I nodded, taking strength from that reassurance, but hating it too. Because if I went bad, I didn’t want to take them with me. They weren’t like that and it gutted me to think . . .
“Stop. You aren’t going bad,” Oka whispered. “Just stop. It is fear that is driving these thoughts. You’re forgetting who you are.”
I wrapped my arms around her, holding her tiny body tightly to me. “There is something else. Your touch helps, Mac.”
“Helps what?”
“Keep it away. The darkness. Alex’s does too,” I said. “Earlier, it took both of you touching me to make the magic draw back.”
“Well,” he said, a devious grin on his face. “I’ll just have to make sure I touch you more than that wolf does, won’t I?”
He ran his hands up and down the outside of my thighs giving me little shivers. “Lie down, Pam. We’re here.”
With a gentle tug, he pulled me back under the thin covers. Oka stuffed herself against my chest and started a low purr that eased the tension in my body.
Through my connection to them both, I knew they slept. But I lay there, awake. My mind rolling through the options of what the caravan could do. What I could do.
And as the sun rose, I hoped only that I had the strength to fight the coming darkness. I would survive the fight. I knew that.
But would I be the same witch when the dust settled?
*_*_*
The three of us packed quickly, finishing as the rest of the caravan started to stir. Richard was still asleep when I tucked my bedroll into the back of the truck and went looking for him.
Asleep in front of Chris’s tent in the same position as the night before. I might as well have not left him for the way the scene looked.
“Dick,” I put the toe of my boot to his leg and gave him a shove. “Come on. Wake up. It’s time to go.” He groaned and rolled over. “Fine. Cold shower it is.” I grabbed a bucket and went to the little creek. The water was freakishly cold and it almost felt cruel, but he needed to move. This wasn’t like him. He rarely slept, and even when he did, it wasn’t hard like this. He was always on guard. Always ready to spring into action to save his caravan. This was not the Dick I knew.
I marched over to his camp, water sloshing out the edge of the bucket.
He was still curled on his side, just the same way he was when I left.
“Dick, one more chance. Get up, man, or you’re getting a bucket of ice water.” I lifted it high, one hand on the brim, one under the bottom.
“Go away.” He pulled the thin, tattered sleeping bag over his head. It wouldn’t offer him much protection from the water.
“Have it your way.” Without any ceremony at all, I dumped the freezing cold water all over him.
“Jesus Christ on a braying donkey! What is going on?” Richard scrambled out of his sleeping bag, soaking wet. “Pamela. What is it?”
I blinked at him. “What is it? I’ve been trying to get you up for the last five minutes. The sun is up. So is most of your caravan. Get with the program, man.”
He looked around, dazed, which only made me want to shake him. I followed his gaze and saw that no one was moving more than the bare minimum. And no one was packing up. They were boiling water over freshly started fires. Like they were staying there for the day.
Richard frowned. “Maybe we should just stay here.”
“No. That’s the dumbest idea on the planet. Everyone will starve to death if we stay here.”
“It’s safe. We’ll see an attack coming, and we’ll be able to defend ourselves,” he argued with a hand pointed to the canyon walls and water dripping off the end of his nose.
“None of that does you any good if you starve to death,” I said, but he didn’t seem to hear me. Nothing seemed to be sinking in.
“Pamela. I don’t have the energy to fight them.” The hope I’d seen in him from the moment we’d met was gone, replaced by total and utter defeat. Was he spelled? Was this land cursed? Well, that was a dumb question, wasn’t it? Of course the land was cursed.
“Excuse me a second, Dick.” I walked away. I needed to see the other humans in the caravan to be sure of my suspicions. I touched a few of them, turned faces to me, and in them I saw the same thing.
One after another, they all had a dead, cloudy look to their eyes. As if they weren’t quite awake.
I took hold of our nurse by both hands. She didn’t try to pull away, or even question why I was hanging onto her. Another time and I would have used spirit to wipe the spell away from them all. The best I could do now was far less dramatic. I reached for that tiny bit of spirit and wove it through Nathanda until I found the spell holding her.
Sweat rolled off me, and my stomach clenched as the pain of using that element cut through me. I held it just long enough to see that the spell was somehow tied to the land. We’d triggered it when we’d slid down into the valley. I let her go and she turned away, silent.
“Damn it,” I whispered. “Damn it all to hell and back.” The only good thing I could see was that the shifters were less affected. Not by much, but enough that they were at least fighting the spell.
Frustration coursed through me. Yet again, I was failing these people who trusted me to help them, to protect them, and I’d led them into a fucking trap.
Alex caught up with me and followed, Jasmine trailing behind him. Hatred crawled up my spine but as if by a magic all his own, Mac appeared and grabbed hold of my hand, helping me to relax my shoulders and stay focused. I kept walking with Mac’s hand in mine as I searched for my beta.
“The humans have all been spelled, and I can’t break it,” I said as I found Crimson, and brought her up to speed. “They won’t leave this place. Which means they will die if we don’t do something.” Just what I was going to do, I wasn’t quite sure yet.
“What can we do?” Crimson asked. “Do we carry them out?”
“No, there isn’t enough time or energy for that.” I had to think fast, and the answer came to me in a brilliant flash. I’d wanted to leave to put some space between me and my family, my caravan, to find a way to be safer for them.
I pointed at her. “You stay here with them. Guard them. Find food if you can. I’m going to take my familiars and Roe and go searching for the wall,” I said.
“I’m going too,” Alex said. “You’ll need extra hands if Roe acts up.”
And not to be outdone, Jasmine opened her trap too. “I’m not staying here with them,” she said with a curl of her nose, as if smelling something off.
Alex turned, his eyes flashing, dominant. “You will stay here, Jasmine. And you will keep them safe, just as Crimson will. Think of Marley.”
She smiled sweetly, but there was venom in her eyes. “Of course. The pup. It’s always the pup.” Her smile faded, and I didn’t miss the bitterness in her voice.
Alex straightened, and the tension grew between them until she bowed her head and backed away. Not without a final look my way as she mouthed, “Dirty, useless witch.”
Mac already had a hand on me, and as the darkness surged, I reached out and grabbed Alex’s forearm, startling him and gaining an even sharper look from Jasmine. I didn’t care what she thought. I was not letting the magic out if I didn’t have to. Certainly not on her account.
“Keep an eye on her, Crimson,” I said, breathing carefully. “She’s a right bitch to Marley.”
Crimson gave me a smile that was anything but nice. “I’ll do that.”
Alex jerked, which took his arm away from my hand. “What did she do to Marley?”
I shook my head. “Now isn’t the time. Crimson will take care of her.” I released Mac’s hand, carefully. The magic was quiet. Waiting, but quiet. “We need to get Roe and get out of here. The longer we take, the longer they’re without food down here. They only have days left. Even if they stretch the rations.”
Mac, Oka, and the others nodded. “We’ll be back as soon as we can, Crimson. Don’t die down here.” I made myself say the next bit. “If you have t
o leave them, if they’re dying and you still have a chance to save the shifters . . . do it.”
She shook her head. “That’s not how packs work, and you know it. We’ll be fine. We’ll wait for you.” She looked at me with her golden eyes, and I knew she meant it. I just hoped I wasn’t sentencing them all to an early grave.
*_*_*
I’d been right about one thing. The trail back up and out of the canyon was narrow. Way too narrow for the trucks. If we didn’t find food on the other side, they would have to go out the way we came in, leading us to nothing.
“It’ll be okay, Pam, we’ll bring back the food we need for them,” Alex said as we walked single file up the path that was nothing more than a goat trail. We each had as large a backpack as we’d be able to carry back loaded with food. Oka, Alex, and Mac would shift to their animal forms in order to take more. Roe, of course, would be free to go once we found the wall.
“I hope you’re right,” I said. “I really do.”
“Of course I am.” Alex looked back at me and then bent into the climb, showing off muscles he had no right to show off. I kept my eyes down on my feet so I didn’t slide and fall backward. Which would’ve been very bad.
Bad, bad, Pammy. I was pretty sure that was my inner voice, and not the darkness. Pretty sure.
The plan was for Mac to carry me and Oka on his back in his bear form, and Roe and Alex would jog beside once we reached the top. Mac figured we could cover over half the remaining distance in the first day.
By midafternoon, we reached the top.
Just as we were about to crest the edge of the canyon, a head poked over and grinned down at us. Two horns, curly hair, and a very human face. He flashed a grin.
A satyr. “Those things are nothing but trouble,” Alex said.
“Good eating though,” Roe said.
The satyr took one look at Roe, flicked his head and snorted. “Well, flounce you too.” He took off in a flash before we came over the top, and we didn’t see him again.
“Probably best,” Mac said. “They’re horny little things.”
“Roe out front, since you know where we’re going.”
“I’m tired,” he groaned.
I wished I had a long whip at that moment. “Move it, Roe.”
Plus, I didn’t trust him to walk behind us. He needed to be out where we could see him. Mac shifted and I climbed on, the feel of him such a sense of relief.
We headed north at a good clip, running on empty, grumbling bellies, until the afternoon light started to fade.
“We should stop here,” Roe said, out of breath, sweat running down the middle of his spine.
“I’m sorry, are you in charge? I think we should keep going. The sooner we get to the wall, the better off those down in the canyon will be,” I said. “Keep running.”
Roe turned and ran backward. “They’re as good as dead, witch.” The gleam in his eye was there and gone so fast I would have missed it if I hadn’t been staring at his face.
“What do you know that I don’t, ogre?” I demanded.
“Nothing. They’ll starve to death in there. They were fools to stay,” he said, far too quickly.
My jaw ticked. There was more going on than he was willing to say. I’d just have to figure it out soon.
We ran for another mile at least and the light was down enough that I held up a hand. In part because I could feel Mac losing steam. “Here.”
Mac and Alex stayed on four legs. “Alex and I’ll look for food.”
Roe snorted. “You’re going to leave me alone here with her? Aren’t you afraid I’ll eat her for dinner?”
It was Mac’s turn to laugh. “You sure have a short memory, don’t you, ogre? I believe she was the one with the knife to your balls, not the other way around.”
I looked at Roe and he swallowed hard. I took one of my blades out and turned it over, the fading sun catching the curved blade beautifully.
Mac smiled. “Frankly, it isn’t her health I’m concerned about, ogre. It’s yours.”
15
Alex
Shitty, shitty, shit, shits, I thought. Why did the bear want me to go with him? I shook my head. I wasn’t worried. The big bear was . . . well, big. And he could squash me like a bug. But I wasn’t worried. We understood each other enough to know we were both there for Pamela. I didn’t dislike him.
I just wished I was in his place.
I shook my head as we shifted and took off running into the wilderness as evening fell on the forest. I wasn’t that submissive wolf anymore. If he wanted a fight, I’d give him one.
I just hoped he didn’t. Pamela would kill me if I hurt him.
Mac stopped and sniffed the ground. The scent of animals was in the air, catching me off guard. It was more than I’d sniffed in days. My stomach rumbled at just the barest scent of a deer, and I spotted the tracks not too far up. I led Mac to them, and we followed them for about a half a mile before they just disappeared.
We both shook our heads and started over. This time with wild boar tracks. Same damned thing happened. We only got so far before the tracks just disappeared.
Over and over again we’d scent an animal, find the tracks, and be led to a dead end. As if the animals just vanished into thin air. Stepping into another dimension or something. Stranger things had happened in our broken world.
Mac shifted as he squatted over the tracks of a raccoon. It wasn’t big enough to fill all our bellies, but it was something and we were getting desperate.
When I saw him in human form looking over the tracks, I felt obligated to shift too, but I didn’t have my clothes with me.
“This is odd, don’t you think?” Mac asked.
I nodded as I knelt, one hand over my crotch, casual like. Shifters didn’t care about nudity, and normally I wouldn’t either but . . . Mac made me feel like a kid again. But he didn’t seem to care, or even notice I was buck naked, which offered me a small amount of relief. Clothes. That’s what would’ve been a huge help at that moment. I cursed myself for leaving my pack with Pamela. But I’d been going for speed.
“Where are they going?” he asked, bringing me back to the problem at hand.
I cleared my throat, trying to focus. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Maybe my guess is better, since I’m not standing there ass to the wind,” Mac said, with a grin on his face.
“Shut the fuck up—” I started, but Mac interrupted me with a laugh that echoed around us. Apparently, he gave up any attempt to hold back. I scowled at him.
“Alex,” he clapped me on the back, and actually put a hand around my shoulder. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“What?” I asked, trying to compose myself, and failing miserably, scrambling to keep my balance, and cover myself while not looking like I was covering myself, all at the same time.
“Pamela. She’s in something deep. I’m not sure I understand what it is. But she needs all the help she can get. She said your presence helps. And anything that makes things easier for her . . . that’s good. I’m glad you’re here.”
I didn’t say anything as we walked away from the vanishing tracks. I knew what he meant. I’d seen the darkness in her eyes. And it was damn scary. It looked like it would eat her alive if it had the chance. Had she really said I helped her? I fought the smile on my face, not wanting to give him the satisfaction.
Before I could shift back to four legs, Mac cleared his throat.
“One more thing. I know you care for her. Love her. And if something happens to me, you’ll be there to look out for her.” His hand tightened on my shoulder, and I shook him off. It was too much. He was putting the squeeze on me but being friendly about it.
I turned to face him, irritated with what he was insinuating. As if without his instruction, I would ever leave her high and dry. Hell, I was almost irritated enough to forget my bare ass. “I’ll be there for Pam no matter what. I don’t need you telling me that.”
Mac folded his arms over hi
s chest and said nothing for a moment. Whatever he saw in my scowl seemed to satisfy him. He broke the standoff and a grin spread across his face. “Good. Because I’m not giving her up. Not even for her first love.”
Well, that knocked me back a step or two. Her first love? “I’m not her first love, bear. You of all people should know that.”
He laughed. “You keep telling yourself that, wolf. But I know Pamela. And I think you do too, if you’re honest with yourself. I can accept it, because I know her. She isn’t like other witches.”
My mouth hung open. I couldn’t be Pam’s first love. Could I? And what did that mean if I was? Had I lost my chance with her? I promised Rylee I’d wait, so many years ago, before it all ended. I promised I’d let Pam get a little older before I told her I loved her. And while we were separated, she’d moved on. He shifted and stretched, turning those piercing blue eyes on me again.
Pam had moved on to a big-ass, Alpha polar bear.
The world fell apart in there somewhere, and it took me too long to find her. She’d grown up without anyone but Oka at her side and I hadn’t been there to keep her safe from the darkness that settled inside her.
But . . . maybe that darkness had always been there. Maybe it had just waited for her to be at a low point to take over her. Maybe this battle of Pam’s had been coming a long time.
Before I could get bogged down into the depths of my thoughts, something cracked behind me. I looked over my shoulder. A zombie lunged toward me, fingers outstretched.
“Greasy ogre tits!” I yelled and stumbled back, shifting as I fell. My only weapons on me were my teeth and claws. The zombie fell with me, teeth clamping onto my right arm and digging in deep. My scream turned into a howl as I twisted around to bite at the dead thing. The smell was intense and filled my nose, bits of dead flesh falling right on my muzzle.
“Dirty. Stinking. Fucker!” I punctuated each word with a snap of my teeth.
There was a flash of white to my side and then Mac was there. With a swipe of one paw he knocked the zombie back onto its ass, full on somersaulting it so it landed with legs and arms tangled.
Caravan Witch (Questing Witch Book 2) Page 17