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“Goddess, your nose is bleeding.”
Raana snapped her head down, blinking at the man as she tried to clear the gleaming map of stars from her eyes. Her free hand lifted to her nose, where warmth had begun to pool below. She pulled back to observe the crimson. Odd. She hadn’t been using magic.
The vendor’s once jovial attitude began peeling away, his hardening gaze shifting between Raana and her companion. His nose twitched like he’d scented something, his eyes sliding to the iron bracelet clamped around her wrist like a manacle, the jewelry she’d found in the Pack Hall holding her enchantment and glamour together that certainly wouldn’t last forever.
Time to go.
With nothing but aHappy Equinox, Raana grabbed the masks, handed one to the soldier, and dragged him into the crowd. At a safe distance away from the bodies, she cut her hand on the side of her blade, quickly recasting the spell to mask her scent, just in case.
Back on task.
They’d gotten this far, and now, she just needed Kai and Isla’s blood before they locked it away.
She couldn’t fail. People would get hurt if she failed, and she wouldn’t allow any more blood or death where she could prevent it.
The stained-glass window of the Pack Hall—so jarring to see after she’d been behind Phobos’s shattered, mirror counterpart—served as their North Star as Raana moved towards the hall, powering forward until she felt the occasional jerk from her companion to shift directions for safer, better-hidden travel, evading the many guards that Kai and Isla had out for the night.
Raana couldn’t see much of his face beyond the dark red surface of his mask, his eyes so deep set in the rounded holes she could barely make out the vacant amber. Her gaze drifted to the faint scars on his neck, just exposed beneath his shifting tunic. Two nubbed points of pearlescent skin gleamed slightly against the street lamps. Could they have been…
She felt the phantom caress of Adrien’s teeth along her neck, the thrill of it, how her body sang at it. A wolf’s bite,wherethey’d been bitten—it meant something.
Whoever this man was…he had a mate somewhere out there.
Mother above.
Raana’s stomach hollowed out, disgust crawling up her throat. This was a man with an entire life, and she was willingly stringing him along like a puppet.
Monster, monster, monster.
How did that, did this, make her any better than Nerissa?
Once they’d reached a shrouded forest, pine held firm to its trees, Raana’s steps slowed, and the man whipped his head to her in demand to pick up the pace rather than question her reasoning.
Before she could even think, even doubt herself, she asked, “Do you have a name?”
She couldn’t see any movement on his face below the mask, whether he raised or quirked his brow. Though he did swallow, and she watched the mark shift with the action.
She repeated, slower, “Do you have a name?”
“I…”
She waited on bated breath for his answer, but then he ripped from her hold so violently he nearly tore off her arm when he reached for his head, breathing hard through gritted teeth. As if riffling through his memories was too painful.
Raana gasped.
Had this been some failsafe for the enchantment? Any attempts at unlocking what Nerissa had caged and hidden away left tortuous?
“No. No, no, no. I’m sorry.” Raana reached out to comfort him, but he reared back again, tears slipping down his chin from the small space at the bottom of his mask.
Something weighed heavily in the folds of her cloak. Another failsafe. A needle filled with poison strong enough to weaken his wolf and make him more complacent. It was to be her last resort, Nerissa’s advisement since she’d need to carry him through shadows once he was unconscious because of it. Or—
“If he becomestoo muchto handle, you may dispose of him. There are others.”Nerissa’s aloofness as she handed her the blade along with the poison made her feel sick.
Raana struggled to swallow down the disgust.
There had to be an alternative. The elder witch hadn’t constantly fed the toxins to her soldiers to keep them in line. There were words. A spell. An extra layer of coating on the hard foundation that she’d already laid down.
Raana had no gift of persuasion, but she hadmagic. Even a thin veil to smooth those painful cracks in his consciousness could soothe him.
