Page 32 of Wolfsbane

Daire’s throat clicked, and I looked up to find his eyes glassy again. Dammit. I kept making him cry.

I cleared my throat and looked back down at my hands, focusing on the request at hand. Both of us, completely. The magic, the wolf, our bodies, even tiny little Drew, because I couldn’t leave him out. We could see each other, but everyone else would struggle to find us. We were obscured in the darkness while their eyes were adjusted only to the light.

Daire’s blood. No one could see that.

With a tiny quirk of amusement, I wondered if that would make it harder for Ermengarde to see herself. Her, I thought, and focused hard. She was the most blinded of all. She was in the middle of a clearing, the sun still glaring down at her.

She saw nothing at all.

When I looked back up, Daire was smiling. “You did it, didn’t you? I . . . felt it, sort of. Not like I did the spell, but a spell happened. I can . . . smell it?”

“Ozone,” I agreed. “Spells smell like lightning strikes.”

The smile fell off his face as he turned his head toward one wall of the cave. “You . . . I’m sure you did it. But I can hear cars. Destiny’s voice. We need to go. Now.”

I nodded, pulling us both to our feet at the same time and handing him my shirt. Maybe I didn’t care about wandering through the woods half or fully naked, but he was basically a human, and they weren’t comfortable with that. At least my shirt would help. I pulled my pants on and poked my head out of the cave.

Drew looked up at me, a little nervous and a little curious, but he hadn’t left.

Of course he hadn’t. It seemed like everyone I knew, including the wildlife, were more selfless than healthy.

Looking less harried and miserable, Daire came out of the cave behind me, my shirt covering him down to mid-thigh, so that wasn’t too bad. He smiled up at me. “So what now?”

“We walk,” I explained. “Can you?”

He scoffed. “What, like I’m gonna let you carry me? Let’s go. As long as we don’t have to run again. Maybe ever.”

I shook my head and . . . was that laughter coming out of me? It felt a little like laughter. Strange. I didn’t know when I’d last done that. Even Drew was giving me a funny look.

We started walking. We could handle twenty miles, as long as Daire had the will for it. He grabbed my hand as we went, squeezing it and holding on. How odd.

I wasn’t sure what it meant, but maybe he just needed reassurance I wasn’t leaving. Not that I could. We were tethered together by this spell, and wherever he went, so did I.

Strangely enough, that didn’t seem like such a big deal anymore.

Well, not until a few hours later when we got to the edge of pack territory and realized the witches’ next play. They hadn’t been able to track us, so they’d gone to where they knew we would go: their SUVs were parked all along the dirt road that stood between us and pack lands.

The road we would have to cross, to get to my people.

CHAPTER 16

Daire

We didn’t talk much as we walked. I didn’t know where we were going, and my head was full of bees. I’d just had sex for the first time ever, and I’d lost my magic in the same moment. I still felt a strange surge of pride that Viktor had been able to use it, not just that my magic was doing good work, but that he’d figured it out so quickly.

If a wolf could learn to cast that quickly, they weren’t anything like we’d always presumed. Viktor was every bit as clever as I thought I was . . . maybe more so. Definitely more capable. He had taken to my magic faster than I might’ve done in his shoes.

So, I’d satisfy myself with that—my magic was in the right person for the moment.

But being a werewolf didn’t make walking through the woods barefoot any easier. The muscles in my legs ached from use, and there was a deeper, duller, throbbing soreness. Both of which made it nicer to hold onto Viktor’s hand. He was steadying, and whenever I took a wrong step, it was his strength that kept me upright.

After about fifteen minutes, I’d decided I was never going to be a hiker.

It took us a few hours more before we got to the edge of pack lands and the road against it. It didn’t circle the whole of their territory, but curled around this side and bisected the forest for miles in either direction.

And the coven was waiting for us. They were here, but they were also out on either side, pulled off the road a couple of miles away. Even over that distance, I could hear their voices.

“We can walk around them,” Viktor said, squeezing my hand.