To The Wolves: A Paranormal Shifter Romance (The Hollow Pack Book 1)

by Camille Rae

  Surely, I had been dreaming the entire time, and I would wake up to find Jude beside me.

  I went through a mental inventory of my body. Head: throbbing. Neck: stiff. Shoulders: stiff. Feet and hands: still attached. Entire rest of me: sore.

  “Don’t try to sit up, you’ll get sick,” a man beside me said and I stilled. Either Jude had drastically lowered her voice or I wasn't home yet.

  His voice was deep and gravelly, as though he hadn’t spoken to anyone in a long time and was a little rusty.

  I did precisely as I was told not to do, opening my eyes and jerking my legs under me to push myself up. I had to get away from here.

  From him.

  He was right about getting sick, though. My stomach lurched and the pain in my head compressed like a vice.

  I waited a moment, lying still to will my stomach not to abandon its contents.

  “Breathe through your nose. Big, deep breaths,” he said, and I opened my eyes to glare at him.

  “I’m fine,” I snapped, shivering and looked around.

  I was with the man who was so familiar, like I had met him before. It was night and we were alone. Or as alone as I could tell at that moment.

  Where was the fire? I looked around.

  As if reading my mind, he gestured to the middle of the circle. “No fire. Too easy to find us.”

  Who was looking for us?

  He handed me a simple porcelain cup. “It’ll help with the nausea. It’s water,” he clarified as I stared down at it skeptically.

  I took the cup, sniffing the liquid. No smell. Probably not poison.

  He laughed, and the sound was throaty and deep.

  I sipped from the cup. It was water and deliciously lukewarm. I gulped the entire amount, gasping for air after.

  The man raised his eyebrows and smiled. “Thirsty?” He asked, eyeing the empty cup.

  “Something about being held hostage really makes me parched,” I countered.

  He lowered a brow but didn't say anything.

  My head throbbed in a steady way to reassure me of its painful existence, and I moved my hand to touch the injury. A large bump, but I couldn’t see any blood on my fingers.

  “What the hell did you hit me with, a brick?” I said, touching the bump and staring at my fingers in the firelight.

  “Just the pommel of my sword,” he said, shrugging.

  I was surprised by his answer, which was basically the last thing I’d ever assume. A sword? Great. I was being held hostage by a crazy dude LARPing in the woods.

  “But why?” I asked, rubbing at the tender lump on my skull.

  “You were with the Queen’s Army,” he said, shrugging a shoulder.

  “The what?” I asked, whipping my head around to look at him, which made a painful shock stab my neck. I rubbed at the spot.

  “The Blues,” he said calmly.

  “I’m not with an army, Queen or Blue,” I said, edging away from him.

  “Not anymore,” he said. He leaned towards me and I watched dimples appear on his cheeks, making him instantly look much younger. His cheekbones were high, his forehead broad. He was startlingly handsome, not that I should have noticed.

  I clasped my hands on my knees, pressing my lips together to prevent myself from panicking. I took a deep breath.

  “I’m not with an army,” I repeated.

  “I know,” he said, conceding. “I looked through all of your things while you were out. Nothing very exciting in there.” He waved a hand dismissively towards my small day pack. By my last count, it had three protein bars, a handful of fruit leathers, a bag of mixed nuts — eating was the best part of climbing, after all — and my climbing gear. More ropes than anything else.

  “Did the Queen’s Army take my friend?” I asked, remembering Jude’s high-pitched scream. And I had left her to be taken. I wouldn’t blame her for hating me because of it. I had run instead of even trying to help her. I stared down at the ground, tears welling up in my eyes. I wiped at them awkwardly with the back of my hand.

  “It would seem so,” he said in response, though his voice was quiet and gentle. He stood, grabbing a blanket roll from a satchel of his own that laid on the other side of him, and flicked it open, spreading it onto the ground.

  “Sleep awhile,” he said, gesturing to it. “We have a long way to travel tomorrow.”

  “I can’t go with you. I have to find my friend,” I said, sniffling and wiping quickly at my eyes.

  He gave me a strange look, but didn’t answer.

  Exhaustion felt heavy in my limbs and shoulders. I looked again at the sleeping roll he had unfurled.

  “How do I know you won’t kill me?” I asked.

  His face tightened slightly, just a hint of a jaw stiffening and an eye twitch. “I won’t let anyone hurt you,” he said, holding a hand to his chest.

  “But how do I know you won’t hurt me?” I ran my hands down my leggings, my palms tingling in anxiety.

  “I said anyone,” he said, and his eyes narrowed slightly.

  Normally, I’d have argued with someone sounding that sincere who had knocked me unconscious just hours before. I knew I couldn’t trust this man, but I was far from anyone I knew and in a strange area I didn’t recognize.

  It was dark, I was afraid, and I wasn’t sure I could even stand up without my head splitting in half. If I had any chance of seeing Jude again, I’d have to try to believe him. At least for tonight.

  What other choice was there?

  I pulled my light jacket out of my day pack and settled down onto the blanket, laying the thin coat over myself. The blanket was barely large enough for one. The thought occurred to me that he might want to sleep on it, as well, and my eyes darted to him.

  His back was turned away from me as he stayed sitting, unmoving.

  “Are you taking first watch, then?” I asked, as though that was a normal thing normal people asked one another.

  “I'm taking the only watch, woman,” he growled.

  Part of me wanted to thank him for being there. A larger part of me wanted to strangle him for knocking me unconscious. I stared up at the trees glowing in the moonlight around us, wanting to mull over the contradictory feeling, but I fell asleep quickly.

  The woman with the blood red eyes, my reflection, was standing in front of me. We were balancing on the high stone wall of a castle, and the wind was whipping her hair around her face. She looked crazed, her eyes wide and staring.

  “You’re here,” she said, laughing. “I can feel it.”

  Her voice sent an icy chill through my veins.

  “I’m coming to find you,” she said, laughing.

  I awoke just at the night sky was giving way to dawn, a grey dusty rose painting the sky. I had never had two of the dreams in a row before, much less three. And no woman had ever been in them.

  I rubbed at my eyes, trying to melt away the anxiety from my dream. Something wasn’t quite right. The dreams felt so real to me now.

  My captor was still in the same spot, but with his head on his folded arms, hunched over. His dark hair fell around his face. I could tell by his slow breathing that he was asleep. Wow, some guard.

  I was shivering. I sat up slowly and pulled my arms through my jacket, feeling the immediate coolness of the polyester lining before it warmed with my skin. My head only slightly ached as I looked around, my eyes adjusting to the light. I had a passing thought that people weren’t supposed to sleep after a concussion, but I shrugged it off. I was alive, after all. Or if not, in some very strange version of Hell.

  The trees around us seemed familiar, but just slightly strange. They weren’t any species I recognized immediately, and I could guarantee they weren’t native to Colorado. They were the same type that I had seen at the mouth of the cave, though. Maybe that meant I was close, or somewhat close to where I had come from. He wouldn’t have carried me far from where he had found me, which meant I was surely within a day’s walking distance of getting back.

 
I reached for my pack and rifled through it as quietly as I could to find my phone. Maybe if I could open Google maps, I could orient myself.

  The phone wouldn't turn on. I clicked the power button a few times, but only the black screen looked back at me.

  Great. It was dead.

  I eyed the man near me and for a moment, and even considered asking him for a charger.

  Hey, I know you just kidnapped me but can I charge my phone in order to escape easier? Thanks so much.

  Yeah, seemed perfectly reasonable.

  I stood as slowly as possible to avoid making noise and stayed still for a moment, making sure the man was still asleep. He didn’t move. I took a step backwards, keeping an eye on him, and had barely stepped off the blanket when I heard his low, raspy voice say, “I wouldn’t.”

  I jumped and nearly shrieked out of surprise, clamping my hands to my mouth.

  He stretched and yawned, his face hidden in shadow. “You’ll get lost,” he said.

  “I know my way,” I lied.

  “Oh, you do?” He said with a snort of amusement.

  “I’ve walked these woods hundreds of times before,” I continued. It wasn’t too much of a lie. I knew the area around our climbing and camping spot well. It didn’t matter that nothing looked familiar, right? I couldn’t be that far from where we had been the day before.

  A low growl began faintly behind me, so quiet that I couldn’t tell if I was imagining it or not. The man didn’t flinch or even move his eyes from mine.

  I glanced over my shoulder, slowly, to see a largest wolf I had ever laid eyes on. It was dark, crouching and baring its teeth. Its hackles were raised. It began creeping towards me. I turned and took a step back towards the man, and the animal snapped in response, licking its teeth in excitement.

  I put up my hands, as though backing down from an armed robber. “Whoa now, good wolfy,” I said, moving to stand behind the man.

  He hadn’t moved at all. In fact, he looked completely relaxed.

  Great, we were about to be this animal’s breakfast and this guy didn’t even care. What happened to not letting anything hurt me? I looked around for a stick.

  “Alright, Mika, that’s enough,” he said flatly.

  The animal visibly relaxed, but kept a wary eye on me.

  I raised an eyebrow. “Mika?” I asked.

  “She’s no harm,” he said.

  “She seems like a real angel,” I said, watching the animal with skepticism.

  “I was talking to her,” he said, pointing to the wolf as he tilted his face up to me. I could see he was smiling. He looked back to the animal and held his hand out. She trotted over, touching her nose to his fingers.

  “So, you have a wolf? That’s…” I paused, trying to find the right word for a combination of weird and terrifying. “Really something.”

  “She’s not a wolf,” he laughed, and rubbed Mika’s neck. She moved away from him, sniffing around the campsite, settling down beside the edge of the blanket I had slept on. She curled neatly into a ball and pulled her tail over her nose.

  I crossed my arms over my chest. “So, I know your wolf’s name, but not yours,” I said.

  “She’s not a wolf, but I’m Loel,” he said.

  His eyes were a brilliant blue, and his lips looked soft. I looked him up and down, taking in his plain brown t-shirt that highlighted his biceps and pecs, and his plain brown pants and boots. It was a casual military getup, but he looked damn good in it.

  Seriously, I was being held hostage and daydreaming about my captor?

  Was this a type of defense mechanism I wasn't yet aware of or was this Stockholm Syndrome?

  And yet that strange nagging feeling that I might know him persisted.

  “I’m Caia,” I replied, sticking my hand out to him. “Have we met before? You look so weirdly familiar,” I said.

  He took my hand, giving it a light shake. His eyes squeezed momentarily, as though something was causing him pain, and he said, “No.”

  “Maybe you just have one of those faces,” I said, feeling embarrassed.

  He definitely didn't. I'd remember meeting a god.

  We stood in awkward silence for a moment as he held onto my hand, and I cringed slightly, feeling awkward, as I took it away. “Okay, well, now that we have that out of the way. Thanks for hanging out,” I said. I gave him a small salute in goodbye and turned, walking towards what I figured would be the large mountainside we had walked through.

  I had been considering the cave ever since we had come through it. On the one side, where I had entered, I knew where I was. It was a route I had climbed many times before, an area Jude and I had hiked together just a few days previously, and where we had camped several times. It had always been one of my favorite spots.

  I had never seen that cave, though. I was sure of it.

  Even stranger was the fact that when I had begun to run away from the people or things that took Jude, I had looked for the cave and hadn’t seen it. Could I have missed it in my fright? Sure, it was entirely possible. But why had I never seen the opening near our climbing area before?

  Something felt very creepy and strange about the situation, and I figured that I’d better not mention the cave to Loel. I had begun to get the feeling that I was somewhere entirely new, not just the other side of the mountain.

  A bird’s song pulled me out of my thoughts momentarily. I glanced back over my shoulder. Loel wasn’t following me or even watching me, but was instead gathering up his bedroll and breaking camp.

  I walked about a hundred feet before the trees opened to the meadow. I sighed, annoyed that I was probably going the wrong way after all. In the dawn, everything looked the same. I looked from side to side, squinting, willing my eyes to adjust to the dimness of the early morning. If I could recognize any flower, any rock…

  The boulder! If I could find the boulder I had hidden behind when Loel had found me, I’d know I would be close enough to try to retrace where I had run through the wood.

  I stepped out from the trees, thinking that if I walked far enough into the meadow, I could turn around to get a better view for where the boulder had been.

  “Be careful, woman.” Loel’s voice warmed my neck as a large hand wrapped around my wrist and pulled me back, just as I had stepped into the clearing.

  I lost my balance, tripping backwards, and Loel’s arm tightened, holding me to his chest.

  He moved his mouth closer to my ear. “They’ll still be looking for you,” he whispered.

  I felt a shiver down my spine.

  “We have to move,” he said. “The wood is thin here and I don’t trust that you weren’t just seen.”

  “Who the hell would have seen me?”

  “Blue scouts,” he said with drawn eyebrows, as though it was obvious.

  I pushed myself away from him and felt his muscles harden under my hand. From this close, I could see him clearly, like how he had a very slight beard, as though he hadn’t shaved in a few days, and very dark brown, almost black, curly hair that fell past his ears in a nonchalant way that said, I have no idea how attractive I am.

  Damn, he was gorgeous.

  Stop getting distracted, Caia.

  I took a step back, hooking my thumbs on the straps of my pack. “Where are we, exactly?” I asked.

  “The Hollow Wood, near Edenth” he said.

  The Hollow Wood. Edenth. I nodded slowly, having no idea what he was talking about, but not wanting to appear so.

  “Edenth,” I repeated, keeping my expression as blank as I could.

  “You don’t know Edenth?” He asked. He looked slightly bewildered.

  He seemed so damn earnest, and something inside of me could tell he wasn't joking. In fact, he thought I was joking.

  “It’s not familiar,” I said, truthfully. “Is it a small town?”

  “If you count nearly one hundred thousand residents a small town,” he said, shaking his head.

  That many people lived in Edenth? I wo
uld have heard about this town if it was anywhere near Denver. It would have at least shown on the map.

  “It’s the third largest city in Laeris,” he said.

  The blood drained from my face. He was definitely messing with me now. Laeris?

  “How far is Denver from here?” I asked.

  “Denver?” He seemed as though he didn’t know what I was talking about. “Is that your home village?”

  “Okay,” I said, trying to keep myself calm. I began to step backwards a few paces. “This has been a fun game, but you’re obviously an axe murderer, or maybe one of those weird mountain men who live alone and have pet wolves—“

  “—She’s not a wolf,” he interrupted.

  “Uh huh, yeah, whatever you say,” I said.

  He crossed his arms, watching me in amusement. “If you’re done, we really have to be hurrying.”

  “Oh, I don’t think we’re going anywhere together,” I said. I was trying to look calm and I began to nonchalantly reach into my pack, feeling around for my bear spray.

  “If you’re looking for this…” He let his question trail off, pulling the spray out of the bag at his side.

  I could only imagine what my face looked like as I felt the blood drain from it, pulling away from my hands and feet I felt that way at the beginning of a full-on panic attack — the classic Fight or Flight response — except for once, it seemed to me like an appropriate response to the situation.

  He crouched very slowly, holding up his free hand, and set the spray down on the ground. “Now, like I said, I would never hurt you. You’ll be safe as long as you’re with me,” he said calmly again.

  My heart pounded I eyed the bear spray on the ground, trying to judge how quickly I’d have to be to grab it, aim it, and then run like hell.

  “I don’t know where you came from, but I know that Theo will want to meet you,” he explained slowly, as though I suddenly didn’t speak English.

  I paused, straightening my posture, and must have looked confused at that, because he continued, “Our leader.”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I pushed my hands through my hair and said, “What, of like, your forest gang?”