by SM Reine
One rat wasn’t a problem; two or three wasn’t even that bad. But when the numbers got into the hundreds, as it now was, they could easily strip the flesh off of someone.
Jerking away from their sharp teeth, she noticed that if she moved in the opposite direction they grew calm.
Maybe if she could just maneuver around the wall and backtrack she could get back to camp and tell Giles they needed to leave immediately.
But every time she attempted to backtrack, the chattering and nipping picked up again. Scanning the ground, she saw the mice from before now joining the rats, and they were both moving in an unified stream, calm only when she moved in the direction it seemed they wanted her to.
Mice didn’t bother her. Their naked little tails and beady eyes had never fazed her much. But there was something unnatural about the way they gathered like this.
Almost as though they were being…controlled.
And with that thought came another: why did it seem like they were herding her? Back of her neck prickling with a spot of fear, she tried once again to backtrack, but the rodents crawled up her leg and one of them took a plug out of her, making her yowl in response. She slapped it off her thigh, feeling a warm trickle of blood slide down her leg.
“Giles,” she cried, feeling a fool because she was sure he wouldn’t hear her from this distance, but it didn’t stop her from trying again. “Giles, come quick.”
Hunched over to avoid the branches of low-hanging pines, Lilith never saw the blow coming.
~ ~ ~
She came to she wasn’t sure how much later. All she knew was that her head was throbbing, she tasted blood on her tongue, and her vision was woozy.
Grunting, she tried to move, but her body was frozen.
An irritating annoying sound, like a buzzing mosquito rang in her sensitive ears.
“Good, she’s awake, sisters,” a female voice sneered and then a bucket of water was splashed onto Lilith’s face.
Coughing, sputtering out the water, she blinked through the haze trying to make out who was attacking her and why.
“Karis, was that really necessary?” one of the voices asked.
Karis?
Lilith sucked in a sharp breath because the mention of that name jogged a long-forgotten memory. It was foggy and only half-formed, but she remembered that it’d involved her brother, Lleweyn, and possibly even her, but the details were extremely sketchy at the moment.
Still coughing, feeling as though she couldn’t take a proper breath, Lilith blinked several times until the spinning world no longer seemed quite so unbalanced.
“Damn right it was necessary. You know what this one can do,” Karis muttered before pinning Lilith with her rich, brown eyes. Curvy and hippy, with a full bust and an enviably slim waist, she looked more like the type of woman you’d see dressed up for a princely ball. Of course it didn’t help that she was wearing a buttery yellow ballgown-looking dress, but this was no regular princess dress. It’d been raggedly chopped off at the knees—as though she’d taken scissors to it and gone crazy—revealing the black laced-up combat boots. Almost like she was thumbing her nose at herself and doing it with an anarchist’s flair.
She had a rich cascade of mahogany-colored wavy hair that spilled down to her waist and large doe eyes. First impressions would make one think she was a gentle-bred woman made to dance at balls and bow to kings. Until one glanced down to the basket hilted sword she usually kept strapped to her waist, but which was now being held tip-first mere inches from Lilith’s windpipe.
“Wolf, we’re not here to kill, but if you don’t answer us we’ll make an exception,” the voice that’d chastised Karis spoke up again.
She still couldn’t figure out why she was bound, who these women were, or why they’d want her. The memory was so hazy it barely made sense.
Lilith tried to make out the creature standing mostly in shadow. In her wolf form she’d have been able to tell immediately, but her human sight wasn’t nearly as good. Not to mention that the constant horrible ringing in her ears was throwing her entire system out of whack.
“Recognize me yet, wolf?” She chuckled beneath her breath. “No?” the female whispered throatily after a lengthy pause. “Then let me refresh your memory.”
There was a scent of smoke, like charred wood, and then the woman talking stepped fully into a circle of light.
She had thick strands of bubblegum-pink hair caught up in a bun that had several golden hairpins sticking out of it. Exceedingly short, she was maybe five feet tall and had delicate but striking Asian features—high cheekbones, full lips, and thick eyelashes that framed greenish-blue eyes peppered with golden flecks that glinted like flame as she smiled.
Garbed in an imperial jacket the exact same shade as her hair and wearing silky black pants that fell to just below her knees, there could be no doubt as to the woman’s heritage.
She was a xiather, also known as a dragonborn. They were born only of royal dragon and human blood, the mating was brutal, and the delivering of a healthy child was exceedingly rare.
Strapped to her back was a golden bow, legendary in that only a xiather could hold it. Infused with dragon’s blood, should anyone outside the genus even try they’d turn to ash in seconds.
In an instant Lilith knew who stood before her. There were only three xiathers known to exist. Two of them males and one female.
“Ying Lor,” she said, and then moaned when a bolt of pain flashed across her temple. She’d taken a direct hit earlier.
Ying’s lips stretched into a sultry smile. “In the flesh, shifter wolf.”
How long had she been out of it? Where was Giles? He must be worrying. His caution of earlier suddenly echoed in her mind. Gods, she’d been foolish. It galled her to admit that he and mother were right about her.
Young and brash and stupid.
Lilith whined from the pervasive sound buzzing painfully in her ear. She needed to get away.
“Why have you brought me here?” she grunted with a voice gone hoarse.
Moving her head left and right, she tried in vain to make out what was holding her strapped to the tree trunk.
“We knew the moment we spotted you entering the pub that there was something slightly off about you, didn’t we, Karis?”
Karis shrugged as a whisper of a smile played about her lips. The sword she held was still steady on Lilith’s neck.
Lilith flexed her fingers, discerning no cuffs, no rope. There was nothing holding her to the tree, and yet she couldn’t move away from it.
Neither a xiather nor Karis had the power to hold her this way.
“Where is the third?” she snarled, realizing there was still one missing.
Brown eyes twinkled. “Only just figuring that out. You’re not very bright, are you, dear?” Karis laughed.
Growling deep in her throat, Lilith attempted to kick her way out of whatever held her bound. Writhing, snarling, and scraping up her back on the rough bark of the tree as she fought furiously to free herself.
A white mouse scampered across her toes, then another, and another. Not attacking, but just staring at her—a whole horde of them coming to join their brothers and sisters. Surrounding not just Lilith, but also the two women who now smiled triumphantly.
Suddenly the ear bleeding buzzing stopped, and the invisible bands holding Lilith in place vanished. Dropping to her hands and knees, she panted, choking down the sweet air.
“Looking for me?”
She was taller than Ying or Karis, though not by much. Wearing navy-blue leather pants and a halter top which contrasted sharply but hypnotically against the dark brown of her skin. Skin that gleamed like rich chocolate in the moonlight. Burgundy and black dread locks fell to the middle of her back. Her smile was huge, showing a set of small teeth with a very dominant pair of canines. Deep, mesmerizing brown—almost black—eyes stared back at her.
Very curvy and busty, she was a male wolf’s wet dream come to life. In her hand she held a silver f
lute that she tipped outward as if to say, The magic came from this.
Lilith sucked in a sharp breath as the face finally clicked into place.
“Rayale.”
Stories always made out the pied piper to be a male with a magical flute who, when playing it, would hypnotize little children into leaving their home for parts unknown. Reality was that the piper was no male—he was actually a she. And she had had the very unfortunate misfortune of falling in love with Lilith’s brother, Lleweyn.
Lilith loved him, but she was no fool, either. Lleweyn was a scoundrel, and that was putting it politely.
“I see I’m not quite so forgettable after all. How are you doing, Lilith?” Her melodic voice vibrated with just a shiver of the raw magic she could wield when playing her flute.
Ying stepped back but crossed her arms, drumming her fingers on her biceps and letting Lilith know in no uncertain terms that should she attempt escape it would end very badly for her.
Karis had still not put her sword down.
Lilith shook her head. “Rayale, I don’t have it.”
“Ha!” Rayale tipped her head back and laughed. “You think me a fool. I know he gave it to you. Now we want it back,” she barked, no longer so jovial.
Lilith could barely remember the night Lleweyn had been beset by this group of deadly women.
It’d been the night of her cousin Briar’s reaping. The night when a she-wolf turned from pup to adult. The drinks had been plentiful and all had been rowdy.
Then the mice had begun appearing.
She shook her head, mouth feeling horribly parched. The ringing in her ears had let up, but the blow to her temple had definitely played a part in her wooziness. Shaking the marbles loose, she reached for her necklace.
“I am telling you, he never gave me anything.”
She could only assume the women were here for whatever it was they claimed Lleweyn had stolen. They’d screeched it at him that night, demanding he return it. She’d been terribly confused then and had demanded her brother tell her the truth as to whether or not he’d in fact stolen an heirloom from the women. But he’d called them crazy and pleaded that Lilith should trust him and not to tell their parents about it.
She’d put the incident behind her, trusting wholeheartedly in the sincerity of her brother’s wolfish gaze. But now she wondered whether he’d lied to her all those years ago.
Sharp claws gripped Lilith’s chin, digging in unmercifully and causing her to wince. Ying’s eyes blazed. “Do you think we would let you charm your way out of this? We want what rightfully belongs to us.”
Realizing they’d divested her of her necklace, she snarled and set to call her wolf out. But Rayale only shook her head and chuckled.
“Honestly, wolf, I know all about shifters. Don’t try anything stupid.” And as she said it she tapped the flute on the palm of her hand for emphasis.
Lip curling back in fury, Lilith jerked her face out of Ying’s grip. “I said I don’t have it. I don’t. You above all should know that.” She eyed Ying.
The piper’s power came not just from calling whatever she wanted to herself, but also the fact that while under the influence of the piper’s magic no creature could lie. No matter what they asked her right now, so long as the piper had her eyes drilled on Lilith, she’d be unable to utter a lie.
Ying’s nostrils flared. “Then if you don’t have it, who does?”
“Look, I don’t even know what this thing is.”
Rayale scoffed. “Oh please, how would you know what we wanted if you didn’t even know what it is?”
“Because I heard you all yelling about it that night, but I swear I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.”
“It glows like a blue-hued heartbeat,” Karis snapped. “Jogged your memory yet?”
Lilith’s jaw dropped open because she had seen something similar to that description just last year. Lleweyn had been digging in his room when a stone had slipped from his shelf to the floor. She’d been enthralled by the sight of it because it had pulsed like a heartbeat and had glowed a greenish-blue hue.
She’d asked her brother what it’d been, but he’d only snarled and told her to mind her own business and she’d never seen it again after that night. Could that have been their treasure?
If it was, it meant Lleweyn had lied to her. She ground her molars at her brother’s stupidity that had now placed her in these circumstances.
“We’ve only been waiting for the day that one of you would be stupid enough to leave your glen again.” Rayale snorted, petting the head of a mouse resting on her shoulder.
“I’m getting bored of this.” Karis clenched her jaw.
Lilith was a predator; she knew the signs of a pending strike and Karis was broadcasting all of them. Her muscles were tense, her knees bent, her wrists rigid, and her eyes cold as ice.
But what caught Lilith’s attention more than all of that was the thin silver chain hanging around Karis’s neck. It was her mother’s pendant.
Licking her front teeth, she moved back onto her heels ever so slightly, affecting a nonchalant attitude and evening out her breath as she prepared to strike. There’d probably be no chance that she could deliver the attack before one or both of the other two women took her out, but she wouldn’t be waiting around to let them kill her either.
“So what now?” she asked, trying to distract them. “I’ve told you I don’t have it.”
Rayale nodded. “True. But I’m almost positive you know all of Lleweyn’s hiding places.”
“What’s so important about that little bit of jewelry anyway?”
They all three hissed at once, if as she’d delivered them a blow.
“That is not for you to ask, wolf,” Karis spat.
Licking her lips, moving ever so slowly into position, she asked the one question that nagged her.
“How did you even know it was me in that pub to follow me out here?”
Ying laughed and clapped Rayale’s shoulder. “Should I tell her or you?”
Rayale flicked her wrist.
But neither one of them wound up telling her. Karis glowered as she said, “Rayale set her mice all around that glen, ready to let their piper know the instant your clan stepped foot out of the protection of the glen. We’ve been following you all along. You almost got away when you became the crone though—”
Ying nodded. “Except for the fact that you travel with that hell spawn.”
“Giles is not a demon,” Lilith snapped, offended by their words though he wasn’t even here to be insulted by it.
Karis shrugged. “Whatever. This is what you’re going to do, she-bitch.” She tipped her sword down a bit, relaxing her grip, and Lilith saw her moment to strike. “You’re going to take us back to—”
She dug her nails into the soil, just a second away from springing into action when a throaty voice sliced through her concentration.
“She’s not going to do any damn thing you say,” Giles growled, materializing as if from nowhere and gripping Karis by the shoulders. He dragged her down with him, pinning her to the ground.
Ying had a flaming arrow nocked in her bow quicker than Lilith could blink and aimed it square at his chest. “Let her up, devil.”
Lilith could barely recognize Giles. Gone was the urbane-looking demone. His hair stood up on his head and his red eyes were wild, shifting between all four of them before finally setting on Lilith’s face with a sort of manic frenzy gleaming inside them.
“Lilith, are you hurt?” His voice rolled with a shot of thunder.
Lilith’s heart doubled in speed; he was a wild looking creature. His skin gleamed like hot coals burned beneath it. Making him appear the devil they thought he was.
Her breathing increased as his scent of smoked cherries pervaded her senses.
“Have they hurt you?” he asked again, snapping her from her heat-induced trance.
“No,” she whispered softly, more grateful to see him than she cared to admit, an
d crawled toward him, snatching the necklace off of Karis.
“Hurt our sister and we will kill you,” Rayale said menacingly.
“Shoot that flaming arrow at me—it cannot harm me,” he said as though taunting, turning his face toward Ying. “I was born of fire, I cannot die of it.”
Moving her shot down an inch so that it now rested on Lilith instead, Ying smiled. “I’ve got no beef with you, demon. Give us the wolf and you can go.”
Lilith was literally outgunned and out-magicked. It’d taken a pack of ten, her, and her brothers along with a few cousins to get the women out of their woods, spreading the word to kill them on sight should they ever attempt to enter their glen again.
Karis glared at Lilith with fury in her brown eyes, but she didn’t move an inch.
Lilith had to admit to being a tiny bit awed by Giles. Here was a creature more fearsome than any she’d seen before, and he wasn’t doing much other than sitting on Karis.
Rayale inhaled, lifting the flute to her mouth.
“Breathe on that thing and I will possess your soul.” Giles held out a hand that now glowed with an orange, hazy hue.
Hands trembling just slightly, Rayale lowered the flute.
Ying pulled the arrow back tighter.
“I don’t think you’re listening to me,” Giles murmured, “so let me make myself perfectly clear. Any of you kill her—in fact, if any of you lay another hand upon her—I will rip your hearts out and eat them for supper.”
His body was tense, his words unwavering, and he was both terrifying and unbelievably sexy in that moment.
Confused by her unexpected turn of emotions, Lilith turned her face to the side and spotted her red cloak lying not ten yards away. Fisting her mother’s pendant tight, beyond grateful to have it back, she could almost sympathize with Rayale’s desire to get hers back.
Rayale shrugged. “All we want is our charm back.”
“What is it?” Giles asked. “Why does it matter?”
She lowered her gaze to the ground. Ying was the one to speak up.
“Because it holds a sliver of our souls. Without it we are not whole.”
He looked at Lilith. “Do you know where it’s at?”
