The Spell

by Heather Killough-Walden

  She’d been dreaming. She remembered that now. Her mouth was dry. She licked her lips. The dream had started out good. Lucas had been there… but then the other one had come.

  Phelan.

  A hard shiver ran through Danny and she shut her eyes, instantly grateful for the dormancy shield she once more wore. It was her security blanket now. With Lucas gone… there remained only one werewolf that she could successfully mate with. And she would rather die than let him touch her.

  These thoughts raced quickly through her mind, melding together in the barely-awakened state of her brain. But they flew from her consciousness, leaving it blank and alert when a sudden, strange perception washed over her.

  The house was quiet. But she wasn’t alone in her room.

  She tried to rise to a sitting position, a fresh scream bubbling up in her throat, but it was too late. The tall form against the wall rushed her with blinding speed, silencing her cry with a strong hand over her mouth. Her body was smothered in her attacker’s weight and she barely had time to blink before her wrists were trapped in a single steel-like grip. Without the ability to use her hands or speak any words, she had no access to her magic.

  Not that she could have cast anything at that moment anyway. Fear was leaving a sour taste on her tongue and muddling any ability to think clearly. She thought she heard death breathing down upon her when her attacker leaned forward and growled against her lips.

  A werewolf. She recognized the feeling now. It was an intense kind of power, a wave of harsh, animalistic might that made her legs go numb in her bed. The growl was low and long and rumbled like distant thunder. It was a quiet warning.

  She tried to make out his face in the darkness, but the moon was behind him. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t think. She could barely breathe.

  And then he was lifting off of her and taking her with him. He moved so fast, she was certain he would wrench her arms out of their sockets, but somehow, he managed to contain her without harming her.

  Her mouth remained covered, forever denying her access to her spells, even as her wrists were captured behind her back. She felt more than heard the clicking of metal sliding into place and her mind registered the telltale signs of handcuffs being snapped shut. There were a few things she could do without having to move her hands or speak magic words, but at the moment, they eluded her.

  She felt strange. Fuzzy.

  Sick.

  In the next instant, her body was lifted into a pair of hard, strong arms. They came around her like steel bands, smashing her to an equally hard chest. All the while, sound remained forbidden to her where his hand clasped so firmly over her lips.

  She felt the earth shift, saw the room blur, and knew he was moving. It was a werewolf speed, too fast for a mortal to distinguish, and it was dizzying to witness. Instinct forced her eyes shut as the werewolf shot through the second story window and fell, taking her with him.

  She would have screamed had she any breath. But the scream would have been absorbed and muffled anyway – and in the end, there turned out to be no need. Her abductor fell the two stories and landed expertly, absorbing the impact with both legs, keeping her from being jarred with the sudden stop.

  Then he was moving again. Once more, his speed was too fast and Danny became instantly dizzy. She fought the dizziness, stubbornly trying to keep track of where he was taking her. She didn’t bother trying to struggle. Strength-wise, she knew she had nothing on a werewolf, and her magic was AWOL.

  The forest closed in on either side and Danny gave into instinct and closed her eyes once more.

  Chapter Eight: “The Pledge”

  Danny couldn’t be sure how much time passed before the werewolf was slowing, but her shoulders ached from the position her arms were cuffed in and she had to fight not to tear up because she knew that if her nose got stuffy, she wouldn’t be able to breathe. She felt exhausted, though she was positive it had only been minutes.

  She finally opened her eyes when a shadow fell over her. They were in a cave. At least, that was what it looked like from her perspective. She could see a shelf of black rock above them and a gray-white opening of fog and ocean twenty to thirty meters away.

  Before she could get a look at anything else, the werewolf was releasing her mouth and spinning her around, one hand wrapped firmly around her neck. She blinked and gasped in a quick breath before she was slammed up against the cold stone wall. She winced as the cuffs bit into her flesh, but he seemed to pull back just a little, affording her enough room that they didn’t damage her.

  And then her abductor’s face was lowering to within an inch of hers.

  Deep, dark eyes pinned her to the spot, their depths glittering with galaxies of untold secrets.

  Lucas!

  Danny’s mind reeled at the sight of him and her heart skipped a painful beat. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Was she still dreaming? Was this a strange, cruel twist to her werewolf nightmare? She tried to say his name, but his grip tightened around her throat, crushing the sound before it could be made.

  He shook his head, just once, slowly from side to side. “Not a word, witch,” he warned. He must have seen the confusion in her eyes because the corners of his mouth turned up in a heartless sneer, revealing fully elongated fangs. He wasn’t hiding his monster from her now. He’s not hiding….

  Because he knows, she thought frantically. He knows I’m a witch. He caught the scent. And that was why he didn’t want her to speak. He knew she could use her magic that way.

  She stared up into his harsh but handsome face and noted the way the shadows fell across his features, making them hard. He was radiating anger and it tore at her. He hates magic.

  If Lucas knew that she was a witch, then he also knew that she was well aware of who he was. Lucas Caige was nearly notorious in magic-user circles. The former alpha had gone on a warlock hunt through all of Australia when his brother had gone missing and was declared by the Clan Council to be dead. Byron Caige had run afoul of a warlock. And that never ended well.

  Regardless, Caige and his family were practically household names among witches and wizards everywhere. Magic users worked closely with the Council in many matters and there wasn’t much the Council did that went unnoticed by coven heralds.

  Caige knew what she was now. And he knew she was aware of who he was too. There was no longer any point in hiding.

  That said, it was clear he wasn’t happy with her being a witch. So Danny was exceedingly grateful that she’d chosen to put back up her dormancy shield as soon as possible after her night with Imani. This was painful enough as it was. Allowing him to find out she was not only a witch but his dormant as well would be sheer hell.

  “You’re Dannai,” he told her, hissing the words across her lips. “Dannai the Healer,” he said, giving a harsh laugh and shaking his head as if disgusted with himself. “I can’t believe I didn’t see it before. But of course, ” he spat. “Danny is short for Dannai.”

  Despite his anger, despite his cruelty in this abduction, Danny felt at odds with herself this close to him. She had been enveloped with a cold and mind-numbing fear when he’d taken her from her room and she hadn’t known who he was.

  But now…. That fear had morphed somehow. She was no longer terrified. She was frightened, but it was a different kind of frightened. And he was doing things to her. She couldn’t help but get lost in the depth of his gaze. She couldn’t help but notice the way his grip had almost instantly eased up on her throat – as if he had only wanted to warn her and not hurt her. In fact, nothing he had done so far had caused her any real pain. He’d been gentle… in so far as an angry werewolf was capable of tenderness.

  His body was radiating heat. She could feel it coming off of him in waves. It warped the air between them, chasing away the cold that had stolen over her. Her stomach felt heavy, her legs wobbly.

  She glanced at his lips and the fangs that threatened so white and sharp behind them. He was beautiful. Even that most
deadly part of him turned her on.

  She looked back up into his eyes and felt a tremor rip through her. She wanted to kiss him. There. In that moment. It was absolute, stark raving madness.

  Caige watched her in silence, studying her as if he could read every thought that raced through her mind. The harshness of his features seemed to relax a bit, softening ever so slightly. His brow furrowed. But his fangs remained bared.

  “Why did you lie to me?” he asked her then. His tone was demanding, half growl and half question. “And be careful how you answer, Dannai,” he warned. His gaze narrowed on her dangerously and he leaned in to finish the threat. “Because if a single syllable of incantation leaves these precious lips, I will choke the life from your body.”

  Danny listened to the sound of her own ragged breathing as he let up on her throat a little more and waited.

  He doesn’t trust me, she thought. I’m crazy about him and he hates me. He probably thinks I’m in league with a warlock and was luring him into some kind of trap. No wonder, she thought. No wonder he’s looking at me like that.

  But she wasn’t in league with any warlock. She didn’t want to lure him into any kind of trap. She just really liked him and she always had. And she hadn’t wanted him to hate her right off the bat.

  Why was she keeping these things from him?

  “Because of this,” she croaked out. Her voice was dry and weak, but she swallowed hard, cleared it, and went on. “Because you hate us so much, I was afraid of how you would react. I was afraid of this.”

  Lucas gazed down into her eyes for what seemed like an eternity. His expression was unreadable, and Danny began to fear the worst. He wouldn’t believe her. What reason did he have to trust her now?

  When he leaned in and she felt his thumb caress the pulse in her throat, confusion ripped through her. “Why did you let me get so close?” he asked her. His voice had dropped and the growl was gone. He whispered the question across the tiny space between them.

  And that was the question she couldn’t answer. Not without telling him everything. She couldn’t do that to him, not now. As long as he didn’t know she was a dormant, he could leave – he could go somewhere else and be free. Couldn’t he?

  Danny remained silent and, when she could no longer stand the pull of his dark eyes, she looked away, feeling something within her heart crack wide open.

  The silence stretched and the tension between them built until the air almost crackled with it. Finally, he released her completely and stepped back. Danny’s head snapped up in surprise. She was still cuffed, but she didn’t need her hands for every spell. His hand was no longer around her throat. Was he trusting her?

  “Very well, witch,” Caige said then. The hard angles to his face were back, and anger once more flashed in his eyes. His tall, strong form looked as hard as his expression, and it gave her a chill to see him standing there before her, looking like the very devil himself. “I have need of your services,” the devil told her.

  Danny blinked. What?

  “You’re a magic user and I just happen to need one,” he went on.

  Was she hearing him right? He wanted to hire her? After all of this? Right now?

  He watched her steadily, most likely noting every perplexed emotion that crossed her features. “I want you to find someone for me,” he said. “You’re supposed to be the most powerful witch in existence. So, I doubt you’ll have much trouble with this.”

  Danny realized that her jaw was hanging open and she snapped it shut. But she was still too stunned to say anything. Lucas Caige had kidnapped her from her bedroom in the middle of the night for no other reason than to hire her services as a magic user?

  The world no longer made sense.

  Danny gently tugged on the cuffs that bound her, just testing them out of curiosity. They held fast. She licked her lips and tried to ignore the ache in her chest; tried to ignore the man in front of her and all of the loss he represented to her in that moment. She could guess who he wanted her to find for him. The same person he had been hunting for decades.

  “You want me to find your brother’s killer,” she said. Her tone felt flat and sounded even worse. Dead. She sounded dead inside. As she spoke, she avoided his gaze. Instead, she looked around the cave. Battery operated lamps had been set up throughout the cavern, along with a space heater, blankets, and a large leather-bound chest that was closed at the moment.

  “No,” he replied simply, drawing her attention back.

  Danny looked up at him. “No?” she repeated dumbly.

  “No,” he said again, shaking his head. And then he smiled and it was the cruelest smile she had ever seen on a man. “I want you to find my dormant.”

  *****

  Lucas watched her closely as he made the demand. It was so easy to read her now that he knew. She tried to hide it, just as she’d hidden everything from him, but his wolf was on to her now. There would be nothing she could do or think or feel that he wouldn’t be aware of.

  Earlier that day, when he’d caught the scent of magic in her bedroom, he’d been stunned. But that was nothing compared to how he’d felt when he’d sensed her dormancy. He’d known it was hers, not someone else’s. It was a signature kind of scent. It was all her. And suddenly everything made horrible, perfect sense.

  At first, he’d been furious. She’d played him. From the moment he’d laid eyes on Danny on the side of the road after his accident, he’d fallen for her. Her eyes, her lips, her hair, her laugh, her stunning, perfect body – it had reached in and captured him and made him forget. He’d forgotten about his restlessness. He’d forgotten about his brother. Everything about her had seduced him into a false sense of security. For a while, he’d even forgotten about the fact that he was an alpha – and somewhere out there was his dormant, waiting for him.

  And then he’d caught that whiff of promise and it had her name written all over it – and he understood. Danny was beautiful and charming enough that any man would fall for her to some desperate degree. But with him it had been more than attraction. And now he knew why.

  His heart hurt now as he watched the panic cross her beautiful features. It was a very real, physical pain. He could smell her friend on her. He knew damn well what the two women had been doing earlier that night. He was torn between wanting to have been there with them – and wanting to rip Imani Zareb to pieces for touching his mate.

  My mate.

  Fucking hell, Lucas swore internally.

  He’d given Danny the chance to come forward about the fact that she was a dormant. He’d asked her why she’d let him get so close. It was her way out of the lying game she was playing. But she still insisted on hiding her true nature from him, despite the magic being out of the bag.

  Lucas wasn’t stupid. He could smell her desire on her. He was having the same effect on her body that she was having on his. Why was she still hiding from him? He could think of only one real reason. She claimed that he hated magic users and it was his hatred that kept her at bay. But she was more afraid of him than he was of her. That was patently clear.

  Oh little Dannai, he thought coldly. Didn’t the witch know that nothing stirred a wolf’s blood like running prey?

  At the moment, she was staring at him with wide kaleidoscope eyes. He loved her eyes. No one in the world had eyes like hers. They were stunning. He had to smile at the shock that registered in their multi-colored depths. He’d just told her he wanted her to find his dormant. He knew he was being cruel. He knew his fangs were out; he couldn’t help it.

  She’d brought it on herself and she was pissing him off.

  “Y-your what?” she asked. He almost laughed out loud. She was far from stupid, but he’d pulled the rug out from under her and she was on unsteady ground. He had her between a rock and a hard place. Just where he wanted her.

  “My dormant,” he repeated calmly. “I can sense her here in this town,” he went on, not exactly lying. “I’ve felt her from the moment I arrived. I know she’s here
and I know you can tell me where.”

  Danny swallowed hard; he could see her throat working. He wanted to kiss it. Hell, he wanted to sink his fangs into it and turn her and show her once and for all that she couldn’t hide from him. Not any more.

  “I-” she started to reply, but stopped herself and pulled her gaze from his again. The signs of her magic were all around her now. He didn’t know how he’d missed them before. Only a witch of her caliber could have looked away from him in that moment. A werewolf’s gaze was a powerful thing.

  She closed her eyes, pulled at the cuffs behind her back, and then leaned back against the wall. She was most likely feeling overwhelmed.

  Good, he thought. Let this hurt. Let it kill her until she gives in to me.

  “I will pay you of course,” he said, laying it on thick. “I’m more than familiar with the cost of this kind of thing.” He straightened, walked casually to the trunk against one wall, and lifted the lid, throwing it open to let it fall. “Take what you want.”

  The interior of the trunk was filled with several things. There were provisions for “roughing” it. And there was money. Lots and lots of it – piles of paper bills, fresh from the bank.

  Caige was a lot older than he looked, and he’d obtained quite a few valuables over the years. It didn’t hurt that in Australia, before his brother had been killed, he’d been a bit of a gambler. A good one. So, before abducting Danny from her room, Lucas had made a withdrawal at the local credit union. He knew Danny wouldn’t really be interested in it. It was there for show. This was part of the game.

  He watched her expression as he revealed the money and wasn’t disappointed to see several emotions cross her features. The first was surprise. The second was disappointment. The third was fear.

  It was the second emotion that he’d wanted to see most of all. To Dannai, the money “proved” that Lucas was serious about wanting to find his dormant. Which meant that he was willing to let Danny go. And she didn’t want to be let go. Her eyes made that perfectly clear.