Storm Witch

by D. N. Hoxa

  Twenty minutes later, I came out of the shower looking normal again. The water was cold, but it was water and I was clean. No dirt or blood on my body, but lots of bruises. Ax’s shirt was okay, but the pants were a disaster. Using my belt, I made sure they wouldn’t fall off me when I walked, but I looked goddamn ridiculous. Mathias was going to let us wash our clothes so I wasn’t going to need to keep them long. The clothes didn’t smell like Ax, so they’d lost their appeal. Putting my weapons on me was difficult with those jeans, but I managed to squeeze them all in—even my swords. They hurt my back when I walked but I wasn’t leaving them behind.

  Downstairs, I found the others the same as I’d left them—watching TV and eating. The chicken fingers were gone but there were still some French fries left. Mathias had come back inside and he was washing something in the sink, something that looked like plants. The silence was getting really old, and I regretted having come downstairs. I’d rather be alone with my thoughts in the guest room, before Sienna and Fallon came to sleep.

  Turning around soundlessly, I made for the stairs.

  When the TV stopped abruptly, I stopped in my tracks.

  “Don’t move,” Mathias whispered, but by then I was already turning around. The others had frozen in place, looking at the short hallway that led to the entrance. Ignoring the witch, I reached for both my swords. Silence was never a good sign. If someone asked you not to move, chances were that they had reason.

  “What is it?” Luca asked, slowly standing up from the chair.

  “Wolf,” Mathias spit, then strode to the hallway furiously. It was enough to make all the alarms in my head start ringing.

  With my swords in hand, I ran after him, assuming the worst: the house was surrounded by ECU soldiers, and they were about to take us down. To escape, we’d have to go through the backyard and jump over the wall. Easy to do because of the stones in it, which were perfectly climbable, especially when running for your life. Mathias had opened the door, and he stepped outside on the porch with his arms raised, his shoulders rigid. The others were right behind me, as ready to fight as I was.

  How the hell had they found us? Because I could see the wolves, too.

  Except, they wore plain clothes, not the black uniform of the ECU.

  “You dare to come in my house like this?!” Mathias shouted, his voice completely transformed. I stepped outside, behind him, just in case someone started to attack. I could see weapons. A lot of them in the hands of the…three, five, eight—ten werewolves in the front yard. How many more were in the back?

  “We don’t mean harm, Mathias,” said the werewolf standing in front of the rest, with his hands folded in front of him—the only one not holding any guns. He was old, as old as Mathias, only much bigger. His shoulders wide, his fists still huge, he carried himself as if he were still thirty.

  “You don’t mean harm?” asked Mathias with a dry laugh. “You’re armed and on my property, Oscar! Have you forgotten who I am?” The witch raised his arms farther up, and the charge of his energy as he reached for his magic almost made me take a step back. Ax hadn’t been kidding. This guy felt very strong.

  “Mathias, please. We’re only here to talk,” the werewolf said, but the guns in his people’s hands said otherwise. To show him that we weren’t as easy prey as he obviously though we were, I stepped to the side and raised my swords. If he thought we were going down without a fight, he was in for a surprise, whoever he was.

  “Get your men out of here, right now,” Mathias said, but he’d lowered his arms, and I no longer felt his magic. The others stood with their chins raised behind us, so that the werewolves could see we weren’t alone. I was hoping to intimidate them, though there were many more of them than us.

  “I’m afraid I can’t do that, not without speaking to you first,” the werewolf said. “If you try to escape, we will kill you. But if you stay and hear us out, I promise you, nobody will be harmed.”

  Laughing again, Mathias called on his magic. The same second, every werewolf in the yard aimed their guns at us. My own magic was at the tips of my fingers, just waiting for hell to break loose so it could shield me. I’d already killed people the night before. I’d passed the invisible threshold, and no matter how much it sucked, that didn’t mean I would hesitate to do it again.

  But Mathias knew as well as we did that if he attacked, there would be no stopping all of them at once. Some bullets were going to fly our way, and some of us might even die. Apparently, he didn’t want to risk that, because the old witch stepped back. The lights coming from the streets didn’t do much, but even in the dark, I could see his fists shaking.

  “I will not forget this,” Mathias said with a nod, and he turned around to walk inside the house.

  What…what the heck? I looked at the others. Did this mean he was going to let the werewolves in?

  The Oscar guy sure seemed to think so. He and four of his people with guns in their hands strode fast toward us, and with their heads down, walked in like they owned the damn place. The rest stayed outside, but they’d lowered their guns now. I considered keeping an eye on them, but I really wanted to know what the werewolf was going to say. For now, I found comfort in knowing that these people were not the ECU.

  Mathias sat on one of his couches, his hands firmly gripping his knees as he looked at Oscar, sitting opposite him, his men standing guard over his head. Soundlessly, we all took our place behind Mathias, too, though we were definitely not guards.

  “This is Oscar Hogan from the Brigham pack,” Mathias said. He masked his anger pretty well, but I was sure the werewolf could still smell it.

  The Brigham pack was one of the two main werewolf packs in the country. The others, the Kaynes, were just as big in number, and as strong. There were other packs out there, small ones scattered around the cities, but none of them as important. And there were packless wolves, too—ones who’d chosen not to live with their packs, or by the rules of their Alphas. They made their own decisions, lived the way they wanted to, but they didn’t have the benefits of a pack wolf—which were mainly physical and financial security.

  “Thank you for letting us in,” said Oscar, nodding humbly, as if four others weren't behind him, with guns in their hands and threat written in their eyes.

  “Speak quickly, Oscar. I don’t have the patience,” Mathias said.

  “Very well,” Oscar said, wiping the sweat off his forehead. “I’m here because of my daughter, to ask for your help.”

  Help?

  “If you were hoping for me to help you, you should have come alone.”

  “I don’t mean you specifically,” Oscar said, then looked up at us. “I mean them.” What the…

  “Us?” Luca said, and it sounded like the word slipped him involuntarily.

  “Yes, you,” said Oscar, straightening his shoulders.

  “You’re in my house, so you speak to me,” Mathias spit. “I will not stand to be disrespected even more from the likes of you.” If Mathias had liked Oscar at some point in their lives, that ship was sailing as we spoke.

  “Mathias, you’re overreacting,” Oscar said, waving behind him at his men. “This is merely to make sure you’ll listen to me.”

  “So speak fast!” The guy was really impatient. Couldn’t say I blamed him. He’d been forced to let these people in, and he was being forced to listen to them, too.

  “Okay,” said Oscar, raising his hands in surrender. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but my daughter was taken by the ECU two months ago.” Then his eyes slowly moved up to us again. “For being like them.”

  Come the fuck on. This guy was out of his mind.

  “You’re a werewolf,” I pointed out, just in case he thought we were dumb.

  “I am,” he said with a nod. “And my daughter is like you.”

  He didn’t, by any chance, say the word adopted, did he? Because if he did, I missed it.

  “They are witches,” Mathias said, some of his anger gone.

  “I�
�m not claiming I understand how, but my daughter is mine, and she was born a witch.” Nope. Still made no sense.

  “Your wife—”

  “Werewolf,” Oscar said. “Just like everyone else in my family. Isabelle was born a witch. She’s never shifted in her life.”

  “That’s not possible,” I said, and Luca elbowed me to tell me to shut up. But how could I? A werewolf witch, born of two werewolves? Unless this guy was cheated on by his wife, I just didn’t see it happening.

  “Look, she’s mine. I’ve ran all the tests. There is no doubt about it, but that’s unimportant. Like I said before, the ECU took her from me. My Alpha let them, and no matter how many requests I’ve sent in, they will not let me even see her.” For the first time, I noticed the desperation in his eyes.

  “Why are you telling us this?” Mathias asked. Exactly what I wanted to know.

  Leaning back, Oscar took in a deep breath. “Because I’m going to break her out, and I need your help in return for mine.” He definitely didn’t sound like he was kidding. Consider me speechless.

  “You want to break your daughter out of the ECU?” Mathias asked, not sure whether to laugh or keep a straight face.

  “My back is against the wall here, Mathias. My Alpha will not help me. No one will help me.” Then, he nodded at us. “They are the only ones who have a reason.”

  “And what reason might that be?” Ax asked.

  “My Isabelle is like you,” Oscar said. “The ECU is after you, too.”

  “That’s not much of a reason,” I said. It definitely didn’t convince me.

  “You understand, don’t you? You’re being hunted without right. Who knows how many they have?” Oscar said. “If you help me get my daughter out, you’ll be helping everyone who’s being held against their will. You can all stand together and make the ECU stand back. It’s the only chance you have.”

  “How do you know this, Oscar?” Mathias asked. “How do you know that the ECU is after them?” A very good question, one I should have wondered about myself, but I was still trying to come to terms with the fact that there was a witch born of werewolves.

  Oscar narrowed his brows. “If they took Isabelle, and they took three others that I know of, they’ll be looking for everyone else.”

  “Yes, but how did you know that we’re the same as your daughter?” I asked.

  “Because I have connections,” Oscar said without missing a beat. “I know how the ECU operates. I know their schedule, and I know their building structure. I have men, too, but not enough.”

  “How? Do you have someone on the inside?” Mathias asked and Oscar nodded.

  “Isabelle’s cousin. He’s going to help us, too. If you help us.”

  “But there’s only six of us,” I said, feeling small all of the sudden. This guy was a werewolf with connections and people with guns to stand over his head. He didn’t look like he needed our help for anything.

  “And I have nine people. If you help me, if we help each other, it’s going to be easier for all of us.” Well, fourteen was better than five, if my calculations were correct.

  “Who tipped you off?” Mathias said. “Who told you they were here?”

  Oscar flinched. “It doesn’t matter, Mathias. I’m not here for trouble. All I wanted was to be heard. If you don’t want to help me, I’m not going to try to make you.”

  I didn’t buy that, not for a second. If all he’d wanted was to be heard, he wouldn’t have brought all those people with him. Or, he just wanted to show us what he was made of.

  Either way, he was right. Together, we had a better chance of making it out of there alive. I’d have believed that wholeheartedly, except there was something in my gut that was telling me things weren’t as easy as Oscar made them sound.

  “We’re untrained,” said Luca. “Our magic isn’t as developed as that of other witches. I’m not sure you got the right idea about us.” He was right, too. They were werewolves, born to fight, soldiers to their core. It was why most of the ECU army was made of them.

  “But it’s magic,” said Oscar with a smile. “We have stones, but we’re going to need much more than that. I have a plan, and I want to share it with you, if you’re willing to help. We can help each other,” he repeated.

  “You seem to be under the impression that we want to break into the ECU,” I said reluctantly. I don’t know what it was about the man that convinced me, but it was like he knew we’d planned on it before. Like he’d been there and heard our conversations. He knew exactly what we were up to.

  “Why wouldn’t you? Alone, you’re easily defeated. Together, you are no longer a prey,” he said, shaking his head like it was absurd to think otherwise.

  He could be right, but I wasn’t sure I believed it. The others remained silent, so I guessed they were feeling the same way.

  “You’ve said what you wanted to say, Oscar. If they want to say something to you, I’ll be in touch,” Mathias said with a nod.

  Disappointment flashed on Oscar’s face. He looked hurt as he stood up with a tired nod. “I’ll be waiting to hear from you.” The living room looked extremely small with all of them standing in the middle of it. They seemed to take up all the air in there, too, until Oscar finally walked toward the door, his men following right behind. With my swords still in hand, I ran to the backyard, just to see how many werewolves I’d find. It was dark, but I’d have heard movement if there’d been any. The yard was completely empty.

  Going back in, I felt confused. I felt uncertain. My instincts didn’t like whatever Oscar had put on the table, but what did I know? I’d never been offered help before. It could simply be the fear of the unknown.

  The others had sat down, some on the ground and some on the sofa, and they all stared at the floor.

  “They’re gone,” Mathias said as he came back from the hallway to take his seat, too. He was still angry, I could see it in his fisted hands, but he was also very confused, just like the rest of us.

  “A werewolf witch?” asked Grover in wonder. “What has the world come to?” Exactly my thoughts.

  “He could be lying,” said Fallon. “About his wife. Or him.” A very strong possibility.

  “No, he’s not,” Mathias said. “He spoke the truth.” How would he even know?

  “I think we should take the offer,” Ax said, making chills run up and down my spine.

  “I think we shouldn’t.” Until I said the words, I hadn’t known how strongly I felt about it. They were werewolves. They were loyal to their masters and that was about it. Trusting them was not something I ever thought I’d have to do, but faced with the choice, I’d really rather not, no matter that I thought they could help us in more than one way. The mindless thingies, or the demons could smell us as soon as we left Mathias’s house, and that wasn’t something to be taken lightly. Yes, we were far away from New York, but one could never be too sure. Werewolves might have been able to help, but was the risk worth taking?

  “Me, neither,” Fallon said. “His timing is perfect. How did he find us, in the first place? And how did he know what we are? If he’s so well connected, he’d have gone in himself by now.” It was kind of scary that she spoke the same things I was thinking.

  “Didn’t you hear him?” Ax said. “He was tipped off. He has money and that makes finding information really easy.”

  “He has money?” Luca asked, surprised.

  “Did you see their guns? They cost a lot,” Ax said. “The point is, he could help us. Going in with weapons like that, and with all those werewolves at our back will sure tip the scale in our favor.”

  “The werewolves have always worked for the ECU,” I said. “They’re all well connected, especially if they come from the main packs, like this guy.”

  “Yes, he’s a Brigham,” said Mathias.

  “And you said he had money. Could he really have this much trouble to find hired help?” Finn’s agency had his doors wide open for everyone.

  “But his daughter is like u
s. That’s the problem,” Luca said. “Nobody knows anything so far, and nobody wants to get involved. I can understand that perfectly.”

  “I understand that, too, but there’s a feeling I have.” A feeling that was growing stronger by the second. “We shouldn’t trust them.”

  “You said it yourself, going in alone is suicide,” Ax said. “We’re hopeless. Completely hopeless. But if we have help…”

  “Allowing them to help us means exposing ourselves to them. It means counting on them.” The Lord knows how I felt about counting on other people, especially strangers.

  “It means they know us, know our strengths and weaknesses,” Fallon added.

  “But we’d also know theirs,” Luca said.

  “Except we don’t have an army at our back and the intent of hunting werewolves down, do we?” We weren’t looking for strengths and weaknesses of others, but they could be. It was what the ECU did, and it did that through their soldiers—the werewolves.

  “You’re being illogical,” Ax said. “Alone, we’ll be dead before we even see another like us.”

  “You seemed to have no trouble with this before.” He had been all in, no matter what any of us said.

  “And I have no trouble with it now, either, but I’m a realist. We need this, whether you like it or not.” Was it just me, or was he attacking me personally?

  “First of all, this isn’t my decision to make. Second, if you’re too much of a p…” I looked at Mathias, found him watching me, then rephrased: “If you’re too much of a chicken to accept that this is weird as fuck, than that’s on you, but we have to consider all the possibilities. I’m the realist here, and I’m telling you that those werewolves knew things they had no business knowing about us.”

  “Yeah, Ax. Stop being an asshole,” Fallon said. I was surprised, in fact. Didn’t she hate me?