by May Dawson
Their Shifter Academy 6: Unstoppable
May Dawson
Copyright © 2020 by May Dawson
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
A Note from May
I. Wandering Queen
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Also by May Dawson
Acknowledgments
Thank you to my wonderful cover designer, Ljiljana Romanovic, for these covers. I love how you brought Piper to life.
Thank you to my amazing reader group, May Dawson’s Wild Angels. You guys inspire me every day to create these stories!
Chapter One
Maddie
The Greyworld was supposed to be our salvation. But life brims with disappointment, and the Greyworld just looked muddy.
Silas had slammed the door shut behind us as soon as we were through, ensuring the shifters who had chased us couldn’t follow through. When the last of the golden glimmer outlining the door faded, the four of us stood in an open field, surrounded by trees that rustled in a constant wind. The sky was heavily overcast, with the kind of dark gray clouds that seem to press down.
“Where are we?” Rafe asked.
Silas looked around rather than pulling out his enchanted compass, then heaved a sigh.
I followed his gaze to the brick house in the distance and the old metal play equipment behind it.
“The orphanage,” I said.
Silas looked almost abashed. I’d thought he wasn’t capable of embarrassment, he always seemed so certain of himself. He admitted, “My mind must’ve lost some focus—”
“When we saw Clearborn shot?” I asked. “Yeah, I wonder why. It’s okay to be human, Sy.”
The four men grouped around me all looked miserable and angry. Of course they were angry; just like me, they probably felt scared for our friends and Clearborn. But these men had a serious problem dwelling on one note when it came to their emotions.
“Oh my god,” I said. “Are we not going to talk about this at all? We just watched the dean get shot—”
“Did we like him enough to mind?” Jensen asked irreverently. In lieu of healthy coping skills, Jensen had sarcasm.
I went on as if he hadn’t spoken. “And we know our friends are dealing with some kind of fight without us. We don’t know what’s going on at the academy now. Right? I imagine we’re all a little…”
I glanced around at them, but no one supplied an adjective for their emotions. They stared at me skeptically.
“You’re all hopeless,” I said, throwing up my hands. “Fine. Let’s get to work.”
They were all going to pretend they didn’t have feelings. But I knew the four of them; they had big feelings. And those feelings would come out sooner or later, despite their best efforts.
As we were walking toward the road, the back door to the orphanage flew open, and a dozen kids raced out. They ran to the swings or the big metal climbing dome, jostling each other for position. A couple of kids came more slowly after the others, surveyed the landscape, and headed into the shelter of the woods rather than fighting for a place at the playground.
Silas stopped and watched them all, just for a second, with something haunted in his eyes.
Rafe was watching him. Then he said, “Tell me more about this orphanage.”
Silas’s gaze swept to Rafe, and the bleak look on his face transformed into his usual dreamy smile. Another of his masks.
“The shield is in the museum at Quorum, so we’ll have to catch a train,” Silas said as if he hadn’t understood. He set off briskly toward the road in the distance.
Rafe crossed his arms, but he let Silas go. He gave me a curious look, though.
“It’s not my story,” I said, to cut him off. They weren’t my secrets to tell.
“How’d you recognize the place?” he asked, falling into step with me, the two of us bringing up the rear as Silas and Jensen walked ahead.
“Silas let me walk through his memories.”
“I see,” Rafe said. “And here I assumed you guys spent your free time solely in debauchery.”
“Assumed?” I asked lightly. “Or hoped? Perhaps for an invitation?”
Rafe gave me a sidelong look. “I don’t need an invitation.”
“You are pretty resourceful when it comes to debauchery.” I fiddled with the straps on my hiking pack absently. My own worries were tormenting me, and I tried to ground myself in the messy present. My sword was concealed between the metal frame and canvas, where I could draw it quickly if I needed to drop my pack.
Well, not my sword. I’d borrowed a sword from the armory.
“I hope Ty brings us back our swords,” I said lightly. The Fae still had our weapons. I wasn’t sure what Turic had done with them, but we hadn’t time to find them in the wreckage of the city. I wondered what Ty was doing back in the Fae world right now.
I couldn’t imagine the year ahead at the academy without Ty, or Lex and Rafe, if we failed in our mission or if the Alpha council simply changed their minds.
“I can’t imagine Clearborn would—” Rafe broke off, then shrugged.
We could probably both imagine Clearborn would. Losing a weapon was an automatic ten with the tawse back at the academy. Clearborn might be understanding of our rather unique situation, or he might enforce the rules with that chilling fairness of his, making an example of us. No one was that special at the academy.
Although, who would carry out our punishment? Would we be absorbed into another team now that our numbers had dwindled so much, with another set of cadre? The thought was horrifying. I couldn’t imagine our team changing, but I knew it had to.
“There are some things Ty and Jensen would not do,” I mused out loud, trying to imagine how the scenario would play out if Ty was our sole cadre, and Clearborn ordered our punishment. If we weren’t all together, there was no team.
Rafe gave me a sharp look. I thought he was going to say something cutting, but instead, he
swallowed, as if he didn’t much care for the memories either.
Still, he glanced at the orphanage and stepped closer to me. His hand fell on my shoulder, drawing me close to him as he lowered his voice. He might be all business, but that touch still made my heart race.
“I’m not asking you to betray Silas’s confidence,” he said. “But every time we started to talk about his life here when we were planning, he diverted the conversation to be strictly… academic. The structure of society, magic laws, history, and politics. I didn’t see it at the time.”
There was the faintest edge of irritation in his voice. He was annoyed at himself. He added, “I thought he was focused. Now I realize he was deflecting. Do you think his background is a liability?”
I worried about who Silas was in this world, about what my men would see that might make it harder for them to accept Silas as my mate. Even though he was no shifter, I knew Silas was just as much my mate as they were.
But Echo had tried to break me to make sure that Winter wouldn’t. He’d hand-fed me and forced me into dependence on him to shield me from the others in that house. My men would be furious if they knew what he had done.
“No,” I said, too late to convince Rafe, who frowned. “Silas will always do what he needs to do. He’ll get through the mission.”
Rafe started to ask something else, and I had the feeling he wanted to know if Silas himself was going to be okay. But he cut himself off and said, “All right. That’s what matters.”
I rolled my eyes. Right. Mission first. We were back to that.
“Maddie,” Rafe warned me, his voice husky and warm. “Not here.”
I had taken a few steps past him to try to catch up with the guys, but now I swiveled on my heels, which squeaked over the wet grass, as I raised my arms in a shrug. “You can’t do anything about it on a mission, can you? So why not here, from my perspective?”
Rafe leveled me a look that just made me smile.
“Let me go check in with Silas,” I said.
“Yes, you do that,” he said dryly.
Silas strode along without another glance at the orphanage. His face was relaxed and calm when I walked up beside him, his posture erect as ever but his hands jammed in his pockets. The incredible Silas Zip. Untouchable.
“I don’t suppose there’s anything you want to talk about,” I said. “Now that you’re home.”
“Not a thing, Maddie. But thanks for checking in.” He winked.
“You’re going to make me regret telling you that you’re my most emotionally-well-adjusted man, aren’t you?” I asked, tucking my arm through his.
“Hey,” Jensen said. When I turned over my shoulder to raise an eyebrow at him, he shrugged. “Okay, I see your point.”
Arm-in-arm, Silas and I sauntered down the road toward the town, walking past big open fields full of grazing cows and horses. The town lay in front of us, in a valley at the base of a green mountain that rose into those low-slung clouds.
We’d chosen our clothes for this mission before we ever went into the Fae world, to help us blend in. Instead of jeans, I wore olive-colored trousers and a thick cream-colored sweater with brown hiking boots. The guys were all dressed similarly, in jackets, sweaters, and trousers that had an old-fashioned, homespun quality.
“We have enough currency to get us on that train, but if we have time once we’ve procured our tickets, I’d like to get some more funds,” Silas said. He glanced up at the clouds. “And maybe get us out of the rain before it starts.”
“Lead on,” Rafe said.
We found ourselves heading past a two-story brick schoolhouse and closer-together houses with small plots of garden, then into the most quaint and adorable town. Little wooden shops and buildings were clustered close together, each with a welcoming front porch decorated with intricate wooden scrollwork.
The train station was small, a wooden three-story house on either side of the tracks with a bridge from the third story over the tops of the trains. Inside, the lobby was hushed and empty. A bored man sat reading a magazine, his feet propped up on the desk. The list of destinations was on a chalkboard in the wall, neatly lettered.
Silas glanced over the board, then said, “Morning. I’m looking for a connecting train to Quorum.”
“Quorum, hm?” The man didn’t even look up as he dropped his magazine and pulled a book toward himself. “You’ll need to connect at Fairway. That’ll be seventy-eight apiece for second.”
Silas pulled out his wallet. “I’d like a private car in first, please.”
Rafe glanced at him skeptically.
“That’ll be three hundred for the car to Fairway and another eleven hundred for the one to Quorum.”
“Lovely.” Silas pulled the bills out of his wallet, then glanced at Jensen, who reached for his own wallet. We each had a thousand of their bills, divided between us all in case we were separated.
I reached into my own pocket and pulled out a few hundreds, not wanting Silas to be without any funds, but he grinned at me as if he had a plan.
The agent took the money and slid it through a slot in the top of what looked almost like an old-fashioned green-and-brass metal cash register. Due to how common magic was here, almost every bill was examined to make sure that it wasn’t created by magic. It wasn’t like in our world, where Silas could create money whenever he chose.
Rafe was still, watching Silas, and I knew he was choosing to bide his time to ask him what the hell he was doing.
Silas took our tickets from the agent and handed them out to us each. “In case we’re separated.”
“We’d better not be,” Rafe said.
“The train’s in three and a half hours,” the man said. “Car three is reserved for you, sir.”
“Thank you,” Silas said. He threw his arm over my shoulder and sauntered with me toward the door. “We’ve got some time to kill. Let’s have a few drinks and a game.”
“A game?” Rafe asked icily as the four of us stepped out onto the porch. The roof protected us at the moment, but the rain had broken, and a heavy drizzle pounded against the roof and fell steadily in front of us. Water ran over the cobblestone streets.
“I know you’re worried about money,” Silas said, glancing at him over his shoulder. “You don’t need to be. Not when you have me.”
Chase’s winning lottery ticket popped into my mind. That was how Silas had gotten around Chase’s pride, while still managing to lavish his friend with everything Chase ever wanted. But that only worked in our world. Here, everyone was guarded against magic.
Silas held a finger to his lips for just a second, as if he knew what was in my mind, that mischievous look in his gaze.
“Silas,” Rafe started. “We don’t want to draw attention to ourselves.”
“I won’t,” Silas promised. “I haven’t been in this town since I was a child. No one knows who I am.”
He raised his hand above the two of us, and a bubble of dry materialized around the two of us. Even when I stepped down into the street where a small river seemed to be streaking around my shoes, the bubble pressed down first, shearing the water away.
“If you’d be so kind,” Rafe said.
Silas twisted his fingers, and Rafe and Jensen followed us with their own magic umbrellas in place. Silas was smiling, just a little. He’d waited and made Rafe ask on purpose.
I elbowed him, and he glanced down at me with innocence written across his face.
“Don’t just be incredible, Silas,” I teased him. “Be nice.”
He looked down at me, his eyes bright in that handsome face, then pulled me even closer to press a kiss to my forehead.
“Nice might not be possible in the Greyworld, Maddie,” he told me softly, and the two of us walked on together.
Chapter Two
Chase
Things happened fast once after Clearborn fell. My eardrums hummed from the gunshots so close to my head.
Clearborn fell to his knees, his face grimly stoic and
unsurprised even when he was shot, and he pressed his hands to the blossom of blood across his shirt before he tumbled forward.
Lex shot him. Before the guard even hit the ground, Penn had lunged for his gun, breaking his grip and yanking it away in one smooth motion. Now Penn held the pistol trained on the fallen guard, who was on the ground groaning.
“We need him alive,” Lex barked at Penn. “We can interrogate him.”
He looked at me and Penn. “Penn, I need you watching over the portal to make sure no one goes after Maddie and the rest of the team. Chase, you’ve got to get to the gate and make sure one of the guards didn’t open it for another pack. We can’t trust anyone right now.”
I nodded and took off.
“I can heal myself,” Clearborn promised Lex. “You deal with him.”
Behind me, I could hear the ripping, snarling sound of the guard trying to transform into a wolf. Fuck, if we still had our wolves, we would’ve recognized that he could shift himself, and we’d have known he was allied with the witches. Without all our senses, we were vulnerable.
The sounds of transformation cut off with a yelp and a gunshot. So much for needing the guard alive.