by Callie Rose
Before I can say anything else, she slides farther up my body and deepens the kiss, and talking becomes the last thing I want to do.
We cross the Two-Tone River later that afternoon, and in the process get a biology lesson on why it's called that. Dirt and sediment settles along the edges, giving the outer rim of the river a brownish color, while the center of the river flows with an abnormal turquoise blue that Dare tells us originates from limestone deposits carved deep beneath the central part of the water.
I’ve never been one to care about shit like that, but Sable’s excitement over learning it—and seeing it in action in the river—is contagious.
The Two-Tone is slow moving and easy to cross, except for the fact that Sable has never gone swimming in her wolf form before. So Ridge and I precede her while Archer and Dare follow close behind her, ready to leap into action if something goes wrong. But doggy paddling is one of those things that comes naturally to pretty much all wolves, and despite her nerves, Sable’s on the opposite bank before she even realizes she’s back on solid ground. The subsequent celebration as she shakes off water and then bounds around the rocky ground yipping like a puppy is so fucking cute I can barely stand it.
Once across the river, we enter the northern mountain range and work our way through all the peaks and valleys. It’s hard work that makes my legs ache, and we have to pause often to give Sable a break. A light rainstorm cools us off in the late afternoon, and by nightfall, we see Wolfsbane Mountain for the first time. It does, in fact, look like a giant, howling wolf’s head, and we make camp in its shadow.
The next morning, we continue past Wolfsbane and deeper into the mountains where the peaks become higher and more craggy, which slows our pace. We spend three days in the mountains, following wispy traces of humanity—a scent in the undergrowth, dusty footprints left in the dirt, tiny things that show someone has been through here.
We can’t be entirely sure we’re tracking the witch. Some of the scents are so faint, we aren’t even entirely certain we’re tracking the same person. But it’s all we have to work with.
On the third day, we catch our first taste of magic.
My skin prickles with the alien sensation of it. I stop walking and glance at my companions to see if they feel it too. Ridge looks around us, confused, but Dare and Archer are tensed as if ready to run.
That’s how I know for sure it’s witch magic. No shifter likes witches, but out of all of us, those two in particular have the most reason to hate and fear the witches—and as a result, their magic.
Hey. No worries. We can do this together, I tell them, dropping back to stand beside Dare. We have your backs.
Archer nods, but I can sense the unease rolling off him.
Beside me, Sable shifts to her human form before any of us can make a sound. She keeps her movements slow and steady as she pulls a cotton dress from her backpack and slips it on over her head.
What is she doing? Ridge grunts inside my head, worry coloring his voice. She needs her teeth.
I’m sure she has her reasons, Archer argues, but he sounds just as concerned.
I nudge her with my nose, trying to ask her what the hell she was thinking without being able to say the words. She’s safest in wolf form, with access to her animal speed and sharp teeth, like Ridge said. Lucky for me, she’s so empathetic she knows immediately what I’m asking.
“If the lone witch is here, and she attacks us with magic, I need to have access to mine,” Sable says urgently, tightening the straps on her backpack so it’ll fit her current smaller frame, then throwing it over her shoulders once more. “It’s hard enough to control the witch when I’m in human form. It’s impossible when I’m a wolf.”
Archer whines, but I nod once, letting her know I get it. And none of us can argue the point—she’s totally right.
Let’s go, Ridge says, drawing in close to Archer. Trystan, take point. Dare, behind him.
His tendency to take the lead used to drive me crazy, until I figured out it’s just how Ridge operates. If he sees a path, he tells us to take it—not because he thinks he’s our alpha, but just because his brain works quickly on a strategic level. Since I have a tendency to leap before I look, I appreciate his quick-thinking.
I trot forward quickly and lead the group forward. Cliffs rise on all sides, boxing us in, though the small clearing ahead of us gives us a little bit of visibility. The valley is small and flat, filled with swaying wildflowers and a few medium-sized boulders. There aren’t many places for a potential attacker to hide, but I don’t like the way the cliffs hover over us. We’re vulnerable here.
Tension hangs heavy over us all.
I glance back to see that Dare’s hackles are raised, and Archer is panting, a physical manifestation of his anxiety. Sable walks between Ridge and Archer in her human form, her gaze darting around as if she’s trying to look everywhere at once.
But it doesn’t matter.
When the attack comes, none of us see it coming.
Out of the open, empty space ahead of us—out of thin fucking air—magic comes hurtling for us.
14
Sable
The space around us seems to crackle with power. I feel the magic coming before I see it, but I’m not fast enough to stop it. I’m still getting used to the feeling of magic in the air, to the way it calls to my own power and sets it humming beneath my skin.
So my reaction time is shoddy, to say the least.
Black smoke shoots past my line of sight like a whip cracking, and several spiky tendrils hit Trystan in the hip. He yips in pain, a sound that sends terror surging through my heart, and his back legs give out beneath him. He trips sideways and sinks onto his back haunches, whining and growling.
My heart drops into my stomach, and I leap forward, desperately rifling through the sigils I learned from Archer.
They’re really all I know, which unfortunately means I don’t know much. The ones I do know have been practiced relentlessly, over and over, until I could recall those sigils in my sleep. But faced with a very real threat, I freeze. Suddenly, I’m useless. Every sigil I ever studied, every sigil I ever drew on the floor or in the air during Archer’s training sessions—they’re all gone like I opened a window in my mind and set them free.
That is, until another black tendril strikes out at us. It misses, but not by much. The static of it in the air raises all the tiny hairs on my neck.
Determination to protect my mates surges inside me. Something in my mind snaps into place, drawing me out of my momentary stupor. I desperately work to recall a defensive spell Archer showed me. The strong, black strokes of the sigil are right there on the edges my mind, hazy and nearly unrecognizable.
For a split second, I’m not sure I can remember its exact shape. I’m terrified I’ll draw the wrong sigil and blow us all up because of my ineptitude. But I can’t consider that right now, as Archer ducks another smoky missile and the energy slams into the dirt, sending a cascade of debris into the air.
I duck and cover my head with my hands as dirt and rock rain down. Then I throw myself between the magic and my mates—or at least where I think the magic is coming from, up the side of a nearby hill—and etch out what I hope is the right sigil. If not, I guess I’m about to find out just how badly I can screw this all up.
Oh, thank fuck.
A dim, gauzy black barrier forms between me and the unseen attacker just in time for another spell to race across the plain. The witch’s magic slams into my shield and dissipates on contact as my barrier renders it useless. But my spell is so weak that my shield shatters beneath the force of the magic, leaving us open to attack once again.
Meanwhile, Trystan has had the time he needs to get to his feet, and he stands next to Ridge. I’m relieved to see him upright, even if he’s favoring his back legs. The two of them scent the air like they might be able to smell the witch, even though I’m sure whoever’s attacking us has thought of that and taken the necessary precautions.
&nb
sp; Then Dare howls. The keening, wordless noise is full of anger and frustration, and as the sound dies in the air, he takes off running. His dark form streaks toward the point where the magic seems to be coming from, as if he’s going to track down the witch and make them pay.
“No!” I bolt forward, tearing past Archer, who’s checking over Trystan’s hind end where he got hit by the magic. I can’t see any wounds or blood, which makes me think the witch’s magic attacked him on the inside—and that’s utterly terrifying. “Dare, no! You can’t leave the range of my magic!”
Another blast of power echoes through the valley, and I whip around to see it coming from an entirely different place. I etch my sigil once more and take the full brunt of the blow. At least this time, my shield doesn’t immediately fall. It wavers tenuously for a second before collapsing.
It’s barely an improvement, but I’ll take it.
All four of my mates take up positions around me, snarling and snapping at the air as they survey the hills around us. Their hackles are up, and it isn’t hard to guess what they’re thinking and feeling—the magic is coming from all around us. From everywhere and nowhere all at once. How can we fight an enemy we can’t see? Especially my shifter mates, who depend on physical strength and prowess.
You can’t tear a ghost limb from limb.
So it’s up to me to do something. I’m the only one who can fight magic with magic.
With my heart crawling into my throat, I close my eyes briefly and open my mind to see if I can sense her presence nearby.
When shifters transform from human to wolf or vice versa, I can feel their magic in the air. So I can only hope that if she uses her powers, I’ll be able to feel it happening. If I can get ahead of her blasts, maybe I can get enough barriers up to keep us safe and figure out where she is and how to stop her.
And it works. I sense her next attack before it even pops into view and sketch my sigil in the air an instant earlier than I had before. That extra perception makes my sigil stronger, and after the witch’s magic slams into it, it remains up, strong and unwavering.
“Get behind me!” I yell to my mates, who are still gathered defensively around me.
Another wave of black smoke lances out from the hills behind me, and I etch out a new sigil, forming a second, slightly less corporeal barrier. Clearly, I’m not skilled enough to hold two at once, while the witch attacking us is definitely skilled enough to do more than one attack at a time.
She attacks again from a different direction. I’m ready this time, because I’m listening to my innate magic sense rather than relying on my sight. But my hands are already full with the first two barriers, and now the third is hardly more than a gust of wind between us and the witch. Her magic tears through my paltry shield as if it isn’t even real, and the smoky tendril flings past me and narrowly misses Ridge’s snout.
My panic and terror are joined by anger as I watch Ridge’s rust-colored wolf dart out of the way. His tail trails too close to the black smoke for my comfort.
If I don’t do something, we’ll all be killed. This witch clearly holds a vendetta—maybe not necessarily against wolves, but at the very least against anyone who encroaches on her territory. She won’t stop until we’re vanquished, whether that means we run away or we’re dead. I’ll be damned if I let her kill us.
But we can’t run either. This witch is my only option. She might hold the key to understanding everything that I am, and to gaining control over my witch side. I just have to figure out how to get past her defenses and convince her to listen.
There’s a slight lull in her attacks, and I take my chance to try another sigil I recall from my practices: this one meant to amplify sound. I etch it quickly over my throat and scream, “We come in peace! Please! We don’t want to fight!”
Before I even finish speaking, another blast of smoky magic snaps out from the cliffs around us. It passes by my head so fast it sounds like the crack of a bullet. I leap away from it as more chunks of rock and dirt explode into the air. Archer yelps as the force of the blow throws him out of range. He lands on his big paws and skids to a stop, shaking his head as if trying to recover from a hard punch.
I have to stop this. My mates are still surrounding me, but they can’t do anything against magic. The only thing they can do between me and this witch is get themselves killed, and I refuse for that to happen.
What I need is a shock factor, like the night of Lawson’s challenge when I revealed myself to the pack as a hybrid wolf and witch. That’s what the witch needs—to see something so shocking that she’ll stop her assault and listen because she wants to know more.
So I drop my shitty magical barriers, and I shift into my wolf form.
The witch deep inside me steps aside to make way for the wolf, thank God, but magic continues to run over my skin. Once my fur has grown in and I’m standing on four legs facing the threat, blackness still races through my fur, rippling over me.
The valley goes deathly silent.
Shoving my way past Ridge and Dare, I drop my pack and put myself front and center so that I can gaze around us, doing my best to spot the witch. Her defenses are so secure that I can’t even sense the magic that’s hiding her.
I realize with a thrill of fear and excitement that maybe this means she’s smart. That she knows what she’s doing. And that she can teach me how.
Suddenly, energy shimmers over the valley just ahead of me. Black smoke tilts and swirls from the air as if being blown away by the breeze, dissipating into nothing.
Like a mirage coming into being, a small cabin forms out of the space between two cliffs. A puff of chimney smoke curves up from a stone chimney, and a pile of cut logs sits against one wall in a perfect pyramid. An axe is planted in a nearby tree stump next to an old well.
As the magic lifts, a woman appears standing several yards away from the rustic cabin. Black smoke still curls from her fingertips, but her hands are at her sides—not raised in a threatening gesture.
She’s older than me. Late thirties or early forties, tall and willowy with pale red hair and vivid green eyes. Her face is white with shock, and her jaw hangs open.
“No.” Her voice is clear as a bell as it cuts through the valley. “This can’t be possible.”
15
Sable
The silence that falls over the valley after her declaration is deafening, especially in the wake of the violence, when her magic was zinging through the air and ripping up chunks of the ground. Not even a bird sings or an insect chirps. It’s so quiet that I can hear my own heartbeat and the breaths flowing in and out of my companions.
In wolf form, the silence is so amplified it’s almost painful.
Now that I have her attention and my point is made, I shift back to human. The moment I’m back on two feet, I put my hands out to my sides so she can see them clearly. The last thing I need is for her to imagine she sees black smoke coming from my fingertips and attack us again while my guard is down.
My heart pounds as I approach her. I keep my steps short and only close some of the distance between us—not so much that it will put her back on her guard, but enough so that we can easily see each other’s faces and hear each other speak. All four of my mates remain as wolves, gathering around me protectively but letting me take the lead. It’s a small thing, but it proves they trust my judgment.
Which is good, since I’m really questioning it right now.
The woman eyes me warily, and I flush, trying to ignore the fact that I lost my clothes in the shift and am now standing before a strange woman absolutely naked. I’ve only just started getting comfortable shifting back naked in front of my mates or other shifters, but this is different. Being naked in front of a stranger makes me feel vulnerable and bare. Especially a stranger who just tried to kill me, and one I need to somehow convince to help me.
“I promise you, your eyes aren't deceiving you,” I tell her, working to keep my voice steady. I keep my hands raised to show that I have no w
eapon and no intention to harm her. “It’s true. I’m half witch, half shifter. I only recently discovered the truth, when my witch side and wolf side manifested separately. Before that happened, I thought I was just an ordinary human. I had no knowledge of any of this for years. I wasn’t raised as a shifter or a witch. I was raised human and never told about what I really was.”
The woman doesn’t interrupt me, though her eyes narrow slightly as she watches and listens. I can tell she’s on edge, just like my men—all of whom basically radiate tension beside me. I don’t need to be in wolf form to read their minds on this. They don’t like being this close to a witch, and they don’t like the ever-present possibility that she might attack us again. I can’t really say I blame them for being suspicious, but I really hope none of them attack.
If they do, the witch will fight back. And she’ll probably win.
“I’m Sable,” I say when she remains silent. “What’s your name?”
She gives a little start, like she didn’t expect me to be so personal. Several emotions pass over her face, but since she’s a complete stranger, I can’t really read them all. Fear, distrust, hope, I don’t know. She seems to consider not answering me, her face set in a hard, suspicious glare. I’m already calculating how I’ll handle the situation if she refuses to speak to me, but then she finally opens her mouth.
“My name is Gwen.” Now that her tone isn’t laced with shock, I can tell that she has an accent. Like a light Georgia drawl, as if she spent time down south but didn’t necessarily grow up there.
I’m encouraged by the fact she answered after considering not doing so. Maybe this means I’ve made a little progress, despite the tension that still fills the air between us all. Since my mates are all still in wolf form, and I’m trying to build goodwill between me and the witch, I refrain from introducing them yet, or even acknowledging their presence. There will be time for that once I’ve diffused the danger of this situation—if I’m able manage that. For now, there’s no need to draw attention to the fact that there are wolves behind me who would love to rip out her throat.
