Pack Violet Shadow

by C. M. Stunich

  Even though we were scheduled for coffee with a witch … and a prophetic reading of animal entrails, I was happy.

  And I would fight like hell to keep myself, my mates, and my pack that way.

  No matter what I had to do or what sacrifices I had to make.

  The coffee shop Whitney chose was on the far side of town, closer to the university than to the Pack Ebon Red property. And it was right next door to a magic shop—a Wicca/new age shop rather than a place for actual witches. Being a witch was not a profession. Witches were a species, not a religion or an aspiration or devil spawn.

  Well, at least I didn't think they were devil spawn until they started eating my people. Now I wasn't sure if their entire species was corrupt or if it was just this one coven. But goddamn, Coven Triad was making a pretty good case against their own kind.

  “Glad you could make it,” Whitney purred, leaning back in her chair and smiling at Aeron as she breezed past the rest of us and into the coffee shop. She bent low and let her lips hover over her girlfriend's for several long seconds before she moved her mouth to the side and kissed her cheek instead. “Take a seat,” the Maiden continued, waving her hand at us and then reaching down to the floor to grab a small leather satchel. “Witch hazel,” she told me with a curt nod. “As much as I could get without arousing suspicion.”

  I flipped open the leather flap on the bag and peeked inside to find six glass bottles of the clear liquid, little plastic spray caps on the top, ready to use and smelling like … nothing at all. So unremarkable they were, in fact, remarkable. Nothing in nature lacked smell like this. It disturbed my wolf side a whole hell of a fucking lot.

  “Thank you,” I said, and I hoped she couldn't read the cautious optimism in my voice. I didn't trust her for shit. Not even a little. Sorry, but that was the name of the game. I couldn't trust anyone … but my new mates. I wasn't sure how, exactly, the sex tied us together or why, but there were now five men blinking twice as brightly on my internal radar. Anubis and Tidus … they were still dim.

  We'd have to fix that.

  “No problem. And who's this?” Whitney asked, tilting her head back, her pointed black hat shifting slightly on her head as she stared the vampire princess up and down. The Maiden was dressed in that cool, urban vibe with dark purple lipstick with gold sparkles, matching eyeshadow, and skinny jeans. Her shirt was a crop top with the Coven Triad symbol on the front, and she had a million little items pinned to it or braided into her hair. Spells, again. All of them. She could probably blow up this entire city block with one tiny pin off her shirt.

  “Harlem Blood of Crown Aurora,” Harlem said, letting Numinous formalities slip over our meeting. She didn't bother to hold out her hand, choosing instead to stand off to the side, near the exposed brick wall on my left.

  “Our reason for the witch hazel,” I said as I took a seat across from Whitney and the boys fanned out to the nearby tables.

  “I'll order coffee,” Nic said, putting his hands on my shoulders and looking over at Whitney and Aeron, sitting close enough that their thighs touched, the sexual tension so thick between them it could be cut with a knife. “Do you want anything to eat?”

  “Yes,” I said—I was fucking starving—“just pick me out something that looks good.”

  Nic gave my shoulders a squeeze and moved up to the counter, taking Tidus and Anubis with him. Montgomery sat on my right while Che, Silas, and Jax occupied the next table over. A whole table of assholes, I thought with a slight smile. A whole table of men that I've been intimate with … One-Kiss-No-Date was no more.

  Okay, so I still hadn't gone on a date … but as soon as Silas got the opportunity, I hoped he'd still ask.

  “Harlem, can you sit down, please?” I asked. “You're making us all nervous.”

  With a sigh, she adjusted the hood on her sweatshirt, taking a seat at the table with Che, Silas, and Jax but focusing her attention on me and Whitney. Seeing a vampire waltzing around in the sun never got old, but unlike Julian, Whitney was a tad sensitive to the light. She had on sunglasses and a long-sleeved sweatshirt, her face buried inside the hood. Paired with leggings and Ugg boots, she was pretty much your typical suburban American girl. You know, except she had fangs and would rise from the dead at some point … But that was neither here nor there.

  “You want to tell me why you've got vampire royalty following your furry butts around on errands?” Whitney asked, leaning back in her chair, her coffee mug between her hands. I couldn't help but notice she had little charms pierced through the tips of her nails, more spells to protect against the world. How clever.

  “It's complicated,” I said as Whitney raised her brown eyes to mine, her purple and white feather eyelashes fluttering against her forehead as she blinked at me.

  “Complicated …” she began, and Montgomery let out an involuntary little growl, putting his hand on my knee for comfort.

  “Yes, complicated. As complicated as your people kidnapping puppies and eating them,” he snapped, closing his eyes for a long moment before he flicked them back open, his face calm once more. I didn't want to give myself too much credit, but I think the sex helped him with his temper. I think the sex helped a lot. Hell, it sure as fuck calmed me down. “So excuse us if we're not interested in divulging every little detail.”

  “Whoa there, down boy,” Aeron said, her eyes locked onto Monty's, her hand on her girlfriend's, a perfect mirror image to me and my mate. “Relax. I risked fucking everything to help you out. Whitney is risking everything to help you out. Cut us some slack.” She snapped the last word off her tongue like a whip, and I felt the stirring of fae magic in the coffee shop.

  The Sightless—the humans—sat around us completely oblivious to what was happening right in front of them. Any one of us sitting there in that coffee shop could've killed them all before they had a change to even register they were in danger. I wasn't sure if I felt sorry for them or if I were envious of their ignorance.

  No.

  No, I felt sorry for them.

  Humans were like pawns on the Numinous' chessboard. The only thing they had on us was sheer numbers. Their weaponry was impressive, but then again, a lot of Numinous worked in military or government positions and had access to all of the same technology plus their own natural powers. Really, humans were like … an aside to the goings-on of their Numinous counterparts. Keeping our existence secret was less for them and more because we were all so busy trying to hide from each other.

  Besides, you don't let the sheep know that they're in a pen, do you?

  “Harlem is an emissary from Kingdom Crown Aurora,” I said carefully, leaning back in my chair and flicking my eyes towards the boys. Jax, Silas, and Che lounged in their seats like they were bored, but to my eyes, their muscles were taut, their pulses just a little too fast. They were nervous, as they should be.

  “Ah, so the meeting went well then?” Whitney asked, sipping her drink and looking at me over the rim of the cup. The movement reminded me of this morning, sipping my own drink and watching Jax. God, the taste and feel of him on my lips … Subconsciously, I found myself lifting a finger up to touch my tingling mouth.

  “It did,” I said, still being cautious, still not sure who the real bad guy was in this scenario. I tapped my fingers on the table and wished I could set aside a day to go get my nails done with Faith. Not for me, but for her. I didn't really care what my nails looked like. And honestly, first time I shifted, the paint would flake off, but I knew how much Faith would appreciate the outing. “And I'm inclined at this point to believe that you're telling the truth, that Kingdom Ironbound and Crown Aurora are not connected.”

  “Not even fucking close,” Harlem snapped, and I saw the flash of fangs in her mouth. She paused as Tidus approached and handed me a steaming hot mocha—Nic knew all my favorite things—and then passed over an identical drink to the vampire girl.

  “Coffee?” he asked, his voice the color of sunshine and bright things. If I still believed in the
lupine and lunar gods of old, I'd have thought they sent Tidus here for a reason: to keep my spirits up, to keep my mates' spirits up.

  “Oh,” Harlem said, her cheeks blushing a ridiculously bright red color, “thank you.”

  I resisted the urge to growl at her, but I definitely found my fingers digging into the back of Montgomery's hand. I believed her when she said she was too smart to hit on my men. But I could also tell she was ridiculously attracted to werewolf boys. Her reaction to Levi during dinner last night was more than proof of that—she hadn't been able to take her eyes off of him.

  Tidus retreated back to the counter as Nic came over and placed a pair of cheese danishes in front of me and Monty.

  “Breakfast is served, Alpha,” he said with a slight smile, the smell of honeysuckle and pine wafting around, competing with Montgomery's fresh grass and rose scent. They were both beautiful, those smells. If I could bottle them, I would. I bet they'd sell like hotcakes.

  He disappeared again and I waited as Tidus and Anubis passed out the rest of the coffees and Nic came back with the danishes—we all basically got the same thing, probably for ease of convenience. But I thought it was sweet how they ordered for both Harlem and Aeron. Whitney already had a plate stacked high with ginger molasses cookies. I knew what they were based on smell alone.

  “Well,” Whitney said, clearing her throat, the charms on her nails clinking against her mug. “I asked you here, so I'll get this meeting started.” She sat forward and put her drink aside, leaning down to pull another leather satchel up from the floor. This, too, was covered in charms and trinkets, bits of bone and tiny glass vials. Good thing we lived in such an … open and accepting town. The Pacific Northwest was one of the few places in the world a girl with a witch hat and a sea of silver stars painted across her forehead could relax in public without being stared at. Go Eugene! Yay Oregon!

  I sipped my mocha and let the chocolate and coffee taste linger on the back of my tongue, cutting through the salty sweet memory of Jax's seed …

  'Don't even,' he sent to me as I glanced over and our eyes locked. His smile was tight, but his eyes were shimmering. 'I can … feel you feeling me, Alpha. My cock is already hard enough as it is.' He looked me up and down in my tight black American Giant tank and sweats like I was wearing a glittering party dress, and I smiled.

  Whitney pulled a purple suede wrapped item from her bag and set it on the table, untangling the leather tie and revealing a stack of tarot cards.

  Ah.

  Right.

  Tarot and then … haruspicy, the ancient Roman technique of reading an animal's entrails. Surprisingly, the magic really worked. I had no idea who had actually invented it, probably a Numinous of some sort …

  Some unsuspecting deer was going down today, but at least we'd eat the meat, so it wasn't a waste of life. My heart quickened at the idea of a hunt, and I couldn't stop a barrage of memories from my first time with Che flooding my brain, naked and wild underneath his thrusting hips …

  Mm.

  “I hate being the fucking Maiden,” Whitney said as she shuffled the cards in her hands, looking at me from across the table. “It was a position forced on me. It's based on skill and power.” She handed the cards to me and nodded with her chin. “Shuffle those for me, would ya?” I did as she asked, feeling magic whisper across my skin as the cards—these ridiculously ancient things made of vellum—brushed against my fingers. My wolf shifted and growled, recognizing the kiss of foreign magic. “And as the Maiden, I'm there to observe and keep peace, to cast spells of protection, fortune, love … but they don't tell me shit.”

  I tried to hand the cards back, but she shook her head.

  “Give 'em to your boys,” she told me and I passed them to Montgomery next.

  “Go on,” I said, picking my coffee back up as Monty shuffled the deck and then handed it over to Che. “So basically you don't have any information to give us?”

  “Nothing new,” the Maiden said with a long sigh, reaching up and adjusting the pointed black hat on her head. “But I know the Crone is planning something big. That little undead vampire brat you sent scurrying back to Kingdom Ironbound told his Queen you threatened war. War is what they want. I assume you figured that out already?”

  “We did,” I said as I switched my drink out for my danish and Che passed the cards to Jax. “But why?”

  Whitney took a sharp, long inhale and looked around the room. After a moment, she paused and snapped off a tiny dangling crystal from one nail, kissing it and whispering some strange words under her breath in a language I didn't recognize. She put the jewel on her tongue and swallowed it.

  “Checking for scrying eyes,” she added when I cocked a brow and wondered if she might be able to teach me just as much or more than Majka? But our magic was inherently different—even I could feel that. “Okay, listen,” she said as Jax passed the cards to Nic next. “There's a big spell on this part of town, one that stretches several blocks and encompasses both the Kingdom Ironbound Seat and the Triad Historical Society. It can be activated at anytime by either the Crone or the Mother. Once they do, it'll put every single werewolf inside of it to sleep. And when I say sleep, I mean you ain't wakin' up until the circle that's been drawn around the neighborhood is broken.”

  'Holy motherfucking shit,' Che said in wolfspeak, and the way Harlem jumped, I could tell he was projecting wide. At least I appreciated that he hid his surprise from the witch herself.

  “A spell,” I said, as I thought about Nikolina storming the door of the Triad Historical Society with an entire pack of Ebon Red warriors. And with all the alphas in town for the Pairing? They'd be with her for sure, all those alphas … all that alpha blood … all that magic.

  My skin pebbled with goose bumps and I felt my hands start to shake, putting them in my lap to try to deal with my adrenaline rush privately.

  'I've got you,' Montgomery said, putting his hand over mine. 'You're not alone, Zara. You're not alone.'

  “Yep,” Whitney said, putting the heel of her hand to her forehead and smearing the silver stars slightly. “Because the spell causes no harm, I was asked to help set it up. I declined, on the grounds that we didn't know for certain that it wouldn't break my Maidenhood.” And yes, it was exactly like it sounded; when a Maiden committed harm against others, her hymen would break and bleed red down her thighs, a sign that she was no longer a maiden but a woman. “But they still had enough power to cast it successfully. Right now, we're just outside the border. If I were you, I wouldn't wander around in a ten block radius of our building.”

  “And the map?” I asked. “The one that turned into black goo in my hands?”

  “It was a locator spell. It would've quietly bound itself to you, so the Crone could watch your movements.” The Maiden sighed. “They asked me to cast it, and I did. But weakly, so you could break it with ambient magic.”

  I looked across the table at her face, her ethereally beautiful face and I hated that all I felt was suspicion when she talked. It wasn't a healthy way to live. I hated it. I wanted to handle this Contribution, rescue my people … and live the rest of this year happily ever after.

  Hah.

  I had a feeling that was a bit of a pipe dream …

  “What about this …” I paused, searching for the terms Harlem had used last night. “This slow drain spell that's been eating away at my people for centuries?”

  Whitney's face paled, and she glanced toward Aeron for a moment, meeting the fae girl's glamoured eyes before she looked back at me.

  “How do you know about that?” she asked, and Harlem raised a hand.

  “I've known about it for some time,” she said, lifting up her sunglasses and staring the witch down with eyes the color of ice, pale, almost colorless. “What was happening to the wolves, it made no sense to me. I dug through old documents,” she added vaguely, almost like she was cutting herself off from saying something more.

  'Don't think we missed that omission, your majesty,' Anubi
s said, leaning back in his chair and looking cute as fuck in a red sweatshirt and black skinny jeans. He'd just look sexy instead of cute if he hadn't thrown on a pair of fuzzy black wolf paw slippers.

  Harlem narrowed her eyes and dropped her sunglasses back into place.

  “What about that?” I asked and Whitney shook her head, lifting up her palms.

  “I don't drink from the cauldron. My power is all my own. It has to be for me to keep my position, but the others … especially the Crone …” Whitney stopped as the tarot cards finally finished their round. Tidus tried to hand them to Aeron, but she lifted her hands up.

  “I can't touch them,” she said as Whitney snatched them back, breathing hard and shaking slightly.

  “I can't talk about that spell,” she whispered as she started tossing cards on the table in a pattern I'd never seen before, a seven pointed star called a heptagram with one extra card in the center. “I'm sorry, but … let's deal with one thing at a time, okay?”

  “You want us to just … let our people have their magic siphoned off?” Silas snapped, slamming his palm on the tabletop. “Does Allister know about this?”

  “Are you kidding?” Whitney said, flicking a sharp glance Harlem's way. “Nobody knows about this. He thinks that by sacrificing his people to be eaten alive, that he'll get some magic from the Crone as well as the alpha seat that's supposed to belong to Zara.”

  “Of course he does,” Silas snarled, clenching his teeth and glancing away, running his tattooed fingers through his hair. “Then why does he care so much about Zara choosing me at the end of the year?”

  “Look,” Whitney said as she studied the cards for a moment, nostrils flaring like she was frustrated with something. This tarot set didn't seem at all similar to the kind I'd seen before, sold in Wicca shops and printed with designs from famous artists. No, I recognized the Major Arcana—like the Fool and the Empress—in the deck, but the art stunk of blood, and it was violent, horrifically violent. I was surprised the Maiden was even able to handle it without losing her position. “Allister has a very specific plan in mind, but I don't know the half of it, okay? I'm not privy to negotiations, and even though he's working with us, he clearly doesn't like either the coven or the kingdom.”