Cursed Wolf

by Stacy Claflin

  He jumped up from his seat as soon as he saw me. “Do you want to stay up here for a while? I’ll take that rain check now.” He embraced me and kissed me even more passionately.

  It took me a moment to recover from the kiss. “I, uh… We should join the pack. Gessilyn said she had good news.”

  He ran his fingertips along my jawline. “But you must be tired. You were gone for a day.”

  “It only felt like a few minutes. I’m fine. More curious about Gessilyn’s surprise.”

  “You still can’t remember what you were doing while you were away?”

  I paused and tried to remember. “I’m not really sure.”

  His brows came together.

  It was all a blank. “I’m not sure, but I’m fine, right? Let’s find out about Gessilyn’s surprise.”

  “Whatever you wish, my beautiful wife.”

  “That’s what I want.”

  “Then that’s what you shall have.” He laced his fingers through mine and led me to our closet, which was as big as a typical bedroom. It actually made me think of a baby’s nursery—it was the perfect size. Toby kissed my neck. “What are you thinking about?”

  My heart raced at the thought of bringing up babies so soon after marrying, but with the curse, I could say anything without fear of upsetting him. “Don’t you think this would make a cute nursery?”

  He trailed kisses to my mouth. “I like the way you think. We should get started on that right away.”

  “What?” I exclaimed. Even with the adoration curse, I hadn’t expected that response. “No, we need to get downstairs. I was just thinking of the future. Don’t you think we should have some time to just enjoy being together?”

  Toby pulled me close, pressing me firmly against his solid frame. “Whatever you want. Your happiness is my happiness.”

  I sighed, a sadness washing through me. Though I knew he meant what he said, I wished this discussion wasn’t happening under the curse. “I should get dressed.”

  He sat on the plush chair near the door. “It’s up to you, sweetness.”

  Of course it was. Pushing aside my disappointment, I hurried over to my clothes and flipped through some dresses. I didn’t have it in me to put together an outfit. All of my energy had been sapped while I was in the woods, for a day. Had I been fighting an enemy? Fallen into a trap and struggled to break free?

  Would I ever find out?

  “You know…” Toby’s voice broke through my thoughts.

  I grabbed a simple dress and turned to him.

  “If I’m being honest, I’ve actually put thought into baby names since you came back into my life.”

  “You have?”

  He nodded. “I couldn’t help myself. I knew we’d been given a second chance, and the one thing I’ve always wanted more than anything is to spend my life with you, and that includes raising a family together.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “I’m a man of many mysteries.”

  “Apparently.”

  “What do you think of unusual names?” He crossed one leg over the other and tilted his head.

  When he tilted his head like that, I would do anything for him. My heart raced. “What was the question?”

  “Do you like names that stand out?”

  “Sure.”

  “I was thinking for a girl…”

  “Yes?”

  “Lakelynn.”

  My heart skipped a beat. I couldn’t explain why, but for some reason that name resonated with me.

  “I don’t know if I heard it somewhere or if I made it up, but I love it.”

  “It has a nice ring to it.” I swallowed, not knowing why the name sent my insides in such a tizzy. My heart continued to race and my stomach tightened.

  Toby frowned. “You don’t like it.”

  “No, I do. I’ve never heard a prettier name. Really.”

  He held my gaze as my pulse raced through my body. After a moment, he rose and kissed my cheek. “I should let you get dressed.”

  “Okay.”

  Toby went out into the bedroom. I leaned against the wall and gasped for air. My mind buzzed as though conversation radiated around me.

  What was going on?

  “Are you okay in there?”

  “Yeah. Just getting dressed.” I threw the towel on the chair and put everything on, barely paying attention. In a daze, I stumbled out of the closet.

  Toby arched a brow. “Are you going downstairs like that?”

  I glanced down. The hem of my dress was stuck in my underwear. My face flamed at the thought of greeting the pack like that. I really needed to pull myself together.

  “I’ll help.” Toby came over and straightened my dress out. “There you go. Are you ready to go downstairs? Gessilyn just texted and said she has to get going soon.”

  “Just let me do something with my hair. You can go down if you want.”

  “I’ll wait.” He grinned at me.

  Why did I expect a different response? I gave him a quick kiss. “I’ll hurry.”

  “Please do.”

  I darted into the bathroom and ran my brush through my hair.

  Lakelynn.

  A mossy stone flashed in my mind, disappearing almost as soon as it appeared.

  I stared at my reflection. My face paled.

  What on earth was going on? Why was I having such a strong reaction to the name?

  Lakelynn.

  This was nearly as bad as the wolf essence stone calling my name. I glanced down at it.

  It glowed red and blue.

  “Lakelynn,” I whispered.

  The stone glowed brighter.

  Clink, clink. The brush fell from my hands and bounced on the counter.

  Toby appeared. “Are you all right?”

  I stared at him unable to find my voice.

  “What happened?” He dashed over and rubbed my shoulders. “What can I do?”

  “The stone. It’s trying to communicate with me again.”

  “This can’t be good. Why would it be calling to you? It’s not Fen—who would be behind it?”

  “I wish I knew.”

  He reached around and cupped it. A bright light shone. Toby flew backward, crashing into a stool outside the room.

  I ran over. “Toby! Are you okay?”

  He rubbed his back. “Yeah, I’m fine. You’d think I’d learn not to touch that thing.”

  “If I could get it off, I would. I’m so sorry.” I held my hand out.

  “It’s not your fault.” He took my hand, rose, and dusted himself off.

  “Actually, it is. I was the one who—”

  He cupped my face and gave me a mind-melting kiss that sent a shiver down my spine despite everything going on. Just when I thought my knees would give out, he pulled away. “It’s not your fault. The stone has done all of this—it called to you, it drew you to wear it, it zapped me. Not you.”

  I nodded, our gazes locked. My insides still felt like rubber but I managed to find my voice. “I… I, weren’t we going to go downstairs for something?”

  Toby ran his hands down my arms and took my hands. “I think so, but we could just stay up here and enjoy being together.”

  “Wait. Gessilyn has good news. We shouldn’t leave her waiting.”

  He trailed kisses from the corner of my mouth to my ear. “Only if you promise we’ll return here. Soon.”

  I swallowed and nodded. “We will. Apparently I missed our first night here.”

  Toby kissed my earlobe. “That you did. We both did. I spent most of the night making calls.” He kissed me some more.

  If we were going to make it downstairs soon, it would have to be at my lead. As much as I wanted more time with him, there were pressing matters—and with me around, he wasn’t going to make any rational decisions. I kissed his cheek and stepped back. “I appreciate your concern last night, but we need to respect Gessilyn. She’s the busiest and most powerful witch on the planet, remember? And she came here t
o help us. We need to honor that.”

  He frowned but nodded, seeming to struggle immensely against his emotions. “You’re right.”

  I squeezed his hands. “You’re a lot stronger than me. If our roles were reversed, I doubt I could fight the new curse as well as you.”

  “Thank you. I’m… trying.”

  “We’ll fix this. I promise.” I dragged him out of the room.

  Toby pressed me against the wall and stood just an inch from me. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay up here? I can make it worth it for you.”

  My heart raced. “We need to see Gessilyn. If we don’t respect her time, she may not help us again.”

  He wrapped a strand of my hair around his finger. “There are other witches.”

  I struggled to breathe normally. “She’s the high witch—there’s no one better than her.”

  “Technically, I’m the high wolf—if you want to use their terminology.”

  My pulse pounded throughout my body, tuning out every other sound. He was so hard to resist, and I didn’t want to—but had to. I ducked away from him, grabbed his hand, and pulled him down the stairs.

  When we entered the living room, everyone turned to us.

  “Why did it take so long to get cleaned up?” Soleil arched a brow.

  Toby squeezed my shoulders. “She was really dirty.”

  My mouth dropped and my face flamed. “Wh—what he means is that I was caked in grime. I… the… he…”

  It took me a moment to realize that none of the pack appeared to have noticed what Toby said, except Soleil who looked like she was holding back an embarrassing comeback.

  “You look great now,” Sal said.

  “Totally amazing.” Carter grinned.

  The others threw in their agreements.

  Toby leaned against me and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “They’re right, you know. You shine like the brightest star in the night sky.”

  I turned to Gessilyn. “Please tell me you can fix this.”

  “Between Soleil and me, I’m sure we can figure it out. In the meantime, I do have some good news.” She dug into her coat and pulled out a small brown satchel. The contents clinked inside. “Shifting rings. These are similar to ones I’ve made for other shifters. Give them a try.”

  Chapter 8

  Toby

  My breath caught in my throat as Gessilyn emptied the rings onto the coffee table. There were more than enough for everyone. I rubbed my neck, hardly able to believe we all were about to shift at will.

  “You really think they’ll work?” Victoria asked.

  I turned to her, my heart sinking. “You don’t think they will?” If she didn’t think they would work, they probably wouldn’t.

  She clasped the wolf essence stone. “I thought it had to do with the stone. It allows me to shift at will.”

  Gessilyn nodded knowingly. “We can’t get that away from you, so I used some of the magic from when I locked Fen in his statue-prison.”

  Victoria gave her a double-take. “How did you do that?”

  Gessilyn spread the rings across the table and gestured for us to take them. “I captured some of the magic that released when I imprisoned him. Then I copied some of the other shifter magic. Just try them!”

  We all dove toward the little table and grabbed the rose gold rings with tiny etchings. I held mine up toward the light. “What language is this?”

  “It’s the language of the earliest witches. I had to learn it to read some of the most ancient spells in the books.”

  I slid mine on. It felt like… a ring. Disappointment washed through me. Maybe Victoria was right. Everyone else had rings on, and they stared at them. Three remained on the table for the wolfborns. I turned to Gessilyn. “Are they supposed to do anything? Mine doesn’t feel different.”

  “The magic isn’t activated until you try to shift. I wouldn’t recommend doing that in here.”

  I glanced at Gessilyn, Victoria, Soleil, Ziamara, and Stella. “Do you mind waiting for us on the front porch? We’ll go out back and try to shift back there.”

  “Definitely disrobe away from us.” Soleil shooed us toward the back. “Go.”

  Laura stepped toward Victoria and looked at me. “You guys go. I’ll try mine when you’re done.”

  I took a deep breath and turned to my guys. “Are you ready to shift on a completely random day?”

  “In the daylight!” Jet exclaimed.

  The others cheered and high-fived each other.

  Goose bumps ran down my arm at the thought of being free of one of our curses. Perhaps being able to shift at will would even help us with Victoria’s newest curse. “Let’s go!”

  With shouts, all the guys thundered down the hall toward the back door. I turned to Victoria, placed my palms on her face, and gave her a kiss that sent a warm shiver zinging throughout my body. Had it not been for the new rings, I’d have scooped her up and whisked her up to our new room.

  “Go,” she whispered.

  I held her gaze for a moment before racing after the other guys. They had already placed all their clothes in the outside cubbies. I removed mine and shoved them in place. “Are we ready?”

  More victory shouts.

  “Let’s do this!” I held up my moon-ringed hand.

  We shared a round of fist-bumps. I couldn’t remember the last time we as a pack had been filled with so much excitement and hope. Maybe never before.

  Everyone stepped back. I closed my eyes, placed my fingers around the new ring, and focused on my inner wolf. I spoke to him, telling him it was time to come out so we could run around in the light. My insides prickled and warmed as he woke from his slumber and prepared for an unexpected release.

  Shouts and cries came from the other guys—the joyful pains of shifting.

  My skin heated underneath the new ring. Excitement ran through me at the prospect of the magic working. The warmth grew and spread. The heat intensified. Finally, my skin grew so hot I couldn’t stand it any longer. My eyes flew open.

  The joyous cries of shifting from the other pack members sounded more pained than happy. Some of them writhed on the ground. Others jumped around, pulling on their rings. My skin burned, and I couldn’t leave the moon ring on. I pulled on it, but the heat burned my fingertips. It also continued searing my finger.

  The wolfborns ran over, howling.

  Unable to take it, I screamed and looked around for something to pull off the ring. I saw nothing. Sweat broke out on my forehead and dripped into my eyes. I cried out again, but could barely hear myself over the sounds of the rest of the pack.

  “Toby!” Victoria exclaimed.

  Great. Now I was hearing voices.

  She appeared in front of me. My intense agony was causing hallucinations. I was in worse shape than I’d thought.

  Smoke filled the air around me. The pain on my finger grew worse.

  Flames!

  My hand was on fire. I waved it around and blew on it, but it did nothing.

  The imaginary Victoria reached for me and pulled off the ring. The flames disappeared, but my skin didn’t feel any better. She rushed over to help another pack member. The other women ran around pulling off burning rings. Only Gessilyn didn’t. She stood in the middle of the chaos, her eyes closed, chanting.

  I raced over to Sal and held my breath as I yanked the searing ring from him. It didn’t burn me, though his finger was in flames, and I threw it on the ground.

  “Thank you.” He ran over to a bowl of drinking water for the wolfborns and soaked his hand.

  Gessilyn’s chanting grew louder and dark clouds covered the sky. A wild wind blew, making it impossible to stand. I clung to the side of the house to keep from falling. With a loud crack, the sky cleared and everything turned silent. I stumbled backward and glanced around to make sure everyone was okay.

  They were. So was I. My hand no longer hurt. The skin didn’t even appear to have been burned.

  Once again, we owed Gessilyn big time
.

  Victoria and the other women helped the guys to their feet. I joined them and turned to Gessilyn. “Thank you. You’ve saved us once again.”

  She grimaced. “Except that this time, I put you in the predicament.”

  Jet stumbled over. “What happened?”

  Gessilyn turned toward the house. “How about you guys put some clothes on, and we can talk about this inside? I’m not a shifter, so this is a little awkward now that you’re all safe.”

  She, Victoria, Ziamara, Soleil, Stella, and Laura all headed back inside.

  Jet grabbed his clothes from a cubby. “This sucks.”

  “What are we supposed to do now?” Bobby pulled on a shirt.

  I reached for my clothes. “Gessilyn will figure something out. I think we just need to get the wolf essence stone off Victoria. Then between Gess and Soleil, they’ll be able to come up with something.”

  “I’ll believe that when I see it.” Sal frowned. “I hate to be negative, but I don’t see us ever shifting at will.”

  “Magic isn’t a science, you know. Gessilyn will figure this out.” I pulled on my boxers.

  The guys snickered.

  “Nice shorts.” Bobby smirked.

  I glanced down at my black silk, red-and-pink heart-patterned underwear Victoria had picked out for me. “Nice tighty-whities.” I gave him a playful shove. “You’re just jealous because you don’t have a hot wife who picks out your skivvies.”

  We all teased each other as we finished getting dressed and then headed inside. The delicious aromas of steak, chicken, roasted vegetables, and garlic led us to the kitchen.

  Laura waved us in while Stella and Ziamara set the table. “I thought you might be hungry after that ordeal, so I’m warming up last night’s leftovers—there are plenty since we all ended up searching for Victoria.”

  “Where is she?” I asked.

  Laura stirred something in a pot and smiled sadly. “She wanted everyone to think clearly while we discussed this, so she went for a walk. Said she might stop in at the Faeble.”

  I smacked my forehead. “That’s exactly what she was doing when she disappeared yesterday! Did someone go with her?”

  “Soleil did. She wants to see what she can do with the essence stone—if anything.”