The Were Witch Complete Series Omnibus

by Renée Jaggér

  “It is beautiful here,” she told the six women under her, “but do not allow yourselves to be distracted. We are close to our destination.”

  The nocturnal paradise of the lycanthropes’ sacred realm, hidden in a far corner of the Other, was a place none of them had seen; in fact, it had been hidden from other species for many generations. They all gawked at the silvered wilderness as they walked.

  But none of the others challenged Villalobos’ proclamations. They were professionals—veteran operatives, every one of them. Perrault and Blasko had accompanied her during their attempted truce with Roland for that very reason.

  And the other four, though younger and less powerful, were considered promising initiates with several combat-oriented missions under their belts.

  “Madame,” asked one of the newer girls, “is it possible that the wizard is somewhere far from the werewitch? The briefings said that the two of them have, in the past, separated for long stretches while training.”

  Villalobos frowned as she felt a ripple of uncertainty flow through the rudimentary coven-mind they had established. It was a good question, she supposed; it indicated that the younger agent was applying her critical thinking skills. But it irked her and undermined the team’s confidence in their course of action.

  “Yes, it is possible,” she replied, “but not likely. Why would he be here in the werewolves’ holy land unless he was aiding or escorting Bailey?”

  The other witch nodded, and the group’s esprit de corps regained most of its strength.

  Although the moonlit forest was treacherous and labyrinthine in its way, the subtle beacon did not fail them. Madame Villalobos had noticed its signal growing stronger in the few minutes since she’d last spoken.

  When she, Perrault, and Blasko had confronted Roland to try to negotiate his defection away from the Weres, they had placed an incredibly subtle and devious tracking spell on him. The magic behind it was new and sufficiently complex and mysterious that even Villalobos did not understand it fully. Madame Dorleac, the second in command of the Order, had taught it to her before they’d departed for the United States.

  It was virtually untraceable. They had no reason to believe that the foolish, handsome, and apparently smitten wizard suspected they’d been following him.

  They trekked up higher and rockier ground, where lupine symbols appeared on stones and trees, and sensed they were nearing a plateau.

  Villalobos raised her hand in a signal to stop. Everyone froze in place.

  Creeping forward and masking her presence with magic, the witch peered through a veil of leaves and saw a great stone temple like an ancient step pyramid rising from the green moor of the clearing beyond. Standing before a wall of mist that surrounded the structure were two figures.

  She recognized both. Roland’s lanky frame and golden hair marked him first, but the other could hardly be mistaken, either—a tall, broad-shouldered man in a bulky, hooded coat. They’d seen him in the vision when he’d intervened and killed the three American volunteers over a week ago.

  And they knew who he was. He could no longer hide his identity.

  Villalobos returned to her squad. “Roland is there, and the so-called Marcus. They are waiting outside the lycanthropes’ temple. We will strike directly. The wizard is to be overwhelmed and taken alive if possible. The other…let me deal with him. He dares not intervene—not this time.”

  “And then?” asked Perrault.

  “Then,” the leader continued, “we force our way into the building. Bailey is certainly in there.”

  The younger witch who’d questioned her before spoke up. “Madame, if the temple is consecrated to werewolves, would it have magical defenses against intruders who are not of their kind?”

  Villalobos frowned. The troublemaker’s name was Holopainen, she recalled, a Finnish girl who was accounted something of a prodigy. She had a penetrating mind, but she would need to learn to keep her mouth shut when her superiors had decided on a course of action.

  “If they do,” Villalobos stated, “we will break them asunder.”

  Chapter Six

  The first passage ended at a crossroads, but “cross” wasn’t the right shape to describe it since the path branched off in five directions rather than four.

  “Fuckin’ shit,” Bailey growled. “It’s a maze. I hate those goddamn things.”

  Instantly she wished she hadn’t said that. Degenerating into a fit of cursing might make it look like she was losing control and erode her pack’s faith in her leadership. However, what was done was done.

  Will stepped up beside her. “Okay, so should we split up? That way, if one group hits a dead end, they can shout to the other group and we meet back up at a point farther along.”

  Bailey considered it, but only briefly. “No, I don’t think so. I see your reasoning, but we don’t know what the hell’s out there. Some passages might lead so far from the rest of the maze that we couldn’t hear each other’s shouts. Or there might be…enemies in there. Not a fun thing to think about, but we have to consider it.”

  Grimacing, the South Cliff alpha gave a nod and folded his arms over his chest. “Yeah, I think you’re right. We need to stick together, but it’ll take longer.”

  “It will,” Bailey conceded, “but we’re not in a hurry, although I’d like to be done with this as much as the rest of you. Time passes slower in here, and we don’t have to deal with thirst or sleep or anything. For now, we work as a pack. Everyone stays together no matter where we end up or what jumps out at us or anything.”

  The Weres grunted their assent. One raised a hand, though.

  “Which way do we start? There are four passages besides the one we came down. Do you think there’s any way to know the right answer?”

  Bailey looked around, but no one had any bright ideas.

  “If,” she began, “there was a clue as to the right path earlier in the temple, I guess we missed it. So let’s just pick one, and then it’ll be a process of elimination.”

  Another guy chimed in, “In old-school gaming, like, dungeon-crawl tabletop shit, the tradition was that you always started off going right. Right, right, right every time, then you started to work your way back through the lefts.”

  “Okay, so be it.” The werewitch shrugged.

  They started with the corridor that branched off farthest to the right. Bailey and Will were in the lead, with the rest of the wolves coming two and three abreast several paces back.

  To everyone’s relief, the way was simple and linear. At first. After five minutes of walking, it bent around at a right angle and then they came to another split, although in this case, there were only two options—right and left.

  “Okay, halt for a sec,” said Bailey. “Decision time once more. Let’s look around.”

  She was hoping to find an indicator that felt right. Some vague indication that one path was better than another, but so far, they both looked the same, stretching between identical stone walls leading into identical cocoons of darkness.

  Then she thought she saw a shape moving in the corner of her vision. It scuttled around the corner between the left-hand hallway and the way they’d just come. Her head snapped toward it.

  There was nothing there.

  “Did anybody else see that?” she asked. “Looked like something moved by fast.”

  A couple of the Weres answered. “Yeah, I did.”

  “Me too.”

  Two others thought they had, but weren’t sure. The rest seemed confused, having seen nothing.

  All of them were suddenly on edge, given the dreary nature of the labyrinth, the exertion of the trials they’d already faced, and the prospect that they could be lost in here for hours upon hours with hostile beings attacking them from the shadows. The combination of factors was pushing them to the limits of their self-control.

  And again, a dark shape flitted by, now in the far right of Bailey’s peripheral vision.

  “Shit!” she snapped. “The hell’s go
ing on? Here, I’m gonna conjure up some light.”

  Raising her hands, she generated a white ball of illumination about five feet above and in front of her, bathing the area around them in its bright glow. Somehow, the shadows farther down the halls were too deep and thick to be dispelled.

  A Were along the side snarled, “There! That’s the fucker!”

  Before Bailey could react, the man who’d spoken had shifted and was bounding on all fours down the left-hand corridor.

  “Get back here!” Bailey barked. “Stop it! We need you here, goddammit!”

  Two other Weres were moving in that direction as well. “We’ll bring him back!” one of them cried out. Then they changed, and another pair of wolves vanished into the black unknown in pursuit of the first.

  Bailey half-jumped after them, then stopped firmly, turning to stare at the rest of the pack.

  “No one else runs off!” she commanded. “We gotta stick together. I mean it. Next guy who tries to go off on his own, I’ll singe the hairs on his ass if I have to and magically glue him to the ceiling by his toes while he chills the fuck out.”

  “Okay,” Will murmured uncertainly. “So, what do we do?”

  Bailey pursed her lips. “We go after them. But we move as a group, nobody splitting away from the rest until they’re all safely back with us, not without my order.”

  She led the way, moving at a fast jog down the left hall. Will and the others crowded around her elbows or behind her, everyone’s eyes scanning the corridor both ahead and to the sides as they moved.

  The path bent around a corner once again, and as they rounded it, they saw another four-way crossroads before them.

  “Crap,” Bailey muttered.

  Bailey stopped at the intersection so they could look down all three of the new hallways at once, but they saw no sign of their comrades. Not anything shaped like man or wolf, nor any trail or other indications of their passage. The corridors all ended in ebon gloom.

  Then came a noise like a ragged, half-growling moan. It echoed down the halls in a way that made it tough to discern where it had originated. The group shifted in discomfort.

  The guy who’d suggested they always take right turns spoke up. “Well, it’s always bad luck to split the party during a dungeon crawl. Especially when the PCs are all lost and with a high-level monster lurking in the dark.”

  Judging by his flippant tone, he was probably trying to cheer them up. The problem was that his words in this context were true, and each of them knew it.

  Bailey put her hands on her hips. “We’re trying to un-split it. I think that sound came from the right. Hard to say, but that’s my best guess unless anyone here is confident it came from someplace else.”

  One of the Silver Stars shrugged. “Either right or straight ahead. I don’t think it came from the left.”

  “Right it is,” declared Bailey. “Let’s hope those guys who ran off heard it too and are bearing in the same direction.”

  They moved out at a trot, keeping the same formation they’d used a minute ago. They were hoping to run into their brethren but ready for anything. The right-hand corridor twisted its way through a series of ninety-degree angles, many of which seemed to double back in the same direction, so they rapidly became disoriented.

  A T-intersection appeared ahead, and Bailey called a brief halt. Before she could examine their two options, however, the rough, moaning bellow sounded again. This time it clearly came from the right.

  “That way,” the werewitch indicated. “I hope it isn’t one of our guys in pain. Let’s move.”

  Will Waldsbach frowned. “Doesn’t sound like a wolf.”

  The next hall stretched onward without bends for a hundred yards, maybe more, then it bent to the left. The pack rounded the corner, braced for whatever they might encounter.

  “Whoa!” Bailey exclaimed.

  Just beyond the turn stood a huge bear, larger than any she’d seen or heard of. Her brain screamed grizzly, but she knew that was incorrect. Its fur was dark brown verging on black rather than the medium brown of that species and standing on its hind legs, it was both more manlike and more muscular than a true bear should have been.

  Not to mention, it was at least twelve feet tall and appeared to weigh about a thousand pounds. It opened its fanged mouth and let out another ragged, bellowing groan, then extended its dagger-tipped paws and took a step toward them.

  “Get it!” someone shouted. Chaos erupted as the battle was joined.

  One of Will’s friends, already shifted into beast form, pounced on the lumbering creature, snarling and foaming at the mouth. The bear met him halfway with a sweeping haymaker, the back of its paw striking the Were on the shoulder and batting him aside with shocking ease and impunity.

  Then the next four, including Will, were upon their adversary, tearing at the great furry legs and belly to little effect.

  In the seconds it took for the fight to get underway, Bailey realized that her wolves were outmatched by the bear’s sheer size and strength. They’d have to try a different tack to overcome it.

  “Get back!” she shouted at them. “Stand aside so I can blast the fucker!”

  Most of them didn’t hear her, but one out front did and backed away, still growling at the monster and trying to hold its gaze as a distraction.

  Bailey threw out her arms and tossed a bolt of magic at the bear’s upper body. It was thrashing around too much to aim at a single point, but she’d directed it such that it ought to hit the chest, head, or neck. The bolt was composed of equal parts electricity, frigid gas, and concussive force.

  It struck the beast’s shoulder but seemed to glance off it. The bear was briefly stunned and growled in pain but continued fighting as though little had happened.

  “Goddammit!” Bailey exclaimed.

  The werewolves were trying to use hit-and-run tactics against their larger foe, snapping at it, then darting away while another wolf attacked from behind. They did almost no damage, but they drove the bear into greater heights of frenzied anger. It roared at them loud enough to make the stones tremble.

  A big guy, one of Roger’s underlings, had shifted back into human form and was trying to grapple the bear from behind. At first, Bailey was stunned by the apparent stupidity of the move, but it made sense. Weres had tremendous strength even in human form, and the bear was mostly fighting on its hind legs, so it might give them the edge.

  Letting out a guttural cry, the man wrapped his muscular arms around the monster’s midsection and heaved it sideways. It did not fly into the wall or fall over as they’d hoped, but it stumbled, allowing another Were in wolf form to bite its rear knee.

  Then the bear shook its massive body and flung the grappler off. The man briefly flew, then smacked into the wall, where he sat dazed for a moment before climbing back to his feet.

  By now, two other Weres had returned to humanoid shape and had similarly ducked in under the bear’s claws to wrestle its lower body, while those still in lupine form leapt up to snap at its face. They were slowly wearing the hulking creature down, but not nearly fast enough. It would overcome them before long.

  And Bailey could not get a shot in without hitting her pack.

  Unexpectedly, the bear also shifted. It shrank to the proportions of a man, naked and bestial-looking. He was as much a giant by human standards as his alternate form was a colossus among bears—over seven feet tall and covered in bulging, rippling muscles.

  The shock of what had just transpired gave a couple of the wolves pause, and the man plowed into them, shouldering one Were aside and knocking another unconscious with a hammer-like blow of his fist. He clinched with a third, whom he began to overpower the instant they matched strength.

  Bailey feared that if she ordered the Weres to disperse, any magic attack she could throw would have little effect. Then the bear-man would maim or kill them in retaliation. Given the lack of damage caused by her first strike, the creature appeared to have at least some resistance to sor
cery. She also felt as though her spellcasting abilities were dampened by the labyrinth.

  She figured the only course of action was to overwhelm their enemy through force of numbers and strategic fighting.

  Plowing into the fray, she drop-kicked the man in the chest, shouting, “Get the wounded away!” as she launched. Her feet crashed against the massive pectorals of the bestial man and drove him back three steps but failed to drop him.

  It was enough time, though, for the Weres still standing to move the injured or unconscious away from their opponent. Bailey saw Roger pulling the guy who’d been knocked out to safety against the far wall.

  She landed on her feet as two other Weres, still on all fours, distracted the bear-man by lunging at his back and side. Bailey moved in and kicked him in the groin, but he was in such a berserk frenzy that it only made him angrier. His gargantuan arm lashed out and she practically fell over, dodging it.

  One hit and she’d be out. She had never fought anyone of such size and physical strength.

  It occurred to her that she might be able to control her size when shifting. Normally she became a singularly large creature, which had given her problems with shredded clothes. In addition to that inconvenience, a smaller form might fare better in the tight confines of the labyrinth.

  Inhaling deeply, Bailey dropped to her hands and knees and exerted her full force of will over the process of transformation. She pictured herself applying the brakes to a truck while driving downhill in the mountains, forcing it to go the minimum speed she wanted rather than careening down according to the pull of gravity.

  She felt her body changing and reconfiguring and fur sprouting from her skin, but somehow she stayed within what remained of her clothes, and the relative dimensions of the hallway did not seem smaller. With a brief rush of exaltation, she grasped that she’d succeeded, having shifted into a wolf no larger than her human shape.