Corruption of the Rose

by S. J. Sanders

  “Rose, is something amiss?” Saris asked quietly, his hackles rising.

  “I wouldn’t worry, Saris. This mage is an odd one,” Gnaval observed, his voice containing a note of bewilderment. “Showing up in strange places, and now lurking in the common room like a ghost. And for what reason—to have her incense refilled?” He jerked his muzzle toward the box in her hand, obviously increasingly more aghast at the situation.

  She frowned at his words. Gnaval was usually quite polite and at times almost amiable toward her. Although there was a possibility that the males, just coming down from the energy high of a hunt, were jesting with each other, the dismissiveness rankled, and her eyes narrowed on him with displeasure.

  “No, my incense is fine,” she replied stiffly. “I did not bring this box here to replenish it. It contains something I found hidden among my tools. Something placed strategically where there was a chance that I would stumble upon it without seeing it. Something that would have meant death for me if Serina hadn’t discovered it first. An envenomated pin rests here, in a bed of protective velvet.”

  Saris froze, a low growl rattling from him as she opened the lid of the box, revealing the shining silver pin within it. He drew closer to it, his nostrils flaring, before he jerked his head back.

  “It stinks strongly of venom from a feathered sun viper. They are great hunters who dwell at the highest peaks of most mountains. This is strange because usually quite discriminating to whom their magic goes to, especially their venom. Just a drop can bring down large prey. Even Darthar had only been able to acquire a small amount in return for a favor. I must check the supply” he growled and snapped the box shut with one hand. His claws curled around it, the tips scoring the wood with his anger. A tremor ran through him for a moment before he leaned down to rest his forehead against hers, one hand cupping her cheek. “You are well?”

  “Yes,” she murmured. “And I was able to get Serina back to her world before the venom took too great a hold… but this wasn’t an accident.”

  “No, it wasn’t,” he agreed. “And we will discover the culprit. The wyrm was an almost believable coincidence, but this trap reeks of desperation. Someone wants to destroy you before you fully come into your power. They are scared… but why?”

  Buried within his embrace, Rose’s lip curled back into a silent snarl. She only hoped that whoever was responsible would suffer the same pain that Serina had suffered—the same pain they had planned on inflicting upon her. Perhaps she would tip her fingernails in venom and drag them over their torso once they were caught. There were many possibilities.

  From outside the shelter of Saris’s arms, she was aware of the other lupi exchanging confused looks amongst themselves as she leaned into the comfort of Saris’s embrace. She didn’t blame them. She was confused too. Aside from a deranged servant of the queen, who could possibly want her harmed?

  Chapter 23

  Saris’s ears twitched, a shiver stealing over his fur. The hallowed Night of Veils was drawing closer, and they still hadn’t discovered who was trying to harm Rose. That the collection of poisons were missing worried him, more so since it had been centuries since he had need of them and so he couldn’t even pinpoint when they might have gone missing or who might have taken them. He had little doubt that the culprit was also responsible for the fire wyrm.

  It weighed heavily on him, especially with the holy day fast approaching. His aggression was already rapidly increasing in response to the energy issuing from the thinning barriers between the worlds. At all hours it hummed over his nerves. In a few days, he wasn’t going to be of much use for anything that would require higher reasoning.

  He glanced at the waxing moon that was nearing its fullest state. His kind always felt more aggressive at a full moon, but with the full moon landing on the hallowed night… he would be a monster. Rose would need control over the pack by then for her own safety.

  He trembled with real fear at what might happen with his savage hunger turned loose on her without control, and what he might do to the other lupi in his instinctive need to keep them away from her so he could have her to himself. It would be a bloodbath in the castle, of both mage and lupi.

  Rose would need to control them and redirect them to their hunt. In the past, the mages had locked themselves in the workroom, but he doubted that would stop him from trying to reach her in his maddened state. While retaining his reason, he had thus far managed to avoid her during the full moon, keeping himself to his rooms where he inevitably tore the space up. Even then, he had barely controlled himself. It was enough to make him dread what was coming. And there was still an invisible enemy to deal with.

  His eyes flicked over the forest, wondering if their hidden enemy watched them now. Gnaval and Jalis drew up to his sides, Gnaval’s expression confused as he too looked around, his ears pricking and flattening with impatience.

  “Why are we stopping here? Does Rose desire to rest?” he asked.

  There was a mild note of censure in the male’s voice that made Saris bristle. Not too long ago, he might have felt the same impatience from halting so soon after leaving the castle, but hearing it come from any of the lupi now made him unreasonably protective. Maybe that too was an unforeseen consequence of the approaching Night of Veils.

  His eyes tracked to where Rose was crouched over the edge of a lake. The silvery form of a finned being mostly submerged beneath the water was visible from where they stood. He could hear the soft murmur of voices as they conversed. Rose sat back slightly on her heels, a frown on her lovely face as she stole a quick glance at him.

  “She is not resting,” he snarled, more than aware that he sounded perhaps testier than what was warranted. “She is attempting to gather information from some of the local resident land spirits to see if they are aware of anything unusual going on, beyond what is typical for the mountain.”

  Jalis sighed and scratched behind one ear as he settled back into a crouch. “I don’t know how she thinks that a lake dweller is going to know more about what is going on than us. We patrol the mountain every day, and you have your goblins informing you when they hear of something. This is a huge waste of time.”

  Saris bared his teeth without uttering a word, silencing the other male instantly. It was all the threat that was required and communicated without any doubt just what sort of reprimand Jalis would be facing if he continued. Gnaval grunted, his expression neutral as his gaze followed Rose.

  “You are overprotective of the mage,” he observed shrewdly. It was said without inflection, but the look he turned upon him, pale yellow eyes judged Saris. “I find this concerning, as likely do the other lupi. Your responsibility is to train her and to test her, and to lead us. She is supposed to take command if she can. All others have failed to do so. Do you lie to her and yourself by allowing her to assume those dead mages died by their own magic?”

  “I have not said so,” Saris snapped. “I have not deceived her.”

  “But you have not been truthful either. You did not tell her that when those mages attempted to exert their authority and failed, our primal instinct already raised in their struggle against them drove us to kill every one of them,” Gnaval returned, anger rising in his voice. “Instead, you coddle her and fuck her. Yes, it was a good sign that she was able to kill her own people to preserve the balance, but you are losing sight of your responsibility to her and to us—and putting her in further danger as the Night of Veils draws near. Do not think that I and the others do not know? If you care about this female’s safety, you will return her to the barrier and release her to return to her world before you destroy her and yourself.”

  Saris bristled, his own eyes narrowing threateningly on the male. “You do not believe that she is capable of being Darthar’s heir?”

  Gnaval’s own fur rose along his spine. “I think that you should not have deviated in your method of training. You have ruined her potential.”

  “The other method was killing the mages,” Saris snappe
d. “You saw it yourself. They were not capable of bonding fully to this mountain. Their fatal inability to bring the powers of the mountain into themselves doomed any chance they had of leashing us to their will. They clung too hard to their humanity.”

  “So fuck her then, but don’t be so foolish as to fall in love with her or let her fall in love with you. That is not what Darthar would have had planned for us. I respect you as our leader, Saris, but I can’t approve of this,” Gnaval snarled in turn.

  Saris struck, his teeth sinking deep into Gnaval’s shoulder, wrenching the bone in the socket even as his teeth tore at the male’s flesh. Blood sprayed over him, filling his mouth with its heady flavor. He could have blamed it on the turning of the season fueling his aggression, but in truth, it was more than that. It gave him pleasure to break the male down so long as he didn’t take it too far.

  Gnaval made an honest attempt at holding his own. Claws raked over Saris’s torso and bites scored his left arm, but the male’s reach was limited by the grip that Saris had on him. The shoulder crunched loudly beneath Saris’s teeth, and the howl of pain made him grin around the mouthful of bloody flesh.

  A whisper of sound caught his attention, making him still, his teeth still latched onto Gnaval even as one hand positioned itself around the male’s throat, the claws digging in deep.

  “Saris, drop him,” Rose commanded as she strode through the grasses that grew around the lake and over to his side.

  He growled in displeasure, wanting to take his time with the impudent lupo, but he complied, yanking his teeth free. Blood rushed from the wound, and Saris opened his hand so that Gnaval fell onto the forest floor. The male groaned where he lay as Saris gestured to the pair of lupi waiting nearby. They both stared warily at him as if half-expecting him to maim them as well.

  Saris growled lightly and stepped away from the prone body of his longtime friend, giving them room to retrieve the injured male. Gnaval groaned in pain, but the males worked efficiently and with haste as they prepared to carry him back. Rose watched the entire thing with a pinched expression that didn’t ease until the injured male was out of sight and his sounds of pain could no longer be heard.

  “That was… interesting,” she muttered with a disapproving look.

  “It was necessary,” he corrected, unruffled by the cool temperature of her voice. “You know we are not human. Our nature is prone to resolving issues between us, and any threats, with fits of violence. Gnaval merely had to be reminded of his place,” he bit out.

  “I see,” she murmured, her expression just as cold. “Are you interested in hearing the information that the kelpie had? Because from where I stood, it looked like you were more interested in fighting than anything else.”

  He gestured for her to proceed, unwilling to comment further on a subject she couldn’t possibly understand. How did one make it clear how violent the nature of the lupi was beyond what she experienced personally at his hand? The pack never held his disciplinary measures against him, just as he didn’t think anything of the way they had all attacked him when he had become too power drunk in their early days. She hadn’t witnessed the centuries between them of both fighting and camaraderie. It was something that she would only come to fully realize with time. Saris stared at her placidly, and Rose narrowed her eyes on him as if uncertain whether he was being dismissive but finally relaxed and brushed her hands on the sides of her robe.

  “Farth didn’t have a lot to say, but he did tell me that the vulpi have been running outside of their normal territory during the late hours. He found it unusual because it wasn’t typical for them to run in such large groups, being the independent sort, but didn’t think much of it at the time. He mentioned that sometimes, at very odd hours, he catches the smell of another human besides myself on the mountain, but it is faint and he can never be certain exactly where it is coming from.”

  “That tells us very little,” Saris muttered, his arms crossing over his chest. “Nor does it give us any clues as to who your attacker might be.”

  She shrugged. “It gives us more than what we had just an hour earlier. The vulpi are magical creatures with their own alliances. Perhaps they are trying to kick me off the mortal plane as part of their attempt to take over the mountain. Making you start all over again at ground zero would delay your control of the mountain once more.”

  Saris frowned thoughtfully. “The vulpi are sly, so I cannot discount it, even if I find it unlikely. They are not organized enough and lack any sort of central leadership for them to make a real attempt to claim the mountain from us. Still, that they are being seen in cohesive groups is concerning,” he muttered half to himself as he scooped her effortlessly onto his back.

  As he leaned forward to settle once more on all fours, Rose’s breath stirred the fur near his ear.

  “So what exactly did Gnaval say that made you attempt to take a bite out of his hide?” she asked as they started off once more into the forest.

  “Nothing worth dwelling on,” he assured her brusquely.

  Rose made a soft sound of disbelief in the back of her throat but did not contradict him or press for more information. Instead, she settled more comfortably against his back, her fingers tangling in the longer fur at the nape of his neck. The press of her body at his back warmed his heart with a sense of contentment. Gnaval may have found fault with his love for the mage as an impediment to her growth and his own duties, but it didn’t feel wrong to Saris.

  They would be stronger for having each other. It was possible that it was the hidden romantic heart within him speaking, however.

  He snorted mirthlessly. He had no interest in attempting to make that distinction. Now they just needed some kind of distraction to take their minds off of murderous plots and do a little murdering of invading creatures from the netherworld. It would at least temporarily restore good humor among them all… For Rose as well, who seemed to take as much delight in the hunt in recent days.

  He could already scent her rising arousal that would thicken as the night wore on, anticipating the intense joining they would experience once they returned to the castle. She would tremble with pleasure after they had satisfied themselves in hunting out the worst of the creatures that escaped onto the mountain.

  With the approach of the hallowed night, the veil was already beginning to part, presenting weakened areas and openings in the barrier between the worlds. The worst would be attempting to creep around the relaxed guard as the ancestral souls of the deceased visited upon their kin who welcomed them. The ones who didn’t belong were always easy for the lupi to discern from the trains of ghostly ones.

  His mouth parted, drawing in large gusts of air as he scented for the foul taint that clung to the beings of the underworld. He felt Rose adjust her seating on his back, her thighs tightening around him as she sat straighter, like she was the Mistress of the Hunt herself. She twisted slightly, and he felt her magic seeking. Water magic carried, much like air magic, and was able to flow into everywhere at once, touching on the subtle energies of the living and spirits alike.

  The dark hunger consumed him as he caught the scent of prey. He knew the moment she discovered it as well because her breath hitched in her throat and her thighs tightened further around his torso at the nearby rattling sound in the thick brush at the other side of the lake. It was exciting but also terrifying knowing that Rose had been so near danger without any of them knowing.

  Few beings could mask their presence so well. The formidable ambush hunters preyed on the essences of other beings. Saris wasn’t sure what purpose they served in the underworld outside of haunting the desolate areas where only lost souls would tread, adding to the torment of the forgotten, often lurking on the riverbanks of the underworld. Of course it would have found the brush near the kelpie’s lake preferable. It was the perfect place to ensnare, but also to hide its scent among the many others that gathered at water sources where one would be more wary of attracting the attention of the resident kelpie.


  Saris’s stomach rumbled with interest as a fresh burst of the delicious scent struck him. Although usually possessing a number of unpleasant protections, such creatures were also the tenderest to devour once one got beyond the most hazardous parts. Excitement spread among the lupi all around him as they caught the scent and bristled. One by one, they darted into the trees, streaming silently into the long shadows of the forest in their deadly pursuit.

  The creature gave chase, sticking to the darkest recesses of the forest as it moved. There was something elegant about it, like a hundred viperous tendrils swaying with some hidden order to their chaos. It was grace in motion, despite the dark pools of poison that seeped from its slick, blood-red flesh. Rose made a little nasal sound of disgust at the oozing essence, but it did not diminish the frenzy rising inside of her, feeding off the hungers of the lupi milling about the cornered beast. Its vertical mouth, filled with three rows of teeth, gnashed and stretched impossibly wide with its every threat.

  Its bulbous torso inflated, secreting even more poison as its tendrils flailed, seeking to slash and burrow into anything that ventured too close. A blood feeder, the terrible mouth was designed to snap around its prey and hold the victim steady while the tendrils dug deep into veins, sucking blood and any otherwise vital essence from its victims. With the living, Saris knew that the tendrils would infest the body, winding around the heart until the chest caved in. Those tendrils snapped out toward the lupi circling it, the shrill sounds coming from it piercing in their pitch.

  Rose’s magic surged, and with it, the viscous fluids increased from a dribble to a steady pour. In some places, it seemed as if the torso was almost ripped apart with the wild gushes of fluids coming from it as it writhed and screamed, its tendrils closing in around itself in some instinctive measure of self-preservation. Rose licked her lips, eyes heavy-lidded as she watched with a gleam of excitement.