The Lorimar wargs rumbled agreement.
“Fan out when you get to the lake. All we know is company’s coming, not where they’ll arrive.” After this, Isaac’s surveillance cameras couldn’t get online fast enough for me. “Signal the rest of the pack if you’re the lucky duck who locates the fae. Do not engage without backup. Capisce?”
The musky scent of fur spiced the air in response.
“Glad we’re all on the same page.” I made a shooing motion. “Last one there’s a rotten egg.”
Shifting in close proximity to other wargs hastens the change. The pain, well, it’s always present. It’s the tithe we pay to have our souls spliced with wolves, and the day we stop owing is the day we die.
Seven or eight minutes after issuing the order, I stood on four legs and shook out my fur. Zed finished a split second behind me, and we bolted for the woods. The lake was a thirty-minute drive, half that as a crow flies and even less than that as a wolf trots.
High on the thrill of running with the pack, my wolf kept the lead until we reached the edge of Watauga Lake. I paused there, scanning the area and waiting for the others. They arrived in twos and threes, scattering into the surrounding forest, using the dense foliage as cover.
Zed stuck to my side, and we began a slow patrol of the area where Enzo had indicated the wards stood. We didn’t have to go far before stumbling over our unexpected guests. A trio of ethereal fae hovered above the water, two females and one male. Each beat of their gilded wings stirred gentle ripples in the glassy surface.
Their inhuman beauty punched me in the gut while their embellished platinum robes tricked the eye into following the elaborate embroidery from their elegant throats down to the modest hemlines that tickled their bare ankles. A subjugation tactic. Cute.
Aware of the web that had ensnared me, I broke free of it like the annoying fly I no doubt was to them.
“What are those?” Awe saturated Zed’s voice.
Archangels. That had been my first thought. Except angels didn’t exist in Faerie as far as I knew, and no messengers of God would resort to such cheap tricks to bring us to heel. Or so I wanted to believe.
“They’re Seelie of some kind.” I inhaled the cut grass and bruised-rose-petal scent of the other world. “What kind, I have no idea.”
I got the sinking feeling that if these fae had wanted to obliterate our wards, they could have ten times over. With a wriggle of their cute button noses.
“Look there,” the tallest woman spoke in a wind-chime voice. “Those are the beasts we came in search of, are they not?”
I flattened my ears against my head. Who was she calling a beast?
The wolf chuffed. That would be us.
“Do you understand us?” the second woman asked. “English is the language of this region, or so I was told.”
“You can’t play diplomat like this.” Zed gave me a pointed look. “You’ll have to shift.”
“Usually when fae come to visit there’s running and screaming and blood flying everywhere.” I pivoted my ear toward him. “Who knew they would want to talk?”
“There’s a first time for everything.”
“Don’t let them out of your sight.” I barked at the fae once and then waded into the thick underbrush to begin my change. “Tell the others what we’ve found and get them into position in case there’s trouble.”
“I think it was trying to communicate,” the man said. “Strange beasts, these wargs. What an odd breed of gatekeeper our cousins have chosen.”
The trio talked amongst themselves, but I lost track of the conversation once the pain took root. For a while, my worldview narrowed to the agony of my transformation. But all pain is fleeting, and this shift left me panting and sweaty on a bed of moldy leaves. I dusted off my bottom and walked out to greet the fae wearing a neutral expression that could tip either way depending on what they wanted with us.
“I apologize for the delay.” I took position next to Zed. “We weren’t expecting…guests.”
“Ah. It does speak.” The first woman sounded delighted. “That will make this so much easier.”
I waited for them to stop being thrilled that my comprehension skills surpassed that of a toddler.
“I am Rilla.” The second woman planted her palm against her chest in a me Tarzan, you Jane kind of way. “This is Alyona—” she indicated the taller woman, “—and this brave soul is Tanet.”
“I’m Dell Preston,” I returned in kind, “beta of the Lorimar pack.”
“How civilized this all is,” Alyona gushed. “I had scarcely dared to hope.”
“We have come to petition you for the return of Prince Tiberius.” Tanet linked his fingers at his navel. “He sojourned to Earth some weeks past. We allowed him his minor rebellion, but the time has come for him to return to Faerie.”
The spit dried in my mouth. “Prince Tiberius?”
Something told me they wouldn’t be thrilled to learn most fae didn’t survive our welcome party.
“Yes, darling creature.” Rilla smiled down upon me with benevolence. “Prince Tiberius of House Seelie.”
Hot and cold flashes alternated sweats and chills on my skin. Never had I been more aware of my position as spokeswoman for the pack. The buck stopped here, with me, and suddenly I was suppressing dry heaves. War with Faerie might loom on the horizon, but if we had killed one of their princes, I guarantee that distant promise would become a present threat in short order.
Heart rabbiting, I managed a conversational tone. “We were not made aware of any visiting royalty.”
A subtle crack in their composure changed the pressure in the air, and Zed pressed against my calf.
“I see.” Alyona sniffed. “I had hoped you would be reasonable, but expecting higher functions from the lower born always ends in disappointment.”
“This is your warning, wolf.” Rilla summoned an orb of white light into her palm and lobbed the ball straight for my chest. I dove aside, and its searing heat glanced off my hip. The pain shocked a cry out of me, and burnt flesh perfumed the air. “Bring my nephew to me before the moon reaches its apex, or you leave me no choice but to reclaim him myself.” She extended her arm, and the brush of her magic woke the wards. They glowed a cool yellow under her hand. She gave several test pushes against the translucent dome, and it caved a fraction more each time. “This is quality work. It’s far superior to your birth, so I must assume you have powerful allies.” Her gaze landed on me. “They can’t save you. Nothing can. Not if you fail to return Tiberius to his rightful place.”
“As much as I appreciate the threats to find a kid you let run off unsupervised, I have no idea where to start.” I sank my fingers in Zed’s fur to hide their trembling while I got my feet under me again. “Do you have a picture? A list of contacts he might have here? Anything?”
“I came prepared.” She plucked a ball of red fabric out of thin air and tossed it to me—through the wards. “That is one of his shirts. He wore it to his combat lesson the night before he left.”
The punch of musk stirred a memory of grassy fields, and it all clicked into place. “He’s a siren.”
“You can tell that from scenting his clothes?” Tanet asked. “That’s remarkable. Your master has trained you to hunt well.”
Biting the inside of my cheek until I tasted blood, I didn’t waste breath correcting him. Poor guy might have a coronary if he realized I had no master and that the chain of command stopped with me.
“Tiberius is no mere siren,” Rilla was quick to correct me. “He is an alkonost.”
Alkonost. Talk about your obscure footnotes in fae lore. Alkonosts were siren cousins with an affinity for thunderstorms. They numbered so few, according to the Dictionary of Faerie, I had overlooked them as a possible culprit in favor of their more infamous cousins. Clearly that had been a mistake. I had gotten so comfortable blaming the rogue weather patterns on the rift that I had turned a blind eye to other possibilities until it was too late.
“My pack and I will do our best to retrieve him,” I promised them.
“We will accept no other outcome,” Rilla informed me.
I took a shot in the dark. “Does the king know you’re here?”
“There was no time to inform him.” Regret wreathed Tanet’s face. “The king is busy with matters of state.”
“The prince has been here for weeks, and you couldn’t put off the search for a few more days?” That whole scenario rang false, and I thanked Isaac for his lesson on fae and the twisting of lies. “This is a shot in the dark, but I don’t believe you. Either you didn’t know Tiberius was missing and you’re about to wet yourselves trying to locate him before anyone else realizes that too, or something changed. So which is it? Are you incompetent? Or is there a threat to the prince that necessitates him being reined in sooner rather than later?”
Rilla narrowed her eyes on me. “You are brighter than your appearance suggests.”
“Thanks.” Nothing like being insulted by a trio of clichés.
“He has a certain fondness for a servant girl,” Alyona admitted. “Their kind bonds deep. Our kind does not. He ran away from court to be with her, and it was all very romantic, I’m sure.”
“Except things are getting serious.” Mix teens and hormones with a total lack of adult supervision, and what did they expect would happen? “He didn’t ditch her and come home like you thought he would. He stayed here. With her.”
“If she binds them, we will lose him,” Tanet said. “Our clan has never had a prince named. We cannot afford to lose our bid for the crown.”
“There’s a king of Faerie.” The line of succession in Faerie was a drunken zigzag, but it existed. “What if he has children?”
“He won’t breed,” Alyona assured me. “Faerie is held by those strong enough to control her, and our king is a half-blood smear on the title. His reign will end soon, and our prince will ascend.”
Bleepity-bleep-bleep. I was in so far over my head I couldn’t tell which way to swim to find air.
“Find our prince or suffer the consequences,” Rilla warned.
A mighty rustle of tawny-gold wings, and the trio ascended past the clouds to vanish under the cover of glamour.
Well, that gave a definitive answer as to how Prince Tiberius had crossed over without ending up as wolf chow. He had flown, eliminating any chance of us picking up a scent trail to follow.
“The boy who almost killed us is a prince.” Zed flicked his tail. “Does that mean we should feel honored?”
I choked out a laugh. “Pretty sure if you’d asked his auntie, she would say yes.” I checked my smartwatch, which I had to admit was handy given our deadline. “It’s a half hour before noon. That means we’ve got twelve hours until the moon hits its apex.”
One by one, the rest of the pack joined us at the water’s edge. They had all been close enough to hear the fae’s demands. At least I wouldn’t have to repeat the dialogue. Verbalizing impending doom gave me indigestion.
“New plan,” I told them. “Y’all take the long way into town. Cut through the safe fields and do not step one paw onto the fae’s property until I get there with backup. We can’t confront them head-on. Zed and I are proof that won’t work. We have to be sneaky.”
“Does this mean you’re going back to Stone’s Throw?” Zed lingered as the others dispersed.
“Not exactly.” I raked my fingers through my hair, knuckles tangling in the knots. “Enzo is benched, so that means bringing Isaac. He already volunteered but…”
“You don’t want him to get hurt.”
“I don’t want any of us to get hurt.”
“Are you shifting?” His tongue lolled in a wolfy chuckle. “You’ll cause traffic accidents if you walk the road nude.”
“I can’t afford to expend the energy.” I flashed my watch at him. “I’m going to give Isaac’s gizmo a try. Never let it be said I don’t appreciate his toys.”
“All right.” He set off at a lope. “I’ll keep an eye on the others until you arrive.”
“Much appreciated.” With no time to waste, I mashed the button to speed dial Isaac.
“Are you all right?” A note of panic laced his voice that I savored for too long.
“I’ll explain it all when you get here. I need you to pick me up at the lake. I’ll meet you at the marina.”
Studying the watch with new appreciation, I had to admit it was smart having a connection to help outside of the pack. Maybe if I offered to pay for the supplies, Isaac could whip up a few more of these. When he moved on, the connection could be transferred to the phone in the security office or whatever snazzy name Isaac cooked up for his techno cave.
“Haden.” I reached out one last time. “This is me giving you the greenlight.”
“What?” The groggy quality to his voice told me he had been up late running drills with the Stoners. “Does that mean what I think it means?”
“You guys are frontline tonight.” I crossed my fingers in the hopes this was the right decision. “The rest of the pack and I are on a deadline, literally.”
“Yeah. Okay.” He perked up in a snap. “We can do this. No problem. Trust me. I’ve got this.”
“I do trust you.” He had worked his tail off to whip those guys into shape. “Don’t be afraid to ask for help if you need it, okay?”
“I will,” he promised. “Hot damn. I was starting to wonder if this day would ever come.”
“Yeah, yeah. Get some sleep.” I grinned at his infectious excitement. “Be careful out there.”
Haden’s buzz got my heart pumping as the connection fizzled, but I had a fat lot of nothing to do until Isaac arrived. Figuring I could use every scrap of Zen I could beg, borrow or steal, I slowed my breathing and got my pulse under control. I sucked at finding my center, but Bianca used to swear by quiet reflection, so I gave it a try.
A pang of regret arrowed through me that I still hadn’t called to check on her. One of these days, I needed to strong-arm my way into Edelweiss and see her with my own eyes. That trick would only work once, though. So far I had been keeping it as a last resort for when her baby arrived. Holding that squirmy bundle would be worth the reprimand by her nurses.
Twenty minutes later, I glided into the brush and picked my way toward the main road leading to the marina. Trees lined both sides, and traffic was minimal today. This would be the best place to hop in the truck—if I could flag him down before he made the last turn.
The main drag came into view, and I didn’t have to wait long before the familiar rumble of Isaac’s engine perked my ears. Once he got closer, I jogged down the incline until my feet slapped on asphalt, and waved my arms over my head.
Honking in the distance brought my head around in time to see a truck coming at me from the opposite direction. I ignored them and waited while Isaac coasted to a stop. He threw the truck into park and stepped out, ripping his flannel down his shoulders, popping buttons that bounced across the pavement, and bundled me in the fabric. He yanked me flush against him as the other driver sped past, and I buried my face against his chest.
“Tease,” the guy yelled, laying on his horn.
A subtle growl vibrated Isaac’s chest, so slight I would have missed it if I hadn’t been plastered against him.
“Sometimes I hate humans,” he mumbled, his lips brushing against my temple.
“No you don’t.” I forced myself to step out of his arms. “They’re not so bad. Sure, that guy’s an asshole. Seeing a naked woman run out of the woods waving her arms in traffic doesn’t entitle you to a free show. And hello? He didn’t stop to ask if I had been in an accident or kidnapped or was otherwise in distress. He just thought hey, that guy’s getting all the boobies.”
Grunting, Isaac guided me into the truck through his open door since mine was held closed with a bungee cord. “He is an asshole.”
I took the hand he offered and slid to my side of the cab. “For every perv, there’s a guy out there willing to lend
a girl the shirt off his back.”
Taking the compliment in stride, he climbed in after me. “I’m not human, though.”
“You’re a guy,” I pointed out, “and love of boobies transcends species.”
“Can I be honest?” He busied himself fastening his seat belt.
“Sure,” I said cautiously.
“I can appreciate that nudity is part of your culture, but it drives me crazy.”
A flush spread across my chest. “What do you mean?”
“Nothing.” He executed a three-point turn and headed toward town. “Forget I said anything.”
Not likely. “No problem.”
Curiosity nibbled at the corners of my mind. There were so many ways to take his statement, and assigning my own meaning was a quick way to get hurt. Worse.
Our old friend the radio filled the silence when it got too thick to ignore.
“So.” I traced a white security sticker on the window. “Are you going to ask me about the crazypants fae who just threatened us with annihilation or what?”
The road forgotten, Isaac swung his head toward me. “What?”
“Apparently the boy in the field is a runaway prince of Faerie.” I omitted getting zapped—the wound had already healed—but filled him in on the rest of the trio’s shenanigans. “That means we get to be the bad guys and break up a happily-ever-after in the making, or we hope we’re good enough to take down three zealous Seelie fae defending their next potential monarch.”
“What about the other kids?”
“No clue.” I had been too shell-shocked to ask. Now I was grateful for that. “They didn’t mention anyone except the prince and his girlfriend.”
“This opens a huge can of worms.” His lips pinched together. “Those Seelie broke the king’s law by coming here. No matter what their intentions, they failed to go about it the right way. They should have petitioned the conclave. That they didn’t makes me nervous. They’re too bold coming to fetch him themselves. It makes me doubt the boy is the only thing they’re after.”
Dog Eat Dog World: Limited Edition Bundle (Black Dog) Page 190