I wondered if Simon was seeing anyone seriously. It would make me feel better if he was, but it would also be ridiculously awkward to bring it up. I made a mental note to ask Lily. “Why don’t you get some rest?” I suggested instead. “It’s a four-hour trip, and I’m used to staying up.” Simon, on the other hand, had to keep a diurnal schedule to go with his teaching job.
“Good idea,” he said, looking relieved.
Simon fell asleep quickly, and my thoughts turned to the Cheyenne werewolf pack. My overall impression of werewolves had come a long way since one had murdered my sister, but part of me still saw them as enemy combatants. I’d seen what a werewolf had done to Sam’s body, and I still had nightmares about it.
You know that was an isolated incident. Sam’s voice said inside my head. I used to think this was just my brain predicting what she would say if she were still alive, but after I found out I was a witch, I’d realized that my sister and I were still connected, thanks to boundary magic. Sometimes her voice came through that connection, popping into my head like a catchy song. Tonight she sounded a little weary, like she was sick of making this argument.
“But it’s not just me,” I said under my breath, with a quick glance at Simon. He was deeply asleep. “Sashi has some kind of terrible history with werewolves. And they were responsible for killing Lily and Simon’s dad.”
There was no response, but this time I could predict what Sam would say, because we’d had this argument before, in my dreams. She would say that people were complicated, and werewolves were just people who’d gotten tangled up in magic, like me or Quinn or anyone else in the Old World. You would think that if Sam didn’t hold a grudge against werewolves, I wouldn’t either. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to work like that. Not with the image of Sam’s ravaged body still in my memory. I had seen carnage in Iraq, but never with such brutality or disdain, like my twin’s body was a chunk of useless meat.
I tried to pull my thoughts back to the current situation—and the current werewolves. Sam’s killer was dead, and I did respect Ryan Dunn, werewolf or not. I had met him only twice, and he was brusque and pushy and concerned only with his own pack, but . . . I understood him. He and I would probably never be friends, but all that mattered was that I could work with him. Besides, it was just for this one thing. I owed him a debt, and he was calling it in.
Simple as that.
Chapter 5
Traffic was light on I-25, thanks to the early hour, and soon I was winding my way along 160, which curled around the bottom corner of the park and led to the park turnoff: a pretty, straight-shot road that probably provided a nice view of the dunes when it was light enough to see them.
By the time we reached the park entrance, the stars had faded away and a ribbon of orange-pink was spreading along the horizon. The visitor center wasn’t open yet, so I drove right past it, following the sign to the parking area. “Simon,” I said, reaching over to nudge his shoulder. “We’re almost there.”
He sat up, yawning and rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hand. He looked around for a moment at the miles of empty darkness and the straight road ahead. “Why are we going so slow?”
“The speed limit is ten.”
“Why?”
“Probably because of them.” I pointed to the handful of deer grazing on either side of the Jeep. You definitely wouldn’t want to hit one of them at fifty miles per hour, especially in the near darkness.
“Oh.” Simon still sounded sleepy. “You’re so smart, Lex.” I had to smile.
We reached a small, rectangular lot, which contained only a navy pickup truck splashed with mud. “That might be the missing couple’s,” Simon muttered.
“You’re so smart, Simon,” I replied, mimicking his voice.
Simon made a show of straightening up in his seat, faking pompousness. “Thank you. I know.”
Grinning, I parked the Jeep a few spots away, right in front of the wooden fence that formed the border of the parking area. Behind it, I could make out wetland willow growing in a sort of second, natural fence, forming a border to the park itself. The lightening sky made silhouettes out of the dunes. I told myself that they probably didn’t look quite so black and terrifying after the sun came up.
“Lex . . . you gonna be okay out there?” Simon had glanced sideways at me to watch my reaction.
I paused, not sure how to answer. I had been afraid wearing ski gear would set off my claustrophobia, and I hadn’t laid eyes on a desert since I’d stumbled out of one after being left for dead. Now I was going to combine those two things.
“I have to be,” I said at last. “Dunn called in his marker.” I opened the car door before Simon could reply.
The Jeep’s thermostat had said it was twenty degrees outside, but I’d taken off my heavyweight coat while I was driving, and the wind bit through my long-sleeved T-shirt. My nose immediately began running. I took a quick glance at the pickup truck to make sure it was empty and decided to get my cold-weather gear on before anything else. Grabbing the coat, I hurried to the back of the Jeep and opened the hatchback.
As quickly as possible, Simon and I started putting on the gear: lightweight snow pants, hiking boots for me, then the coats. I showed Simon how to pull his BUFF scarf over his head and turn it into a balaclava.
Dunn’s battered Forester pulled up as we were still getting dressed, and he and Mary gave us a quick nod and headed straight for the pickup. Dunn pulled the door handle, found it locked, and put his hands over his eyes to peer inside. “Anything?” I called.
He shook his head. “They’re still out there, or they’ve been taken by someone. We’ll change now,” he added abruptly, and he and Mary went toward the willow clusters, Mary already peeling her loose sweatshirt over her head, exposing a lot of pale white skin.
Simon and I went back to putting on hats and gloves, the goggles hanging around our necks. I insisted that he put a bottle of water, an energy bar, and a compass into his messenger bag even though he complained about the weight. As he slung the bag over his shoulder and began to turn away, I caught his arm. Making sure the werewolves weren’t looking, I reached into a compartment in the Jeep and handed him a knife that Quinn had bought for me the previous Christmas. It was in a leather sheath and had a small clip to hook on one’s pants. “It’s silver,” I said. “Just in case.”
Simon rolled his eyes good-naturedly. “I’m a witch, remember? I can handle a physical threat, Lex.”
“Yeah, but there’s two of them, and not all of your spells will work against werewolves,” I reminded him. As witches, Simon and I were in no danger of being turned into werewolves ourselves, but we could still be mauled to death by big-ass teeth and claws. I was carrying my revolver, loaded with silver bullets, and I would have offered Simon one too, if I’d thought he would carry it. Simon wasn’t great with guns.
I extended the knife toward him again. “Humor me, okay? We might need to split up and follow different trails, and I don’t want to be worried about you the whole time.”
Simon gave a little headshake, but he took the knife, tucking it into his jeans underneath his snow pants. Hopefully the wolves wouldn’t be able to smell the silver under the layers.
Simon began walking the parking lot’s perimeter, setting up his humans-go-away spell. There was just no way to cast the spell around every single entry point to the dunes—the park and preserve covered more than a hundred and sixty square miles—but he could put a wide net around the entire parking area and the road leading to it. It was also the off-season for the park and early morning on a weekday, both of which worked in our favor. Add in the illusion spell that made the werewolves look like dogs, and I figured we were probably safe.
While Simon worked on the ward, I went to the Jeep’s back seat and began unwrapping the two fifteen-pound rump roasts we’d bought on our bathroom stop. The change from human to wolf used up a lot of energy, and Ryan Dunn had suggested that they eat before we started the search, so they’d be better
able to concentrate on tracking. I was just as happy not to be heading onto the sand dunes with two hungry werewolves.
When the roasts were unwrapped and set out near the edge of the parking lot, I wandered over to the Ventimiglias’ pickup truck and peered inside, just out of curiosity. I understood immediately why Dunn hadn’t bothered to break into the truck. Matt and Cammie clearly used it a lot—there was dust and some mud in the seats and footwells—but the tiny back seat held only a couple of neat piles of folded clothes, a gallon of water, and what looked like a roadside emergency kit. Nothing that would help us find them.
There was a loud grunt of pain from the direction of the willows, and I automatically glanced over, seeing the naked black branches shaking. I had never seen one of the werewolves change, and I planned to keep it that way. I looked for Simon, and saw him tramping back toward me, almost unrecognizable in his heavy coat and John’s ski gear. He hadn’t put the goggles on yet, and his eyes smiled at me.
“Done,” he said, stamping his feet a little to warm them up. He leaned against the Jeep. The willow branches went still, and I figured they had to be almost finished. “Um, when they come out,” Simon began, “we should probably try to look nonthreatening.”
“I do,” I said, looking down at myself. “I mean . . . right?” It wasn’t like I was holding a weapon.
“Standing at parade rest is maybe a little threatening.”
Oh.
“We’ve worked with them before,” Simon said mildly.
I pushed out a breath. “For one night, three years ago, on our territory. That’s not the same as trust.” And they killed my sister, said an irrational voice in the back of my mind. I knew it was irrational, but I couldn’t help having the thought.
“I don’t necessarily disagree,” Simon replied. “But let’s maybe not start a fight we don’t know we want?”
“Yeah. Okay.” I stepped toward him and copied his body language, leaning against the Jeep.
A moment later, the two wolves emerged from the brush on our right, moving toward the rump roasts. Once again, I had to marvel at the insane size of them. I had seen natural wolves at a preserve, and those had been much bigger than I’d expected—but werewolves followed the law of conservation of mass. Dunn was two hundred pounds of muscle as a human, and as a wolf he was still two hundred pounds of muscle, which made him even bigger than Scarlett’s bargest. He had thick fur that was dark gray on top, fading into white on his legs and tail.
Mary was smaller and sleeker, but her dark coloring and intelligent green eyes somehow made her equally terrifying. I made myself look away. Simon was right. There was no sense in challenging them. I’d come here to help.
The rump roasts were on the ground right in front of the Jeep, but to my surprise the wolves barely glanced at them. Moving cautiously, they walked right past the meat—and toward us.
Simon made a little noise in the back of his throat. Dunn was leading, and he moved closer and closer, his shoulders lowered slightly, coiling to spring.
I found myself pulling my sidearm, but I had never practiced with it in thick gloves. I fumbled it to the ground just as the wolves leaped toward us.
Chapter 6
“Down!” Simon shoved me hard, causing both of us to crash to the pavement. The wolves soared right over us—and raced across the pavement toward the cluster of deer that had caught their attention.
I had completely forgotten about the deer.
I would have breathed a sigh of relief, except Simon had knocked the wind out of me. I lay sprawled on the pavement, trying to get my lungs to work, dammit. I knew my eyes weren’t actually bugging out like I’d been deprived of oxygen, but that’s how it felt.
“Lex!” Shifting his body off mine and supporting himself on his elbows, Simon flapped off a glove. He used his uncovered hand to push the makeshift balaclava off my forehead, pulling it down below my chin, doing the same with his own.
Simon smoothed the hair from my face with a cool hand, murmuring, “I’m sorry, it’s okay, it’s okay, you’ll breathe in a second, I promise.”
Agonizing seconds ticked by while I struggled to force my diaphragm to do its thing. This had happened to me many times over the years, but it never ceased to be scary.
At last, my lungs reinflated, and I gasped in a great breath of air. Simon grinned ruefully, and I couldn’t help but smile back. “I didn’t mean to push you so hard,” he apologized. “I’m clumsy in this gear.”
“I’m sorry,” I told him. “I thought they were attacking us. I feel really stupid.”
“Me too. Let’s not tell Lily, okay?”
I chortled, which hurt my chest. “Simon,” I gasped.
“Yeah?”
“Can you get off me?”
His olive skin flushed, and he sat up and backed away from me. I had to laugh again at the mortified look on his face. “You didn’t hurt me,” I assured him. “It’s cool. We’re cool. I’m just going to lie here for a minute and feel like an idiot.”
The pain in my chest was already receding. Simon relaxed; then there was a loud, wet crunch, and I think we were both relieved to turn our heads toward the werewolves. They had gotten one of the deer down and were nose-deep in the carcass. “I guess they prefer their food hot,” Simon remarked. He stood up and extended his bare hand to me. Grunting, I took it and let him help me to my feet.
We spent a minute regrouping—he retrieved his glove, I fixed my headscarf in place and put the revolver back in my pocket. I got an old backpack with emergency supplies out of the back of the Jeep and strapped it on. By the time I straightened up again, the wolves were trotting toward us, licking blood off their lips.
Dunn approached me cautiously, and I had the sudden impression that he could smell the silver bullets. I wasn’t going to leave the gun behind, so I fixed my eyes on the ground and held out a closed fist for him to sniff, while Mary and Simon did more or less the same thing.
“You remember us?” I asked, risking a quick glance at Dunn’s eyes. “We’re . . . friends. Well, allies, I guess.” The wolf’s expression didn’t change, and I felt stupid all over again. What exactly was I expecting here? I gestured to Simon. “He’s going to put an illusion on you so you can run around during the day without scaring people.”
The wolves seemed to understand that, or maybe they just remembered Simon casting the illusion charm on them before our fight with the sandworm. Either way, they held still for a moment while he did his thing, pausing in front of each wolf, touching its head, and mumbling something I couldn’t hear.
When he stepped back again, the wolves looked exactly the same to me. The last time we’d done this, Simon had explained that because magic didn’t work well against itself, knowing there was an illusion allowed me to see right through it.
When he was finished with the casting, Simon slung his messenger bag over his shoulder and glanced at me. “The shirts?”
“Oh, right.” I went over to Dunn’s Forester, opened the unlocked passenger door, and found the paper Whole Foods bag he had told me about. Dunn and Mary had stopped at the missing werewolves’ house before coming to Boulder. I reached into the bag for the two sweaters, holding them out for the wolves. They sniffed the fabric with increasing interest, and Dunn let out a low growl in the back of his throat. I’d spent enough time around canines to recognize it as a worried sound. “We’re here to help,” I said to him, “so try not to leave us behind, okay?”
Dunn let out a short bark and took off at a fast, relaxed lope, Mary at his heels. They disappeared into the brush almost instantly.
I handed Simon one of the sand sleds, tucked the other under my arm, and started after the wolves.
We caught up with them easily, to my surprise. They had stopped to sniff around the little strip of willows next to the parking lot where they’d changed earlier. Simon and I climbed down a sandy ramp to join them.
Now that we were inside the willow patch, I could see a wide expanse of damp sand stretching f
rom here to the foot of the dunes. “That’s the creek,” I told Simon, pointing. “In the summer this whole thing is water, but it must run dry in the colder months.” A few little rivulets of water were still moving sluggishly across it, but most of the remaining water had frozen over.
Simon nodded, adjusting his goggles, and I scanned the creek bed. I had sort of been hoping for giant wolf footprints leading us in one direction or another, but I saw right away that this was silly. The wind was constantly shifting the landscape, even over the wet sand. Footprints would disappear in an hour or two.
We watched the wolves for a few more minutes, and then they finally left the willows and began making their way across the creek bed. Simon and I started after them, with Simon picking his way around the puddles in his nonwaterproof shoes.
As soon as we left the protection of the brush, I felt the wind buffeting against my coat, searching for gaps in my gear. I hadn’t left many, but soon a few tendrils of my hair writhed free of the headscarf and danced around my face. I tried breathing through the layer of scarf, but it was wet and cold and my nose began to run again. The goggles and gear immediately began to feel oppressive.
I decided that a cold, runny nose was preferable to claustrophobia, and pulled the scarf down, giving myself room to breathe—at least, when the wind didn’t snatch my breath away. Between the wind and the gear, it was difficult to hear much, so Simon and I just lumbered after the werewolves, avoiding the patches of ice.
Dunn and Mary didn’t seem bothered by the cold wind or the sand, but judging by their frequent backtracking and widening circles, they were struggling to track their missing packmates. As I watched them move in circles, I decided that Matt and Cammie likely had run around the creek bed for a while, stretching their legs and enjoying themselves.
Still, I figured they would have made their way to the sand dunes eventually, so to conserve energy, I gestured at Simon that we should keep going, trudging across the packed sand in a straight line. With the wind whipping at us, it seemed to take us an eternity just to cross the creek bed, and by the time we reached the foot of the dunes I could see Simon panting. I looked around for Dunn and Mary just as they trotted past us, heading up the nearest dune.
Boundary Broken (Boundary Magic Book 4) Page 4
