The Curse (Shifter Origins)

by Harper A. Brooks

  “Although, I have to admit, I didn’t expect it to be you.” Erec leaped from the rock’s ten-foot height and landed in front of her in the soft snow. Just like before, she found it hard to keep her gaze from drifting, her imagination from stirring, and her words from getting stuck in her throat. He was leaner than the other men in her pack, with wide, defined shoulders. The shirt he wore was ripped wide at the collar, exposing most of his chest, and every inch of him that she could see appeared to be sculpted out of solid muscle. The pants she’d left for him rode low on his hips, and she couldn’t stop her thoughts from drifting to what lay underneath.

  Astrid’s cheeks heated, and her gaze flew up to meet his eyes again. He was watching her with an arched brow. She swallowed roughly.

  “You’re staring,” he said.

  She shook her head. “I am not.”

  “Uh-huh.” He glanced at the spear clutched in her hand, and his sideways smile returned. “I remember your brother warning you not to leave the pack. Does he know you’ve followed me all this way? Better yet, does Boden?”

  “Er—” Astrid took a short step back.

  “They don’t know you’re here, do they?”

  She cursed silently, preparing herself for the lecture. She had to go back because it was too dangerous for her; she was a woman in the forest and alone. She needed to obey the alpha’s orders. She’d heard it all before from her brother. It infuriated her. “No, they don’t, but—”

  Erec’s growing smirk stole the argument right from her mouth. She waited a few more seconds for the familiar speech, but he said nothing.

  “What? Aren’t you going to tell me I need to go back?” she asked, confused. “That I should have never left, and it isn’t safe to be out here alone?”

  He shrugged, chuckling. “Why would I? You’re not a child. You can make your own choices.”

  Astrid stood still, unsure how to respond. That wasn’t the answer she had been expecting. She always had to defend herself, but now that there was no need to, the words sank like stones in her belly.

  “So…” Erec circled around her, his gaze traveling over her, and ran a hand over the blond stubble along his jawline. “How many Blue Moons do you have now? My guess is twenty, maybe?”

  She glared at him. “Twenty-four.” She held up one of her hands to show him the blue ribbon-like marks around her fingers. “But my father and brother like to treat me like it’s six.”

  “Hmm, you’re right there with me then. Twenty-four.” He pulled back his cape to reveal the similar swirling pattern on his shoulder and upper chest. “Three more weeks until our final one. Then, it’s all over.”

  Pressing her lips into a hard line, Astrid nodded. She still didn’t want to think about the few days she had left to be alive. It was too sad and scary to imagine right now, even as close as it was. She’d rather ignore it and worry about what mattered most to her—protecting her pack, her family.

  With a frown, Astrid glanced around for something else to talk about. Her gaze found the cave again. “Do you…live here?”

  “Yes and no,” he said. “I travel a lot and don’t stay in one place too long. I just came back to pick up a few things before moving on again.”

  Astrid had never met a rogue wolf before. Their kind was known for staying in groups. There was protection in numbers, and they became a family. She remembered Erec saying Mikel had taken him in when his parents died, and the pain in his voice when her father had brought up the alpha’s death. Erec obviously cared for him, so why did he leave? Why would someone want to be alone for the rest of their life?

  Erec walked past her, heading for the woods again. “Why were you following me?”

  She spun around and went after him. She sped up to match his longer strides. “I wanted to bring you back to talk to my father. He can be hardheaded, but maybe if we spoke to him together, we can make him understand we can’t run from Jerrick forever.”

  He sighed. “At least someone gets it.”

  When he didn’t say anything more for a few more steps, Astrid continued, “I saw what was left of Mikel’s pack when we found you. I know we’re next if we don’t do something soon.” She wasn’t sure where he was leading her, but when she peered up at the canopy of naked branches, she could see the crescent moon peeking through and Vallor, the brightest star in the night sky, twinkling just ahead of them. They were moving north.

  “I think you should come back with me,” she repeated. “Now that Mikel is gone, and you don’t have a pack anymore…”

  “I never had a pack.” His tone was quick and sharp, but his face was unreadable as he marched forward. “Not really.”

  “What do you mean, ‘not really’?” she pressed. “I thought Mikel took you in.”

  “He did. Well, more like he tried.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Maybe I wasn’t a very good fit.” His jaw clenched in annoyance. “It’s complicated. Can we leave it at that?”

  Astrid bit the inside of her cheek. She wasn’t getting anywhere with him this way. Her father had said Erec’s parents had died, and that’s when Mikel had taken him in. She had lost her mother ten Blue Moons ago, too, and that was the worst time of her life. She couldn’t imagine losing both parents at the same time. The heartache would be unbearable. The loneliness…

  Debating on what she should say next, Astrid strode alongside him in silence. The encroaching uneasiness made her skin crawl. If she couldn’t get Erec to help them, there was no hope in saving her pack.

  “Please, come back with me,” Astrid sputtered as fear rushed forward. “Our pack is full of children. I couldn’t imagine more deaths like the ones I saw in the valley. I can’t convince my father on my own. You know how Jerrick fights. You saw it. We need to convince him—”

  “Weren’t you there? Boden doesn’t want to hear anything other than his own voice.” He didn’t even turn to look at her as he plowed ahead.

  “We’ll make him listen.”

  “Make an alpha wolf listen? Do you hear yourself?”

  Anger mounting, Astrid snatched him by the arm and pulled him to a stop. She lifted herself onto her toes to meet his gaze head-on. “What would Mikel say?” she snapped. Father had always seen him as an ally and a friend. “He’d want you to help us, wouldn’t he?”

  Erec’s face fell, and his gaze drifted toward the trees. She recognized that weighted look of sorrow and guilt; she’d seen it on him before, when her father had first mentioned the old alpha’s name. Her heart ached for him. There had to be more to him abandoning Mikel’s pack than what had been said.

  Her grip loosened on his arm, and her voice softened. “I didn’t know him, but from what my father said, he was a man of loyalty and peace. A man that believed there was more to family than blood.”

  Erec’s brows pinched, and when he looked at her again, pain lingered behind his eyes.

  “My pack is my family,” she whispered. A heaviness tugged at her heart. “We don’t all share the same blood, but they mean everything to me. I’ll do anything to protect them. Please, help us.”

  Erec’s arm came out to stop her. “Don’t move,” he grunted. His face drained of all color, and his gaze skimmed the trees in front of them. “Listen…”

  Astrid’s knees locked her in place as she peered into the dark forest. What was going on? Were they in danger? She saw no movement among the shadows, only floating snowflakes on the breeze, but her inner wolf jumped up into high alert. She rubbed her lips together, reminding herself to stay calm, and leaned forward. Erec’s quickening breaths drowned out all other sounds, and the smell of a smoldering fire laced with cedar and a twinge of perspiration—his scent—surrounded her.

  “What is it? I don’t—”

  Then she heard it. A muffled whimper in the distance.

  She paused. Another wail, louder this time, pierced the silence.

  …

  The stunned look on Astrid’s face told Erec she was thinking the same thin
g he was. A baby this far out in the woods, miles away from Boden’s pack or any other neighboring territory? Impossible. But the cries continued to shatter the forest’s silence.

  A shiver of warning ran through Erec. He didn’t like this. Not one bit. He and Astrid were alone. If things went wrong, all he had was the knife he’d grabbed from the cave and hidden in his boot and the minutes they had left before dawn. Those marked with the curse could only shift under the moon.

  Their waning time increased his worry. Whatever was going on, it couldn’t be good. He touched Astrid’s arm. “We should go.”

  Her green eyes widened. “It could be another survivor of Mikel’s pack.”

  “We’re too far from the valley and Mikel’s camp.” It could be a wandering pack or more rogues, like him.

  Or it could be someone else. An enemy.

  Erec’s wolf forced his feet to take a step back. The sensation of danger crawled up his spine. During his nine Blue Moons on his own, his instincts had never steered him wrong, and he wasn’t about to question them now. “Either way, it isn’t any of our concern. Let’s go back.”

  Another trembling wail shot through the forest. Astrid grew rigid beside him and twirled her spear as if she was ready for a fight.

  “Astrid…” he warned.

  “You can stay here and be afraid all you want. I’m going over there.”

  “This doesn’t have anything to do with us.”

  “It could be someone who needs our help, Erec,” she said harshly. “Like you did.”

  Erec grunted and rolled his eyes skyward. He couldn’t argue with that, now, could he? With only a few weeks until their final Blue Moon, he understood living with a bit of recklessness, but he certainly didn’t want to die any sooner than that. Especially because some stranger wanted to jump first and ask questions later.

  But she could be right. It could be someone hurt or in need of their help. Just the possibility made it hard for him to ignore. Maybe they could check it out from a safe distance.

  “All right.” He sighed. “We’ll go. But we need to stay together.”

  They began to jog side by side, but as the cries became louder and more frequent, Astrid’s pace sped up to a full sprint. Damn, she was fast. The distance between them was growing by the second.

  As Erec struggled to keep up, the bitter wind slapped against his face, stinging his cheeks, and the tip of his nose prickled. In front of him, Astrid’s red hair danced free of her hood as she rushed through the woods. He sped up, leaping over mounds of white fluff and dodging low-hanging branches.

  He needed to stop her or at least slow her down. She was heading into an unknown situation that could be dangerous. He understood her fear of not reaching the victim in time, but they needed to be smart about this. As the space closed between them, Erec gritted his teeth and reached out his hand.

  Just a few more inches. The fur of her coat hovered below his fingertips, just out of reach.

  At that exact moment, the distinct scents of man and wolf filled his nostrils, telling Erec there wasn’t only one person beyond the trees but many. And Astrid was heading right for them.

  He leaped forward, grabbing her around the waist. His momentum threw them both forward, and they tumbled into the snow together. Her spear landed somewhere in the brush.

  “Are you out of your mind?” Erec gushed in between short breaths. Astrid glared at him as he pushed himself off her. His temples pounded. “What if it’s a trap set up by Jerrick?”

  She sat up and shook her head, causing clumps of snow to fall. “And what if it’s not?”

  Erec opened his mouth to reply, but suddenly, the murmurs of nearby voices drifted from the other side of the brush. He froze, and terror flashed across Astrid’s face.

  His stomach twisted into a tight ball. That definitely didn’t sound like just a baby.

  They stayed completely still for a few breaths as the whispers continued, followed by another shrill wail. Erec strained to hear the hushed conversation in between the cries.

  “Can’t you quiet him some? They’re going to come back.” The rushed words belonged to a man.

  “I’m sorry!” a woman replied, her voice shaking as if she’d been crying herself. She shushed, but the volume of the baby’s screams didn’t ease.

  Slowly, Astrid moved onto her knees, shifting closer to the bushes separating them from the noises, and peeked over the top.

  Was she brave or just foolish?

  “You’re going to be seen.” Erec snatched her by the arm and tugged her back down. “I don’t know about you, but I’d like to stay alive as long as I can. No need to speed up the process.”

  She glared at him. “Now you sound like my brother.” She jerked herself out of his grasp.

  “Your brother’s a smart man.”

  Astrid said nothing for a few seconds, her expression hard. Then, she turned to him with a fierce determination sparking in her eyes. “There’s a cage just up there. It’s filled with people. Men and women. One’s holding a baby, and they look scared.”

  A cage? Erec turned around and poked his head out from behind the shrub. Astrid was right. Through the skinny tree trunks, he could see a large cage with thick metal bars. Close to a dozen men and women stood inside, huddled together for warmth.

  Erec’s heart sank as he scanned the many worn and dirty faces and spotted a couple familiar ones—a man and a young blonde girl he had seen dragged off by Jerrick’s wolves. Like the others, their clothes were torn and bloody and their thin bodies slumped against the side of the cage.

  A frail-looking woman Erec didn’t recognize held a naked infant in her arms, cuddling it close to her chest. She tried to soothe it, but it continued to cry, its face as purple as a wild berry.

  Wolves lay in the snow around the cage. At first, Erec thought they were guards to keep watch of the hostages, but then he noticed the spiked collars around their necks and the chains that bound them to nearby trunks. Blood matted their fur where the metal barbs poked into their skin.

  Fury tore through Erec at what he was seeing. Jerrick was torturing these people. Were there more prisoners that he couldn’t see? Where was his camp? There was no smell of fire nearby, and only trees surrounded the prisoners. No tents or any other signs of Jerrick’s men. But they had to be close. He wouldn’t want to keep his captives far from him.

  He had guessed Jerrick’s camp lay north of the valley, but it seemed they were traveling west now, closer to Boden’s territory. They were moving quick, had already crossed the river, and could be upon the pack by dawn. Astrid and her family were in more trouble than he’d thought.

  He couldn’t leave these people here. If Jerrick didn’t kill them off, the winter cold and starvation would. His thoughts flew to Mikel and what he would do if faced with this situation. The answer was easy enough. He would help them, risk it all to protect these strangers, just like he had done for Erec all those years ago. Why? Because he believed everyone deserved a chance.

  If he didn’t find a way to get these people out of the cage and the chains, they would die. He had to help.

  “This is horrible.” Astrid’s warm breath against his ear startled him. “We have to do something.” When she went to jump to her feet and reveal their hiding place, Erec quickly snatched her arm and pulled her back down. He admired her compassion, but this wasn’t as easy as running out there, opening the cage, and letting them all go free. They didn’t know how close Jerrick and his men were, if they were watching their captives from a place concealed from view.

  He needed to search the area first and find out a little more about what they were up against before risking their lives. He and Astrid were no match against Jerrick and all his followers.

  “Stay here,” he said in a hard whisper. What he really wanted to tell her was to go back to her pack and warn Boden about this, but it’d only be a wasted request. “I’m going to look around and come right back.” Her lips moved to protest, and he narrowed his gaze on her. �
��Five seconds. That’s all. Stay.”

  He stayed low and crept away before she could argue. Sticking to the shadows and denser parts of the forest, Erec looped around the small clearing in a flash. While on the opposite side, he spotted two sets of footprints coming to and from the north, but they were shallow with a new coating of snow. By the speed in which the snowflakes were coming down and their size, he’d predict their owners hadn’t been by for about twenty minutes or so.

  Erec paused for only a moment when the breeze pushed past him. He inhaled deeply and smelled blood and wet fur, most likely from the injured wolves stuck in their animal forms by the collars. Wherever Jerrick’s pack was, they weren’t here now, but it did nothing to calm the uneasiness stirring inside him. He had a feeling there wasn’t much time before the two watching over the captured returned to check on them.

  When he came back to his and Astrid’s hiding place, he was surprised to find her still there.

  “Just so you know, that was almost a full minute,” she said, her tone more teasing than annoyed. “I counted.”

  He found himself smiling at that. “There are tracks across the clearing, on the other side, leading north. They aren’t too fresh, so I’m expecting whoever they belong to will be back soon.”

  Astrid hopped onto her feet. “So we don’t have much time.”

  “Exactly,” he replied. “But we need to be smart about this. We can’t jump without thinking. If we’re caught, we’re dead.”

  “I get it.”

  Great. Erec moved around the bush with Astrid following close behind. As soon as they passed the trees, every wolf’s head whipped toward them; the sorrow and defeat reflecting in their big eyes stabbed at his chest. In the cage, the men and women shuffled back against the bars, frightened, while the baby fussed in its mother’s arms.

  “We’re going to get you out of there,” he told them as he walked around the front of the cage. An iron lock was clamped around the bars, keeping the door sealed shut. With his senses on high alert, he reached into his boot and pulled out his knife. Maybe if he got the blade into the keyhole, he could work the gears inside enough to release the latch or pry it loose.