“It is safe for you to go back now, kid,” the wolf shifter says. “The new laws will protect you.”
I am so glad, so proud that Aragon made changes to help others and the whole of shifter society. The council had ruled for too long; the laws had been for a different time. I feel overwhelmed, knowing what has happened—gratified that I made the right decision in leaving. Aragon did all that because I wasn’t there to be a toxic distraction. I am still better off dead.
“I can’t,” I say huskily, looking at my hands. “I don’t want to,” I say quietly. I peek up and meet Madán’s eyes. “I can beg.” I will go on my knees if I have to. His eyes widen, and mine plead. Please don’t send me back; please don’t. I want to die free.
A muscle ticks in Madán’s jaw as he continues to stare at me. “Aragon misses you.” I shake my head in denial. Madán sighs. “He is going to murder me…Okay, Forrest. I can see you are not for changing your mind. I will help you. Foremost, we have to remove that bloody curse…” When I shake my head in panic, he holds his hand up to stop me. “And the half mate-bond. I will link you to my court as a warrior, like Mac.” He tilts his head towards the wolf shifter. “The magic is omnipotent; it will clean up all that fragmented magic.” He scrunches his nose and waves his hand around, indicating me. “It also means that you will be able to stay in Ireland without any repercussions. As a warrior of the court, you will be asked to help out on low-level missions, similar to being a hunter in the Hunters Guild. I will not ask for any more than you are willing to give. I offer protection, and you commit to a minimum of twenty hours a week. I will contract you for three years, to which you must commit. It isn’t a permanent position—after three years you may leave. I must be getting soft in my old age,” Madán says, tucking his hair behind a pointed ear. I sit in shock; the Aes Sídhe can’t lie.
Mac gives me a big smile. “What do you say, kid—no dying, no psycho-mate bond, and you can have your wolf back, and a job where you can help people. You do any more hours than twenty, and you’ll even get paid.” Mac winks. I nod in agreement.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
Madán’s offer is more than I could ever dream of. I glance down at the cup in my hand. It’s more then I deserve. “If you’re willing to help me, it would be an honour to serve the court and help others.” I lift my eyes and meet Madán’s pale blue gaze. “I will not hurt the innocent, but if you point me at the bad guys, I will be good to go—I have a lot of repressed anger.”
“I’m able to ascertain why he is fond of you,” Madán says gruffly.
“When do I start work ?” I ask. A small, repressed voice at the back of my head whispers that I will need a theme tune.
“You need to recover from the curse; we can do the warrior link now. I am worried that if we wait any longer, we might be too late.” I nod. Wow, I guess I am so not dying today, and I get my magic back!
“I will need to put my hands on your neck. Is that going to be a problem?”
“No, that’s fine.”
Madán moves closer and puts both of his elegant hands on my neck. They easily wrap around; he holds me gently. His eyes close, and he starts to chant in a language that I don’t understand. His hands heat up, and even my human nose can smell the scent of grass and flowers. A light breeze from the magic ruffles my hair. My vision goes slightly cloudy, and my right arm tingles.
Once Madán releases me, I pull up my sleeve, and we all look at the silver markings on my arm. I blink up at Madán. The surprise on his face is a tad concerning.
“Warrior markings,” he says quietly, with awe.
“Is that normal?” I ask, poking at them.
“No,” he replies, knocking my prodding finger away with a frown. He pulls my sleeve up further. Of course, my strange magic has to act up and give me proper Fae-warrior markings when it shouldn’t. The markings are silver and not black, so they’re different. I wonder if they do anything. Another Forrest record-breaking feat, which is freaking Madán out. I hope he doesn’t put the curse back on. “Would you please remove your jumper.” I nod and wiggle out of it.
My warrior markings are on my right arm; they start at my fingers and go up to my shoulder. At first, I presume that they’re a random pattern, but after staring at them from various angles, Madán deems that the markings depict the tree of life.
Instead of worrying about them, I will embrace my inner freak—as long as Madán and the other Fae don’t get angry and try to kill me, which could still be a possibility. My eyes start to close of their own volition. The magic has drained me.
“All right, Forrest, you are going to need a few hours of sleep to recover. We shall see ourselves out. Mac will be in touch to let you know when your training starts. Do not mess with the markings,” Madán says firmly. I nod in sleepy confirmation, and he leaves the room. Mac takes hold of my arm and guides me into my bedroom and to my bed.
“Sleep, kid. When you wake up, you're going to feel so much better. You will be running as your wolf this afternoon.” I mumble a thank you, my eyes already closing. I sleep.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
It has been over three-and-a-half years since Madán removed my curse and that godawful mate bond. I have my freedom, and I’m healthy.
I’m also haunted by the nagging voice in the back of my head—the voice that gets louder late at night, whispering Aragon’s name. Half the time, I convince myself that Aragon wasn’t that special and that eventually he let me down, or at least he failed to give me enough information to protect myself. I try to convince myself that I am still not grieving the loss of him.
The warrior training was brutal. My first week, the guys on my course (all no shorter than six-foot) made jokes about me being the token shifter mascot—the pet freak. I am sure that in their eyes the five-foot-two pink-haired shifter was a joke. They thought they had every reason to mock me. I didn’t rise to the bullying—I mean, come on, I have handled so much worse.
At first, hidden deep inside I was devastated. Who doesn’t want to be liked? I found their gibes and nasty comments hurtful. Mac was furious, but I made him promise that he wouldn’t interfere. I kept my chin high acclimatised and got over it.
I proved my point and got payback a week later when we started physical training.
One class, my favourite, was fight-training. In one afternoon, I kicked the absolute fuck out of every guy in my class. I was so aggressive that by the end of the day, the training staff decided to pull me from sparring, for my classmates’ safety. Funnily, no one talked about my mascot status again. Mac spent the whole afternoon clapping and laughing.
The Fae I worked with became warier of me. I guess I should have stuck with being the joke mascot instead of the psycho shifter with the creepy dead eyes, fire magic, and stolen warrior markings.
I wore another mask and learned it was better to be feared than liked. I couldn’t kid myself that I would fit in, and part of me didn’t care.
Fuck them. I’m dead inside.
My soul is lost in buried memories. The best parts of me remain with a dragon. I’m just the remaining shell.
I made sure to keep my chin held high and to walk with extra swagger. My new warrior theme tune: “Broken People” from the film Bright, playing in my head.
Years later—after they realised that I wasn’t going anywhere, I think—I slowly earned their respect.
Always the hard way.
Being a warrior is a tad anticlimactic. It isn’t how I thought it would be. Sometimes you want something so badly you get caught up; you lose yourself in the dream. You find out that what you wanted isn’t what you initially thought it would be.
It’s December, and ugg, today I am training an idiot. I huff out a frustrated breath, yawn, and scratch the back of my head. I’m glad I opted to have the magical cameras, as no one would believe this shit. I’ve set them to track my movements. It’s like your own film crew following you around. The magic cameras film everything that’s happening, circling above
and below, getting the best angles. It helps with information-gathering and prosecution. Some warriors choose not to have them. But it’s something I don’t mind. At first, they were something that Madán had insisted on. But over the past few years, I’ve come to be so glad he did, as they have helped to exonerate me from many claims of excessive violence. No guy likes the idea of a tiny female warrior taking him into custody, so they claim loads of fake shit. The cameras are so small; it’s almost impossible to see them, even with my eyesight.
“What is that!” The new warrior-in-training shrieks in a total panic. He’s freaking the fuck out, and it’s amusing. The Slime Monster he is screeching at is an amorphous, shapeless, gooey creature that’s leaving bits of itself on the pavement outside my favourite ice cream place—the same place where years ago, I first met Madán and Mac.
The newbie warrior pokes his iron blade at the blob-monster, and the knife just disappears. Huh? I have no idea where it goes, but there’s a kind of sucking sound as it vanishes.
“I wouldn’t get too close to him, Noel,” I say helpfully, licking my ice cream—what? It honestly would be rude not to grab one while I was here. A yummy waffle cone, even if it's freezing today—I have a scoop of Belgian chocolate and a scoop of cherry. Yum, the best ice cream in Ireland. Noel screams and dives away from a tentacle of goo; I roll my eyes.
He then produces a flame. He has a fire gift, which is why I have had him dumped on me. “Noel, don’t use a flame on him, fire doesn’t work.” Noel has just fallen on his bottom as he has tripped over a bollard that he didn’t notice behind him, as he’s so panicked. He flails on the floor. I frown as Noel screeches in a pitch higher than I could ever hope of achieving. My ear that’s closest to him rings painfully. I frown and rub it on my shoulder. As he cries, Noel throws his flame at the Slime Monster.
I wince and rub my forehead. With a whoosh, the whole monster is now alight and is dripping not just goo, but flame-y goo all over the pavement.
Noel screams again, the sound grating. I finish my ice cream and decide to rescue the situation. I circle the monster and make my way to Noel, who is still on the floor wailing. I smack the back of his head. He finally shuts the fuck up and turns to me, his eyes wide in panic.
“Get up, you idiot. Noel, you need to listen better. You haven’t even noticed that the creature is not trying to hurt you; he is just standing there!” I huff out a frustrated breath and point at the flaming goo monster. “You have set him on fire for no reason at all, apart from your total lack of control and your fear.” I march up to the scary-looking Slime Monster, wave my hand, and call the fire that surrounds him into my control.
I have learned a lot over the years, and the fire listens to me as if it’s my own. I wave my hand again, and the fire dies completely.
“Hi, Bert, thanks again so much for helping with training. I appreciate your time. Sorry about the fire…” Bert, the Slime Monster, nods his head, burps, and the missing iron knife tumbles to the pavement. “Tell your family hi from me.” Bert gives me what I interpret to be a slimy wave and goes off to his car.
Bert and his family are so helpful. They help a lot in training newbies to react to a situation and not to what a creature looks like. It’s usually a good lesson—unfortunately, it’s one at which Noel has failed miserably.
I scowl at Noel, who is still on the floor. His mouth is opening and closing. He’s doing a good impression of a goldfish as he watches Bert leave.
“You let him go? He is getting away!” I roll my eyes; this idiot needs a miracle to pass his training. Thank God I got this on film. I chuckle evilly.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
I am playing bait this evening, as we’re hunting some big bad. The evil bastard has been killing young girls; we presume it’s a male solo predator. He has moved across the country, killing as he goes. He has murdered fifteen young girls, and three girls are still unaccounted for. He started in Dublin, and it didn’t take the local police—the Garda Síochána, more commonly referred to as the Gardaí or "the Guards"—and the Fae warriors long to connect the dots. The public is pissed. The human papers are blaming the Fae, and the Fae are biting back, with everyone pointing an accusing finger at everyone else. It’s turning into a total clusterfuck, a nightmare of epic proportions.
All I am focused on is the big bad, and I let the higher-ups deal with the shit that’s going down. The state of urgency demanded from everyone is nothing compared to the pressure that, as warriors, we put upon ourselves. We need to find this guy, and quickly.
For some reason, he doesn’t mind who he picks—human or Fae, it doesn’t seem to matter much. He does have a type, though: he likes the girls young and delicate-looking. So it stands to reason that I’d volunteer to be the bait to try and catch him. We know he’s heading to the Sligo area, but we don’t know when, so this week my evenings have been filled with me sashaying around Sligo town centre in a pretty dress looking irresistible. We have yet to get him, and I’ve become disheartened. On a plus note, we have already arrested three idiots who thought it was a good idea to try and take advantage of me.
The self-control I have mastered in the past few years is impressive; I don’t have the worst record for beating the crap out of the bad guys. I want nothing more sometimes then to punch a few predator dickheads in the face. Women should feel safe to go anywhere after dark, without risk. I hate that in our modern multi-creature world, that isn’t the case.
Tonight is Saturday night, and I’m wearing a lovely gold dress. It has long sleeves and a high neck. It’s mega short, and I have to keep reminding myself not to tug at the hem. I am bloody freezing, as I am not wearing a jacket. Apparently, young humans like to freeze when they go for a night out. I am twenty-seven and find it ridiculous. A coat would be nice. I hate the cold.
“Peter, ya burger, did ya want cheese?” Arrah, I bloody hate having these idiots in my head. Bloody mind links...luckily, it’s a spell used only on these kinds of assignments. But the guys on duty with me tonight, all they have done is eat.
“Yeah, and bacon.” I huff out a cloud of hot breath. I am cold, and now I am fucking hungry.
I wander to the next pub and grab a drink and a snack from the bar. I find a great place to sit, in the corner, where I can watch everyone and get myself warm.
I am also isolating myself, screaming: Hey predators, look at me, the easy prey, oooh all on her own, looking lost.
Two members of my team keep up the chatter about food. Mac tells them to shut the fuck up, but not until after he orders his meal. Such a bunch of twats. My tummy rumbles in agreement.
I like this pub. It’s situated next to the River Garavogue in Sligo town. It’s the right mix of traditional Irish and modern. I love that it’s still privately owned, with its character intact, and not owned by a pub chain. There’s a long bar running down the left-hand side of the room. Small wooden tables are scattered around, with half a dozen booths along the right-hand wall. Chart music is playing at the moment; the live music has finished for the evening. The majority of the customers are braving the cold weather in the beer garden, which is the smoking area outside.
I sip my half-pint of Guinness and blackcurrant. I also nibble on a bag of salt and vinegar Tayto crisps. Obstinately I allow my crisp-crunching to echo in my thoughts. Crunch. Crunch. Mac groans—he hates food noises. That will teach them to have burgers without me.
“Hi, you on your own?” A guy takes the seat across from me, without asking—creepy fucker. I have to remind myself that I am playing bait. I peek up at him from underneath my lashes and smile in what I hope is a timid way. I always wonder if they will notice my dead eyes and realise I’m not what I pretend to be. But I have this down to a fine art, and they see what they expect.
“No.” I shake my head, and then I shrug my shoulders and let out a little sad-sounding laugh. I lean forward and glance around as if I don’t want anyone else to hear me. “Sort of, I guess. My sister has my phone and my purse. I went to the toilet,
and she held them for me, and she wasn’t around when I got back. I searched for her; I couldn’t find her, so I thought I would come to this pub to see if I can find her here instead.” I shrug again, tucking my hair behind my ear. “She always comes to this one. I don’t think her friends like me too much.” I widen my eyes in fake horror, then glance about again, searching for my non-existent sister.
The creepy guy nods. “I can help you find her if you like. A beautiful girl like you shouldn’t be on her own.” I nod and give him a smile, dropping my eyes coltishly back to the table and my drink.
“Thank you,” I say, and he smiles at me, showing a little too many teeth.
He is a troll, although he’s attractive in a greasy-hair, slicked-back, 80’s-troll kind of way. Trolls usually are quite easy to like. They’re big and dumb, and they work a lot in security. But this guy, even if he isn’t our killer...he’s bad news. My creepy-bad-guy warning alert is pinging like crazy. You know that feeling? The female lizard brain that warns you, someone or something is dangerous and to run? I think mine is a bit defective, as it always encourages me to run at them and punch them in the face. This creep makes my hand itch with the overwhelming need to slam the heel of my palm into his nose.
“Please, could I borrow your phone? I might ring my dad and ask him to come and get me,” I say shyly.
“Sure, beautiful.” The creepy guy pulls out his phone. He looks at the screen with a mock-sad face, waves it at me, then taps the phone on the side of his head. “No signal. We will have to step outside.” I give him a sweet, timid smile, gulp down my Guinness, and get up. I let myself wobble a little as I stand.
“Oh, room spin,” I say with a hiccupping giggle. Creepy takes hold of my arm and instead of leading me to the front of the bar, he puts a hand around my waist and muscles me towards the emergency exit at the rear.
Cursed Wolf: Urban Fantasy Shifter Stand-Alone (Creatures of the otherworld Book 1) Page 21
