by Elsa Jade
Cautiously, averting her gaze from the blurping sludge coming to a slow boil in the cauldron—she did not want to know—she joined Rita at the altar that had been in their family for generations. She shuddered to think what sort of history the inscribed hollow block had seen.
Gin was perched on a stool at the end of the counter, carving at a small piece of wood with a very large, very shiny, obviously very sharp knife. Practically a sword. Probably part of that sketchy history.
Brandy had sworn to rescue Aster from the beast that had trapped him, and if that meant reclaiming at least part of her Wick heritage too, so be it.
“Did I get enough?” She peered down into the bowl where Rita was mixing bits of who-knew-what with the remnants of the hairpin flower. “The red silk made it hard to see his blood.”
Gin snorted. “Probably a good thing, considering how queasy you get.”
“Not everyone has to like the darker arts just because you do,” Rita said mildly.
“But Bry doesn’t like any of it.” Gin flicked a glance at her, sharper almost than the knife. “Never has. Never will.”
Brandy made a face at her sister. Was Gin ever going to forgive her for wanting a real life, one that didn’t include newt eyes or whatever?
“There is no never,” Rita said. “And no always. It’s all balance, all a spinning wheel.”
This time, Brandy and Gin shared an eye roll.
“Must be so nice, knowing everything as you do,” Gin snarked.
“Yes. It’s delightful being the eldest,” Rita shot back. “Are you done playing with that?”
Gin tossed the knife across the table, and Rita caught it neatly by the blade, her graceful fingers pinching the symbol-etched iron to avoid the cutting edge.
Brandy closed her eyes. Aster must never see this, once she got him back. He’d been a daredevil from the moment he figured out how to crawl. She didn’t want him knife-juggling.
Oh god, what if he never had hands and fingers again, only paws? She caught back a despairing sob and turned it into a growl instead. “Quit playing around, you guys. This spell has to work.”
Because she didn’t think she’d have another shot at Mac. Whatever Rita might have learned from her studies with Aunt Tilda and the rest of the circle, Brandy knew she’d never see Mac again.
And to her dismay, she suspected she’d always remember his kiss.
Chapter 5
Mac slammed out of his truck, slammed his way up the sidewalk to the rental cottage he shared with his cousins, slammed through the front door—
“Don’t you dare slam that door,” Ben hollered from the living room. “I have this antenna exactly perfect and managed to dial up a dating site in Tasmania and just found…” He groaned. “I hate you, Mac. I hate you so much. She’s gone. She was perfect, and now she’s gone.”
Yeah, she was gone. “Join the club,” Mac snarled as he slammed the door.
His cousin slouched back on the couch and set aside the cell phone that he’d rigged with something that looked like an octopus made out of tinfoil, pipe cleaners, and—
“Is that my hoe?”
Ben gave him a pained look. “She was gonna be my girl, Mac, a good girl. But yeah. I thought it would boost the signal.”
Mac sighed, the pointless rage draining out of him though the beast within still circled restlessly. “You reached Tasmania?” Cell service in Angels Rest vacillated between notoriously dreadful and utterly absent—something about the mineral composition of the mesa—so Tasmania was impressive. Not useful, but impressive. “What were you going to do with a date in Tasmania?”
“Dream.” Ben sighed too and tipped his blond head back against the couch cushion to stare up at the ceiling.
“A dating site, huh?” Mac crossed his arms skeptically. “Not a porn site?”
Ben angled another wounded stare toward him. “I want a mate, Mac. My bear won’t let me sleep.”
A niggle of unease pushed Mac out of the hallway and into the living room to eyeball his cousin. “How bad is it?” They’d come so far, trying to redeem the clan. If any of them went rogue now, all his hard work would be flushed away.
“It’s lonely,” Ben said. “It hurts.”
The bear was strong. And that was a problem. When a powerful creature was trapped and wounded, it would rage against the confinement. It would do anything to be free.
Free to find the true mate who would soothe the savage beast.
“I’ll call Domingo,” he vowed. “Get us some more work. You can sweat it out.”
For a heartbeat, the bear stared at him out of Ben’s blue eyes, then his cousin blinked and gave him a lopsided grin. “Easier than swimming to Tasmania, I guess.”
“Right,” Mac said. Except maybe not. What else could he do to show the town’s shifters that the bear clan only wanted to be part of the community again?
The next morning, he thought he’d found the way.
He’d called Blaze Domingo, crew leader for Sunday Landscaping, to ask—okay, maybe beg—for another contract. Before the trouble with the Kingdom Guard, the bear clan had done well enough for itself. To discover that their leader had sold them out—literally selling some of their clanmates to the anti-shifter zealots—had broken them. The other shifters in town had hated them for the treachery.
Even after Kane Villalobos, the alpha wolf who ruled Mesa Diablo, had absolved the clan from complicity, the bears were still left out in the cold. Until Blaze had asked if they wanted to put together a crew for his family’s expanding business. Mac jumped on the chance with all four feet and his two cousins in tow. They were doing good work, not just because their bear strength made them ideal for digging, climbing, chopping, and whatnot, astonishing the clueless human clients with their abilities, but they were showing the judgmental shifters they were redeemed.
Now Blaze hesitated when Mac asked for another gig. “I already have the schedule set, but…”
“Anything,” Mac said, hoping he sounded helpful, not desperate.
“I want to spend the solstice with Annie and the baby, and there’s still some work to do for the jubilee.”
“On it.” Mac had seen his boss’s pretty mate and the pack’s newest pup, so he could understand the wolf’s desire to celebrate high summer with his family. The shifter community was tight—had to be, to stay under the radar in an oblivious world—and shifter blood bonds were tighter yet.
So he just wouldn’t tell his lovelorn cousin they’d scored the gig because they were outsiders, alone.
After getting the details on spiffying up the town and the ceremonial fields on the mesa before the jubilee, Mac relayed the news to Ben after he got back from mowing their elderly neighbor’s lawn.
The lawn hadn’t needed mowing, but Ben needed the distraction and old Miss Morton liked to watch burly Ben mow. He always used her late husband’s ancient push mower because she said the sound of a powered motor rattled out her hearing aids. Mac suspected she appreciated the extra effort that usually ended up with Ben shirtless and sweating.
Probably not the kind of date Ben was hoping for…
But his cousin was thrilled to hear about the solstice work. “I remember the jubilee challenges up north when I was a kid. It’s great Kane is bringing back the old traditions.”
Ben had grown up in the farthest reaches of Canada; maybe that was why he was such a nice guy. And it was great the Mesa Diablo pack’s alpha was trying to balance the old ways against the inevitable changes of their modern world.
Changes Mac was struggling to keep up with.
Speaking of struggle, now he had to tell his other cousin about the gig.
He went to the kitchen and yanked open the pantry door. The harsh light from the bare bulb was swallowed by the black hole dug deep below the linoleum. Never let it be said that a determined bear couldn’t move the earth, literally.
And yeah, they probably weren’t getting their security deposit back.
Swallowing back a sigh,
Mac swung himself onto the ladder that descended under the house, careful not to step on the orange power cord—that belonged on their electric mower—threaded through the rungs. Maybe he’d been unfair to blame the push mower on Mrs. Morton.
Bears needed their close, cozy dens to be happy, but this was just ridiculous. And he was going to tell his cousin that just as soon as—
“Aw hell,” he whispered.
The yellow glare fixed on him from the darkness in the far corner of the roughly excavated cellar made his heartbeat stutter in atavistic fear. And he was a bear himself.
But Hawthorn Thorburn wasn’t just a bear.
He would’ve been rex ursi—king bear.
Under that yellow stare, harsher than the bare lightbulb and almost as bright, Mac’s knees ached, the beast in him torn between the urge to kneel and the instinctive impulse to fight.
Thor had retreated to this den—this self-imposed prison—and Mac’s bear knew someone had to ascend in his place, for the good of their broken clan.
With a wave of hopelessness, he acknowledged he was the ridiculous one. He thought he could redeem the clan by getting lawn-mowing jobs? That box of rocks in his truck was smarter than him. Hell, the dirt on the rocks was smarter.
“Thor.” He dropped to one knee. Not in reverence, not as a prelude to charging at his would’ve-been king. But because he wasn’t sure he could hold up under the pressure anymore.
The heavy breath and heavier scent of boar bear filled the den, and the beast in Mac wanted to rise in sympathy, in challenge.
It’d been too long since he shifted. He’d been so focused on being a good citizen in front of their community that he’d forgotten to be a bear. That would get him in trouble if he wasn’t careful.
Hell, it had already gotten him in trouble. Now that he thought about it, it was obvious that he’d gone after Brandy because his beast was hungry.
Good thing she was gone. He’d make time to head for the hills, let his bear run and feast on juniper berries and prickly pear. As soon as they got the jubilee work done.
He lifted his head but kept his gaze focused somewhere to the left of his liege. “Need a hardscaper for the next job. Not digging though. Building. You up for it?”
Okay, maybe there was a tiny bit of challenge in his voice. Judging by the low, thunderous rumble from the royal bear, at least Thor seemed to think so. Mac just wasn’t sure he cared anymore.
Or he cared too much. And he knew they couldn’t go on like this, exiles among their kind.
“Up is kind of the key word here,” he continued inexorably. “You’ll have to come up. Stand up. Speak up. You’ll need hands—”
Thor roared.
The volume shook dirt from the claw-marked ceiling into Mac’s hair. Oh yeah, he was definitely all kinds of dumb.
“Probably less teeth,” he went on, brushing at his shoulder where only twelve hours ago Brandy had rested her hand.
He froze when Thor charged him.
God, he forgot how big a king bear was. And Thor was maybe halfway to his father’s fighting weight. No wonder none of the clan’s dominant males had challenged their old king, even when the whispers had started that he’d made an unholy deal with the Kingdom Guard.
And no wonder Thor had lost when he’d tried to make things right.
Yet here Mac was, trying in his dumb way to help the clan, to save the beast who should be king.
Still on one knee, he waited. If Thor wanted to gut him, there was no way he’d make it up the ladder in time to save himself.
So he just closed his eyes and waited.
A ferocious huff of hot, rank breath blasted back his hair.
But the body slam never came.
He cracked one eye carefully. “First light tomorrow morning. At the festival grounds. Apparently the chamber of commerce is providing some volunteers and lunch too. Those will not be the same thing, of course.” He grinned at the big bear. “See you there.”
With even more care, he rose to his feet, angling his body halfway between direct confrontation and a too-irresistible-not-to-chase retreat. But Thor didn’t follow, and Mac made it up the ladder with all his bones intact and major internal organs still contained within unbroken skin. Yay. He’d take his victories where he could find them.
Especially after his epic failure last night.
Nope, not thinking about that again, ever.
Which is why he felt more attacked by Ben than Thor when he stopped in the kitchen to grab a snack and his cousin asked, “How’d your date go last night?”
Mac popped his head over the open refrigerator door. “What?”
“Your date,” Ben repeated, as he mixed up salmon cakes. “I was so whiny about losing my connection, I forgot to ask you about yours.”
“I didn’t have a date.” The rush of cool air from the fridge couldn’t banish the prickling heat of embarrassment, but Mac kept the door open like a shield.
“Oh.” Ben returned his attention to the breadcrumbs he was mashing. “I smelled her on you, so I thought—”
“No date,” Mac repeated testily. He realized his hand had been hovering near the strawberries—sweet and pink. He slammed the refrigerator door. “I was at Gypsy’s to rub elbows with the guys.”
“Mm-hmm.” Ben went to work on the onions. “Something got rubbed, anyway.”
His eyes were watering from the onions, Mac told himself, not the urge to punch his cousin.
Definitely not because he was weepy about not getting rubbed in any way.
Lest there be any mistake, he repeated, “No. Date.”
“She smelled nice,” Ben mused. “If you’re not dating her, maybe I should—”
Thor hadn’t charged, but Mac did.
He found himself toe to toe with his cousin before he could blink.
His beast didn’t blink at all.
Ben lifted one blond eyebrow. “No date?”
“No date,” Mac growled as he twisted on his boot heel.
“Okay.” A not-quite singsong note of disbelief. “Dinner’s at seven. Don’t be late.”
With his cousin’s smirk burning in his brain, Mac slammed out of the house.
It was definitely too damn late.
Chapter 6
“It’s done.” Rita sagged onto the stool next to the altar and massaged her legs, which Brandy knew must be aching after the long night in the spellatorium.
Gin wrinkled her nose at the amulet they’d spelled. “You sure?” The razor cut of her crimson bangs and the sometimes grating edge to her tone had been worn down by the late—early?—hour. And maybe just a touch of rare fear. “Maybe we should’ve asked Aunt Tilda and the circle before they left.”
Brandy shook her head. “You know they wouldn’t have approved.” Frustration spiked like over-caffeinated jitters. “Live and let live, and all that.” Easy enough for the older witches like her aunt and the rest of her circle to say such things. They didn’t have to live with the repercussions of their pagan-er-than-thou choices.
Okay, maybe that was unfair. There’d been a time when witches were burned, not merely disbelieved. But still. Aunt Tilda thought Aster was adorable and that he’d grow out of his fur in his own time, like he’d so readily and cheerfully outgrown his diapers.
But Brandy knew the world didn’t have room for oddness, not for “the weird Wick sisters”, and certainly not for a baby boy bear, no matter how much she loved him.
It was because she loved him that she’d stand up against the circle’s nonchalance, not to mention any wild animals that got in her way.
She remembered the out-of-the-blue, middle-of-the-night call from her mother just days after Aster’s birth. Woozy from sleep deprivation and hormones, Brandy had picked up her cell without checking the ID.
“Your love reached all this way.” The line crackled with some unknown distance. “And your fear. As hard as it is to believe right now, you’ll know what to do.”
Brandy hadn’t heard that achingly fam
iliar voice since she and her sisters had finished high school and watched their mother pack for what was—or so they suspected, amongst themselves—the last time. “At least I know I’ll never abandon him.” She didn’t care if it was cruel to say it aloud.
“Him?” Her mother chuckled. “You had a boy? Oh, the circle must’ve been so shocked. You always were the willful one. And you did walk away from the circle, didn’t you?” Was that a broken note of regret or just more interference on the line? “I’ll pray that’s as far as you ever have to go.”
Despite the anger and confusion surging up over her exhaustion, Brandy asked, “Where are you?” If her mother said outside your door right now…
“Between places. Following a very credible lead on a discovery that could change everything the circle believes.”
Brandy closed her eyes. Having triplets for the circle wasn’t enough; her mother had always wanted to go as far as magic could take her. Yet another reason Brandy had gone the other way. “His name is Aster, by the way.”
The silence was so long, she wondered if they’d been disconnected. “Aster. The star. The flower is used in love spells and healing elixirs.”
“He won’t be used for any spells,” Brandy had told her mother firmly. “He’s a little boy.”
Oh, if only she’d known what the future held. That’s what she got for refusing to look in magic mirrors.
Rita must’ve misread her stony silence, because her sister echoed Gin softly. “You sure?”
Brandy blinked hard and glared at her. “Is there a bear cub chewing my anklet?”
Her sisters glanced down with identical smiles.
“Let’s do this,” she said, summoning the note of command she never used with her elder sister or the younger. “I want my boy back.”
Rita let out a short breath, as if letting go the last of her objections which she knew wouldn’t be heard anyway. “We need to be outside, somewhere the animal energy can escape and be free.”
Brandy swallowed. Thinking of the bear as a separate entity unfairly possessing her son should’ve made her more determined to banish it.