Wolf Pack (Wolf Ridge Book 3)

by Jayne Hawke

  I raised an eyebrow.

  “You said that way too casually. And I’m assuming that means there’ll be some stigma if she chooses Set?”

  Amy gave a small nod.

  “It will be very painful. She’ll lose everything she ever knew, and the transition in magic will be difficult. And yes. Set witches aren’t always well received within the community. Many believe that the chaos aspect is too dark, and they believe that Set is more the darker, devil form.”

  “What do you think?”

  Amy smiled, a gentle knowing smile.

  “I think that Sky is a protector by nature.”

  I squeezed Amy’s arm, knowing that she was talking from experience.

  “I got extra pizza because wolves eat an obscene amount,” Sky shouted.

  Briar went rushing into the hallway, and I heard the sound of her absconding with half of the pizza boxes and running to re-join Adam. I wasn’t entirely sure what the siblings were doing up there in their rooms, but I left them to it. It seemed better to let them hide from the stress and tension if they were so inclined.

  “Come on before the terrible twosome eat the lot,” Sky said.

  “Don’t say anything. She’ll talk when she’s ready,” Amy whispered.

  I nodded. It sounded like a difficult topic.

  “We can trust her, right?” I whispered back to Amy.

  “More than anyone else.”

  I felt relief as an unseen weight lifted. Sky was a good warrior, and beginning to become a friend. We needed all the help we could get with this situation.

  “Find anything while I was gone?” Sky asked.

  I stole two pizza boxes from the four-box heap Briar had claimed. Briar grinned at me before she stuffed most of an entire slice in her mouth.

  “Such ladylike behaviour,” I teased.

  She swallowed down her food and grinned even more broadly at me.

  I shook my head.

  “Not really. I got the details on Natasha’s hate of Cole, but that doesn’t tell us anything about the Apophis witch. You?”

  Sky wrinkled her nose.

  “I have a couple of leads. I’m hoping to have something workable tomorrow.”

  “Tell me,” I demanded.

  Sky rolled her eyes.

  “I’ll tell you when I have something. Amy, got anything?”

  Amy placed a large pitcher of ice water in the middle of the table.

  “I’m working on some location-finding stuff. It’s difficult as I can’t quite pin down the witch’s magic. That’s the problem with chaos.”

  Sky nodded.

  I was itching to get going, but hassling the witches wasn’t going to achieve that.

  “Keep digging. Into the witch and Natasha,” Sky said around a bite of pizza.

  “We’ve been talking to our people,” Adam said.

  He had somehow managed to come down the stairs silently. I’d almost jumped when he spoke.

  “You have people?” Amy asked.

  Adam looked down and away.

  “Yea. We do. Anyway, there’s a fae thing going on. That uprising those pixies talked about in the cabin.”

  I wrinkled my nose.

  “They have one or two of those a year.”

  “This is different. They say they have witches on board.”

  I looked between Sky and Amy.

  “It’s not entirely unlikely. Some smaller covens are desperate for power,” Amy said.

  “Are they going to interfere with our hunt for the Apophis witch?” I asked.

  “Maybe. We’re not sure yet. We need more information,” Adam said.

  I exhaled slowly. The fae were such a pain in my ass.

  “I vote we ignore it,” Sky said.

  “Agreed,” I added.

  “The fae are always pushing and trying to claim their piece of the earth plane. It never gets that far, and I’m pretty sure they have people devoted specifically to making sure it stays that way. Let the specialists handle it, and we’ll focus on our problem,” Sky said.

  I took another piece of pizza and agreed with her.

  “What’s their deal, anyway?” Briar added.

  “Some people think they just want land and power, others think that Fae is losing its magic so they need to flee here. I once heard someone say they thought they could steal the gods’ magic if they got a good grip on the Earth plane,” Sky said.

  Amy laughed.

  “The very idea of them stealing the gods’ magic is completely absurd,” Amy said between laughs.

  “I wouldn’t put anything past the fae,” Sky said.

  “Is it true there are witches who capture them and try to harness their magic?” Briar asked as she sat on the arm of the couch.

  I guarded my pizza with bared teeth. Briar quickly looked away.

  “There are covens who try,” Amy said.

  “Some people are desperate enough to try anything, but there are those ruled by their curiosity. They have to pull things apart to see how they work,” Sky said.

  I wrinkled my nose, trying to hide my horror and understanding. There were people who kept garou as pets. It wasn’t a surprise that there were those who cut us into small pieces just to see how we ticked.

  12

  An unfamiliar set of tyres came up the driveway and I tensed, wondering who was approaching my home now. Briar was at my back in her wolf form, hackles raised and teeth bared as I opened the door.

  The car in question was a bland black car like those driven by people in upper management who wanted to blend in with their fellows. A pair of older people stepped out of the car. Each had touches of silver at their temples and hard-worn faces showing the creases of time. I sighed and held my hand out flat to tell Briar to remain still. They were councilmen.

  The woman, a witch judging from the pendant and the crackle of magic as she held my gaze, held her mouth in a thin line. I beamed at her; I’d had more than my fill of witches and was not in the mood to be chewed out. Her nostrils flared and her magic pulled tight around her, adding a cold steely grey to her dark blue eyes.

  The old cougar shifter with his tawny blond hair approached me first. His golden eyes pierced mine. Flickers of the dark markings smudged his cheekbones. I refused to look away and took a step forward. They were in my territory, and I wasn’t going to screw around showing submission. Council be damned.

  “You upset a lot of witches,” the cougar growled.

  “And killed prominent hunters,” the witch seethed.

  “I am trying to get Cole back. One of your councilmen,” I growled.

  The witch rolled her eyes. I snarled at her.

  “That is not the matter we are discussing here. You have caused a great deal of trouble to many people. You are becoming far more of a nuisance than you are worth. You will come into the custody of the council, and we will discuss how your guardian nature can be used in a beneficial manner.”

  Briar pressed against my thigh. I swatted her nose to make her move back. No good came from allowing her to bite one of them.

  I took another step forward, pushing the cougar to step back.

  “No.”

  The witch flushed red with pure rage. I crossed my arms and stood my ground.

  “I am neither a toy, nor a tool to be used at your discretion. I am a person, and I do what I must to keep my people safe. I couldn’t give less of a damn what you think of me, or the trouble I have caused you. A garou is currently being held by a very dangerous witch.” I turned my attention to the witch. “A witch that the witch community did absolutely nothing to stop or control. Apophis witches are dangerous by their very nature, and yet I have seen no signs of you and your council trying to stop him.”

  “That is entirely irrelevant.”

  “No. It is very relevant. You do not get to come to my home and threaten to put me in a cage when you do not do your jobs. Guardians exist to keep the supernatural beings safe. The council is supposed to keep their people safe, and yet, from wher
e I’m standing, you’re far more interested in lining your own pockets and keeping your own petty power. So, I repeat: No.”

  The cougar snarled.

  “How dare you! You arrogant little child.”

  I bared my teeth at him.

  “I might be new to being a shifter, but I was chosen as a guardian for a reason. We stand separate to created bodies such as your worthless council. And I will not be cowed by your worthless politics.”

  “You are a fool with no grasp on how this world works. Girl,” the cougar spat.

  “Do you really think that you can kill prominent, powerful hunters and have no consequences?” the witch sneered.

  For a brief moment there, I really had. There hadn’t been much time to really think about it.

  “Forget about Cole Loxwood. There will be other good-looking garou out there. If you really want to protect your precious garou, then you need to understand the position you have put them in,” the cougar said.

  “The Apophis witch is a far bigger threat than some hunters,” Sky said from behind me.

  “Forget about the Apophis witch. They are nothing and will be dealt with when the time’s right,” the witch said coolly.

  “I am a Morrigan witch and I have been tasked with removing the Apophis witch,” Sky returned.

  The witch before me paled a little.

  “And is your coven on board with this?”

  Sky stood a little taller and said nothing.

  “I thought as much. Your coven has the good sense to know how this world works. Be good little girls and stop playing with things you can’t possibly begin to grasp.”

  “I am a Ma’at witch, and my lady has tasked me with removing the scourge from this world. The Apophis witch is the top of my list, but I will be coming for you soon,” Amy said coldly.

  I’d never heard such venom from the usually bubbly little witch. It caught me off guard. She had moved Briar out of the way and stepped up next to me, standing tall and strong as her cold gaze made the councilmen step back.

  “You cannot threaten me,” the witch said quietly.

  Amy smiled coldly.

  “It was a promise.”

  13

  “Someone fill me in on what just happened,” Adam said.

  Sky sighed and Amy went to make coffee.

  “The council is corrupt, and I believe they’re siding with the Apophis witch, and possibly the hunters too. The Apophis witch has sunk his claws far deeper into the political landscape than I first realised. It means we’re on our own here,” Sky said.

  “Are you ok, Amy?” I asked.

  She smiled brightly at me.

  “Peachy. I’m feeling better than I have done in ages. Ma’at has given me something I can really sink my teeth into.”

  “So, we can’t trust the council? What will happen with the hunters?” Adam asked.

  “No. We can’t trust the council, and I don’t know about the hunters. We should have scared them enough to have a little breathing room, but there will likely be a big retaliation. Rosalyn’s going to have her work cut out for her as a guardian over the next few months,” Sky said.

  Adam’s brows furrowed.

  “You know we’ll have your back,” he said to me.

  I nodded and smiled, trying not to think about it. One thing at a time.

  “Cole isn’t corrupt,” I said firmly when Briar gave me a searching look.

  “No. He’s not. I believe he’s been trying to fight it from the inside,” Amy said.

  I relaxed a little having the confirmation. Of course, I’d wanted to believe he was innocent and good, but I’d been tricked into trusting Valentin. My taste in men was clearly imperfect.

  “There’s a chance that the witches and council will be trying to stop us from finding Cole,” Sky said.

  “How do we work around that?” I asked.

  My wolf side was itching for a fight. Tearing a few throats out might get them to talk.

  “Carefully,” Amy said firmly.

  I wrinkled my nose. That sounded slow.

  My phone began ringing with Cole’s ringtone. I raced to it, my heart in my throat.

  “Hello?”

  “Rosalyn, how good to hear your voice,” Natasha purred.

  I bit back a snarl and began pacing around the room.

  “Cole is a wonderful lover. I suppose you haven’t found out yet, and now you never will.”

  I exhaled slowly, refusing to rise to her bait. Silence stretched between us while I tried to listen for some clue where they might be.

  “It won’t be too long now until I kill him. Liam has promised me everything Cole should have given me and more.”

  Liam? That must have been the Apophis witch. Maybe that was a clue that we needed.

  “Poor little fallen princess,” I taunted.

  “Everything was stolen from me! I should have been on the council presiding over garou and helping move our kind into a brighter future. Instead, I was stuck begging for scraps. Cole Loxwood did that to me.”

  “From what I understand, your family did that to themselves.”

  “We were a proud and beautiful bloodline. We were pure and strong.”

  “And yet here you are.”

  “How dare you speak to me like that, you pathetic little turned? I will tear the mantle of guardian from you and take my people into a beautiful future.”

  “How original,” I said drily.

  Still there was nothing. Not a single sound besides her obnoxious voice. She must have been using magic to hide the background sound.

  She hung up on me. I threw the phone onto the couch.

  “The Apophis witch is called Liam. That’s all I have,” I growled.

  “No background noise?” Amy asked.

  “Not a sound. Absolute silence.”

  Amy pursed her lips.

  “That means another witch was there. Apophis’s magic is chaos, silence doesn’t fit into that.”

  Fantastic, just what we needed.

  “We can look into Liam, though. People are creatures of habit. There might be some clues about places he went, places he might have taken Cole.”

  I focused on that. We were getting closer. I had to believe that.

  14

  We ordered an obscene amount of takeaway and settled down in front of our laptops, trying to dig out what information we could. Adam had managed to find a couple of obscure books and brought them home to try and crack the book I’d stolen. The damn thing just wouldn’t re-form into words. I’d tried battering it with my guardian magic, but it remained moving squiggles.

  Briar sat next to me as we looked through the Grim trying to track down anyone who might have known this Liam before he went rogue.

  “Apophis witches aren’t born. They’re highly illegal. That means he was in a normal coven before he turned,” Amy said.

  Sky was pacing around the back yard glaring at her phone as though she could make it catch fire with her mind.

  The fact there wasn’t an entire coven of Apophis witches out there gave me some comfort. The world couldn’t handle the solitary witch we had, it certainly couldn’t survive an entire coven of them.

  “His goal will be to plunge the world into darkness and chaos right?” Briar asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  Amy passed me some pad thai, and I ate some distractedly while figuring out how best to sweet talk the witch I had in PMs into letting me see some of the lower-level witch stuff on the Grim. Amy had been put on a temporary ban since the library incident, which was all over the Grim.

  Once again I had to deal with seeing memes of myself all over the site. At least I looked pretty badass in most of them. A number of them had me in Indiana-Jones-style situations outrunning boulders and such. I could live with that.

  Word was that a few more people had tried to steal books from the library since. They’d had to increase security measures.

  The question everyone was asking was why I’d been allowed to ke
ep the book rather than having some awful arcane punishment meted out. No one had an answer, and that just added more pressure to my future.

  The witch I had in PMs suddenly vanished and took my hopes of getting into the witch section of the Grim with him. Liam was nothing more than a profile picture on the wider site, which gave us nothing. We needed to understand what his life was like, which coven he’d come from.

  No one was talking to Amy, and Sky was busy tracking down leads from another direction. Rolling my jaw, I tried not to let the frustration get to me.

  Sky came in and dropped into her preferred armchair with some sweet and sour chicken in her hands.

  “So, I have bad news.”

  I gave her my full focus, needing to hear this.

  “The witch, Liam, has been turned for longer than we feared. This ritual will allow him to become the avatar of Apophis. Cole’s going to be sacrificed in three days if we can’t get to him soon. The ritual itself is huge. They’re going to need a big clean space, and a good deal of desert sand, ideally from Egypt. He’s becoming the avatar for the god, which means he needs ties to where the god came from. Egypt has a lot of sand; sand’s easy, particularly given Apophis is chaos. If this were Bast, maybe they’d look into an Egyptian cat. Anyway. I think if we can track that shipment of sand, we’ll be onto something. Unfortunately, it appears that Liam has been gathering sycophants and allies. We were right about the council. He has a lot of them in his pocket, so they’re likely to be getting in our way. There are whispers that he also has some fae and, potentially, entire covens on his side. I don’t know how the covens work, given they have their own gods.” Sky held her hands up. “I’m just passing on what I found out.”

  Three days was doable. We’d find him before then.

  “I’ll see if Ma’at will shine any light on this,” Amy said.

  “Adam and I can ask around about any weird sand shipments,” Briar said.

  “Tell me exactly what type of space we’re looking for, and I’ll compile a list,” I said.

  Sky nodded and smiled. There was a slight dullness to her that I hadn’t seen before.

  “We’re going to win this battle,” I said firmly.