. As much as it felt good to be so near to the forest, there was only so much time I could spend in the same place. Thankfully, Amy invited me over to her place that afternoon. We planned on figuring out a game plan for the blood witches, but I suspected there’d be wine and movies involved too.
The blood witches felt like the challenge that was going to make me really step up and become what I was supposed to be. They were a great danger to garou, to my people, and to Cole. I chewed on my bottom lip as I triple-checked I had everything in my backpack. My laptop and charger were in there, along with the notebook I’d sketched the symbols into. My phone was fully charged. Everything looked good to go.
Something still niggled at me. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but it felt as though something was going to happen. Shaking my head, I pushed the feeling aside as a general worry over the blood witches. I was new to having a pack, and my protective instincts were kicking in pretty hard. The siblings weren’t the ideal packmates, but I would do whatever I could to keep them safe.
Amy’s place was an adorable little house at the far edge of the town. It had a neat dark grey roof with pale cream walls and old-fashioned windows with plants on view in every single one of them. The front yard had small circular flower beds bursting with gold and white flowers in every shape and size you could imagine. It positively oozed friendliness and peace. I closed my eyes and breathed it in for a moment before I walked up the short driveway to the dark wooden door. The porch was barely big enough for two people, but it provided some shade from the hot sun while I waited for Amy to open the door.
The witch greeted me in a pair of lilac yoga pants and an over-sized t-shirt with a basket full of kittens on it. I didn’t think I’d seen her looking quite so relaxed before. She pulled me into a deep hug and practically dragged me down the wide hallway into the compact kitchen.
I tried not to wrinkle my nose as I saw how little counter space there was in there. It’d be hopeless for baking. Still, the sun formed shards of warm light on the pale wooden floor that had been worn soft and smooth from many years of feet.
“This is the first time I’ve really done something like this. Helped with a bounty hunt,” Amy enthused.
I laughed and grinned at her.
“It’s a pretty good feeling isn’t it?”
“It is! My goddess is very pleased to have some part in the end of these witches. They have worked hard to throw the balance of things off, and she will not stand for that or the injustices they have committed.”
Maat sounded pretty intense in that moment. Amy was practically glowing, though. Her hair had been pulled back into a scruffy bun which revealed a small tattoo where her neck met her shoulders. The eagle feather stretched across her spine and gently curved up to meet the top of her shoulders.
“Do all witches get tattoos tied to their deity?” I asked as Amy handed me a cup of coffee.
She shrugged and gripped her piping hot coffee tightly.
“No, it’s not that common a practise. Personally I felt it was right for me and the bond I share with Maat.”
Her glow dimmed, and I knew there was something painful there.
“Did you always know you were a witch?”
She pursed her lips.
“I think so. I was born into a coven, being a witch was all I knew. I was surrounded by magic. Witch m
agic comes directly from our god, but I never really felt him. When I was younger, I thought there was something wrong with me. Sometimes a person is born to a witch but isn’t one themselves. People will whisper that they had an affair or have lost connection with their god.” Amy shrugged. “I was just trying to work with the wrong god.”
“How do you know who the right one is?”
I was fascinated.
“It’s hard to explain, and it’s different for every witch. There’s a connection though. We all have personalities, skills, strengths, and they must fit with the god. Maat and I work well together. Sometimes she gets a little frustrated with me as she’s… very focused, and I am broader in my thoughts.”
I couldn’t imagine being bound like that. I supposed it wasn’t too different to having an alpha.
“There are garou witches sometimes. They’re rare, and always from a garou-witch pairing. And there are garou who work with Fenrir. I don’t think that would suit you though,” Amy said with a smile.
I wrinkled my nose.
“Fenrir and having the gods shout at me doesn’t really sound like my thing.”
Amy laughed.
“The Fenrir wolves are wild; I think you’d like them, but I agree. You’d chafe under a god, even a wolf one.”
I made a mental note to see where the closest Fenrir wolves were. I’d like to meet one out of curiosity.
“Shall we see what we can find about these blood witches?” I said.
Amy grinned and her glow began to bubble up again. I breathed a sigh of relief at seeing her happy again.
We settled ourselves down in Amy’s cosy living room. The couch stretched almost from wall to wall despite only seating three people. It was soft enough that it felt as though it were trying to devour me when I sat down. Once I got comfortable, it was heavenly.
We pulled out our laptops and I showed the symbols I’d drawn to Amy.
“I saw these carved into a heart from a deer at a ritual site. Any ideas?”
Amy took the notepad and peered at it.
“They look like communication sigils. I’d guess that they were offering up the deer in hopes their god would give them some guidance.”
I frowned and took a sip of my coffee.
“I thought a witch’s deity communicated freely with them? And do the various pantheons use the same symbols then?”
Amy put the notepad down on the well-worn coffee table in front of us.
“Well, sometimes. In a larger coven you’ll often see that lower ranking witches never achieve direct communication with the coven’s deity. I believe these are a small coven though, no more than five. From what I’ve managed to dig up, the Aztec and similar witches all work in very small groups. They don’t seem to get along well enough to form a large coven, which is realistically better for the world as a whole. And that’s a more complicated question. There are some things called sigils that are almost universal. The parts that make up a sigil can be used to figure out the intent. It’s a bit like knowing the cognates of the romance languages. You might speak Spanish and be able to figure out roughly what French is saying, from those cognates.”
I raised an eyebrow, feeling lost.
“Aztec and similar witches tend to be… brutal and bloodthirsty. Those deities were particularly fond of darker more intense lifestyles. Which is why they’re few and far between. It wasn’t uncommon for other covens to take out the darker covens, in an attempt to protect themselves and keep the supernatural world hidden from humans. It was decided that a larger body was needed to keep everything like that straight though. It was too easy for the covens to make claims and take out a rival coven and it became dangerous.”
I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. They certainly sounded dangerous. That explained where the council had come from. I added it to my mental list of supernatural things to try and research.
“What do we know about this particular group? Are we sure they’re the same ones that killed Cole’s pack?” I asked.
“I believe so. The style of carving looks the same. How does Cole feel about that?” Amy asked, a thread of worry running through her words.
“He’s being a stoic alpha. He hasn’t said a word about it and is bottling up his feelings. I’ll be there if he wants to talk about it, but I’m not going to push.”
Amy’s eyes went slightly glassy for a brief second before she nodded and smiled.
“It’s a new relationship, that’s for the best.”
My stomach twisted at the word relationship. It felt a little early to be calling it that. My wolf side was very interested in establishing it as a relationship, but I didn’t want to rush into anything. We still didn’t know each other all that well.
“Did you know garou mate for life? It’s said they know when they find the one,” Amy said casually.
I nudged her with my elbow.
“You’re as subtle as a redwood.”
She grinned at me.
“Did Valentin tell you why they targeted the Loxwood pack?” Amy asked, all business again.
“He said they were a powerful pack.”
I pushed the images of the rogue out of my mind. His death still haunted me. I could see the emptiness in his eyes as he lay there lifeless at my hands.
Amy hugged me.
“I’m sorry. I was just trying to see how worried we should be for Cole.”
I smiled.
“It’s fine. So, how worried should we be?”
Amy’s face turned deadly serious.
“I think they’re likely here to finish what they began. Their god won’t be happy to have that debt outstanding, and now that Valentin can no longer fulfil it, they’ll be under a lot of pressure to do so.”
A growl rose in my throat involuntarily.
“If they hurt Cole, it’ll be the last thing they ever do,” I snarled.
26
We hadn’t made as much progress on the witches as I’d hoped, but I felt more confident. Amy had said that they were incredibly ritualistic, some of the most ritualistic of the witches. They needed the correct locations, star alignments, and such to perform their sacrifices. So if we could figure out what they needed, we’d be able to track them down.
I returned home at around ten PM and felt the familiar itch of my skin growing tight where I needed to shift and run. Part of me felt guilty indulging in it when the siblings couldn’t, but holding back would only make me more dangerous. My wolf side would grow increasingly frustrated, and I carried too many blades with me to take that risk. Having my face splashed across the local paper with a headline saying I stabbed someone for cutting me off in traffic wouldn’t look good.
To my surprise, there were two strange cars sitting in front of the house. I assumed the older car was Adam and Briar’s, but the other was brand new and very expensive. The pure white paint hugged the low-slung sports car that practically screamed money. I bet it had one of those high-pitched race car V8’s under the engine. I ran my hand over the hood of my old Mustang and gave it a pat. I’d take the deep growling of the older v8’s any day.
The air temperature dropped as I walked closer to the house. Goosebumps formed up my arms and a shiver ran through the depth of my bones. There had only been one other time when I’d felt a cold like that. The ice fae at the ball.
Opening the door, I reflexively drew my knife and hated the feeling that my home had been invaded. A silky woman’s voice came from the room to my left that we rarely used. I walked inside and found Cole with his arms crossed glaring at the ice fae. She wore a beautiful shimmery white silk shirt that hugged her lithe figure, and a pair of ice blue pants that seemed to have been made from sea ice. There was a faint glitter in the fabric that I swore mimicked the frozen waves.
“Ah, Rosalyn, just who I’ve been waiting for,” the fae greeted me.
I looked between her and Cole. If Cole’s jaw got any tighter, he was going to break it.
“Eira has been waiting for almost thirty minutes for you
,” Cole ground out.
“I wasn’t expecting anyone,” I said, moving closer to Cole.
“Oh, this was a surprise visit. I was in the area,” Eira said.
Her magic slithered between us, a delicate sheet of ice that caressed my skin and made me want to wrap my arms around myself. I stood taller and stepped into her space.
“And what brings you here?”
She looked pointedly at Cole.
“That’s a private matter.”
“She’s my shadow,” Cole snarled.
Eira pouted.
“She still has a mind and life of her own. Anyway, we both know that shadow bond means little given her guardian status.”
“She is still under my protection,” Cole said, baring his teeth.
“And I won’t harm a single hair,” Eira said in a confident tone.
Cole exhaled slowly and rooted himself to the floor.
Eira rolled her eyes.
“Rosalyn, would you kindly walk me to my car?”
I didn’t trust her, but I also wanted to remind Cole that I was my own woman and capable of looking out for myself.
“Of course,” I said.
Eira gave Cole a victorious smile that drew a deep growl from the alpha’s throat.
Once we were outside in the darkness of the night, Eira put her hand on my arm. My instincts told me to pull away, but I refused to show such weakness and instead stared her down.
“A guardian is a very valuable thing. I am a woman of great power. We could help each other,” Eira said.
“Not interested.”
Her porcelain face flickered into something bestial. It was there and gone again too quickly for me to be sure I’d seen it at all.
“You haven’t heard my offer.”
“I don’t need to.” I turned back towards the front door. “Enjoy the rest of your evening. Kindly don’t step foot on Loxwood land again.”
The air temperature plummeted around us. I ignored the thin layer of ice that spread out around my feet and crept up the windows of the house before me. Let her have her little tantrum; I wasn’t going to allow myself to become a plaything for the fae.