by Laken Cane
She flung it at the hag.
Again, the bitch stopped it.
And then she blasted Abby with an explosive red and black stream that hit her square in the chest. Abby was hurled backward, only stopping when a tree got in her way. Unable to breathe, she bounced off the tree trunk and hit the ground, but she set her teeth and flung herself right back into the fight.
Three things had helped prepare her for that day.
Her practice, her round with Acadia’s minions, and the fact that Waifwater Woods had yanked out whatever hidden darkness and power had lain dormant inside her and forced it to the surface.
It was all there, waiting for her to utilize it.
The dogs screamed as they not only distracted two of the hags, but eased the sting of the magic bombarding Abby.
They’d fight with everything they were, and the hags would do well not to underestimate them. At that exact second, Sadie broke through the barriers her foe had erected and tore out the woman’s throat.
The hags were powerful, but they were rusty—perhaps because they hadn’t had to fight magic for a very long time. All they’d done was use their power to trap innocents to devour.
And that made them vulnerable.
Or maybe Abby and her familiars were just stronger.
One down.
Two to go.
Abby swung her staff and shoved the glowing, fiery tip at the hag she fought, and it was like pushing it through thick, sticky tar. But her staff was not only created from her obedient wand, it was also part Camilla—strong, angry, and mean. The heavy, twisted staff pushed itself through that tarry magic, and though the hag pushed back as hard as she could, shrieking incantations from her toothless maw, Abby pushed forward with a relentless strength the old witch could not halt.
The staff broke through the barrier of power with a suddenness Abby wasn’t expecting, and drove itself through the hag’s heart with a force that split the old woman in half.
Abby stood, dazed and disbelieving, as the two halves separated with a thick, sucking sound before they fell slowly to the ground in a mess of blood and gristle. And finally, she remembered one very important thing.
She needed one of the hags to reverse the spell on Eli. It was their spell, and Abby could not break another witch’s spell. At least not quickly.
She gasped and spun to face the other hag; both Sadie and Elmer were attacking her—Elmer leapt for her throat as Sadie broke through the magic surrounding her and sank her teeth into the woman’s back.
“Stop,” Abby cried.
If she’d been a second later with her command, it would have been too late.
The hounds dropped the ground immediately, and the hag stumbled, then fell between them. Sadie put her paw on the woman’s throat and held her there.
Abby shot a glance at Eli as she hurried toward the hag. He was unmoving, still in wolf form, but she could feel him watching her.
He seemed unable to shift back to human form. The hags had wanted his wolf.
She hit the hag with a spell to paralyze her, then knelt at her side. She wouldn’t have much time. Another witch would have automatic protections and would be able to counteract the paralytic spell in minutes.
“You will remove the spell from the wolf,” she commanded the hag. “And I will let you live. If you refuse, I will pluck out your eyes and force you to roam these woods blind and alone for eternity. Do you understand me?”
There was nothing hesitant in her voice, nothing that would have made the hag doubt her. Still the old witch stared at her with loathing and a coldness so severe that Abby shivered to see it.
Abby stood, then closed her eyes to concentrate and wrapped a binding around the hag’s body, and when she was finished and the restraints were secure, she lifted the hag and floated her toward Eli, directing her movements with her staff.
“Are you both okay?” she asked the hounds, without taking her stare off the hag. Sadie and Elmer huffed gently in answer, then Sadie loped toward the wolf.
Elmer followed her. Sadie sat at Eli’s shoulder, watching Abby expectantly, and Elmer flopped down beside the alpha and began licking his face.
The wolf growled, but gently.
When he saw the hag, though, his growls became louder, harder, and tinged with apprehension.
The horror of what he’d gone through would likely never leave him.
Abby swallowed her tears and leaving the hag floating in midair, she lifted the paralysis.
At once, the hag began muttering incantations, but Abby pushed the end of her staff into the hag’s mouth, effectively silencing her.
“You’ll have one chance to free him,” she told the old woman. “One chance. You have five seconds before I shove this staff into your eyes. Do it. Now.”
She yanked the staff from the witch’s mouth, but instead of beginning the reversal, the hag spoke to her.
“I’ll make at trade.” Her voice was high and wavering and for a second she looked like someone’s elderly grandma. But there was no mistaking the wickedness that shone from her tiny black eyes. “I will free the wolf if you give me one of your dogs. I’ll need a companion since you took my sisters.” She spat at Abby, narrowly missing her with a glob of green tinged spittle.
Elmer stopped licking Eli and whined, then laid his chin on his paws. He’d do whatever she told him to do.
Even if he didn’t want to.
Abby looked at her alpha, who watched them all quietly. He was unable to move, unable to think exactly as he would when he was in his human form, but he understood what they were saying.
Abby took a deep breath.
Give one of her familiars to the evil, horrible hag?
Hell no.
“I warned you,” she said, and she shoved her staff into the hag’s left eye.
The old witch shrieked and shook her head violently, but she couldn’t move her hands to touch her wound. And she could not heal herself.
Abby flung the eyeball to the ground.
“You have one more chance,” she said, her cold voice rising over the shrieks. “And you have one more eye. Release him now and retrieve your eyeball from the dirt, or refuse and lose them both forever.” She held the staff over the witch’s right eye. “Your choice.”
The hag released the wolf.
And never again would a fight between wolves, no matter how bloody and vicious, seem quite as brutal as it had to her before she’d entered the woods. Before she’d brutalized the hags.
The wolf struggled to his feet, disoriented and in pain, and limped away into the dark trees. He would regain his ability to heal and would do so before shifting to his human form.
“Follow him,” she whispered, and her familiars rushed after the alpha.
Abby would join them, but first…
She circled the old woman, muttering, touching the unmoving body with her staff. When she was finished, she strode away, leaving the hag hanging upside down in midair.
The witch wouldn’t be able to move for at least an hour, but then the spell would dissipate and she’d be free to retrieve her eye and begin to heal.
Abby had wanted to kill the hag before she caught someone else to torture, but she’d made a deal. She’d given her word, and she would not break it.
“Eli,” she called, and hurried after her alpha.
It wasn’t time to go home, much as she needed to. Her sister was hunting a demon witch, and no matter how strong she was, she would need backup.
And Abby was not her father. She would not leave Jewel alone to face torment and death.
As much as she wished otherwise, they could not go home.
Not yet.
She had a feeling it would be a long, torturous time before they could wrench themselves from the dark clutches of Waifwater Woods.
Chapter Eighteen
By the time Abby found the alpha and the hounds, Eli was in the process of changing back to his human form. She stood back, suddenly shy, and waited for him to shift.
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Sadie and Elmer lay a few yards away, sprawled out under the cold moon, dozing. Elmer opened one eye when she approached, then gave a yawn and went back to sleep.
She pulled a container of water from her pack and finally, when Eli stood tall and naked and silent, she tossed it to him.
She stared at him as he drank. He downed the entire canteen, then screwed the cap back on and stood watching her as she watched him.
“Abby?” he asked, at last, and there was something so raw and vulnerable in his voice that she couldn’t hold back a second longer.
She no longer cared that he’d fought and killed the man who’d challenged him. No longer cared that his nature was violent and hard and aggressive and sometimes cruel. What they’d lived through, what they were still living through, it kicked that shit in the head and sent it packing.
She’d thought she’d lost him. Forever.
And she realized that no matter what, Eli Dean was the man she loved. She loved him—every part of him. The good, the bad, the wolf, the man.
She threw herself at him, sobbing with relief and realization and overwhelming joy. “Eli,” she cried. “Eli.”
He buckled beneath her slight weight and sank to the ground, holding her so tightly she couldn’t draw a breath.
“It’s you,” he murmured, hoarsely. “Isn’t it?”
Maybe he thought she wasn’t real, that he was dreaming, that his mind had broken beneath the horror of the hags.
“I’m here. I’m here, Eli.” She was almost unable to get her voice above a whisper, but he heard her. She ran her hands over his beloved face and his familiar body, looking for injuries.
He shook his head, and finally, his voice changed to something close to awe. “Abby?”
“Hi,” she said, smiling.
“It’s really you.” He pointed his chin at Sadie and Elmer. “And the dogs.” His voice deepened, and his eyes held a look that said he still wasn’t sure if what he was seeing was real. “You came for me.”
“God, Eli,” she whispered. “Of course I did.”
“Your face,” he said, hoarsely. “Your incredible face.”
“You can see me.” At last.
“I see you. What a goddamn fucking beautiful woman.” He closed his eyes, then buried his face in the warmth of her neck. “My woman.”
He saw her.
She would likely change back when she left the accursed woods, but he’d seen her true face. He would not forget it.
“You came,” he whispered, again. “I didn’t think I’d see you again.” He stood, lifting her with him, then let her slide down his body until she was standing, wrapped in the circle of his arms.
“I feared that myself,” she said, her lips moving against the bareness of his chest. “But that was not an outcome I could live with.”
He buried his fingers in her hair. “Look at me. Let me look at you.”
She lifted her face and stared up at him, sure her heart was in her eyes. His eyes were stark and too wide and still full of the horror he’d been forced to endure, and she knew that just as he’d never lose the look of her face, he’d never lose that horror. Not completely. It was part of him now.
“You’re injured,” she murmured.
He shook his head. “I’m alive. You saved my life. And my sanity. And you’ve given me…” He pressed his lips together, then continued. “You’ve given me everything.”
She smiled, but could feel the tears in her eyes, blurring the world.
He leaned forward to kiss her forehead. “My thanks are not enough.”
“Your thanks are not necessary.”
“You shouldn’t have come.”
She flinched away. “What?”
“I don’t want you stuck here, Abby. I don’t want you to live in this world. It’s a hellish place. You don’t belong here.”
She straightened her shoulders. “We’re not staying.” She slid her hands down his arms and laced her fingers with his. “After I help my sister kill a certain demon witch, we’re all going home.”
He stared, his eyes glittering, but he couldn’t ask the question.
She answered him anyway. “Jewel will guide us out. There’s a door that leads into the pocket. We’re not stuck here. And if she has defeated or failed to find Acadia, Jewel will be waiting for us.”
“She’ll wait?” He was unable to believe it. “In this place?”
“She would wait forever,” she answered, fiercely. “And she will lead us home.”
When she turned, though, he did not move.
“Eli?” And she shivered beneath the darkness of him.
“I’m different,” he said. “There’s something…”
But he did not finish, did not tell her how he was different, and she did not need him to.
She only nodded. “We all are, Alpha.”
“Alpha.” He frowned, and looked away, as though turning the word over in his mind, trying to figure out what it meant. As though it had no meaning. As though it didn’t pertain to him. “Alpha…”
She lifted her chin and pinned him with a stare she knew was at once challenging and angry. “You are the alpha. You are…” she licked her lips, forced her trembling hands to still, and continued. “You are my alpha.”
When he’d been in the woods, naked and tortured and helpless, he’d forgotten who he was. He’d forgotten what he was.
But he would be okay.
The woods, the hags…
They could not kill the alpha’s spirit. Not for long.
Finally, he nodded. “Let’s go help the girl.”
“Wait,” she said, remembering. She let go of her staff and it stood without falling over, drawing from Eli a look of surprise.
She shrugged the bag off her shoulders and pulled from it a rolled pair of soft blue jeans and a long-sleeved back t-shirt. She’d also brought a soft pair of shoes, too thin for the weather, but she’d needed something light. His boots would not have fit in the bag.
“Clothes,” he said, and gave her his first smile. “You brought clothes.”
She smiled back at him, and that smile stayed in place as he pulled on the jeans, then leaned over to tug on the shoes.
But then, she had to smother a gasp as she caught sight of his back.
“Eli,” she murmured, as he got his shoes on, then straightened to pull on the shirt. “Were you alone with the hags?”
His face went dark, then completely blank. But his eyes blazed. “Why?” he asked, softly. Too softly.
She trembled, unsure, and her heart began to thump hard and fast against her ribs. And she knew he could feel her fear. Her dread.
“Were you alone,” she asked, again, her voice a dismayed whisper. No, he hadn’t been alone. No.
“I was not the only prisoner they had,” he said, finally. “Not at first. But I was the strongest.”
She nodded, then turned, unable to say another word.
“Abby—”
“Not right now,” she said, hoarsely. “It will wait.”
Sadie and Elmer stood and trotted to her, confused by her distress. They saw no threat. They did not see Eli’s back and wouldn’t have understood it if they had.
She barely did.
There were faces on his back. Not…flesh, but imprints. Pictures…sort of. Faces of terror, of horror, of torture. Wide eyes, bloody flesh, wide open, screaming mouths.
Death. Death was on his back.
And she couldn’t bear it.
“Jewel,” she screamed, uncertain how to make her sister hear her. “Where are you?”
They had to get out of the woods before the woods devoured them.
Her father was there, but the last thing on her mind was searching for him.
He could find his own way to the pocket—he’d said as much. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Not anymore.
If she made it home, she’d never enter Waifwater Woods again.
When. When she made it home.
“Jewel,” she
screamed. “Jewel!”
And then she felt her sister. Jewel filled her mind with a comforting warmth, a steady light in the darkness, hope where there was nothing but hell.
She sobbed, and did not resist when Eli took her into his arms. He held her against his chest, unmoving and unspeaking until finally, Abby pulled away.
She straightened her spine and lifted her chin, glaring out at the world of the woods.
“Jewel,” she said, but softly. “I’m listening now.” She cast aside her fear and the darkness of the place, and she waited. “Show me where you are.”
And Jewel was there. Not just inside Abby’s mind, but in a shining, white light on the cold ground, beckoning them onward. Abby began to follow that light through Waifwater Woods.
But then Acadia Desrochers came screaming out of the darkness, uprooting trees and digging furrows into the ground as she flew like a brimstone-soaked wind toward Abby, Eli, and the hounds.
Abby was not at all surprised.
She just hoped she was ready.
Chapter Nineteen
Eli had shifted the moment the witch came careening out of the sky, and he and the hounds leapt at her, growling and snarling, even as Abby lifted her staff and sent a blast of power through the air.
Acadia ignored the wolf and hounds—teeth and claws wouldn’t work against Acadia. Only the muscle of magic would bring her down.
She snatched Abby’s sphere of power out of the air. She tossed it not at Abby, but at Eli, screaming with laughter when the power slammed into his chest and sent him hurtling through the air.
Abby flinched at the loud crack! his body made when it hit one of the many thick, unforgiving trees.
Sadie and Elmer were baying and shrieking, running back and forth underneath the demon witch, frustrated that she hung just out of reach of their snapping teeth.
Acadia was a sight to behold—it didn’t matter that Abby hated her, she could still acknowledge the woman’s terrible beauty. Her enormous wings unfurled into the dark sky, and they were so vividly red that the night lit up with scarlet.
