by Carter, Mina
Reaching down inside himself, he called his lion to just under his skin, holding the power of the cat in check. Just. His fangs ached, ready to drop into his mouth, and his fingertips itched over claws demanding to burst free. Holding them both, he opened the door and glared at the man standing in front of it.
“You are?” he growled, aware of two things immediately.
One, the guy was both a lion shifter and not a lion shifter all at the same time. Two, he reeked of power, serious power, and there was only one creature that could combine both.
Sully blinked. “Shit, you really are a werelock.”
Hale Roark chuckled. “Yeah, I am. Was a bit of a surprise to me, too.”
He flicked a glance down at Sully’s partially dressed state. His lips parted, a sharp intake of breath as he scented the obvious. “Initially, I thought this might have been a bad time, but this is way more serious, isn’t it?”
Sully nodded, stepping back and sweeping his arm out to invite Hale in. “Very. You got any experience with magical injuries? She got into a tussle with the Latvarian wolves, took a hit to the side. When I arrived she was trying to heal herself, but it didn’t work and I can’t get the wound to stop bleeding.”
“Show me.” The man was short on words as he followed Sully into the main room. As soon as he saw Meredith stretched out on the couch, his eyes narrowed.
Sully watched as Hale knelt next to her, alert to any threat to his mate. The werelock lifted his hands, holding them over her side as he chanted soundlessly. Sully’s nose prickled, his eyes watering as magic filled the room. It engulfed Hale’s hands in a golden glow, leaving a trail as he moved over her torso. Finally, after long minutes, he stopped chanting and stood up. Sully’s eyes cut to the unconscious woman. She appeared to be breathing easily and her color was much better.
“She’s been poisoned.” Hale ushered Sully out of the room into the hallway, keeping his voice low. “I would guess that the wolf tipped his claws with something, but I can’t isolate exactly what he used. I’ve stopped the bleeding and repaired what I can, but she’s powerful…I can only do so much. We need to wait an hour or so before we move her to a safer location.”
Sully frowned. “What do you mean? I thought werelocks were the shit when it came to magic? Aren’t you guys supposed to be able to go up against demons and the like?”
Hale’s lips quirked into a wry smile.
“Yeah, that’s what they say, but the thing is, the more powerful a spell slinger is, the less they can be helped by another. Your girl there,” he jerked his thumb over his shoulder, “is about the most powerful I’ve ever seen. Apart from me, of course. What do you know about her?”
Sully shrugged. “Other than a name, Meredith James, not a lot. She’s a suspect in a case I’m working, but the Latvarians got to her first. She managed to get away, and I tracked her here to find her close to bleeding out. That was just before you turned up.”
Hale nodded. “I’m not surprised she made it this far. Magically, she’s very strong. There’s something about her I can’t put my finger on, though…” He paused, looking back into the main room where the woman they discussed lay sleeping on the couch. When it became apparent he wasn’t going to say anything else, Sully cleared his throat.
“Might as well grab a drink. Coffee?”
Hale rumbled assent and followed as Sully made his way to the kitchen. Busying himself making coffee, he looked over his shoulder at the other man. He’d always assumed werelocks were a story told to kids, a fairy tale. But now that he looked at the guy, he could see there was something different about him. Something familiar. Very familiar.
He frowned as the kettle boiled. Hale had the same sort of weird buzz around him as the Cat…Meredith for want of a better name, although he knew deep in his bones that wasn’t her real one…did. Almost the same, but not quite.
“Are there many of you?” he asked as he searched through the cupboards for some mugs.
Hale leaned against the counter opposite, his arms folded over a broad chest. Like Sully, he was tall with the thick muscle of a lion shifter. His expression was neutral and polite but a flash of humor lit his eyes. “Magic users? You been living under a rock or something, bud? We’re like dog shit. We’re all over the place.”
Sully resisted the urge to shake his head. There was always one.
“No, I meant you. What you are…a werelock.”
The humor disappeared from Hale’s face. “No, there’s just me that I know of. Why?”
The kettle clicked off. Sully shrugged and reached for it to pour water into the mugs. Instant coffee but it would have to do for now.
“No reason. Just wondered. So, you think we can move her in an hour or so.”
Hale nodded as he accepted the mug Sully held out to him. “Should be able to. The spell I used has repaired some of the damage and should allow her to start healing on her own. Once she’s a little stronger, and it won’t take long for a magic user packing the kind of power she is, we can move her back to my place. I’ll be able to link with my mate and use the extra power to clear whatever shit they used on your gal from her system.”
“Yeah? Your mate is a werelock as well?”
Hale chuckled, shaking his head. “No. She’s a lion-shifter. Technically she’s both my mate and my familiar.”
“Oh?” Sully had heard all the stories about werelocks, but that detail had passed him by.
“It’s what gives us our power,” Hale explained. “Werelocks are technically warlock/shifter hybrids. Whichever side we come from, we need the other side to complete the process and bring us into our power completely. So…say your gal in there was a werelock, she’d need to find her shifter mate to access her full potential.”
Sully lifted his mug to inhale the steam rising from it, keeping the fact that he was fairly sure the woman in the other room was his mate to himself.
She was a magic-user and he was a shifter… He shut that thought down before it could form. No way was his little mate a werelock. It just wasn’t possible…
Was it?
* * *
Beth woke to a world of fire and pain. Every cell in her body felt like its own mini nuclear explosion, and she couldn’t help the soft groan that forced its way past her lips.
The sound allowed her to focus, though, and breathing through the pain, she forced her mind to cooperate. Sluggishly at first, but gaining speed, it pulled up memories of the deal with the werewolves going bad, her getting clawed and the long ride back as the poison worked its way through her body, attacking her link to the core of her magic.
She frowned, eyes still closed. The memory of pulling her bike into the garage was crystal clear, but then things started to get hazy. She knew she’d made it down to the basement to start casting healing spells, but those memories were all mixed up with the memory of a man holding her. More than holding her…he’d been kissing her, his big hands moving over her body, inciting feelings she didn’t want or need at the moment. His lips were carnal temptation itself and then his hand had swept up further, her body arching to urge him on…
The memories after that disintegrated into an inferno of pain. She reached for her magic to try and soothe it, only to find the access blocked. Her eyes snapped open to look up at her living room ceiling and she took a deep breath to force down her panic. She just needed to try it again, sometimes if she was tired or ill, it didn’t come when called.
Yeah, but that hadn’t happened in years, the little voice in the back of her head whispered, and it was right. She hadn’t had problems since she’d reached adulthood. Worry wormed its way through her veins. If she couldn’t reach her magic, she was fucked.
Male voices reached her ears and she froze. Keeping her hand pressed to her injured side, she rolled over carefully and put her feet on the floor. Both voices were deep, with a rumble that told her neither was human, but only one was familiar and tugged at something deep inside her.
The face of the guy who’d bee
n tailing her filled her mind’s eye, quickly followed by the memory of kissing him at the museum. Hard on the heels of that memory, her mind added the fractured images of her dream man and she sucked in a hard breath.
It hadn’t been a dream. That had been him. Heat and another, indefinable feeling, thrilled through her at the memory. He’d found her in the basement and kissed her like both their lives depended on it. Like they were the last people on the face of the planet and he couldn’t get enough of her.
It was intoxicating, delicious, and utterly addictive.
She looked down, realizing that her wound was dressed and bound more professionally than the kitchen towel she’d been using. And it was no longer bleeding. A frown creased her brow. The wound was magical and it had taken most of her energy to get the bleeding to slow down. She moved experimentally, feeling it pull under the dressing. Yet now it felt like it was a couple of days healed. How the hell had he managed that?
Pushing herself upright, she padded across the floor on near-silent feet. With the hatch to the kitchen closed, the occupants couldn’t see through into the lounge and, therefore, couldn’t see her. But she could hear them, loud and clear. Altering her position slightly, she peered through the gap between the hatch doors.
“So you live close by?”
Warmth filled her at the voice. That was her guy, she’d know his voice anywhere. He leaned against the counter next to the sink, a mug in his hand. She had to bite back a smile at the caption: Diva Princess in training. Now she could see him clearly, and in the daylight, she had to admit, he was hot. Everything about her yearned to go to him, a feeling that scared the crap out of her even as she admired him from afar. What was it about him? Why did she find him so fascinating?
Her warm and fuzzy feelings disappeared as the other male crossed her line of sight. Even though she could only see his profile and part of his shoulder, she recognized him. It was Hale.
Her heart pounded in her chest and she slid along the wall. She had to get out of here. There was only one reason a warlock, especially one from the family that had disowned her, would be here, and that was to eradicate the “mistake” in their bloodline. Perhaps because she was tired and in pain, tears drove hot needles into the backs of her eyes. She was broken—defective by their standards—and they’d already thrown her away. Why couldn’t they just fucking leave her alone?
The voices continued from the kitchen as she crept along the hall. There were two doors to the garage, which meant she didn’t have to go through the kitchen. But she’d have to be fast. As soon as she kicked the bike up, they’d be aware she was leaving. She couldn’t afford that. No, her escape needed to be clean and quick. Without her magic she was vulnerable, and with a warlock in the house, that meant she was fucked if she stayed.
Reaching the door to the garage, she paused by it and slowly wrapped her fingers around the handle. The door always squeaked unless you knew how to open it right. Rising on her tiptoes, she centered her weight and pushed down. There was a tiny click as the latch released. She froze, ears primed for any sound of surprise from the kitchen, but the rumble of conversation continued as before.
The door swung out silently into the garage and she slipped through, closing it behind her just as soundlessly. Without her magic, she was forced to improvise and grabbed the garden rake from where it leaned against the wall. Jamming one end under the handle of the door, she set the metal spikes to dig into the grooves of the concrete floor. It was the work of a moment to secure the door to the utility in the same way.
Speeding across the garage, she threw her leg over the bike. The keys were still in the ignition from earlier along with the remote control for the garage door. Fortunately, given her background, she was prepped for a quick getaway. Hitting the remote, she twisted the key. Shouts of alarm sounded behind her but it was too late. Kicking the machine into gear, she let go of the clutch and ripped the throttle. The bike roared to life under her and sped toward the opening door. It was just open enough for her to duck down under it without taking her head off and then she was out. The wind whipped her hair away from her face as she accelerated, ignoring the shouts behind her, and skidded the machine out onto the road and away.
6
Asphalt sped beneath her, eaten up by the power of the bike as she gunned it down the road. She hadn’t had time to grab her helmet, or any protective gear, so she focused on what she was doing. The last thing she needed at the moment was a tangle with the road at speed, especially when she was low on power.
She tested the link to the well of magic in her soul and got nothing more than a little ping, the tiniest trickle where before there had been a torrent. It was all she could do to pull enough for a simple illusion spell and weave the appearance of a full face helmet and a leather jacket about herself. While some states had different laws on protective gear for motorcycling, police officers in all of them would pull over a rider covered in blood. The effort made her head swim and she was forced to concentrate on staying on the bike.
That scared the crap out of her. She’d been injured before. Hell, she’d taken hits that would have killed a lesser magic user, but she’d always come back kicking. This felt different, though. Whatever the wolf had done to her had eaten at her magic, eroding it so that it was a mere shadow of what it had been. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the strangeness in her blood, the one she always ignored, kept pushing forward as though trying to get her attention.
She ignored it, brushing it aside as she concentrated on the road. She needed to make it to Astarte’s cabin before nightfall. Although she knew the demoness wouldn’t be there, too busy skiing in Europe, she’d at least be able to use the protection sigils embedded in the place and power up. She nibbled her lower lip in worry. At least, that was the plan.
The road narrowed into complicated twists and turns, forcing her to slow down. No matter. She’d have needed to take it easy along here anyway. The road to Astarte’s cabin was never the same twice. Instead, those who sought her were forced to look for markers along the road to show them the way. A glimmering sigil, a star within a circle, emblazoned on a tree trunk flared as she passed, telling her she was on the right track. Within two turns, though, the hackles on the back of her neck rose sharply. She turned the next corner and found the road filled with SUVs.
“What the fuck?” she muttered, slamming on the brakes and trying to keep control of the bike as the back wheel fishtailed wildly. She was more concerned with not spreading herself all over the side of one of them in a bloody mess than who they actually were.
“What the fuck do you think you’re playing at?” she yelled, tweaking the illusion around her to make it appear that she’d yanked her helmet off. Which was when she got a good look at them…and the amulets that glimmered on their chests.
“Oh shit.”
The Latvarian wolves. They’d found her. Shitshitshit.
Tearing the throttle back, she tried to spin the bike around and get away. She’d have managed it, already meters away and accelerating, but for the fireball that hit her back tire. The impact shunted the bike sideways and sent her spinning off the road.
Screams filled the air, hers, as gravity took over. She and the bike tumbled down the steep hillside, end over end, the heavy machine slamming into the ground next to her. She expected every moment to be her last, to be either crushed between the bike and the ground or have her brains dashed out on the rocks embedded into the slope.
They came to a stop at the bottom of the hill. For a moment, she lay there, too stunned by the fact that she was still alive to do anything but breathe. Then the howl of wolves cut through the air and she lurched to her feet.
Pain battered her body but she began to run. She didn’t know where—all she knew was that she had to get away. Now. Before they caught her. Because if they did, she was deader than the roadkill she’d almost become.
The howls behind her swelled in intensity. More voices. She risked a glance over her shoulder to see a horde of
semi-shifted wolves chasing her. Teeth and fur, all fixated on her with murderous intent. Digging down, she tried to find more power but it was no good. Her legs trembled, weaker with each step, and her side where the wolf’s claws had ripped into her skin was on fire. The air became thick, each breath like acid as she dragged it into lungs that wouldn’t cooperate. It felt like she was swimming through treacle instead of running.
The howls got closer and became triumphant. The bastards were celebrating their victory already. Anger flared but she had nothing left to give. No magic, no energy, nothing left to fight with.
The wrongness in her blood surged forward like it had so many times in the past. But this time, she didn’t push it away. Couldn’t. It was the only thing she had left. A tear tracked down her face, a sob in her throat, as she gave up and let it in.
Power the like of which she’d never known flooded her system. She gasped as her spine arched, her body twisting and contorting as what felt like lava poured through her veins. She jerked, like a marionette on its strings, and her bones crunched. Her body was changing, broken and torn apart by some strange magic. A scream ripped from her chest as her joints went the wrong way and she dropped to all fours. But the pain she was expecting as her hands hit the ground didn’t come.
Instead, she ran. Her body wasn’t broken as she’d thought. It was just…different. Her hands weren’t hands anymore. They were paws the size of dinner plates hitting the ground in a quick rhythm. Her spine bunched, powerful back claws digging into the earth to drive her forward as her tail lashed to keep her on balance.
She ran and ran, the sounds of pursuit falling far behind her. She didn’t look back as she ran toward safety. Whatever the fuck she was, she didn’t care anymore, as long as it kept her alive.
