Pack Witch (Captured Souls Book 1)

by Brenna Clarke

  He made a face. “He’s protecting you.”

  “No. He’s controlling me.”

  “You’re wrong, Maisie.”

  I knew I wasn’t. But I had no intention of sitting next to Rex and spending the next hour fighting about it. Neither of us would change the other’s mind.

  “You and your dad have had your issues—”

  “He’s not my dad. My dad was a good man who never would have forced me to do his bidding, nor would he have threatened people I care about.”

  Rex frowned at me. “You have your issues, but he cares about you.”

  “He cares about what I can do for the pack.”

  “That too, but everyone in the pack has a role. We all do our part. That doesn’t mean we don’t care about one another because of what they do; we care about one another because we’re a family.”

  Laird didn’t care about family. If he did, he wouldn’t have turned his back on Seth. I didn’t say this to Rex. I could only push so much before Rex lashed out at my bashing his alpha.

  Yes, each pack member played a valuable role in the pack and that wasn’t why they were included, but I was different. I wasn’t a wolf, and I wasn’t blood. I wasn’t even related to Laird anymore. He and Mom had separated years ago. If he wouldn’t protect his son, he certainly wouldn’t protect me if I didn’t help him in some way.

  “You’re one of the strongest men in the pack,” I said. “No one is after me, but hunters are after Noah. You should be with Noah, protecting him. He needs you more than I do. He needs all of you right now until I can figure out a way to save him. And stop the both of you from ending up in hell.”

  Rex raked his fingers through the short hair on his chin. He went quiet for a few minutes. I thought we’d pass the rest of the drive in silence. I focused on the passing evergreens and fields of wildflowers and the infrequent farms. Then he found his voice.

  “Maisie, you care about Noah, yeah?”

  I snapped my head in his direction. “Of course, I do. He’s…he’s my friend.” Though that didn’t even come close to describing my feelings for him.

  “Hunters are strong, perhaps stronger than us. You never see a hunter coming. Our best chance of protecting the pack—and Noah—rests on you. If something happens to you, we’re all fucked. Noah is fucked. So, calm the fuck down and stop giving me lip. We’re on the same side. Whether you go to Milford alone or with a handsome older man is irrelevant, okay?”

  “Handsome?” I retorted, my defenses crumbling with the cheeky grin he wore that reminded me all too much of Noah. Was that because they shared blood, or was it because Rex had raised him since he was young? “All right. But I could have done it alone. They’re not after me.”

  He nodded.

  “Any chance you want to tell me why they killed Marco and why Noah is marked too? Noah wasn’t very forthcoming when I asked him.”

  He licked the corner of his lip while he thought about it.

  “I’ve rearranged my life to help you. The least you could do it tell me why this is all happening.”

  “Noah never told you?” He eyed me in a way that made it seem as if he thought Noah might have.

  I rolled my eyes in his direction and gave him an “are you kidding” face? “Noah is a vault.”

  He laughed.

  “And I think Laird keeps things from me just to piss me off. He has to know letting me in on everything might help me help him, but he’d rather frustrate me.”

  “You’re way off the mark.”

  “So prove me wrong.”

  “It’s bad, Maisie. Real bad.”

  “Okay. I’m listening.” I sat up straighter. I wanted to know. It didn’t matter how bad it was.

  Rex’s grin faded before he released a deep breath. Then he calmly said, “Marco made a deal with the devil.”

  Sixteen

  We continued along the highway for a few kilometers while I processed what Rex had told me. Yes, supernaturals existed. Clearly. Because I was one of them, and I also sat in a car with a man who could grow fur and fangs. But the devil?

  “How’s that possible?” I finally said when I found the energy to form words in my dry mouth.

  He shrugged.

  It wasn’t an answer.

  “Oh, no you don’t. You can’t throw that out and then back down. Explain, please. And the quicker the better.”

  He nodded. “We didn’t know until about three months ago. Marco had taken Seth’s death hard. More than we ever knew. You know us, we don’t talk about the dead. We move on. Marco couldn’t do that.”

  I glanced his way, noted the sweat beading on his forehead, and I rolled my window down a fraction. Not that it would help. I knew his warmth didn’t come from the temperature, but anxiety or stress. I worried I might not be able to handle what was coming next.

  “Marco was struggling, and he wouldn’t ask for help. On the outside, he was cool. He acted like nothing affected him. We didn’t know what was going on behind the scenes. That he was drowning in grief for the friend he’d lost. I think he felt that he could have stopped it somehow.”

  I sunk in my seat as I recognized those unhelpful and destructive thoughts that you could have done something or said something to make someone think twice about ending their life.

  “Marco came up with an idea. I guess you talked about raising the dead once with Marco, Noah, and Seth. It stuck in his mind.”

  My body grew cold and a shiver ran through me. “I also told him bringing back the dead usually meant giving a hitchhiker a host.”

  “I think he hoped you were wrong. He got into online chat groups and found someone who claimed to be a witch. He met up with her and she was willing to bring Seth back—for a price.”

  I swallowed hard. It hurt to breathe. The ache of losing my brother resurfaced in a rolling wave that crashed into me in one swift hit.

  “She told him she’d have to use dark magic and the price would be his soul.” He ran a hand through his hair and dragged it down over his face. “He accepted.”

  “Why would he do that? Just give up his soul? For a version of Seth that wouldn’t be real? Why? He should have called me. He should have told me about this, and I would have told him not to do it.”

  “Sure. Maybe that’s why he didn’t. You made it clear you didn’t want to be part of the pack when you left. You’d never have come back if Laird hadn’t made you.”

  I rounded my shoulders. Was this preventable? Had this happened because I’d run away? Could I have saved him from selling his soul? If I’d just learned to deal with my emotions and found a way to control my magic?

  “Did…Seth? Did he…?”

  Rex nodded. “Yeah. They brought him back. We never knew about it until a few months after…”

  I snapped my head in his direction and hung on his words. “After what?”

  He averted his eyes, looked out the passenger window and then turned to me. “Marco was hiding Seth in that cabin in the woods where Noah took you to see Marco’s body. He kept him in a cage…because the new Seth was a little unpredictable.”

  I shook my head. No. I didn’t want to hear any of this, but I had to.

  “Seth got out. It was about three months ago now.” He let out a sigh. “Marco knew he couldn’t hide Seth from us once he was loose. Marco finally told Noah and me. Not Laird and Douglas though. That came later.”

  “I don’t blame him for not telling them,” I said quietly. I could imagine how they’d have reacted. “What was he…like?” I felt as if a blade twisted in my heart. I should have felt joy to know he was alive again, and I didn’t. I didn’t really believe the man they brought back was my brother, though I desperately wanted to believe in it.

  He sighed. “He wasn’t Seth. I mean, he was, but he was darker. We kept Marco’s secret for a few weeks. As long as we could. We’d hoped we could find Seth before we told them to kind of…mitigate the damage.”

  “Laird would have banished him.”

  “Or worse
.”

  I curled my fingers into fists.

  “But Seth had a real appetite and he could still turn,” Rex said.

  “He was still were?”

  “Yeah, and he was hungry. For meat. And not animal meat, if you know what I mean.”

  “Oh, my God.”

  “Some tourists had gone missing in town, and Marco was sure Seth was responsible.”

  MacGregor and Gemma had mentioned something about that the day of the barbeque. It made sense now. Those missing tourists had been Seth’s victims. My brother’s victims. I leaned forward in the car and resisted the urge to vomit. They’d brought my brother back—or a version of him—and now people were dead. How could they have done that? How could something I have said inspired this? I missed Seth, too, but bringing him back wasn’t the way to move on. I was a hypocrite to think this. We’d all shut out our grief, and this was just a glaring reason why none of us should. Desperation leads to desperate actions.

  “We started to worry Seth might get noticed or our secret might come out,” Rex said. “I mean, how do you explain a guy who was supposed to be dead? And what if he changed in front of people? We couldn’t risk it.”

  I frowned at him, knowing exactly what came next.

  “We tried to find him, but we couldn’t follow his scent. Weirdest thing. He didn’t seem to have one. We didn’t have a choice. We had to go to the witch for help. But she wouldn’t help us, not until…well, not until…”

  “Noah stepped in.” My voice trailed off. A lump in my throat became almost too large to swallow.

  Rex nodded. “The kid protects no matter the cost. Best enforcer a pack could have. He, uh, well, he first tried to muscle her. She was like nothing I’d ever seen before. She moved liked the wind. In one spot one minute and then poof, she was on the other side of the forest clearing we’d met her in. She said she’d put Seth back in the ground if Noah made the same deal Marco had.”

  I held my breath. His burn from the Dosifine didn’t matter. He’d told me in not so many words, but I didn’t fully understand what he’d meant until now. He’d assured me he was going to hell, and I’d thought he was just being hard on himself. But what he meant was he’d already sealed his fate months before. His burn didn’t matter. The mark had ensured where he would end up.

  “How much time passed between Marco making the deal and the hunters coming for him?”

  “Months.”

  “A few months. I was hoping we had more time.” My magic burned through me, hotter, fiercer. I could feel my fingers pulsing. But they weren’t red or sparking, thank God. “Why would Noah make that deal? Why doom the both of them?”

  He shrugged. “We couldn’t fight her. She moved too quick and there was something about her eyes. She was no witch. Her scent was off too. You smell human to me, but she didn’t. Then there’s the fact that witches don’t offer deals with the devil. At least, not that I know of.”

  “You think she was a demon?”

  He shook his head and his faux leather seat scratched as he adjusted. “I don’t know. She wasn’t mortal. I know that.”

  We needed to get to the bookstore fast. I had no idea how much time we had left, and I couldn’t risk Noah’s life. I imagined a world he no longer belonged to, and I winced, tears coming. I swallowed down the pain. “You should have tracked Seth down on your own.”

  “And killed him? The last time he died, he killed himself, and we all felt responsible. You really think one of us could have looked him in the face and done it for real? That was never going to happen. None of us had it in us to do it, not even Noah.”

  “Laird?”

  Rex grimaced at me. “He didn’t find out about Seth until after Seth was dead. We thought it was best.”

  “Did Douglas know before Seth died?”

  “He did. He ordered us to take care of it or we’d all be banished. So, we did.”

  “But Laird didn’t know?”

  “No. He became alpha soon after. I think Douglas did it as a sort of peace offering.

  “That’s why he’s alpha.” I finally understood.

  Rex nodded. “The pack was just starting to heal from all of this when Marco was killed. And now it looks like we’re just going to keep reliving our past mistakes.”

  My anger for each of them, Laird included, faded a little. I believed what he said. Deep down, I knew none of them could have killed Seth. They’d hurt him and banished him, yes. But deliver the fatal blow? No, I didn’t think any of them were capable of that. Not even Laird.

  We reached Milford in record time. Rex put the car in park and turned off the car. He had his hand on his seat belt when I told him to, “Stay here.”

  “Not a chance. I told Laird I’d protect you, and I can’t do that if I don’t have eyes on you.”

  “There are two witches inside that bookstore.” I pointed to it. “I don’t know how they’ll respond if I bring you inside with me. I stand a much better chance at getting answers—truthful answers—if you stay put.”

  “It’s not going to happen.”

  I growled at him. He unbuckled his seat belt, and I grabbed his arm to pull him back inside as he started to get out of the car. “Rex, I need you to trust me.”

  “Maisie, I’m fond of you, kid, but my trust is limited.” He glanced down at my hand on his forearm and raised his eyebrows. I released my grip and swore under my breath.

  “Do you trust me to do what I can to save you and Noah?”

  He cleared his throat and relaxed in his seat.

  “That’s all I’m asking you for. They aren’t a threat to me.” I lowered my voice and tried to tone down the frustrated whine that my voice had assumed.

  “I want to hear what they say.”

  “You think I’ll lie?”

  “I think you want to return to your life with the doctor.”

  He couldn’t have been farther off the mark. “The doctor and I are over.”

  His expression softened as he looked at me curiously. “Sorry to hear that.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I didn’t really mean it.”

  “It’s not hard to tell you and Noah are related.”

  He smirked at me. “The answer is still no.”

  I released a groan and got out of the car. So did he. He followed me to the steps of the bookstore, but the moment he got close he let out a quiet yelp. I turned to see the flesh on his face bubbling. I opened my eyes wide in surprise. He took a few steps backward, and his skin started to settle. What the hell? He growled and tried again, stalking forward, but after two more steps his skin started to sizzle again.

  He looked around. No people walking the streets were close by. It seemed as if no one looked out windows of nearby stores. He ducked his head to hide his face as his rough skin once again became smooth, except for the odd wrinkle in his laugh lines and on his forehead.

  “Did you know the place was protected?” he asked me in an accusing manner.

  I shook my head. “If I knew, I would have saved myself the trouble of arguing with you.”

  He snarled as he stared down the building and whoever it hid inside.

  “I guess you’ll have to wait here,” I said in my most diplomatic tone.

  He growled at me.

  “Noah is my best friend. I’ll do everything I can to save you both. I swear it.”

  He dipped his head and sighed. “Don’t be long.”

  The place looked the same as the other day I came here. After I walked inside, Elizabeth trotted down the staircase with her tail wagging. She rubbed against me and walked to the door, where she hissed.

  “He’s no danger to you,” I said to the cat. “He’s just trying to protect me.”

  She turned her back to the door and walked back to me, her body magically shifting to a human as she moved from all fours to two and then grew to human size, her fur retreating and her face morphing into the beautiful woman I remembered. It still surprised me how she shifted and how her clothes magical
ly appeared. It was one of the things my wolf friends struggled with. When they turned back, they were always naked, which became tricky if they had to turn back quickly when there were no free clothes in sight.

  “Back so soon?” she said with a smile.

  “How do you do that?”

  “Do what?” she asked with a quizzical look on her face.

  “Shift into a woman with her clothes on.”

  She laughed heartily at that before waggling her eyebrows. “Magic.”

  I bet my friends wished they had some of her magic.

  Floorboards creaked toward the back of the store, distracting me.

  “Is Mr. Jenkins here?”

  “Yes. Shall I make some tea?”

  “Um. No, thank you.” Food and drinks were the farthest thing from my mind. I followed her to the back room where Mr. Jenkins ground some green herbs up with a mortar and pestle. He looked up at me and pushed his glasses up his nose. When he focused on me, he smiled.

  “Ah, there she is. Good to see you again, Maisie.”

  “It’s good to see you too.”

  “How did the spell work?” he asked me eagerly. “I felt the wolf’s presence but couldn’t tell the effects.”

  Oh, he meant the spell outside. “It made his skin sizzle. Like a burn.”

  “Fantastic! It works. And thank you for bringing a friend we could test it on.”

  “Um…you’re welcome?” It was an odd thing to thank me for. I certainly didn’t mean for him to come or get burned in the process. “Is it new?”

  He nodded.

  Elizabeth rolled her eyes. “When you came here with talk of werewolves, he thought we’d better be safe than sorry.”

  “But you’re a shapeshifter. It doesn’t work on you?” I asked.

  “I’m also a witch. It won’t work on witches. Although, wouldn’t it be nice if worked on some?”

  Mr. Jenkins eyed her, and then he continued grinding up his herbs.

  “You need our help,” he said. He picked up a glass bottle and poured a touch of white liquid into his mortar.

  “Yes.”

  “Hmm. Well, ask then.”

  “Why must we go straight to that? Come sit.” Elizabeth gracefully lowered herself into an old Victorian lounge seat with golden wood edges. She patted the flowered fabric next to her. “We have a new friend, and we must get to know one another. We barely had the chance last time.”