Compelled

by Shawntelle Madison

  “What’s wrong with you?” I asked.

  “Does she always ask questions at times like this?” Tamara rushed to hand me my backpack.

  “There isn’t enough time to tell you how often.” Thorn finished dressing. “How much time do we have during your diversion?”

  “Not long, unfortunately. Two inexperienced spellcasters is a lot for even me to handle. Once they breach the spells protecting this house, all bets are off. It will be just me and them.”

  I reached out and touched her hand. “Are we meeting up somewhere?”

  Thorn tugged my hand to leave the room with Tamara behind.

  “Just worry about now, girl. We got bigger problems than figuring out what will happen tomorrow.” She shoved us toward the stairs. “Go to the cellar. Down there will be a door. Hold your breath as you go through and you’ll find a path to safety on the other side. Lock the door behind you, though, and don’t look back.”

  Thorn nodded. “Safe journey.”

  “To you as well. If you travel along the closest main road north toward Bol’shoye Tsvetochnoye lake, you’ll enter Finland and find the Yhdeksän Männyt Pack in a small town called Nuijamaa near the border. Their alpha is an old friend of mine, and he’ll protect you.”

  The trip down the stairs was hard going with Thorn’s weakness, but we made it. Offering to carry him wasn’t even a question. I’d never belittle him like that.

  By the time we reached the staircase for the cellar, we noticed the dwarf had taken this path, too. This must have been how he escaped with the twins. Upstairs, the house shuddered as if the roof would come down any minute. The lights flickered and the air was saturated with the sticky sweet scent of cinnamon.

  At the far end of the dank cellar was a door I’d never seen before. Where I’d once seen rows of preserved food in jars was now a dark wooden door made from large planks. The knob was made from tarnished brass with deep scratch marks in the metal. I helped Thorn across the room and soon we reached the door.

  “Are you ready?” I whispered to him.

  And that’s when the upstairs exploded.

  The explosion drove us to the ground. Thorn didn’t move when I tried to revive him, so I hoisted him onto my shoulders. I held my breath and opened the door. No turning back now. My ears popped and something stung my eyes like onions. There was no smell or sound, just a dark path ahead. Heat fanned my back from the fire above. I entered the doorway and closed the door. I remembered to lock the door behind me and I carried Thorn down the dark path, all the while holding my breath.

  With each step I took, my body begged me to breathe. To help get through the tunnel, I reminded myself that at any moment we could be attacked. I couldn’t hear my footsteps, but something told me I walked a dirt path. Eventually, I emerged through a hole in the ground to the outside. Fresh air fanned my face, so I took a deep cleansing breath. How wonderful the air was. The golden box in my pocket hummed. When I retrieved it after putting Thorn down, I noticed it had transformed back into its original form. We were safe from our threat. For now.

  Miles away, I saw an orange glow and a line of smoke extending into the air. That had to be Tamara’s home. With a sigh, I said a prayer for her and wished her well. She made a sacrifice for us I wouldn’t forget. After all the dark things I learned about her, this one moment of light was one I wouldn’t forget. She could’ve gone through those doors and left us behind. Yet she hadn’t. Her final words echoed in my head as I picked up Thorn and headed north.

  I still have cards to play, Natalya. You haven’t seen the last of me yet.

  Thorn had carried my knocked-out butt a few times. I had yet to return the debt and there was a good reason. The guy was heavy as hell.

  A few human guys I’ve met could stand to get a good meal or two on their bones, and the white wizard I’d carried home once in the past required nothing more than a fireman’s lift. So I’m guessing I needed a challenge to keep me frosty and fresh, like a werewolf with solid muscle mass. While lugging him up a hill, I groaned, “Good Lord, did you eat Little Red Riding Hood on the way to Russia?”

  The night stretched out as I carried my charge. The goblin blade, my usual alarm to trouble, remained inert at my side in a knife scabbard.

  The countryside was so beautiful this late at night. I had no choice but to enjoy it. Maybe it was because I had Thorn with me. I leaned my head against his side. He didn’t stir, still sleeping. He always had a way to make me feel like I could face the world. The very idea that I might have to live for centuries without him tightened my throat and faltered my step.

  Even five years was a damn long time to be without the love of your life. It almost seemed like a lifetime since Thorn had left me behind five years ago to go to San Diego. It was a long story I tried not to dwell on, but he’d tried to keep his father from killing me, so he left. In the end, he nearly died at the hands of a warlock who trapped him for five years. In order to escape, Thorn had cursed the warlock, an act that blackened Thorn’s soul and left him dying.

  Both of us had been through so much. Would all our efforts be in vain?

  A few hours later, the sun rose to my right. Its warmth was welcomed. From Tamara’s house, I ventured to the nearest country road and continued north. Earlier, I used my phone to figure out our position and determine how far we had to go to Finland. If we had to do it all on foot, the distance was insane. I needed to find us a ride sooner or later. I couldn’t carry Thorn that far while we were both so vulnerable.

  Suddenly Thorn chuckled. “You can put me down now.” His hand tapped my back.

  “Good morning.” I tried to sound cheerful.

  Thorn staggered a bit, but he was steady on his feet once he found a set of bushes to relieve himself.

  While I gave him his privacy, I checked the phone to determine our location.

  The phone pretty much read “middle of nowhere” in Northern Russia.

  Not a single car had come down the rough country road. We had at least twenty miles until we reached the Finnish border.

  “How are you feeling?” I asked him.

  “Pretty rough. What the hell happened back there?” He rubbed his hair, which now stuck up in the cutest manner.

  “I don’t know to be honest. While we were on the way to the door, the house exploded.”

  Thorn frowned. “It was going to happen sooner or later. She was playing with shit she didn’t care about.”

  “What do you mean?” Did Thorn know something I didn’t?

  “I left out a lot of things while we were there.” He tugged me to stand so we could keep walking. I offered him water from a bottle and he drank it.

  “Like what?”

  “Tamara had wards all over that property. I could sense them the minute I stepped past the fence.”

  “Sense them?”

  He grinned at me. “I’m not the same man I used to be, sweetheart. Old magic has changed me in ways I still don’t understand.” Thorn revealed he knew old magic when the Long Island Pack leader had cornered me to kill me. That warlock who had imprisoned him taught him a thing or two.

  “What else have you held back from me?” I asked.

  “Tamara has weaved everything there in dark magic. Hardly anything on that property is defensive light magic, the house in particular. Didn’t you say something attacked the place the day after you arrived?”

  I nodded.

  “Whatever was trying to get in had to be crazy powerful ‘cause the house was built like a tank.”

  As he shook his head, everything weird about that house flashed before my eyes: the scream I heard on the burned floor, the walls that reacted as if alive when the attack occurred, and Luda mentioning the trapped beings.

  “It wasn’t a house, Nat. It was made from the...bodies of other creatures. Every time I walked in or left, I could feel them crying out in pain.”

  I slowed down. “What are you saying?”

  “She took shape-shifters, like us, and used their bodies
to create the house to protect her and the twins.”

  “No way!” So that was what Luda meant.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I snapped.

  “Tamara had her fingers in everything. The whole property was her dark magic playground. From the grounds to barn to the house walls. Every single conversation was heard. Every sound,” he said.

  “So why did we stay?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe I had hope,” he admitted. “Foolish hope, anyway.”

  I took his hand. We were both fools, hoping for the best even under these circumstances.

  A ride finally came by after an hour. A woman and her family appeared all too kind and offered us a ride to the nearest town where they lived. The ride was pleasant, even with the suitcases and such in the back.

  “You feeling all right?” Thorn asked. “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you sooner. I wasn’t in any shape to face Tamara.”

  The back of the truck wasn’t the cleanest, but I was too shocked and numb to notice. All that time I’d stood in that kitchen. I lit a fire and burned the walls with my lack of control. I’d caused those…shifters pain. I hadn’t even known they were trapped. Just the thought of it made my stomach churn.

  When we reached the nearest town, we stopped and got a bite to eat. A local werewolf offered us a hand and took us to his alpha. From there, we were given a ride to the border.

  “You two are smart to leave this area,” the older man who gave us a ride said in broken English.

  “Why?” Thorn asked.

  “The war between the warlocks and wizards is starting to spread out. We thought they’d keep to themselves and stay out in the north where there aren’t as many people, but their conflict is carrying over into the human world.” The man sighed. “Those wizards have the nerve to ask us for reinforcements. Like I want to bring my pack into their mess.”

  “Are you serious?” I asked.

  The man huffed. “We have no reason to trust any of them. It’s crazy shit, if you ask me. I wouldn’t help them if they offered to help me on my death bed.”

  The ride was quiet after that. On the way to the border, we stopped at a gas station. Our driver pulled over to pump the gas while I got out to stretch my legs. Thorn was fast asleep in the passenger seat. The temperature was a bit cooler here, but it was pleasant nonetheless. I walked a distance to the side of the road. What I spotted made me stop.

  Across the road from me were sets of white tents. Like a campground of sorts. But none of the humans who pumped their gas or pulled out of the station glanced in the direction where I looked. I rubbed my eyes in case I was seeing things.

  Nope. The camp was still there. A man emerged from one of the tents. When he noticed that I was looking directly at him, I quickly glanced away.

  Oh, shit, shit!

  Act normal.

  Along the edges of my peripheral vision, bits of the campground appeared muddy, as if I were looking through a dirty window. I wasn’t meant to see him or the camp. All of this was probably thanks to Bill’s goblin magic that helped me see past most glamours.

  I turned around and hauled my butt back to the truck. Our werewolf driver was still pumping gas and whistling along with the radio. I settled into the backseat so my twitchiness wouldn’t wake up Thorn. I placed my hands in my lap and tried to act natural. Maybe staring at fingernails would work.

  The Russian werewolf did a little folk music dance at the pump oblivious to my behavior.

  Also, he didn’t see the man who stood in front of my window.

  Oh, fudge.

  The guy had no smell and didn’t make a sound. There wasn’t the telltale odor of cinnamon or any other indicator he was there. Was he a wizard? It was impossible for me to tell. Even worse, had I stumbled upon a warlock encampment? They could be walking around all over the place.

  If so, we were dead werewolf chow. I rested my hand against the goblin blade hilt as my heartbeat rose to blinding levels. I even closed my eyes for good measure.

  Go away. Go away.

  Don’t force me to fight you.

  Did I even have it in me to use the old magic Tamara taught me? When I heard a car door open and the Russian driver got inside, the man who had approached my door was long gone.

  I finally exhaled.

  “You okay?” Thorn asked. He’d awakened and promptly joined me in the backseat.

  “Fine.” I tried to sound like everything was okay and probably failed. “I’ve been awake too long. A little fried.”

  If he only knew.

  “Get some sleep.” He tilted my head to his shoulder. “I’ll stay awake.”

  Sure, sleep with spellcasters roaming around. I turned my head to glance at where the encampment lay.

  “You see something?” Thorn asked. So he didn’t see it, which meant there were things my eyes could see that his couldn’t. I had to remember that for the future to keep us safe.

  “Nothing you need to worry about,” I replied.

  The ride toward the border left me wary. Would we be followed?

  Not far from Finland, our driver dropped us off. We’d have to cross through the forest. “Good luck, you two,” he said with a wave.

  We thanked him and set out.

  As we hiked through the dense forest toward Finland, I wondered how this would work out. Would we encounter a fence or some other structure? Was the border guarded? As we made our way deeper into the woods, we came to a small clearing. There were men waiting for us there.

  My stomach dropped when I spotted the man I saw from the encampment. They looked like a bunch of humans going out on a camping trip with their jackets and such.

  I grabbed Thorn’s arm. He had tensed up, too.

  “We can’t go this way,” I hissed.

  He pushed me behind him and took a step back. “Do you know them?”

  “Not really. I saw that man at the gas station.”

  “And you thought to keep that to yourself?” he grumbled.

  He picked a shitty time for a squabble. “I didn’t know who he was. He showed up, disappeared, reappeared. I wasn’t gonna roll down the window and say, ‘Hey, whassup?’”

  Thorn turned in the opposite direction and ran into a full sprint. This was the man I remembered. As to how long he’d be able to keep it up was uncertain. We ran as far as we could until Thorn slowed down first. His grip on my hand loosened, but I refused to let go of him.

  One minute we were running through the forest, the next we had five men blink into existence in our path. There was no way we could outrun them if they could teleport like that.

  “This land isn’t safe for you, wolf.” The man from the gas station stepped forward. He was the shortest among them with dark eyes and hair. He had that twinkle in one of his eyes that I noticed on Nick once in a while.

  At my side, Thorn’s body vibrated with hints of the change.

  “Let us pass,” he growled.

  “We’re not those war-hungry bastards,” the man said.

  So they were wizards, a rather scruffy looking band of them.

  “Then why are you following us?” I asked.

  “Where did you get marked by a darkling?” His words sank in slowly.

  A darkling?

  “I don’t understand what you mean?” I took a step around Thorn.

  “He has to be referring to those things that went after Tamara,” Thorn said.

  Out of curiosity, I glanced at myself. Nothing appeared out of sorts.

  “Which one of us is marked?” I asked.

  The wizard in the front with the longest hair spoke. “The female was marked first, but hints linger on the male. Only one of you has been near it.”

  Realization hit and I tried to process all of it. “First of all, what is a darkling and once you find out where we got marked, how will you use that information?”

  “A good question,” a voice behind us said.

  We turned to see a white-bearded, older gentleman strolling toward us—Dr. Frank. Now that w
as a face I hadn’t expected to see. At all.

  “Dr. Frank, w-what are you doing here?” I stammered.

  It was rather strange to see my therapist out in the middle of the woods like this. His gray eyes shined with amusement. “A scout from this party told me they were questioning a woman fitting your description. I was…surprised to confirm it was you.”

  “There have been some developments since my last appointment,” I admitted.

  “For both of us,” he said.

  He nodded and an understanding passed between us. He knew based on past therapy sessions that I was here for Thorn, and I suspected he was on the frontlines to assist in the war.

  “Now as to your original question before I interrupted your conversation. We’ve been hunting a warlock named Cato Fillian who has unleashed his minions to the countryside. His superiors apparently want him to keep others from learning how to remove the curses. And that includes werewolves who use old magic. I have a feeling you’re included in that group, yes?”

  I nodded.

  “These creatures are difficult to track,” he said. “We lost a trail in Finland and only happen to come back across the border and find you here. I wonder how deeply you’re involved in all of this.”

  Thorn grabbed my hand. When my mouth opened, his grip tightened. His apparent signal to keep my mouth shut.

  “What happens to us once we tell you what you want to know?” Thorn asked.

  “I’ve taken care of Natalya for a long time, Thorn,” Dr. Frank said to reassure him. “I’ve known her far longer than even you have.”

  With Dr. Frank here, I couldn’t resist confessing everything. “I have been working with another werewolf to learn old magic to find a cure for Thorn. We just happened to become a target when these darkling things attacked us, too.”

  “They are probably just as clueless as we are as to where the darklings are located,” the short wizard said.

  “I agree, Wilhelm. We’re chasing troublesome shadows, and the threat from the warlocks is growing worse day by day as they take our weapons away.”

  The stricken look on their faces filled me with dread. How badly had things gotten over the past three weeks?

  “So no one has come up with a way to remove curses?” I asked. “I mean, c’mon, you guys can do amazing things. Why not something so simple?”