Witch's Reign

by Shannon Mayer

  Lila shook her head, but not before I saw her eyes dart to the side. “No, I never heard that. There is nothing holding the dragons out of her territory.” Her words sounded off to me, like something she was saying by rote.

  I frowned. “Lila, what aren’t you telling me?”

  “Nothing.”

  A lie. I stopped moving, turned and looked at her. “Lila, what aren’t you telling me?”

  Her head lowered and she swayed from side to side. “I can’t tell you. I’m bound by my family’s oaths which means this is not something I can even say. Seriously, I can’t even speak it.”

  I closed my eyes. “Are you actually here to help me?”

  “Yes, but . . . I miss my family, and you said you were scouting their grounds. And if they know that the first two guardians are gone, that I helped kill them, they might let me come home. I love being with you, Zam, I do. But . . . the chance that I could go home is too much,” she whispered. I opened my eyes to see her staring back at me with something akin to hope blended with sorrow.

  Maks had left me.

  Lila wanted to leave me.

  Merlin tried to kill me.

  With friends like these, I didn’t need to worry about enemies. I lifted my lips into a snarl. “Go then, go back to your family, Lila.” The words were not hard as I intended, but full of fatigue, mixed with a sorrow that I didn’t want to think too much about.

  The curse on me flexed and I knew it was slowly tearing my life apart. Just like it had been waiting years to do.

  I took off, racing through the snow, my light body not even breaking the top crust. There would be no tracks to follow, which would help. I tried to keep my mind focused on what was ahead, that I would find Darcy and everything would be okay. We’d get out, we’d go home, we’d laugh about this trip like we always did when we told our stories of our hunts and thefts.

  She’d know I finally forgave her, and we could be like we were before stupid Steve.

  Only it felt like there would be no laughter this time, only tears, like the curse would finally be the end of us all. I ran as fast as I could through the sparse forest, keeping to the shadows on instinct alone. And that was about all that saved me.

  An arrow slammed into the ground right in front of me, spraying snow up in my face. I caught a glimmer of sparkling blue and silver material attached to the back of it right before the material shot toward me, like a living rope seeking me out. A catch arrow.

  I blinked and dodged to the right as a chorus of howls went up through the night air. The blue and silver cord slid across my back and tightened but not fast enough. I turned on the speed.

  Maks hadn’t lied about the Ice Witch’s goblin army, and part of my brain bucked against that. Only because how could he—a human—possibly know more about the Ice Witch than us? How could he know about the flail, that it would kill the White Bear, and how could the flail leave him untouched when it had almost drained my life? How could he be all those things . . . unless he wasn’t human.

  The interactions with Merlin made sense in that context.

  Maks wasn’t human, but . . . if he wasn’t human, what was he?

  Another arrow cut across my path and buried into the tree to my right. The same blue and silver cord shot out from it and I dove to the left, right under the feet of a freaking ice goblin.

  I blinked up at him, took a single look, and then shot between his legs. His ears were black, frozen, and dead with the cold, same with his nose and lips, eyes of silvery white, and dressed in rabbit furs and dragon scales if the smell was any indication.

  “Get that fucking cat. I want pussy for dinner!” he roared after me. I grimaced and bolted, doing what I could to stay ahead. But as soon as I thought that, the way ahead of me closed off, a wall of goblins.

  “I curse you that nothing you do will go right, that you will always end your choices in disaster.” Marsum’s words cut through to me and I let out a breath. The same thing I’d done with the White Bear, I had to do it here too. I had to do it to live.

  I had to try and get caught.

  I slid to a stop and sat back on my haunches, though it went against every instinct. There was no time to hesitate, none at all. “Okay, take me then. I give up. I want to be captured.”

  The goblins all looked at one another like they weren’t sure what game I was playing. Adrenaline pounded through me and I knew that I had to hold my ground if I wanted to get caught. I had to believe it completely. Or it wouldn’t work. I lay down in the snow and rolled onto my back as fear cut through me in that vulnerable, submissive position.

  “Come on then. I’m here. Take me.”

  “She’s playing a game. Be careful. What magic could she have?” a goblin growled.

  I rolled back to my belly so I could see who was speaking. “No, I’m not playing any games. You want to eat me, I want to die. Or be caught, whichever you like.”

  The words seemed to stick to the roof of my mouth. But the goblins didn’t come forward. I stood and took a step toward them, doing my best to give them soft kitten eyes. “Seriously, take me.”

  They backed up farther. One nocked an arrow and his buddy put a six-fingered hand on his arm. “Don’t . . . something is wrong with her. Maybe she’s sick—contagious.”

  The group of ice goblins covered in weapons and body parts that didn’t belong to them took a collective step back, then another and another.

  “Come on, I want you to eat me.” The words sounded so dirty, and I had to struggle not to let the near-hysterical laugh bubble out of me. I mean, who the hell wanted a goblin to eat them in any way, shape, form or . . . anything? Nobody in their right mind.

  I mentally wanted to reach for the necklace, the ring of my father’s that had protected me for so long, but of course, it wasn’t there. That was the whole issue.

  I took a few steps toward the goblins, and they promptly broke rank and scattered ahead of me. I turned and looked over my shoulder, sure that there would be a dragon behind me, fooling me into thinking that little old me was the reason behind their fear.

  Nope, not a single breath of dragon wing behind me.

  I took off as fast as I could, taking advantage of the goblins’ weird fear of me. Score one for the cursed kitty cat.

  As I ran, I kept my ears pricked and swiveling for any sounds that would give any more goblins away, but they were gone, as if they’d never been there.

  The trees around me thinned further until they were so scattered, I had to run to each one to hold to any sort of cover. With a grimace, I slid to a stop at the last tree. Ahead of me was the castle of the Ice Witch and it was one big, bad, ugly looking fortress. This was no princess castle with winding spires and gilded turrets glittering in gold and silver. The palace was a square black block on top of other black blocks, on top of other dark squares, and it sat on top of an outcropping that looked out toward the open sea on one side and the massive river that flowed around it like a natural moat.

  And of course, that moat was what I had to cross. Hundred feet or more of flowing icy river. Being this close to the sea, the salt intake kept the river from freezing over like the southern part of it which was a . . . “Son of a bitch.” I hadn’t taken that into account. I’d thought I’d be able to just truck across it. No problemo. La-dee-fucking-da.

  I bit my lower lip, a growl slipping out of me as I stared at the water, listening to it gurgle and flow.

  “Come on, let’s get back to the castle. Queenie ain’t going to be happy we left the cat out there.”

  “Nah, that wasn’t the one she wanted. She said it was a lion shifter to look for. That was a damn pussy cat. Black to boot, not even gold like the others.”

  The goblins’ voices called out to each other and I crept through the snow toward them. Fifty feet up river they stood on the bank, a boat bobbing along still tied to the shore.

  I swallowed hard. “Curse, you’d better be a real fucking thing and not crap out on me in the middle of this.”

>   A curse meant to destroy my life, and now I was banking on it to help me save those I loved.

  The irony was not lost on me.

  I crouched against the tree closest to the bobbing boat as half a dozen ice goblins climbed into it. I waited until they pushed off, as they started across the river with long poles and oars. I drew a slow breath in, out, and then bolted forward.

  At the edge of the water, my paws touched the ice-cold death that would take me and I leapt into the air, sailing over to the left of the boat, deliberately trying to miss it. Deliberately trying to hit the water.

  The boat veered suddenly and was under me. I landed on the prow and balanced there. I grinned at the goblins as they stared at me. “Hiya, boys, did you miss me?”

  They roared and scrambled to get away from me, two of them going overboard. This was ridiculous, but I would take it. “Come on, I thought you wanted to eat me?” I couldn’t help the grin this time. The ridiculousness of it all was just too much. Giddy, I was giddy with adrenaline.

  The remaining four managed to pull themselves together and formed something of a barricade against me, spears and swords out. Shaking. Their weapons were shaking as I sat balanced on the edge of the boat.

  “You know, we’re going to end up in the ocean. I think that’s a good thing,” I said, pushing my cursed ability just a little further. What would that fucker Marsum say if he knew I was using his curse to actually help me succeed?

  That thought sent a shiver down my spine and my fur raised so I was a black puff ball. The goblins blinked as if waking from a deep sleep. As if . . . they realized that I was indeed worth killing. What had I done?

  Marsum’s laughter tickled the edges of my ears again, like he knew and had changed the curse accordingly.

  “Get her,” the lead goblin snarled. “Now!”

  Ah, fuck, that’s what I got for being cocky. We spun sideways in the boat, and I looked to the shore. We were about twenty feet off solid ground. I blew out a breath and leapt off the prow with all I had. I covered over half the twenty feet before I hit the water, sliding under the waves. No ice covering my head was about the only positive I could come up with. Arrows flashed through the water around me and I swam as if I could set myself up for being hit.

  I came up for air, gasping, waterlogged and swimming for all I was worth, not for the shore but for the ocean. Stupid, it was stupid but the curse kicked in again, and a weird twisting current swept me up onto the shore in a splash. I scrambled forward, running before I thought of anything else, my fur dripping wet.

  The goblins were still in the river and trying to get to shore after me—at least, if their cursing and the splash of their oars were any indication. There were no trees to hide behind, no cover for me other than the dark of the night.

  That would have to be enough to get me to the edge of the castle. Though looking at the slick stone sides of it, with no apparent doors other than the drawbridge, it wasn’t like I had a way in. I slid to a stop and looked back at the goblins as they finally reached the shore.

  I dropped to my belly and wormed under the snow, cursing the cold water as it froze my fur. But the snow helped to soak up some of the moisture, which I would take as a win. I waited, shivering violently as the goblins made their way up the slope. “Come on, boys, you can find me,” I whispered. “You can find me.”

  They turned around and round like they were blind to my tracks and the spot I’d buried myself.

  “Fucking cat is a fucking ghost. Come on, it’s cold and I want to warm my belly before we report to Maggi.” The leader made a waving motion with his hand and they fell into line, trekking right past my measly hiding spot. The fourth in line stepped on my tail and I bit back the howl that bubbled up my throat. As it was, as soon as they were ahead of me, I slipped out and stepped into line with them.

  Not one of them looked back. I held onto the thought that I wanted to be discovered, that I wanted to be caught. And they stoically led me all the way along a path that was barely visible, to a section of the castle wall that looked like every other part. The lead goblin used the tip of his sword to place a complicated knock against the stones. The wall fell inward—a hidden door—and the goblins trudged inside.

  I took a breath.

  This was it.

  I shot in with them, into the castle of the Ice Witch.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The Ice Witch’s castle was no warmer inside than outside. In fact, I would have sworn the temperature dropped at least another ten degrees, crystalizing the tips of my still-damp fur. The four goblins ahead of me took a left at the first intersection and I paused to think about where to go next.

  I was in, but I still had to find the dungeons. I would guess on them being low. A part of me wanted to shift back to my two-legged form, but I knew I was safer like this. Small and easier to hide in the shadows with my pitch-black fur.

  I frowned. If I wanted my curse to work for me, then I needed to find a way to word things in my mind. I worked it through a few times before I whispered it out loud. “The last place I want to find is the dungeon. I mean the absolute last place. Worst place ever, who the fuck would want to be in the dungeon?”

  Nothing happened. I screwed up my nose to try again and caught a whiff of something I knew almost as well as I knew my own smell.

  The scent of lions. They were mingled together, but I could pick out the threads of those I knew. Steve, Darcy, and even Kiara. But there was a fourth lion I didn’t know.

  I held it in my mouth and tasted it to decipher how old the scent was. A day at best for that fourth one, but he—and it was a he—was not known to me at all. It didn’t matter, I would get them all out.

  I crept along the edge of the stone wall, my breath puffing in front of my face, following the smell of lion. Maybe it was good that Lila and Maks had abandoned me.

  It hit me like a ton of bricks that the curse had done that too. Taken away my support.

  Left me alone, and in that, had helped me get further toward my goal.

  And it was right about then the entire plan, the whole rescue Darcy and get the fuck out, went right to shit.

  Cue the curse in full effect in three . . . two . . . one . . .

  Screams erupted ahead of me, filling the walls with the horrible sounds of blood in throats, of fear and pain. The blast of a gunshot that echoed against the stone walls.

  And above it all was a voice I didn’t expect for one second.

  “Damn it, where are you, Zam?”

  Maks had come back.

  I shot down the hall like a bullet from a gun, careening off the corners as I slid around them, my claws scrabbling for purchase on the stone, and then finally skidded to a stop. Maks stood in the middle of a large room, goblin bodies around him—in what was a freaking bloodbath. He had his shotgun in one hand and a short knife in the other. His hair was mussed and his eyes wild. I let the shift take me back to two legs because, let’s be honest, it wasn’t like we were slipping by at this point.

  “Maks, what are you doing here?” I took one step, then another. “I thought you were escaping?”

  “Changed my mind.” He lowered the shotgun. “We need to get to the dungeon.”

  “I’m working on that,” I said, and he shook his head.

  “This way.”

  He turned on his heel and led me away from the big room and down a hall to a set of stairs. Something blocked his way; he pulled the gun and the boom of it echoed back to me. I clapped my hands over my ears.

  “Maks, this is going to draw the Witch’s attention!”

  “I know.” He looked back at me and there was a glimmer in his eyes. “This is the best I can do for you, Zamira the Reckless. I’m sorry, for everything, and this is the best I can do to make it better. The dungeon is down there,” he pointed to a set of stairs. “There’s an escape door as well on the southern wall. It opens onto the cliff, but you can do it. All of you can do it.”

  His jaw ticked and his eyes raked over
me, as if this were . . . the last time he’d see me.

  “Maks, you’re human, you can’t—”

  “I’m not human, Zam. I’m not. I lied to you. I thought . . . I thought I could escape my past, but you kept showing me that my past was something I had to try to rectify.” He shook his head, grabbed me and landed a hard kiss on my mouth, catching me off guard. He let go of me and I stared at him.

  “Maks.”

  “Now go. We don’t have a lot of time.”

  The best he could do for me? What the hell was he talking about? He spread his fingers out, palm to the ground, and a black mist curled up around him, covering him wholly. So, he was a supe, a mage, and suddenly things made sense in our journey that hadn’t before. For now, I would take his word and get to my friends. But what Maks didn’t know was that friends were hard for me to come by, and I wasn’t about to let him down either.

  “I’ll be back for you,” I whispered.

  I turned and ran for the stairs, leapt down them ten or more at a time, grabbed at the walls to keep my balance until I was at the very bottom, crouched and searching the shadows. The smell of lion was strong, but so was the scent of something else.

  Something dark and full of blood, something that didn’t like daylight all that much.

  “Well, well. Do we have a new friend to chain up today?”

  The voice was drawling, and had such a thick accent, I could barely make out what he was saying.

  “Vamp?” I asked.

  “You betcha, little lion,” he growled and then he launched at me from the darkness.

  A blur, he was just a blur of arms extended, white fangs, and glittering blue eyes. For a moment, I thought it was the dead vamp from the graveyard, but no, this one’s face was not so lovely.

  He was fast, but I was no slouch in the reflex department. I spun to the side and drove my knee up, catching him in the solar plexus. With him caught on my knee, I pulled my blades and rammed one into the back of his neck, and the other somewhere in the kidney region of his back.