“Baby, speak up,” Zoey ordered.
“I used it,” Isadora repeated.
Dominic frowned. “When?”
“When I made you afraid.”
Dominic sucked in a breath. That explained why he hadn’t been able to fight against it. Through the Blood Pact between he and Zoey, Zoey had gained greater power of resilience—more like a wolf—and she could also sense her mate as long as Dominic was alive.
It also unlocked some of the blood within Isadora to help her put shields on her wolf’s cravings as best she could.
But if she used them …
“Your Witch Doctor gift was only to be used to hold your wolf at bay while your grow, young lady. How did you even know how to do … whatever you did?”
“I wanted to stun you and asked the power to show me how to do it. Only way was fear. It whispered you weren’t familiar with the feeling in a battle and it would throw you off, so I used it.”
It whispered to her? She was talking to her gift? She spoke to her Witch Doctor power and it answered?
As a child, she’d used it unknowingly, but now she obviously could control it and was speaking to her gift. It was growing within her just as fast as her wolf. Hell, he’d never heard of mage gifts answering like a wolf could to a shifter.
She was turning all they knew upside down.
“Sonofabitch.”
“Language,” Zoey admonished.
Isadora choked out a laugh. “That’s a bad word, Daddy.”
Dominic glared at his daughter. “You know better.”
She swallowed her smile. “Sorry.”
Dominic sighed. Being a father was one of the hardest things in his damn life. One little frown from the little pint and he wanted to rip out his own heart. “We’ll figure it out. From now on, though, when we battle, Silva is going to put up one of those osraebrin things.”
It was the same orb Heath had used when he battled Silva. The orb allowed for mages to battle it out without hurting anyone else. But it could be tinkered with to set parameters—one being no magic use allowed.
“Aw, no fair,” Isadora argued.
“It will be. That way you can only use your wolf. We don’t need to strengthen all of you just yet, little one. Just give you a chance to use your claws. Deal?”
“But–”
“Or we don’t do this anymore and you can go back to boring gym class at school with the rest of the kids. How about that?”
Dominic happened to know which wolf he’d entrusted with doing the gym class at the school for shifters. One of the only wolves he could trust to help contain his daughter.
Isadora’s gaze traveled over to Pasquale before coming back to her father. “Deal.”
Dominic figured. Pasquale wouldn’t fight Isadora, but his Alpha call was wielded with enough precision to stop the little one from fighting anyone. A feat that pissed Isadora off to no end. Eventually, it wouldn’t be enough, but it worked right now.
Dominic looked to Zahara. “Is this how it is to be a Witch Doctor?”
“She is more t’an I’ve ever known. But … when t’e time comes, I know who t’ reach out to.”
Silva stood, watching the entrance to the Arena. Her change from joking aunt to instant warrior made Dominic stand up.
“What is it, Silva?”
