Tracking the Bear (Blue Ridge Bears Book 1)

by Jasmine B. Waters

  Our mirth petered out a short time later and he helped me to sit on the floor.

  “I’m sorry about your leg,” he muttered. “Did I hurt you?”

  “A few scratches, that’s all,” I said, waving airily. “I’m not even convinced you made half of these. I tripped a lot when I ran last night.”

  “Why’d you run?” he asked. “It sounded like you would have been safe at that campsite. If you’d crawled underneath the barrier and prayed a little bit.”

  I nearly smacked myself. He was right. If I’d been thinking, I could have gotten inside the tent. I probably could have dragged Chance in with me, and we would have both been safe.

  “I panicked,” I admitted. “I wasn’t thinking.”

  “They have him,” he said. “I’d bet good money on that.”

  “That’s a sucker’s bet,” I said. Icy fear shot into my veins. Freyr said that the Aesir had threatened him. They’d been willing to use me against him. The head werewolf had been pretty set on turning me into one of his lackeys. I was pretty sure that the blackmail would work both ways. They couldn’t get to me, so they’d hold him, hoping to lure me, and hopefully Luke into the open.

  “What can we do?” he wondered aloud. “There were dozens of wolves, Lucy. I’m not sure I could take them on as a bear. I definitely can’t manage it human.”

  “And if the goddess is there again, she can make you transform,” I muttered. “She did it to Chance on the freeway. He nearly crashed. It was like he didn’t have will of his own.”

  Luke shuddered. “It already feels like that for me, Luce. I feel it coming on when the moon is full, and then suddenly it’s there, in my head and I can’t see or feel anything else. I just need to kill something, or I’m going to go insane.”

  My hands balled into fists again. I wasn’t going to leave him to her mercy. But what could we do? Luke couldn’t get near her. I realized with mounting terror that if she couldn’t control me already, she would be able to soon. I had a bear. In a month or less, she could force me to shift. She could force me to kill.

  The metal something bit into my palm again and I relaxed my grip, peering down at the object in my hand. There was a necklace in my palm. It didn’t look like much. It was a simple gold chain attached to a small teardrop pearl. It looked like something I could buy at Walmart for prom. I remembered Freya slipping something into my palm as I fell. Surely, this wasn’t the only thing she’d given me to survive.

  Luke glanced down at it and gave me the ghost of a smile.

  “You know gold isn’t my color, Lucy,” he teased.

  “No.” A voice agreed from the mouth of the cave. The red haired boy from the trail head was walking toward us. He looked more careworn than I remembered him a few weeks ago. There were dark circles under his eyes, and he looked paler under all the freckles. “No, but it was my sister’s.”

  I raised the necklace up to the light for him to examine. “Are you saying this is Freya’s? Why would she give it to me?”

  “I assume she charmed it in preparation for just such an occasion,” he muttered, smiling wryly. “She certainly had plans, my sister. I just wish I could puzzle out what those plans were.”

  I glanced at the necklace. The pearl shone innocently in the light filtering into the cave.

  “Is it a weapon?” I asked hopefully. He shook his head.

  “Defensive charms only. It’s meant to prevent magical interference. It’s the same sort of instrument the Aesir wore to fend off our magic in the first war. Of course, that was when they had considerably less magic than they do now. I suppose it was a reasonable precaution now that they are equipped with both magic and weaponry.”

  My shoulders slumped. I’d been hoping it would be simple. I wanted an easy solution, some sort of cosmic gun I could shoot to take the bitch down.

  “I don’t suppose you’re going to help us at all?” I asked testily. I was getting tired of his fortune cookie bullshit. If he was just going to pop in and out of my life at will, the least he could do was be helpful.

  “I already have,” he said, fixing me with a stare. “That bear saved your life.”

  “Thank you.” I huffed. “But now it’s Chance who’s in danger. I can’t just abandon him. Don’t you have anything useful to add?”

  He scratched his chin. He had a beard coming in. His facial hair wasn’t as impressive or sexy as Chance’s in my opinion.

  “I’m limited in what I can do,” he said. “Without Idun’s apples, our reserves our limited. Up to this point, I’ve bartered favors to accomplish what I have. I need to ration my power in order to prepare for battle. Frigg has already strained her abilities by forcing Kaswell’s change.”

  “Could we use that against her?” I asked. I thought back to the wolf attacks the night before. They had been smaller than Chance, but they’d kept him still, harassing him, tiring him, slowing him down. Maybe I could achieve similar results.

  “Perhaps,” he said, arching a brow. “What did you have in mind?”

  I stood, latching Freya’s necklace around my neck. Almost at once, the pain in my leg became distant. I breathed a sigh of relief. Without the pain clouding my thoughts, I could actually plan. Freyr watched me expectantly.

  I bent and picked up a rock from the cave floor. With the sharp tip, I drew a very wobbly picture of what I wanted on the cave wall. Hey, I’d been an athlete, not an artist.

  “How much power would it take to give me something like this?” I asked, gesturing at the wall.

  “You can’t be serious,” he said, looking simultaneously irritated and amused. “That will never work.”

  “Just trust me,” I said. “I know this better than anything else. How much power would it take?”

  “It could be doable,” he finally admitted.

  “Will you do it?”

  “This is still insane,” he grumbled. “But I don’t see we have much choice. Frigg won’t stop until Luke is dead. And you’re quite right, you’re the only one who can face off against her.”

  Freyr pressed his large palm over my pathetic drawing, and the section of wall began to glow with the same silver light of as my bear. I just hoped that the actual weapon would turn out better than my crappy drawing had looked.

  When he finally drew his hand away, he held my weapon in one hand. He offered it to me, looking skeptical. “This will only work short term. I can’t channel this much power infinitely. Not without Idun’s apples. You have two hours, no more.”

  I took it from him. The power buzzed between my hands, and I nodded solemnly.

  “I only need one.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Chance

  Being forced to remain in animal form well after the moon had disappeared was one of the worst pains a were-creature could suffer.

  I’d heard stories about it as a child. Bjorn the Terrible had been tricked by his lover into entering a mirror on the way back to his body. His soul lived permanently on in that mirror, while his body continued to roam, searching for but not finding him. The stories said he’d lived in agony for the remainder of his life, until someone merciful had smashed the mirror in to free him.

  And as an adult, I’d seen actual proof that it had been used before. Trapping someone as a bear after the moon had once been a common punishment for lesser crimes. It had finally been ruled inhumane in the 1990s and was banned in the United States.

  Even my brief experience with Frigg weeks before hadn’t prepared me for what I was experiencing. It was four in the afternoon. I’d been in bear form for fourteen hours, twelve of which I’d been conscious for.

  At first, it had merely been uncomfortable. During the night I was naturally inclined to stay in my more capable form. But as dawn had approached, I’d tried to resume human shape. I’d met immediate resistance. And that was when the pain had started.

  Frigg was all but crushing me with her power. If I’d been human, I might have been able to remain pliant. I could have watched and waited until th
e time was right for me to strike. But I wasn’t human. The berserker’s spirit that had wound itself so inexorably into the bear’s mind until they became one couldn’t remain still and do nothing under such an onslaught. We were being attacked, held down with our face literally and figuratively smeared into the mud. Pitting itself against Frigg was ultimately useless, but it still tried.

  It felt like crawling naked over glass. My bear tore at me from within, and Frigg’s power pushed me down onto the spikes. She paced a few feet away, looking as lovely as she had the last time I’d seen her. If it weren’t for the slight sheen of sweat on her forehead and the tremor in her fingers, I would have thought she was entirely unruffled by the whole affair.

  “How can you have lost them?” she snapped. “He’s one bear, carrying a human girl. It shouldn’t be so difficult.”

  “Something was masking their scent.” Cave wolf, whose name I’d learned was Calder, scowled at the mud at Frigg’s feet.

  “Something like what?” she snapped. “You’re wolves, for Odin’s sake. What could possibly throw you off the scent?”

  “After the apparition appeared we could smell naught but magic, my queen. It was as you warned. The Vanir know of our plans.”

  Frigg froze mid-stride, turning slowly to face Calder. To his credit, the wolf didn’t immediately grovel at the look she gave him. It promised murder. I struggled even harder, hoping the lapse would break her concentration and allow me to shift back, or hell, just move away.

  Frigg fixed me with an icy stare and her hand clenched ever so slowly into a fist by her side. A strangled sound escaped my throat. Phantom hands squeezed my intestines shut. Nausea boiled in my gut and my body heaved, trying to expel whatever had caused me such agony. I only managed to turn my head in time to keep the vomit from covering my front.

  The pain lessened a few minutes later, when her wrath seemed to have been sated. The nausea and muscle cramps remained however.

  My thoughts spun out wildly. This wasn’t right. The tales I’d been raised on had always painted Loki or Thor as the vicious ones.

  Mother Frigg was supposed to embody love, kindness and self-sacrifice. She was what most Nordic shapeshifter females aspired to. She was what the Proverb 31 woman was to Christians, or Gaea was to Neo-pagans.

  Had the legends always been false? Were the Gods as prone to selfishness and short-sightedness as the rest of us? Or had the loss of her beloved son, Balder, turned her into this hardened shell of a woman?

  I panted, but didn’t attempt to move further. She was back to pacing like a caged panther, and I didn’t want to draw her ire.

  “Send out more wolves,” she snapped at Calder.

  “That isn’t wise,” Calder murmured. “I’ve sent out thirty-five already. The humans may be slow, but if we go out in numbers they will take notice.”

  Frigg had her back turned to me, so I couldn’t see her face. It must have been a sight to behold though, because Calder the Cro-Magnon werewolf went skittering back a few steps, an unconscious whine slipping from between his teeth.

  “Find Luke Elmsong and bring him to me,” she hissed. “Before dark. I can barely restrain this one. I cannot force his cooperation if he takes bear form.”

  She couldn’t? That was news to me. Her hold felt pretty damn inescapable. A plan slowly congealed in my brain. Maybe, if I could keep her occupied until sundown, Luke could assume his bear form. It was sad really, that allowing the insane killing machine to rampage all over the campsite would actually be the lesser of the two evils.

  After a few moments of thought, I had an idea. Gods and Goddesses had to communicate with followers somehow. Most major religions posited that prayer was the way to open a dialogue with a higher power. So, I tried it.

  “Dear Mother Frigg, you are the bitchiest Goddess I think I’ve prayed to all week.”

  For a few seconds, nothing happened. She was still in conversation with Calder, still pacing a path from the constructed tent poles to me and back again. She paused halfway through a threat and tilted her head, as if listening to a distant sound.

  She turned half toward me, so I could see her profile. Despite the insult, she looked pleased. “Smart bear, figuring that out so quickly. But if you want to talk to me, you don’t have to preface every sentence with a prayer. I can hear you, if I listen.”

  Good to know. It would probably make the conversation less profane, in any case. There was only so much obsequious groveling I could take before I got snarky.

  “You won’t get away with this, you know.” It didn’t sound as cavalier as I’d hoped.

  She turned fully to face me then, and I was relieved to see that I hadn’t imagined it. She really did seem amused rather than put out. She’d dialed back the Stepford smile, at least. Calder was watching the one sided conversation with a bemused frown on his face.

  “Has the pain addled your brain that badly? Or are we really speaking in clichés now? I suppose this is where I say, but I already have?”

  “If you want to ride the witty banter train, I’m game. But I warn you, I’ve never been beaten.”

  Frigg flashed me a smile. An honest-to-Gods smile. She really was enjoying this. I tried to ignore the positive swell of emotion that came with the expression. It was difficult, like trying to scowl on a perfect summer’s day.

  “Oh, but you are funny. It’s a shame I have to kill you.”

  “What?” Calder’s head jerked around and he stared at her in alarm. “The All-Father said there would be only one kill. Elmsong has to die, but the girl would become pack.”

  “Well, that’s changed, hasn’t it?” Frigg said, bitterness creeping into her voice. “She’s a bear, thanks to that twice damned fool, Freyr, isn’t she?”

  Calder shuffled from foot to foot. “But he is right, my lady, if he said what I believe he did. He is no ordinary bear. He is a lawman. He will be missed.”

  “He will die,” Frigg said with a shrug. “They will appear to have been killed by the quarry they sought. Very tragic.”

  “You really think they’ll buy that?” I mentally scoffed. “A medical examiner will be able to tell it was done by wolves.”

  Her answering smile was so saccharine, I’d probably developed diabetes from being in the vicinity of it. “By the time your bodies are found, it will be impossible to tell.”

  Unfortunately, that was probably true. Even in high traffic areas, it could take days or even weeks for bodies to be found. In an area as remote as this mountaintop, it could be months, possibly years before we were found.

  She clucked her tongue. “No snappy retort? I thought you didn’t lose, Mr. Kassower?”

  “Why?” I thought desperately. “Lucy has nothing to do with this.”

  “No?” She raised a brow at me. “Did you know she’s been enlisted by the Vanir? I didn’t. But now that I do, I can’t simply let a Vanir challenger go. No matter how insignificant a pawn, I can’t allow her to disrupt our plans at this point.”

  “Pawn?”

  A lance of panic shot through me as a familiar voice carried to us. I struggled against Frigg’s power, which had suddenly doubled in intensity.

  Lucy crested the hill. Despite the pain and the panic, I couldn’t help but stare. Her hair shimmered in the mid-afternoon sun like spun gold. Her eyes were like shards of ice in her perfect face. She was covered in mud, dried blood, and the deep circles beneath her eyes said she’d had about as much sleep as I had. She was so beautiful, I might have wept at the sight of her if I’d been human. My love, my mate. She was here. And insanely, her presence did make the press of Frigg’s power less painful.

  Frigg’s hand clenched into a fist at her side. “Yes. You’re a pawn. Did you truly believe you were special somehow? Freyr is nearly as slippery as Loki. You’re foolish if you think you’re anything more than a means to an end.”

  “I’m the means to end you.” And she let the object tucked beneath her arm fall. A black and white soccer ball tumbled end over end toward the g
round. Just before it could touch the earth, Lucy pulled back one shapely leg and kicked the ball directly at Frigg’s head.

  The Goddess sidestepped the attack, looking unfazed…until the ball grazed her champagne-colored hair and singed half off it off.

  Frigg raised one shaking hand to feel the extent of the damage. “You’re going to pay for that, you little bitch,” she seethed.

  The pressure on me abruptly disappeared as the Goddess gave Lucy her full attention. I wasn’t sure if Frigg had forgotten me in her fury, or if she assumed that I was in too much pain to move.

  The latter was nearly true. Nausea still rose to choke me. I felt like I’d suffered a bad bout of the flu. All of my muscles ached, and it was an effort to roll onto my stomach. I had to resume human shape. If I did, the pain would lessen and I could help Lucy.

  “I hope that little trick amused you,” Frigg said, advancing on Lucy. “Because your little toy is gone, and there’s nothing stopping me from snapping you like a twig.”

  “Wrong.” The male voice that issued from the opposite side of the clearing was unfamiliar. Frigg spun to face the speaker. He was tall and broad, and even with his shaggy hair and beard, I recognized him from the pictures Lucy had shown me. Frigg only just spotted the soccer ball as it sailed toward her once more.

  This time, the powerful kick landed a blow directly in Frigg’s middle. She doubled over, frantically batting the ball away from her stomach. It bounced away from her, back toward Lucy. There was a perfectly circular burn on the front of her dress.

  Her flesh bubbled like grease in a pan and I got a sickening glimpse of her innards before her powers healed the worst of the damage.

  Lucy caught the ball easily with the side of her foot. I waited for another sizzle, or maybe the smell of charred meat as the ball melted her flesh. Nothing happened. Lucy positioned herself for another shot and pelted toward Frigg.