by Rose Francis
Lucia smiled. “Just stopped by to tell you to cancel the bounty you put on Avar’s head is all.” With one hand on her hip like a cocky asshole, she was the spitting image of her mother.
“You screwing him now? Is that what this is? After all the effort I put in to raise you, this is how you repay me. By spreading your legs for a slimy little cock like him?”
“Yeah,” Lucia said. “I didn’t think you’d listen to reason. I told them you wouldn’t, but they wanted to try talking first.”
“First?” The baron laughed. “Are you actually threatening me? Do you know how many armed men I have here right now?”
“If Quinn and Postie are doing as they were instructed, then you have ten fewer than you did when we started talking.”
The baron’s skin went cold as he realized he couldn’t see any of his guards in the field.
“You made my life hell, you know?” Lucia removed her leather gloves, folding them over the top of her stolen dive bike. She flexed her fingers, the sun reflecting off her elongating claws blinding the baron momentarily.
“I fed you. I clothed you. I kept you safe.” The baron spat over the balcony. “That’s more than most get.”
“Yeah, well, I can see talking won’t do too much good.” Lucia sighed, shaded her eyes with her hand and scanned the property. “How many people have you killed, Uncle? Why hasn’t anyone ever stopped you? An operation like this, seems like the Suzerain would be all over it.”
Did she know? How could she know? He was protected, from on high. An old deal struck in the middle of the night. Palms sliced and bleeding into each other. A blood oath to protect blood. It seemed fitting. A child was taken in and in return, no interference. A free hand. Whispers in the ears of local authorities to stay out of his way. A minor empire of dust and rock and raw ore, balanced on the head of one small child. Was it over now?
“I’ve only killed one person in all my life,” he shouted down to his traitorous niece. “And I regret that every morning and every night.”
Lucia nodded as if he’d been rambling about the weather like a doddering old man.
“I’m not going to kill you today, Uncle. But I am going to free your slaves. I’m going to take whatever of my things are left in the house and, well, anything else I want from you. If you or any of your murderous nitwits try to stop me,” Lucia trailed off, waving one clawed hand in the air.
“So you learned to shift your fingers!” he roared in response. “Big deal! I shifted once, too! Look at the whore, come back home to show off her new clothes and the sleazy pirate that slithers between her legs.” A noise behind the baron drew his attention. Turning, he saw the largest wolf shifter he’d ever seen. The man had to duck to clear the doorway onto the balcony. He had silver fur and a wide calm face.
“It would be better for you if you did not speak of her that way,” he said, his voice oddly musical.
“Is she spreading her legs for you, too? How many cocks did she have to suck to get her way?” The baron leered at the wolf man, searching for that kernel of lewdness he knew all men hid.
“I would do anything for her,” the wolf said. “And today that means I spare your pathetic, disgusting life.”
The baron spat in the wolf’s face. He was big, sure, but big didn’t mean shit. Not when you had a bolter on your hip and an army at your fingertips. “Fucking cowards. No wonder she fell in with you.”
The huge wolf sighed and shook his head. “How can a man such as you and a woman such as her be related?”
The baron shrugged, but before he could answer the wolf had him in his hands, held tight, and then the baron was flying, toppling end over end, to land hard on his ass on the parched ground. One of his legs snapped in the fall. It’d be a bitch to get it set properly before it healed at a bad angle.
Sitting in the dust, snarling, a shadow fell over the baron.
“Don’t let me hear about you hurting anyone else, Uncle.” Lucia looked down on him, a pitying expression on her face. The pirate and the giant wolf man stood on either side of her, protectively.
“In case you were wondering, Lawson, I’m not going to pay you.” Farid shrugged, his smirk as irritating as ever.
“That deathmark will follow you to the grave, boy.”
“Then it shall wait a very long time, you ignorant oaf,” the white werewolf growled.
Lucia sighed, as if destroying his life was something of a letdown. “C’mon boys, lets get these miners back to civilization.”
“Who do you think you are?” the baron howled at her back. “The fucking law? There’s no law out here! Just wolves and men, teeth and blood. The strongest makes the law!”
“Well,” she said, tugging her gloves back on. “Guess I make the law now.”
END
***
Thank you for reading The Wolf, The Witch, and The Wasteland by Jacqueline Sweet. If you’ve enjoyed this book, please consider leaving a review on Amazon or wherever you may have purchased it.
A Note from the Author:
Hi, I'm Jacqueline Sweet. I love to write sexy, thrilling stories. My stories are either paranormal, or contemporary and steamy. I love to write about werewolves, succubi, witches, dragons and everything else that has magic pumping in its veins. Broadly speaking, my stories are either centered on the paranormal community of California's Bay Area, or take place at my sexy, dangerous Penrose Academy, a university for wizards too dangerous or odd for the better wizarding schools.
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***
Marked By the Alpha Wolf
(Book One of the Braving Darkness series)
By Scarlett Grove
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter One
2020
Denver Dome
Efficiency and diligence safeguard the future, a friendly female voice pronounced through the dome-wide loud speakers.
“Efficiency and diligence safeguard the future,” Cassie and her roommate Lindsey said, smiling at each other as they began their exercises on opposite sides of the small dormitory room.
Always do your best, in all things.
“Always do your best, in all things,” said Cassie and Lindsey as they stripped from their sleep shifts and stepped into the shower stalls.
After their shower, they pulled on their matching gray jumpsuits, slipped into their soft shoes, and hustled out the door to join the rest of the twenty-year-old unit. The unit marched down the hallway into the dim sunshine beneath the roof of the dome. Cassie could see the ruined sky above, gray and black from the toxic storms that raged outside.
Loyalty, fidelity, trust.
The twenty-year-old unit repeated her words and continued to the cafeteria. Machines squirted food into the slotted trays for each youth. Cassie glanced down at her nameless, shapeless food, and a slight memory of fresh strawberries flitted through her mind.
Gratitude, service, respect.
She grasped her tray and sat at a long ta
ble with Lindsey and several other youths from her unit. Groups of children as young as five filtered through the doors and into the cafeteria.
The youths silently ate, as was the custom for mealtime. The hall echoed with the sound of forks against trays and the occasional cough or giggle from one of the younger children.
After breakfast, the twenty-year-old group marched to their lecture hall to begin class. Cassie sat in the front row and waited for her teacher, Professor Weston, to begin his lecture.
“Today is the fifth anniversary of the end of World War Three. In recognition of what ended the world as we knew it, Pyramid Corporation has chosen to commence a long-awaited genetic rehabilitation project. A few lucky young women will be chosen to be the first to participate. The girls will be tested in The Program to determine their fitness. The girls with the top five scores will have the honor of leading the way with this important endeavor. All young women will stay here to receive instruction. Boys, you will study with class nineteen today.”
The boys shuffled out the door. Cassie sat in the classroom with twenty other young women, all looking blankly at Professor Weston.
Professor Weston led the girls to The Program terminal chamber –– a room dominated by steel and chrome. A series of reclining chairs circled a central, cylindrical computer terminal that reached up to the ceiling.
Cassie took her seat and settled back in the chair, allowing the helmet to descend over her head. Behind the darkness of the mask, she heard Professor Weston move through the room, giving each girl a shot of serum that would allow her to enter The Program.
Professor Weston’s smooth, cool hand gripped her arm, and the sharp needle pricked her vein. Cold fluid entered her bloodstream, and she fell into darkness.
Slowly, she became aware of herself standing in an open field. The bright azure sky expanded above, and yellow grass shimmered under the intense sunlight. She squinted and shielded her eyes with her hand, taking in her surroundings. She hadn’t seen a landscape like this one since before the war.
A breeze blew over Cassie’s skin. She looked down to see her nude hourglass figure exposed to the world. She covered herself instinctively. The mind read The Program as reality. Pain, pleasure, embarrassment, and fear were all experienced as real.
She assessed that the nudity was part of her test, so her first order of business was to find clothing. Covering her private parts, Cassie walked through the grassy field in search of a landmark.
The field expanded in all directions, as far as she could see. The only marker was the sun that hung on the western horizon. Heat pricked her skin as the temperature rose, and the grass began to scratch her bare feet. A voice called behind her, and she spun to face it.
“Cassie? Baby?”
A woman shimmered like a mirage before her.
“Mom?” Cassie said, recognition building. Her mother had died five years ago in the war, like her father. A tear pooled in her eye. “Mommy?”
She ran to the flickering woman and tried to embrace her, but Cassie’s arms passed through empty air. “Where are you? Why can’t I touch you?”
“That doesn’t matter right now. I have something to tell you. You must beware. The leaders of the dome have plans for you. It is not approved by the council. They have interfered…”
Her mother’s voice broke into static, and the image wavered and disappeared. Cassie stood blinking under the hot sun, forgetting to cover herself. She’d never encountered either of her parents in The Program before. The likeness had been too real. Her stomach clenched, but she held back her sadness. It was just a projection.
The Program was able to take information from the participant’s brain to create the simulation. She’d been training in The Program for five years and was one of the most adept subjects in the twenty-year age group.
Cassie had worked hard to master every simulation The Program had thrown at her. She wanted to be chosen for the project, to do her best. Taking a deep breath and brushing off her sadness, she charged onward toward the sun.
She plodded through the hip-high grass, her long dark-blond hair hanging nearly to her waist. In the distance, Cassie spotted a pole rising from the ground, high into the air. She jogged toward it, believing it would take her one-step further to mastering the simulation. When she reached the pole, her eyes scanned upward as she circled around it, trying to understand what it was. About fifty feet up the pole, her jumpsuit fluttered in the breeze. She smiled at herself, knowing she’d found the key to the test.
She thought briefly about her mother and tried to connect her presence in the simulation with the clothing challenge. It didn’t seem to have a logical place in the test. Usually, The Program operated by the visible laws of physics, yet her mother had popped out of thin air and flickered like a hologram.
It gave her an idea. If The Program could operate outside the laws of Newtonian physics, why couldn’t she? Cassie closed her eyes and imagined herself rising. When she opened them again, nothing had happened. She’d never done anything out of the ordinary in The Program before. What made her think she could now? She sighed and leaned against the pole, crossing her arms over her ample breasts.
Cassie had also never seen a hologram of her mother before. She closed her eyes again and used the oddity of the experience to make her brain believe she could do the impossible—levitate. She held the impression of the woman in her mind, and slowly her feet rose from the earth.
Inch by inch, her weight curled off the ground, and she rose. She didn’t dare open her eyes for fear of breaking the spell and falling. She felt the smooth pole under her fingertips as she glided upward.
When Cassie felt the cloth of her jumpsuit, she grabbed it. With the motion of her arm, her mind faltered, and she fell several feet. Clamping her eyes shut, she kept her mother’s image in her mind. The fall slowed. Her feet felt the sharp grass as she descended to the ground. When she had warm dry earth below her feet once again, she opened her eyes and pulled on her clothes.
Task one complete.
She looked around and glimpsed a hint of a shadow on the horizon. It seemed as good as any direction to go. While she strode toward the shadow, she pondered the hologram’s words of warning. She had no reason to doubt her benefactors, Pyramid Corporation. They had saved her from the nuclear bombs. She owed them her life.
Cassie drew closer to the shadow, which turned out to be a line of trees. A smile crept over her face, knowing that she’d found her second challenge. She broke into a run, ignoring the increasingly sharp grass slicing her feet.
As she approached the forest’s edge, the hologram popped in front of her again. Cassie stopped short, panting.
“Cassandra, the council has granted you a special gift. It will allow you to see the truth.”
“What council?” she said, tilting her head to the side and putting her hands on her hips. She now assumed the hologram was her next challenge.
“The Council of the Seventh House. I can’t explain this now. If Pyramid Corporation or the Anu find out I’m here, it will be dangerous for you. I might have stayed too long as it is. Please, beware.”
“What gift? Who are the Anu?” she called after the fading hologram. Her mother’s mouth moved, but no sound came out. Cassie bit her bottom lip and looked around, wondering what to do. Why had Professor Weston decided to use such a disturbing simulation? Was her loyalty being tested?
She continued toward the forest at a slower pace. When she broke through the tree line, the sight of sunlight streaming through the tree bows mystified her. The cool air smelled of fresh earth and moss, smells she’d almost forgotten.
She walked slowly, her feet padding over soft fallen leaves. The shade of the forest gave relief from the burning sun and sharp grasses of the field behind her.
Cassie’s feet were scraped raw and were bleeding. She had to find a way to wash and bandage herself to complete the trial. She followed the path through the woods, searching for a water source.
She ducked
through a thick stand of willows and emerged on the rocky shore of a stream. She sat on a large rock and dipped her feet into the cool water shimmering below. The blood washed away, and so too, it seemed, did her cuts.
A low muffled growl rumbled in the distance. Cassie drew her eyebrows together, not knowing what could have made such a sound. She scanned the forest until her eyes settled on a shaking bush ten paces away and up a gradual slope.
A giant monster broke through the bush with its sharp, white teeth, snarling. Before she could think, several other monsters followed. Wolves. She scrambled to her feet. Her legs felt weak, but she forced herself to run.
Cassie could hear them gaining on her, yipping at her heels. She tried to force herself to levitate as she had before. Fear pumped through her bloodstream, and she couldn’t make her brain cooperate.
She glanced behind her as she ran and crashed headlong into an earthen wall. She whirled around to face her predators. They gnashed their teeth, snarling and salivating. Cassie put her hands out toward them, willing them to disappear, but she couldn’t get her fear under control.
She fell to her knees, and the leader of the pack lunged forward.
Blackness.
Unconsciousness.
Chapter Two
Cassie shook her aching head, trying to clear the confusion. Coming out of The Program was always disorienting. She swung her feet around and placed them on the cool concrete floor beside her cot. On the small steel table by her bed, she saw a cup of water and two pain pills.
She grabbed the pills and downed them with the water. Moments later, her pounding headache subsided. Her roommate Lindsey walked through the sliding steel door and lay down on the bunk beside her.
Lindsey was a tiny girl, several inches shorter and much more slender than Cassie. Lindsey was like a little bird while Cassie was voluptuous and tall.
“Didn’t you get chosen for the project?” asked Lindsey as Cassie curled under her blankets.