by Lib Starling
“Can you help her?”
“Her?” Katrina stared at Alexander in disbelief. “It’s Roxy?”
“Yes. She came over to…to have a talk with me, and in the middle of our conversation she was attacked.”
“By Scarlett?”
“Who else? She’s trapped inside her totem, just as Chase was. You have to get her out!”
Katrina touched the fox’s pelt again. She could feel Roxy’s heart racing, the shallowness of her breath. “She’s only been trapped for a little while,” she said.
“About two hours. I had to search for you…I didn’t know where you’d gone. The whole time I carried her, she was fighting—trying to reverse the shift. I think she’s exhausted now. But you can bring her back. You brought Chase back, and he’d been trapped for nearly a week…”
“It’s not as simple as that,” Katrina said. Anxiety welled up inside her, and she pressed it back down again with a hard will. “The Power is all…twisted. Someone has been tampering with it. Scarlett—I’d bet anything it’s her—but it doesn’t really matter. It’s unpredictable right now, in this location. I don’t know if I can do it again. It won’t be as easy as it was for Chase.”
“Still, we have to try.”
Alexander’s face was long and stricken, shadowed by such desperation that it took Katrina aback. She had never seen him looking so frightened and upset before.
She took his hand. “Okay. I’ll give it my best shot. Here’s what I need you to do.”
It took at least half an hour for them to assemble all the items Katrina would need for the reversal spell. While Alexander gathered as much soil as he could scrape off the frozen ground, Katrina huddled beside Roxy’s small, prone form, concentrating on the words she must speak, reciting the verses of the spell.
Finally all the components were ready, and Katrina made her circle of salt right there in the snow, surrounding Roxy and herself with pure white grains from the Airstream’s salt shaker. When the circle was complete, Katrina frowned down at the little plastic shaker where it lay in her palm. Trying to enchant a mostly-dead sprig of touch-not on a night when the moon wasn’t even full…being beaten to the discovery of how shifters and witches could work together by Scarlett, of all people…and now this, casting a circle with a hokey little sprinkle from a table-top shaker.
I am one half-assed witch, Katrina thought darkly.
But then she chanced to look up, and met Alexander’s commanding, icy stare. He believed in her, at least. She had to succeed, for him—for all the brothers of Alpha House. And for Roxy, too.
Do it, she told herself. Don’t let Scarlett win.
Once again, Katrina worked through the reversal spell, though she worked with even more care now than she had with Chase. The Power was thick and unwieldy, and she could still sense its inner brittleness, as if it would rather break itself apart than be manipulated by whatever unwilling shifter Scarlett had in her thrall. Katrina laid the lines of her weave with agonizing care, placing each thread with such fearful effort that a sweat soon broke out on her forehead. It felt as if it would turn to ice in the night-time breeze.
Each time she felt the Power faltering, or stubbornly resisting her weave, Katrina looked to Alexander. His confidence in her seemed unshakable—as if he was offering some of his own unflappable self-assurance and cool, easy courage. As she worked through the motions of the spell, Katrina recalled the time she had shared with Alexander—how wild and free she had felt in his arms…how powerful. He was gorgeous—there was no denying that—but something beyond mere looks attracted her to the platinum blonde. In the days when they’d been together, long before Katrina had her first inklings of shifters and witches working together, Alexander had made her feel somehow…more than she could ever be on her own.
Maybe we can have that kind of connection again, Katrina thought as she laid her final thread of Fire carefully into place. Maybe…maybe we can have more than what we had before.
Turning her thoughts away from Alexander, Katrina reached for Roxy’s human spirit. It took her a long, desperate time to find it—so long that for one sick moment, just before her own spirit brushed the faintly glowing edge of Roxy’s, Katrina was afraid the woman was truly locked forever within the fox.
She took a tenuous hold on the edge of Roxy’s being and pulled with delicate care. The fox moaned. Katrina tugged again, working more of Roxy’s spirit into her grasp. Finally, she could manage a firmer hold, and gave one strong pull. The fox whined and shuddered in the snow.
“Sorry,” Katrina muttered.
Then, with a quick prayer to the goddess, Katrina gave one fierce, hard wrench.
The fox gave a heart-rending yowl, rolling and twisting between Katrina’s feet. But Katrina didn’t let go. She felt the strange, enveloping pressure of Roxy’s spirit everting around her grip, and then with a jolt that knocked Katrina backward, the woman popped into existence, weak, gasping, and naked in the snow.
“Get blankets,” Katrina said to Alexander. “Quickly!”
She took off her coat and wrapped it around Roxy’s shoulders, urging her onto her feet. Even in the dim moonlight, Katrina could see that Roxy’s freckled-porcelain complexion was flushing bright pink against the cold.
Roxy mumbled incoherently and tried to walk.
“Hold still,” Katrina said. “You’re barefoot, Roxy. You’ll scrape up your feet in the brush and ice.”
After what seemed like a freezing eternity, Alexander was back, his arms full of the blankets from Katrina’s bed. They quickly wrapped Roxy’s body, and then Alexander lifted her onto his shoulder, where she hung inert like a sack full of flour. Katrina led the way down the slope, picking the easiest route and directing Alexander’s steps with care. Roxy was a big girl, and even a man as strong as Alexander might tire quickly. Katrina was frightened that he’d slip in the snow, and that both of them would go crashing down. But they made it safely back to the Airstream, and Katrina helped maneuver Roxy inside.
They bundled her onto Katrina’s bed, and Alexander rubbed her hands and feet, talking to her in a calm but insistent voice while Katrina opened a can of soup and heated it on the little propane stove. Finally, after sipping at the hot broth for a few minutes, Roxy’s eyelids fluttered, and her green eyes opened with startling focus.
“Where am I?” she said in a clear voice.
Alexander and Katrina exchanged relieved sighs.
“You’re in my camper,” Katrina said, “in the foothills. Do you remember anything that happened to you?”
Roxy sat up. The blankets fell away from her naked body, and she stared down at herself in surprise, then, blushing, pulled the blankets around herself again. “I…I think so. I was in Alexander’s room…” she shot a guilty glance in his direction, “and then I…I shifted. Is that right?”
“Yes,” Alexander said. “You were forced.”
Roxy’s eyes sharpened and her lips pressed into a thin, pale line. “Scarlett. Yes, I remember it all now.” She shuddered, covering her eyes with one shaking hand, as if she could block out the terrible visions of memory. “Thank you,” she said to Katrina, with her eyes still hidden. “Thank you.”
“It’s no problem,” Katrina said. “The least I could do.”
But it almost hadn’t come off. As thick and resistant as the Powers were now… She turned a thoughtful stare on Alexander, taking in his calm composure, his powerful body that surely reflected the strength within—the magic he wasn’t even aware he wielded.
“You’re a witch,” Roxy said, toying with the spoon in her bowl of hot soup. “So tell us…is there any way—any way at all—to stop Scarlett before she does this again? Before she does real damage, that you can’t reverse?”
Katrina gave Alexander one more lingering glance. He won’t like it. But what choice do we have? The Power is so damaged in Scarlett’s proximity that I don’t know whether I can fight back at all—not on my own, at least.
“I think there may be,” she fin
ally answered. “But it’s…experimental.”
“Experimental?” Alexander, sitting beside Roxy on the bed, leaned forward. His brow was furrowed in concern. “What do you mean, experimental?”
“Scarlett has found a way to amplify the Powers. She’s using a…a magnifier of sorts. But it’s not a willing magnifier. I’ve been observing the Powers, and I’m certain that it’s not consenting—that it’s being compelled.”
Both Alexander and Roxy shook their heads, their expressions dazed.
Katrina took a deep breath. How can I explain the Powers to a couple of shifters? They aren’t even aware yet that the Powers exist, even though they use them all the time.
“Scarlett has found a way to make herself stronger than any witch ought to be. And I think I can fight back against her strength, but only if I can face her on her own footing—on a level playing field.”
“All right,” Alexander said. “And what do you need in order to accomplish that?”
“I need exactly what she has—what she’s found, or more likely, what she’s taken by force.”
Roxy and Alexander shared a wary glance.
“And what is that?” Roxy asked.
Katrina caught Alexander’s eye. The interior of her camper was dim, shrouded in violet-black shadows, but even so, she could see how his stare glimmered, ice-blue and powerful.
“I need a familiar,” she said.
.3.
“ Absolutely not,” said Alexander.
It wasn’t the first time he’d said it. Roxy watched him pace from the foot of his bed to his window and back again, fists clenched and arms swinging at his side. The light of late morning glared through the window behind him, casting his tall, strong body in silhouette, which only seemed to emphasize the stark anger that had rendered him rigid with offense. Roxy sighed, leaning against his dresser, and waited for Alexander to stop his pacing once more so she could try—again—to convince him to take the chance and become Katrina’s familiar.
Just being back in Alexander’s bedroom gave Roxy a chill, and made the sick knot of anxiety writhe in her stomach. She couldn’t help but remember every panic-inducing detail of yesterday’s forced shift—and worse, the blunt, monolithic terror that had loomed over her when she’d realized she was trapped—how the fear had surrounded her completely, smothering her senses and stripping all rational thought away until nothing existed in the world but hopeless desperation.
I can’t let that happen—to anybody. If Katrina needs Alexander to stop Scarlett from ever doing this again, to anyone else…well…then it’s up to me to make it happen.
Roxy had come to Alpha House after a fitful, pointless attempt to get a few hours of sleep in Katrina’s camper. The blonde-haired witch had been solicitous and kind, and Roxy owed her a debt of gratitude that could never be repaid. But still, the proximity of a witch filled her with mistrust. Roxy’s mind couldn’t stop racing, examining the problem of Scarlett—and of witches in general—from every conceivable angle. Worst of all, Chase’s scent was everywhere, crowding Roxy’s thoughts with visions of his face, his body—with the fear that she would lose him now to Scarlett, just when she and Chase had finally, truly found one another.
Alexander’s pacing slowed; the stiff disbelief in his face softened, just enough that Roxy felt it was worth pressing her point again.
“We don’t even know what it means, to become a witch’s familiar,” she said. “It might not be as bad as you’re imagining.”
He huffed a short, bitter laugh. “I do know what it means. Katrina told me all about it while you were resting in the camper.”
“Oh?”
“I’d be expected to bond with her, Roxy.”
He weighted the word with such palpable scorn that Roxy stood up straight and clutched instinctively at her stay, as if she might seek protection from her totem—though protection from what, exactly, she couldn’t say.
“I…I don’t know what that means,” she admitted.
“That’s right. You don’t know what it means.” Alexander turned abruptly away, and his broad shoulders were like a stone wall, shutting her out completely. “Just suffice to say, it’s nothing I’d ask a friend to do. Or a person I cared about even a little bit. Though you’ve made it abundantly clear that you don’t care for me at all, so—”
“Wait a minute,” Roxy said. “That’s not fair. Just because I know I should be with Chase, that doesn’t mean I don’t care about you.”
He shrugged wordlessly. Maybe, Roxy thought, it was just the exhaustion of her tense, terrible experience and the near-sleepless night that followed, but she couldn’t keep her anger from flaring up at Alexander’s cold dismissal—and she wasn’t sure she would have kept her temper in check, even if she could have managed it.
“You’re being a real ass, Alexander. I hope you don’t think this petulant, moping act is going to get you anywhere, because I’ve got news for you—”
He sighed, turning back to her with his hands raised in a gesture of pleading and truce. “I know I’m being and ass—I know. And I’m sorry. I really am. I just can’t seem to do anything else right now. I mean, everything that happened last night…I was so afraid for you, Roxy…I barely held it together.”
She felt her cheeks flame. I’m being too hard on him. I’m not the only one under stress… “You were amazing,” she said. “You saved me.”
“Katrina saved you. I didn’t do anything.”
“You found her. And you carried me there.”
Roxy remembered the night’s desperate struggle, the cold assaulting her weakened body as she hung in Alexander’s jaws. She remembered the wolf’s warm breath passing over her, the gentle grip of his teeth—the only constant sensations in all the world, as she thrashed in and out of consciousness, locked in a dire, inner struggle for control over her own self. She remembered how Alexander’s warm grip had quivered with relief when he’d found Katrina at last. The instant sensation of hope and reprieve had reached even into her shuttered consciousness, and Roxy’s fox had opened its eyes, peering up to see Katrina limned in moonlight at the crest of a snowy hill. That sight had felt like salvation to her. It was a vision Roxy would never forget.
“I never will,” she said aloud.
Alexander’s stare was quizzical.
“I’ll never forget what you’ve done for me. Everything—you’ve helped me so much and for so long…not just last night.”
“But what’s it all been worth?” His voice was dark with loss. “You don’t want me.”
“We have to focus on other things now. The picture is so much bigger than just you and me—or Chase and me.”
He flinched at Chase’s name, but Roxy pressed on relentlessly. “We don’t have time now to wallow in sadness, Alexander. We have to stop Scarlett for all our sakes.”
He shook his head. “You’re right, that we don’t have time for emotions. And I can put that aside—for now.”
Something in the way he said it made Roxy lift one eyebrow. I won’t let you go, Alexander had said. Roxy had thought those words had just risen from his thwarted passion, but now she wasn’t so sure. Did he mean it? Was he still planning on pursuing her heart—even though she’d told him that whatever was between them was now finished?
But she had no time to mull the thought over. Alexander was still speaking: “But there’s more I have to consider, Roxy—more that’s at stake. It’s not just about my heart. It’s about my future, too.”
“Your future? I don’t understand.”
“If I agree to become Katrina’s familiar and bond myself to her, that bond can’t be broken. Or at least, that’s what Katrina told me. It’s permanent. And it means that everything I’ve built here at Blackmeade—my role as alpha of the frat, my grades, my degree, even my plans to go into business and become a CEO like my father—they’re all toast. Everything I’ve worked for these past four years will vanish.”
“Why?”
“You’ve learned so fast and come so
far, sometimes it’s easy to forget that you’re still new to this world—still a virgin shifter, in a way. Roxy, you know how serious the conflict is between witches and shifters. I’ve seen you around Katrina—you try to hide it, but you can’t quite feel comfortable with her, can you?”
She folded her arms tight across her chest, an unconscious gesture of defense, and said nothing.
Alexander nodded. “You see? Just the thought of a witch makes your skin crawl. It’s an instinctive response with shifters—it’s just the way we are. Can you imagine what would happen to my place in this world if I were bonded to a witch—if she went everywhere I went, did everything I did—if I shared my life with her?”
Roxy swallowed hard. “You’d be rejected.”
“That’s putting it lightly. Rejected—by everybody I know, cast out of my own society—maybe even my own family.”
He looked for a long moment at the painting that hung on his wall—the beach scene created by his little sister. Then his eyes drifted to the framed photo of his siblings, and Roxy had to avert her own gaze from his face. The pain that sharpened his features and deepened his eyes was too much for her to bear.
“I’d certainly have no future as a businessman,” Alexander went on. “No way to support myself, no upward mobility—no future at all.”
“I…I didn’t see that side of it,” Roxy said quietly.
“I know you didn’t. This world is new to you.”
“I can’t expect you to give up your future, Alexander—none of us can.”
Wordless, he nodded, his lips compressing into a thin, pale line.
“We’ll have to find some other way of fighting off Scarlett,” Roxy said. “Some other way…I see that now…I’m sure there’s some other way.”
But how? In all their searches through Blackmeade’s huge, musty old library, where the knowledge of uncountable generations of shifters was collected, none of the brothers of Alpha Delta Phi had yet uncovered even a scrap of information that might help them bring Scarlett under control. Katrina hadn’t been entirely confident that a bonded familiar would give her the push she needed to face Scarlett head-on, but her very cautious prospect was still the best hope anyone could find.