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The door opened of its own accord. I walked through the doorway and into the inner sanctum of the most powerful warlock in our town.
“Hello? High Warlock? It’s Monique.”
“Yes. Come through.” His voice was soft and non-threatening, but I still shivered at the sound. The high warlock wasn’t a man I trusted, despite being told my whole life that our leader was good and kind.
I shook myself and pulled on my best persona. My strongest, most likeable visage. “Come on.”
I walked ahead, and the wolf shifters trailed behind me. I glanced back to see Xander duck his head to get through the doorway without bumping himself. He was truly the tallest man I had ever met.
When we reached the large living room where the warlock was sitting drinking tea with his wife, we all stopped.
The high warlock didn’t get up from his seat on a floral couch, but as his gaze raked the three of us, I felt the tightening of the protective charms in the room, like a whisper against my skin. I suppressed a shiver.
“Who do you have here, Monique?” The high warlock took another sip of tea from a porcelain cup, before placing it down and staring at me with an expression I couldn’t read.
I gestured to the two hulking men beside me. “I met these two wolf shifters in the woods, and they said they’re looking for a witch.”
“Outside the barrier? And you thought it best to bring them into the safety of our veil?” He asked the questions in a calm tone, but goosebumps rose up on my skin.
Danger.
I straightened my spine, feeling a strange pressure squeezing at my temples. “Once they had seen me, I didn’t think it wise to let them go.”
“So, they are your prisoners?” the high warlock asked, lifting his chin and staring down his nose at the two men.
How he did that when they were over six feet tall, and he remained seated, I’d never know.
“No, they came willingly.” I didn’t want the high warlock to enforce his magic on them. “They are looking for a witch who—”
“Quiet.” The high warlock’s voice snapped through the room.
I slammed my mouth shut.
These two would end up in chains, bound to the floor if the high warlock had anything to say about it. Sudden regret at my decision to bring them here raced through me.
“We’re nobody’s prisoner,” Xander barked, and the high warlock’s wife, seated across from her husband, twitched. Her eyes went as wide as her tea saucer.
Kyle stepped in front of Xander and put his hands up as if in supplication. “What he means to say is, we come in peace. We just wanted to ask you a few questions, and if you don’t know the person we seek, we’ll leave immediately.”
The high warlock snapped his fingers. Chains wrapped around the wolf shifters. Both Xander and Kyle growled as they struggled against the restraints.
I stared in horror as the silver chains wrapped tighter around their bodies. They began to shift, turning into the wolves I’d come across in the forest. The chains morphed with them, remaining tight around their wolf bodies as they struggled in vain.
“You don’t need to do that,” I told the high warlock, a lump forming in my chest at the sight of the two shifters restrained in such a way. “They aren’t here to hurt us.”
“That will be determined by me, Monique. Not you. Go home now.”
My legs shuffled backward, then my body swiveled and I began walking toward the door. My movements were not driven by choice, but by his magic.
I fought against the pull, trying to stay in the room.
“Please,” I said. “What will you do with them?”
“I’ll keep them in the dungeon overnight, and tomorrow, the Council will question them.”
It was torturous watching them fight against the chains, howling and snapping at the silver that wrapped around them. Their pain seemed to fill me, too, for some reason. The chains tightened even further, forcing them down until they were laying side by side on the ground, finally unmoving.
Even their muzzles were chained shut. The only movement and life left was in their eyes, which were wide and wild, filled with panic and rage.
“Please don’t hurt them,” I whispered, deeply regretting my decision to bring them into the town with me. I should have simply vanished in the forest and left them there, alone.
Why had I brought them here? Into danger?
The high warlock’s voice spoke softly in my ear as his magic pushed me out the door. “I will do what I like with them, Monique.”
Then the door slammed behind me, and I was alone in the dark.
