by Renée Jaggér
Feeling faster and more acrobatic than she ever had, the werewitch sprang into the fight again. While the ursine hulk turned to fight off the others, her teeth sank into the back of his leg to hamstring him. His body was so powerful that she failed to disable him, but the wound slowed him down.
As the other Weres circled, Bailey, still in wolf form, spat a continuous torrent of magic, tossing anything she could think of at the bear-man. It struck him full-on and drove him, grunting and hollering, against the wall. The stone behind him cracked.
Alphas! she called via telepathy rather than speech. Stand guard over the wounded!
Another burst of magic pressed their huge foe into the stone. It didn’t do much damage, but it kept him pinned down. She increased the volume and intensity of the spells, still finding her abilities oddly limited, but it was enough to put the bear-man on the defensive.
Magic alone wouldn’t do the trick, she knew. Will! Attack him! Being a good shaman meant knowing when to ask for help, and she needed it.
Will left Roger’s second-in-command to guard the fallen and flung himself at the titan. Bailey kept her streams of crackling sorcery focused on the man’s upper body while the South Cliff alpha snapped at his legs.
The big Silver Star Were, the one who’d tried wrestling with the bear previously, was back in the fray. He again piled into the man during an instant when Bailey let up on blasting him with magic, seizing a better hold of him now that the two were of comparable size. He dashed the werebear’s head into the stone.
Then their enemy shifted back into his beast form, the sudden explosion in his size driving the big guy back. Bailey launched a fireball at his eyes to distract him, then pounced and snapped her teeth at his throat.
As he dodged, the burly Silver Star jumped on him and astonishingly, lifted the massive beast in the air to slam him into the ground. Bailey paused for a split second in awe, then pressed her advantage and leapt toward the bear, shifting back into human form in midair and landing on him with a powerful elbow-drop. The bony protrusion of her arm crunched into the huge man’s stomach, and his eyes rolled back in his head.
The wrestler type pounded the man’s head with his fists while Bailey twisted his leg, grinning fiercely with the knowledge that victory was nearly theirs.
“Wish I had a ladder or a steel chair to whack this guy with,” she growled.
Her companion loosed one more punch into the giant’s face, and finally their adversary slumped, unconscious and drooling blood on the floor.
“Well,” she panted, standing up and wiping her palms against each other, “that’s not how I expected a dance with a bear in a dark room to go in 2020.”
She looked up, but nobody seemed to have understood the joke. Or they were distracted by their lingering fear, growing tiredness, and the after-effects of adrenaline. She gave a sour grimace and turned back to business.
Two men were on the ground, though still alive—one of Will’s, and one of Roger’s. They were both banged up, possibly with minor fractures and bleeding from half a dozen small wounds. She and the others who were still on their feet helped them up and checked them over. Though compromised, they seemed able to continue.
Roger was about the same. He’d wisely hung back from the main fight and stuck to supporting activities. In his current state, if he’d tried to take the bear on, he might well have died.
“Right,” the werewitch announced. “We basically have two choices. Either we can look for a way out, or we can keep looking for the rest of the pack.”
No one weighed in right away, so she added, “Which, as far as I’m concerned, is only one choice. We have to find the others. Then we’ll find our way out of this wretched place.”
Nodding grimly and straightening up, the Weres readied themselves for further exertion and stress.
Unexpectedly, blue light coalesced behind them, and again the guardian wolf spirit addressed the group.
“Congratulations,” it began, “on navigating this far into the labyrinth and defeating the great bear. You showed excellent courage and coordination. Not everyone is capable of overcoming such a mighty creature.”
Her curiosity racing ahead of her thoughts, Bailey asked, “What was it? One of us? I’ve never seen a werebear, although it makes sense that there’d be bears along with us werewolves.”
“Ursine shifters exist, just as surely as lupine ones do,” the spirit explained. “But their numbers are far smaller, their members existing in isolation even from us, their distant brethren, so their presence is not so acutely felt.”
Bailey marveled at that silently. She wondered if anyone she’d met back home in the northwestern mountains was secretly a werebear. If so, it wouldn’t be any stranger than half the other crap she’d encountered in the last two months.
But she had other priorities. “Thanks. But now that we succeeded, is there any chance you can help me find the rest of my pack?”
The phantom’s blue light dimmed. “I cannot. You must do that on your own.”
She sighed. “Yeah, figures.”
Chapter Seven
By this point, Roland was getting a better grip on how time passed within the Other. He and Bailey had figured out that time was not frozen within it. That it moved forward, rather than backward, so they would always emerge at a point later in their world than when they’d left. The rate was still difficult to determine, however.
He was still waiting outside the lycanthropic temple. It was impossible to say how long Bailey and her Weres had been in there, but it seemed like far too long.
“Fenris,” he asked, “is there anything like a ballpark estimate of how long those trials are supposed to take? Wait, don’t tell me—the answer is something like ‘How long is a piece of string?’ or ‘What is the sound of one hand clapping?’ or that sort of thing, am I right?”
The god had been standing in front of the mist barrier and aligned with the entrance, grimly staring into the depths as he waited. He slowly turned his head and looked down at Roland.
“Yes,” he said.
The wizard nodded and gave a thumbs-up. “Great. Okay, just so we’re clear on that. Thanks.”
“If you’re restless,” the shaman went on, “I can transport you back to an area of the Other you’re familiar with, train or spar with the local spirits. We should not fight here since it might rouse the anger of—”
“Us,” a female voice snapped. Both men spun toward the sound, tensing at the sight of seven leather-clad women bursting into the clearing.
Fenris thrust forth his chin. “This is holy ground, consecrated to lycanthropes only. You are trespassing and need to turn back now, or you will incur the wrath of the accumulated ancient spirits of our people. The great shamans and pack leaders of old are not to be trifled with.”
Roland’s eyes fell upon the woman in the lead with recognition that quickly turned to malice. “Villalobos, was it? So much for your peace mission—unless you’ve come to offer your unconditional surrender, which would be a damn good idea on your part. So you know, all you have to do is—”
His answer was a storm of magic, seven bursts flying at him from different directions. Not powerful enough to break through the shield he immediately raised, but more than enough to busy him with self-defense.
The barrier he created—still glowing greenish, since he hadn’t had time to concentrate on a nice transparent one—crackled as he waved his arms, already straining to keep the blasts from penetrating and killing him.
“What,” he bellowed, “are you doing? How crazy are you people?”
Villalobos smiled. “We are not trying to kill you, Roland. Only to stop you from getting hurt.”
“Well, this isn’t the best way of showing it!” he threw back. For good measure, he also threw back three of the magical bursts, which arced like purple and green comets back toward their casters.
The witches to the sides ducked, and Villalobos caught and neutralized the projectile headed for her face. It fiz
zled out in a puff of steam.
Fenris had done nothing. To Roland’s disbelief and anger, all he did was stand there watching with a solemn, smoldering glare.
“Roland,” the lead sorceress said again, “stop this nonsense and come with us. We are only trying to rescue you from the dangerous wolves who have corrupted your mind, perverted your desires, and are using you for your power. Squandering it. You have far too much potential to waste it in their service like a pet. Come with us instead. Besides, we don’t wish people to think we have any ill will toward other witches.”
Roland’s jaw dropped. “Ill will? Here, let me show you some fucking ill will.”
At a vicious swipe of his hand, the concentrated energies of the remaining attacks they’d flung at him, combined with three times more of his own, rocketed toward their position like the initial explosion of an erupting volcano. The storm of elemental, arcane, telekinetic, and psionic force struck them with such speed and force that for a brief instant, it seemed that he’d blotted them out.
But the witches were too strong to be overcome so quickly. They’d had to divert all their energies into defending themselves, with each of the seven doing her part to absorb, redirect, or neutralize the furious mass of deadly magic. Far too soon for Roland’s liking, four of them had things under control again, while the three most powerful ones counterattacked.
He reeled before the assault. Deadly waves of lightning, fire, ice, wind, and acid rained down on him. The earth buckled under his feet, and his mind reeled from psionic spells designed to drive him to terror or despair or befuddlement. Storms of blades made of pure arcane essence threatened to skewer and incinerate him. He was a wizard of unusually strong talents, but the Venatori had sent their best this time, and he was hopelessly outnumbered.
“Fenris!” the wizard shouted. “Why the hell aren’t you helping me, goddammit?”
“Because he is not allowed to!” Villalobos laughed, sadistic triumph in her voice. “We know who he is. The ruse is ended!”
Gritting his teeth, Roland managed to repulse most of the magical blasts coming his way, but the witches easily dodged or blocked them and continued their onslaught. There was no way he could counterattack effectively at this point. For all his talents, he had to devote one hundred percent of his magical powers to keeping himself from being reduced to a melted patch on the grass.
“Bullshit!” He scoffed. “Marcus—Fenris! You helped us before, didn’t you?”
He recalled the shaman intervening two weeks ago when he and Bailey had been attacked in the Other by a trio of the Venatori’s American patsies. Fenris had swept in and utterly destroyed the sorceresses. They had been weak enough that the wizard and werewitch could have done it themselves, but still. Now, in the current struggle against seven witches who were far more powerful, he was refusing to enter the fight.
Roland abruptly remembered he had mentioned something about how his intervention could cause severe consequences.
“It’s true,” Fenris stated, his voice edged with anger but restrained.
“You see?” Perrault, the Frenchwoman agreed. “There is nothing you can do, Roland. Now is the time for you to surrender and come with us.”
The wizard almost collapsed from despair. When he needed help the most was the one time he couldn’t get it. Although his abilities were sufficient to keep the Venatori from killing him, he couldn’t hold out indefinitely, not against all seven. If he struggled on, after a while, he’d pass out from exhaustion, and they’d take him prisoner anyway.
“Fenris!” he called again. “What do you think they plan to do? They’re going in after Bailey once they’ve captured me! For fuck’s sake!”
“If he aids you,” Villalobos jeered, “he risks the entire world. An attack by a deity upon the people of another deity will bring about a conflict between gods. All living things on the planet would be caught up in it. Even werewolves are not so stupid as to risk that!”
Fenris shook his head. “I cannot act directly against them, not with my identity known. Even with my own people, the Weres, my powers and privileges are limited by ancient pacts that I can’t just go around breaking. I can guide and teach, I can demonstrate, I can keep troublesome alphas or lone wolves in line with careful shows of force, but that is all. A battle between Freya and me would cause untold devastation, and since I’d be the one who broke the pact, other gods would side with her, and we would not have much hope of winning.”
Squeezing back tears, Roland thought of Bailey. If she burst out of the temple right now, the two of them might be able to win this. If she didn’t, all he could do was wish her luck.
Close to total exhaustion, he allowed his shield to weaken. Madame Villalobos fired a lance of concussive force and psionic confusion straight through it, striking him in the face. He flew back to crash against the barrier of solid mist, slumping in semi-consciousness.
Cackling with glee, the sorceresses advanced beyond the threshold of the woods and into the clearing to claim their prize. Two of the younger and weaker among their number seized Roland, shackling him with chains engraved with anti-magic runes and pulling him to his feet as his head lolled.
Villalobos folded her gloved hands in front of her. “Take him back for questioning and debriefing,” she ordered the pair. “At once. Then one of you shall return.”
The Spaniard spread a hand and opened a shimmering violet portal, and the two witches and their prisoner vanished into it. It seemed that only a minute or two had passed when one of the Venatori came back through.
“It is done,” she reported. “He has been delivered to the others, who will see to him.”
“Good.” Madame Villalobos turned to the wall of magical fog, conjured a white-hot sword blade of arcane plasma, and used it to cut through the barrier, holding it open as her followers stepped through. They turned to smirk at Fenris.
The humanoid god glared at them with undisguised loathing. “I will warn you one more time,” he thundered. “I might not be able to stop you, but there are other entities that can and will. This is your last chance to turn back. You’re making a mistake, and you won’t like the consequences.”
Villalobos ignored him and stepped through. The mist sealed behind her.
“Pay no heed to that fool,” she told her acolytes. “He is a god of dumb beasts. And now, let us go fetch the ones who are even lower in the food chain than he is.”
With a confidence bordering on arrogance, the six witches strode through the dark entrance of the pyramid and were lost from sight.
Fenris remained behind, clenching and unclenching his powerful hands.
“Good luck, Bailey,” he muttered under his breath. “You’re going to need it more than ever.”
* * *
“Sound off,” Bailey commanded, “or stand there while I count your heads. Need to make sure we’re not down any other guys besides the ones who ran off.”
They obeyed, and she went over them quickly to ensure they hadn’t lost anyone else. Everyone was present, save the three who’d sprinted after the mysterious shape in the dark.
After another short break to get their bearings, the group set back off into the maze in search of their lost comrades. They proceeded in the direction they’d been going before the bear had appeared, and they continued to follow the strategy of always taking right turns unless a reason popped up that indicated otherwise.
But no such justification ever appeared. They saw nothing, heard nothing, and found nothing.
Roger, struggling against the feverish delirium threatened by his injuries, asked, “Do you think they might have gotten out of the maze by now? Maybe they’re back in that other hall we came from, or they’re on the other side of it.”
“Could be,” said Bailey. “But if we get out the other side and they’re not waiting for us, we’ll just have to go back in looking for them. Too bad nobody has a pen and paper. We could have at least started making a map.”
The guy who’d made the dungeo
n-crawling reference chimed in. “I already checked my cell phone, and it’s not getting any service. Who woulda thunk? Half a mile underground in a parallel dimension. Shouldn’t all this magical stuff function like a signal booster? What a fuckin’ rip-off, man.”
The werewitch gave a low chuckle, but then she thought of something. “Signals. Hey, Will? Roger? And anyone else. Do you guys, or other alphas, have a call or distinctive sound you can make that the others would recognize? Like, a universal wolf code or that kind of thing?”
Will widened his eyes in appreciation. “Yeah, honestly, I know one. I dunno if they’ll be able to hear since we don’t know how far away they are, or if this stupid labyrinth will block the sound, but it’s worth a shot.”
Bailey gestured to him. “Do it, then.”
The South Cliff alpha shifted to beast form, his loose clothes tightening around his second shape as he elongated and sprouted sepia fur. Then he raised his head as if to howl at the moon, but the sound that emerged was low and understated, almost infrasonic to the humanoid ear. She felt it more than heard it.
Silence reigned over the maze. They heard no reply.
Bailey looked at the wolf. “Stay shifted. Keep doing that every time we turn a corner or come to an intersection, or what feels like every five minutes. There’s a chance some other fucking thing will hear and come after us, but we’ve got to risk it. The pack can’t stay split like this.”
They continued through the trackless succession of dim corridors and blind angles, Will sending out his locating call here and there, but receiving no answer.
Fortunately, that meant that no hostile entities had heard them either, but the peace and silence of the corridors were deceptive.
She told herself as they paused to rest and check things out at a crossroads, There’s no way this will be so easy in the end. It isn’t through with us yet, and I think things will get worse before they get better.
