by Leigh Evans
That is, until the ingrate opened his mouth.
“Do you not see?” Danen said, his breath coming hard. “This is not the prophecy, but evidence of their unholy union!”
“Seriously, asshole!” I exclaimed. “How much more do you need?”
“Hedi,” I heard Trowbridge growl.
“No, screw this! Danen needs to wake up and smell the magic.” I yanked my hand from Lexi’s grip and chopped the air with my arm. “Everybody douse the wattage, okay? I can’t see the man for the flares.”
If anything, Lexi’s and Trowbridge’s flares grew fiercer. Light danced over Danen’s auburn dreads—the blue of an angry ocean; the penetrating green of a dark woods.
The sharp smell of magic was explained. Something—or rather someone—had stripped Danen of his weapons. His bow was up in a tree, his arrows broken. And the knife he’d probably hoped to use to gut us was stabbed into the heart of a pine.
Matter of fact, everybody had lost their weapons, even my Trowbridge. The Old Mage might be miserly with his magic, but when push came to shove he wasn’t taking any chances with Lexi’s body.
Danen’s body language broadcast barely controlled violence.
“This guy is mine,” I said.
I didn’t look at my mate, though I sensed his coiled tension. Nor did I do an auto-check of Lexi’s mood, though I felt him take a step closer to me. I just stared at Danen, who in turn was gazing fixedly at the ground.
“Danen is a strong fighter,” murmured Trowbridge. “He’s never lost a challenge.”
I lifted my shoulders. It had to come down to this, hadn’t it? If there was a tomorrow and a hardscrabble future among the dreadlocked wolves, I had to show them that I wasn’t (a) the girl most likely die or (b) Trowbridge’s sex buddy. Better to prove myself as a force to be contended with now. Better to do it here, against Trowbridge’s second, then in a series of scrimmages against lesser wolves.
It was all or nothing.
I’ve got magic, Trowbridge. Don’t forget that.
In case he needed his memory jogged, I flexed my spell-casting fingers, which my serpent took as permission to investigate. She undulated across the five feet separating me and the dreadlocked Raha’ell and began to sniff at his moccasins.
The bits of glitter inside her coiled length flickered.
Tasty, was he?
“You’re right, dickhead,” I told Danen. “It’s an alliance. Me, my mate, and the man you call the Shadow. We’re all in it, and it’s time you all understood that, and the fact that it’s going to take the three of us to defeat the Royal Court and the Black Mage.”
Lexi’s flare had intensified and focused itself solely on Danen. The Raha’ell blinked hard, and a tear trickled down his cheek. My serpent followed the column of his throat and nipped in to taste the salty wetness.
It was a fleeting touch, but Danen flinched, then glared at me. Naked hatred.
Or fear.
I could work with fear.
“Why didn’t you free your Alpha when you saw him captured?” I asked Danen as my Fae slipped from his neck to twine herself in an airy circle around his chest. “You watched them put the Son of Lukynae in chains. Why did you skulk along, hoping for an opportunity for rescue that never came?”
For a moment, I thought he wasn’t going to answer.
“There were too many Fae,” he finally spat out.
My serpent of talent glittered, a band ready to tighten. “He’s weaker than us,” she hissed. “For he has no magic.”
“There’s always going to be too many Fae,” I bit out. “They. Outnumber. You.” The man’s scent turned a tad more pungent. “The Fae have magic, and horses, and more archers than you’ll ever be able to breed. They intend to wipe you out, and by numbers and magic they will.”
“Fine words from the Shadow’s get,” he sneered.
Oh snap. At the exact moment I thought about crushing the attitude out of the man, my Fae decreed “tasty” and squeezed hard.
“Witch!” cried Danen, clawing at his chest.
I heard a crack, knew it was his rib.
“I am no witch,” I growled. Not me. No mage, no wizard, no coven of three. However, I was possessed. By my own sense of inevitability and urgency; by my wolf’s desire to crush any opposition; by my Fae’s interest in general mayhem. And baby, it was well past time to demonstrate that I had more than words at my disposal.
Lift him, but don’t crush him. Toy with him, but don’t destroy him.
My coil of magic suddenly cinched his torso and the Raha’ell let out his own growl—a savage beast sound that raised the hair on the back of my neck.
Growl at me?
“Up!” I shouted.
Theoretically, 190 pounds of muscle, and dreadlocks, and deerskins should not go “up” easily. Not when it’s being lifted by a five foot two inch woman whose idea of a workout consists of sprinting to the corner store for another handful of candy bars. There are laws of physics involved.
I broke them.
Up that howling bastard went.
“Yesss,” my Fae crooned as Danen thrashed against our hold.
“Higher,” I demanded of myself, of my Fae, of my inner-bitch. My magical talent was already with the program, and she chortled when my wolf surged inside me, reaching for our magic, binding herself to mortal-me and Fae-me.
Animal power, magical power, girl power. We were bitch to the power of three.
Freakin’ invincible.
So higher Danen went. We lifted him until I could have counted the stitches on his moccasins, if he were lax, instead of scissoring his legs like some freakin’ three-year-old having a tantrum. We gave him a reproving shake. “Get this straight—I’m not the Shadow’s get, or his whelp or his by-blow!” I shouted. “I’m his sister. And I’m not just some girl Trowbridge plowed; I’m his mate. Got that?”
Mulish bastard should have said, “Got that.” He didn’t, and I heard another snap of cartilage or bone. Was I going to have to break him bone by bone? In front of Trowbridge?
I’d do it. I wanted to; we wanted to.
Lexi’s flare was now the dark green of the deepest forest, where children are lost and predators prowl and bad things can slip between tree and tree. Trowbridge, on the other hand, had not moved, except for his chest, which rose and fell higher and faster than usual, and his nostrils, which were flaring like those of a racehorse ready for the bell. And yet for all that, the rest of him was immobile.
“Give me one reason why we need this guy!” I snarled.
“Danen’s the only one ready to take over the pack,” he replied. “If something happens to us, the Raha’ells will need him.”
“Like hell they will. He’s already blown that. You left Danen the dickwad in charge for a couple of weeks, and he let the jinxes take your people.” Stupid, dumb wolf. If he’d only done his job …
My Fae tightened and Danen groaned.
“Why couldn’t he have figured out the mud trick earlier?” I demanded of Trowbridge. “It took you what? An hour to realize that you needed to cloak your scent? He had days! Days! Why couldn’t he have taken your people to some caves? Or the very least, why couldn’t he have sat it out until you got back? The dickwad’s next to useless. He can’t lead them like you can lead them.”
“No. But I can’t find game like Danen,” said Trowbridge. “He’s an expert tracker. He kept the pack from starving the winter Helzekiel sickened most of the game.”
“Well, bully for him. The man drew on you. I still want to break him like kindling.” I was already halfway there. Danen’s lips were blue tinged, and his legs had gone from wildly thrashing to weakly twitching.
“I know,” said my mate.
And that was all Trowbridge said. He didn’t try to convince me one way or the other. He’d stated his side and now he was letting me work it out. Kill Danen or let him live. My choice.
Danen’s eyes were dazed slits.
The man weighed a ton and my shoulder
was on the verge of dislocating. I lowered him until his soles flattened, then slightly loosened the rope of magic around his massive chest. The Raha’ell folded at the waist, limp as a puppet on a loose string, then braced his hands on his meaty thighs and did some heaving.
“You need to get some facts straight,” I said over his tortured breaths. “Fact number one: I have killed for your Alpha, and will kill for him. Should anyone try to hurt him again, the last thing they’ll feel is my magic shattering their ribs.” I was shaking with fury. “Fact number two: no one pushed the Son of Lukynae through the portal this time. My mate came back to Merenwyn—to a realm where he’s the freakin’ first name on the kill list—of his own free will. He chose. To come here to this place … where they hunt you, and trap you. Where they treat you like you’re some sort of sub-species. Goddess, I can’t believe I was ever proud of being half Fae.” My anger swelled my serpent of magic, and the man encircled by her groaned. “Your Alpha could have stayed in Creemore. A lesser man would have.”
Lexi’s light flickered and then died. He blinked hard before he took a threatening step toward Danen.
“Don’t,” I said.
Lexi paused.
The wolf’s lip curled, and he forced himself to straighten slowly.
“The man you call the Shadow is my brother.” I watched the wolf’s reaction carefully, my control thread thin. “If I let you live, you will call him by his true name—Lexi Stronghold. He is my sibling, stolen from my family when he was just a child, and brought to Merenwyn by the Black Mage. He couldn’t find a way back to Creemore, any more than he could escape Helzekiel—”
“Who’s Helzekiel?” Lily murmured.
“He’s a murderous bastard who deserves to die slowly.”
“They know Helzekiel as the Black Mage, Tink,” said Trowbridge. His flare was softening, soothing, not scorching.
“Who’s Tink?” asked Lily.
“Shut up!” I nailed everyone with a glare. “My brother,” I repeated in a harder voice, “couldn’t escape the life he’d been forced into. Not until he met Trowbridge, and realized that together they could open the portal between the two worlds. Together, Danen. Not separately. Trowbridge and I may know the location of two portals—the one over our territory in Creemore and another—”
“What other?” Danen asked sharply.
“The Safe Passage. It’s how we came here.”
Danen’s expression turned speculative. I moved to add, “But neither Trowbridge or I know how to open the portals. Not without the words. Only my brother knows the words.”
At least I was hoping he knew the words to open the Safe Passage, because otherwise I could kiss Kit Kats and Cherry Blossoms good-bye forever.
“I don’t believe the Shadow is here to help us,” Danen said belligerently. “And you are connected to him by blood and bone.”
“I’m not here to help,” said Lexi. “I care nothing about the Raha’ells. You could all die for all I care. I’m here to put a match to a book.”
“What book?” asked Brutus. His mud disguise had fallen victim to his body temperature; patches had greased into a slick taupe film.
“The Book of Spells,” I answered. “If is not destroyed, then Helzekiel’s power will know no boundaries. He’ll be able to walk between worlds. All worlds.”
“Including yours,” Lily added shrewdly.
I gave her the stink eye. “Including the one that the Raha’ells are hoping to take sanctuary in.” Danen held his arms strangely akimbo, and I realized that he was loath to allow his flesh to touch the invisible band wrapped around his chest.
My wrist ached. “You really are one dumb, stubborn wolf.”
Mr. Too Dumb to Cave just stared at me.
I let my breath out through my teeth. “Cut,” I said. My serpent gave him one last hiss-inducing squeeze and then broke. “If you still want to challenge your Alpha or me, go ahead. Die fighting. Robson Trowbridge will kill you. He’ll fight to defend me, just like he’s fought for the chance to lead his people back to the world from which we came.”
I saw the longing in the wolf’s eyes.
“There really is a land of plenty where wolves can live in peace and children can grow up with full bellies and no fear,” I said slowly. “And even though you’re proving to be an asshole of major proportions, neither of us will leave Merenwyn until every Raha’ell is free to travel with us back there.”
“You don’t have our blood,” Danen said. “Why would you risk your neck for ours?”
“I’m done,” I snapped. “Kill him, Trowbridge.”
“She’ll stay because she’s decided her people are my people,” said Trowbridge. “That’s all it takes, Danen. Once a Stronghold closes a fist around a person’s heart and claims it, they’ll go to the ends of the world to protect that life. They’ll risk everything. They’ll face anything. They’ll do what must be done. They’ll hold.”
Danen cast a look at Lexi that needed no interpretation, then turned to Trowbridge.
“Lexi loves his sister,” said my mate, his tone hardening. “I left her in his care, because I knew that he would have taken an arrow for her.” My mate held Danen’s gaze, then moved to mine. “He will not betray us.”
Message received. The Old Mage was a different game.
Danen thought; then he sighed and pressed a hand tightly to his side. Awkwardly he got down on one knee. He shook back his dreads, exposing his neck. “I offer you my blood, once more, Son of Lukynae. You may spill it as you wish.”
“We’ll need it, Danen,” said Trowbridge. “We’re going to walk into the castle, and we won’t walk out of it until everyone is free.”
“Mutts too?” said Mouse quickly.
“Mutts too,” I said.
Damn, my own eyes were watering now. Too much flaring, too much emotion. I savagely dried my cheek with the back of my free wrist. “Before you guys start singing your kumbayahs, I want his word.”
Danen turned. “I am yours to command. Yours to—”
“No, not that. That’s a given.” I scanned the group. “What I want is to never hear the word ‘halfling,’ or ‘mutt,’ again. If we make it back to Creemore, none will judge me or anyone else by their blood. You will judge us by what we do. Who we are. Can you all do that? Because that’s the price of entry to the promised land.”
Danen stared at me for what seemed like a very long time; then he nodded. “Aye,” he said with a slow smile. “We can do that.”
* * *
Danen’s irises were an amber brown. His lashes were sparse and his right eyebrow was caked distractingly with dried gray mud, but once the deadly intent was drained from them what were left were kindly eyes.
He nodded to me, as if we were ending a long conversation instead of three seconds of mutual appraisal, then turned to Trowbridge. “Is there a plan?”
“There is,” Trowbridge replied.
“Right, we’ll recover our weapons and refill the water skins.” And with that, what was left of the free Raha’ells set about doing just that—all three of them bypassing what was shaping up to be a group-hug moment to break apart into satellites set on a mutual goal.
Rearming themselves. Evidently, big muscles and quick reflexes weren’t enough. Brutus picked up an arrow, checked the feathering at the end, and tucked it under his arm. Lily walked past the Gatekeeper’s body without looking at it.
I just stared down a Raha’ell. And there’s a body pinned to a tree and I’m not even wanting to throw up. Wow. I’m a badass.
Lexi glanced at me, then grabbed Mouse by the shirt. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?” squeaked Mouse.
“Lily’s going to have to climb a tree.” He pulled the boy over to the fallen leg, pushed him down until he sat on it, then slowly collapsed himself. He stretched out his legs and crossed them at the ankles. “This should be good.”
Lily passed them, showing her front teeth.
Lexi lifted one brow.
Reality was setting in. I jammed my trembling hands deep into my jean pockets.
Trowbridge crossed the ten feet separating us and cupped my face. His right thumb stroked my jawline. “Proud of you,” he said.
I bit down on my lower lip. Held it there, firmly snagged by the pearly whites, until it stopped with the annoying quivering. Geez Louise. Don’t lose all the ground you gained by swooning in front of the troops. Real heroes don’t melt in the aftermath of a battle. They raise their paws for a fist pump. They shout, “Hell yeah!”
Trowbridge’s fingers tightened almost painfully. “Steady,” he whispered.
His scent swept around me, another set of arms, surrounding us in a fog of musk, and woods, and man, and—oh yes—Trowbridge yum. My lids fluttered closed, and my wolf moaned, and somehow her earthy response slid right up my throat.
I could take him here. Right on the ground.
Only his fingertips touched me. I leaned into them, imagining them moving over me. Touching my neck. Dipping into—
Lily coughed.
My eyes flew open. Trowbridge was staring down at my upper lip as if it were dewed with honey.
“You like my mouth,” I said breathily.
A lopsided, tight grin. “It has its moments.” Suddenly somber, he fingered the limp curl at the side of my neck. “But it almost gave me a heart attack again.”
“You had my back.” I lifted my shoulders. “You would have killed him if I—”
Expression grim, he shook his head very slightly. “You challenged him, Tink.”
“Yeah, but—”
“You did,” he repeated.
“But wouldn’t you have—”
“Shhh.” My lover turned me around so that I faced the tall tree in the west, then wrapped his arms around me. It gave us the semblance of privacy. The undersides of my breasts rested comfortably on his corded forearms. My mate pushed aside my hair to reveal the tendon he’d once bit down on. He pressed a warm kiss there, then nuzzled my temple.
“If I stepped in,” he whispered into my ear, “you would have been perceived as weak. Not my equal. Someone I fucked.”
