Wolf Bound Read online

  But she didn’t hit the ground, because he caught her.

  His touch was icy, with a strange burn that ran through her limbs, making her hot and shivery. Familiar, powerful, but muted. She gasped, gaze jerking to his.

  He had his arms wrapped around her, bent over, almost as if they were performing a wild dip in a sexy dance. Slowly, ever so slowly, he straightened, taking her with him, her body sliding against his, aligning breast to chest, hips to hip. She was tall, but he was taller—the first man to make her feel dainty, protected, womanly, and not like some overgrown Amazon. She hated it and cherished it all at once.

  He turned her inside out. How did he do that? She had no idea, but around him she was never certain about how she felt. And for someone who was always so certain about things, it was unnerving. She didn’t like it. And yet she kept seeking him out, going back for more. Even now when she was certain there was no point, she wanted him.

  She must be some kind of masochist. Huh. Her aunt Lilyanna, before she went insane, used to say you learned something new about yourself every day. She’d thought that was rubbish. She’d seen a documentary when she was younger—Seven Up! it was called—where a filmmaker had interviewed children about their futures, based on the Jesuit motto of ‘Give me a child until he is seven and I will show you the man’. She related to that series and had seen nothing in her life to indicate the premise wasn’t true. Her gift had frightened her when she was seven and she’d vowed to not let it rule her life. That ideal had set her on her path. There was nothing new to learn. She was who she was going to be.

  At least, she had been until she’d met Adam and Jason and their pack and they’d turned her life, and the lives of her friends, upside down. Bron and Skye were happy with the turmoil. She hadn’t been. What Lilyanna had said was being proved right. She was learning something new about herself every day and it frightened the life out of her. Especially now those other words whispered by her aunt on the night she’d taken her life had new, meaningful significance.

  ‘You okay?’ Adam asked as he settled her back on her feet. His arms were still around her.

  ‘Yes.’ She licked her lips. His gaze slid to watch the movement. Her mouth dried. Her lungs burned. Breathe. She had to breathe. She opened her lips to take in a breath, her tongue darting out again to wet them.

  He groaned, his fingers flexing on her back. ‘Damn,’ he whispered and lowered his head to hers.

  ‘Shelley? Shelley! Are you in here?’

  She leapt out of Adam’s arms as Eloise, Iain and Patrick came into the room, tripped over her still overturned chair and would have landed on the floor if Patrick hadn’t caught her this time.

  His touch didn’t burn like Adam’s. Her breath didn’t catch in her throat as he held her close. Her heart didn’t bang in her chest as his hands steadied her. Their eyes met but her mouth didn’t dry, her words of thanks making it out clear and steady. Not for one moment did she long with everything in her for him to kiss her.

  Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn!

  ‘Are you okay?’

  She forced a smile before turning to right the chair she’d knocked over. ‘Yep. I’m fine. Just a clumsy clot today.’

  ‘Did we startle you?’

  ‘No. Not at all.’ She brushed her hands down the front of her soft woollen jumper and plastered an even bigger smile on her face when what she really wanted to do was slink off into a dark corner and lick her wounds. Or tell them to piss off so she could kiss Adam.

  She ran her hand through her hair, noticed her ponytail was askew, pulled out the band with a yank—the pain a kind of sharp relief—and busied herself pulling her hair back tight into the ponytail again, fluffing her fringe.

  ‘What were you doing?’

  ‘I was reading the diaries.’

  ‘From over there?’ Eloise pointed to where she’d been standing when they entered the room a few paces from the table. Adam stood on the other side of the table, a troubled frown on his face as he stared at her. She shook her head at him, desperate for him to understand that she didn’t want him to say a thing. If he spoke, she would lose her shit. And right now, she so desperately needed to keep a hold of her shit. It was the only thing she had any control over—however tentatively.

  Thankfully, he seemed to understand. At least, he kept his mouth shut.

  She turned her back on him so she didn’t have to see the question in his eyes. It hurt to think what that question might mean.

  She swallowed hard. Tried to remember what had just been said but gave it up for hopeless. ‘Did you come to see me?’

  ‘Yes.’ Eloise gave her a considering look, but thankfully didn’t press her. ‘Actually, we came to ask you a favour.’

  ‘Step into my parlour,’ she said, trying to keep it light, but falling flat. None of them laughed. Or smiled. They just kept frowning at her. She was acting weird. She had to stop it. She blew out a breath. ‘Sorry. I’ve been so lost in the diaries, I’m afraid I’m not quite myself. Take a seat and tell me what you need.’

  ‘Perhaps you need a sleep first.’

  ‘And some food.’

  She rolled her eyes at Iain and Patrick. ‘Why are the men in this pack always so certain sleep and food will fix everything?’

  Eloise smiled at her. ‘Because it does for them. And it makes them happy.’ She patted Iain’s arm. ‘They’re simple creatures.’

  Iain snorted. ‘Simple my arse.’

  ‘No. Your arse isn’t simple, I agree with that. It’s delectable.’

  Patrick laughed as Iain grabbed Eloise and kissed the breath out of her.

  Shelley looked away and right into Adam’s eyes. ‘Sorry,’ he mouthed.

  She closed her eyes. She couldn’t take his apologies right now. She didn’t want them. She wanted … Well, she wasn’t quite certain what she wanted anymore. Tears prickled behind her eyes again. Damn. She pressed her fingers against her closed lids for a moment and breathed steadily until the sensation passed. When she opened her eyes, Eloise, Iain and Patrick were all staring at her. ‘My eyes are sore. Damned hay fever. Anyway, where were we?’

  They all took a seat around the table and Iain told her about his ideas surrounding Eloise and finding out about her past to understand what role she played and how it affected all of them.

  ‘That makes sense. But I don’t see how I can help with that. I’m already poring through the diaries trying to find out information about Skye, Bron and my powers and how we fit and work in the pack. I’m also looking for information on Warlock Lightning and how to heal it as well as discovering if there’s anything about the Trickster that might help us in healing Adam. Oh, and I’m also trying to find out information on different kinds of spirit entities.’

  ‘Why are you doing that?’ Patrick asked.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Why are you trying to find information about different forms of spirits? I’d imagine there’s only one.’

  She floundered for a moment. Fuckity-shit, she’d almost given away the truth about Adam. Although she supposed they’d have to tell everyone soon.

  ‘What about Shades?’ Eloise said. ‘They’re a kind of spirit entity and you didn’t really know about them until Cain became one and I told you what I know. It isn’t much. It would make sense for Shelley to be researching them too.’

  Shelley pounced on Eloise’s words like a drowning man on a life buoy. ‘Yes. That’s what I thought. And then I thought, if there are Shades and we don’t know about them, what else is out there that we don’t know about.’

  Eloise nodded. ‘Makes sense to me.’

  Shelley nodded. ‘So, I’m not sure I can look for anything else while looking for all that, but if you’ve got something to keep my eye out for, I’ll try.’

  ‘No. We don’t want you to look up anything else.’ Iain gestured at the mess of diaries spread out over the table between them. ‘You’ve got your hands full with that. Too full, perhaps.’

  ‘I can manage.’ She cross
ed her arms, straightening in her chair. ‘So why do you need me then?’ She was beginning to get a prickle in her back, knowing what they were going to ask of her.

  ‘Well …’ Patrick paused, gaze darting to Iain.

  ‘We need you to speak with Adeline and the other elder spirits.’ Before she had a chance to say anything to that, he held up his hand and rushed on. ‘Eloise thinks that Cain has been completely taken over by the Darkness. Not like before when it was just influencing him. It’s gone into him. Become him.’ He looked over at Eloise.

  She nodded. ‘There is no more Cain.’

  ‘It’s like when Morrigan took over Skye’s grandmother’s body,’ Patrick added. ‘But worse.’

  Shelley nodded. ‘It makes sense.’

  ‘It does?’ Patrick said.

  ‘Yes. Of course, it wouldn’t be content with only being partly in control of people, of influencing them in bits and pieces. It wants to be in the world. More than it ever was before.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Eloise’s eyes were large, and despite her questions, Shelley knew that Eloise had an inkling of what she’d realised weeks ago.

  ‘The Darkness somehow got into the Were people centuries ago. It influenced them, changed them, kept their two sides separated in the cruellest way and turned them into savage beasts every full moon to do its bidding. It might have been content to continue down that path, but then Bridgette Colliere forced it out of the Were, made them whole again, and kept them too filled with power from the light for the Darkness to be able to slip back in. It was lost, alone, searching for a way back into the world. It found Morrigan—we know that much. But while it could use her to create havoc and sow the seeds of violence and division, it didn’t have control over her like it did over the Were. It’s not so … personal. I always wondered why Morrigan has come after us like she has, and then it dawned on me it’s because the Darkness wants back in. It wants her to corrupt the Were, to break the flow of power between the covens and the Were so the Darkness can be a part of them again, to rule them like it once did.’ She paused. They were staring at her intently. ‘We’ve thwarted its plan three times now. First when Skye and Bron and I joined and brought her power forth to fight it in that cave. Skye and River lived, and in doing so, cut off the Darkness’ path back into the Were. Then it focused again on River, having managed to get a foothold inside him. But thanks to Eloise’s help, Bron was able to help River fight it off and expel the bit of Darkness that had infected him once more. And then when he was mated to Bron, it meant that River was no longer its conduit into the Were.’

  Iain and Patrick stared at her, obviously stunned. Had they not thought of all this before?

  ‘Most people don’t see things as deeply as you do, Kitten.’ She jumped at Adam’s voice close behind her. It took everything in her not to respond verbally—although she really wanted to. How was it he could read her so well? She needed to find out so she could stop doing whatever it was—it was aggravating.

  ‘Go on,’ Eloise urged. ‘What about me and Cain? How do we figure into its plan?’

  She shrugged. ‘This is only supposition, but I think it probably sought to use your power to make itself whole. But when you fought Cain at Ostara and expelled that bit of Darkness that had melded with Bridgette’s soul centuries ago, mating with Iain and the pack to give yourself the strength you needed to do what Bridgette couldn’t, things changed. You chose to bind yourself to the power of the light, expelling anything of the dark. It had no way of using you to make itself whole or even to get back inside the Were.’

  ‘Why do you think that?’

  ‘Well, from what we’ve discovered, your power ties into those elements of nature centred around creation and rebirth, so it makes sense it wanted to use you to make itself whole again—to be reborn into itself. Centuries ago, when it went into the Were, it split into countless pieces as it tried to influence as many beings as it could, but once expelled, it stayed in those pieces. It never became a whole, stronger entity once again. I think it can’t do that by itself. It needs you. It wants to be what it once was.’ She looked around at them all. ‘I mean, wouldn’t you want that?’

  ‘You’re right,’ Eloise said.

  ‘What about Adam’s wound? We know it’s black magic, but what if it’s also a conduit for the Darkness?’

  Something about Patrick’s question rang a bell in Shelley’s mind. Standing abruptly, she hurried around the table and opened an old chest pushed against one wall. Reverently, she reached inside and pulled out one of the grimoires stored there and returned to the table.

  The binding crackled. She straightened her gloves and picked up the tweezers. The pages—animal skins scraped so thin she could almost see the shadow of her hand through them if she held it up to the light, turned with a soft shushing sound without her even touching them, falling open to the page she remembered. The crackle of magic prickled her skin. She scanned the page. ‘I gave this a cursory look last year when I first started researching the diaries.’

  ‘What is it? It looks older than the diaries,’ Iain said.

  ‘That’s because it is. It’s the Colliere Grimoire, one Bridgette had added to. It’s mostly made up of spells and information particular to her coven but not necessarily the pack, which is why I’ve not looked at it deeply. I thought the diaries would hold more information to help us learn about our powers and how they relate to the pack. Much of what’s in here relates to a time before the pact was made.’

  ‘I can’t read any of that,’ Patrick said as he leaned beside her. ‘It’s more jumbled than some of the entries in the diaries.’

  She looked up at him. ‘Yes. It’s more heavily spelled than the diaries so that only those with witch- or warlock-like power can read it.’ She glanced over at Adam, horribly aware that his ability to read from the diaries and grimoires was even more proof of what she’d discovered about the Trickster genes.

  ‘If you didn’t really look at it, how do you know it can help us now?’ Eloise asked.

  ‘It was Patrick’s question about being a conduit.’ She tapped the page lightly. ‘This didn’t make sense when I first read it, but Adam wasn’t hurt then.’ She looked up at them. ‘I believe this is the story of the first instance of Warlock Lightning.’

  ‘What does it say?’ Patrick asked.

  ‘It’s a suspension spell at its heart.’

  ‘Then why does it kill?’

  ‘Because it’s too strong—concentrated magic in the form Cain used. This entry is written by Catellyn McCaeth, one of Bridgette’s ancestors. According to her, the power was originally used as a healing spell, to cauterise wounds and hold them in that moment, allowing the healer to gather their power and heal from the inside.’

  ‘How was it turned into Warlock Lightning?’

  She didn’t look up at Eloise, her gaze skimming over the passages. ‘It was to do with Catellyn’s betrothed. He was a leader in their coven, but then he began to change. His power built inside him and none of the remedies or spells she used seemed to help him. He couldn’t release the magic. He was going mad with it and she was terrified he was going to explode. He was preparing to leave so that he wouldn’t injure anyone when their village was attacked.’ Her eyes skimmed over the words as her brain registered the information and tried to summarise it. ‘Picts swept down from the north and tried to raid their winter stores. There was a fierce battle. Many were injured. The coven healers were being worn out with using their power while in their midst there was one of them who was bristling with power that was killing him. It was then Catellyn wondered if her betrothed used the excess energy to heal those lying on the battlefield, it might help to save him.’ She took a breath, firming her mind to ignore Catellyn’s obvious grief as she spilled out the agony of watching her betrothed be taken from her by the power that was at the core of who they were. But still her voice broke as she continued. ‘It didn’t.’ She cleared her throat again, blinking back the tears. It was so hard not to f
eel the agony that had been cried into the page with the ink that created the words.

  A cold touch on her shoulder firmed her resolve, fingers gripping, giving her a squeeze. Adam. She glanced at him briefly. He nodded, encouraging her to go on, his lips not in their customary aggravating grin but whispering to her, ‘You can do it. Go on.’ She shook her head slightly, but he simply nodded, lips forming the words, ‘You can’.

  ‘Are you okay, Shelley?’

  ‘Do you want me to read it?’ Eloise asked.

  She shook her head, took a deep breath, and looked back at the text in front of her. ‘He went out into the field, engaged the healing power of the lightning, but something dark had touched him in his increasing madness and he wasn’t able to contain control over what he was doing.’ She hissed. She’d read these words before, but they’d had no true meaning then. ‘He killed everyone on the battlefield in one blast of power, Picts and coven alike. Everyone except Catellyn.’

  ‘Did he survive?’

  Her gaze skimmed ahead. She closed her eyes, then said the words that were printed on her eyelids. ‘No. He cried out in agony at what he’d done, and then turned the power on himself. The force of the explosion knocked Catellyn back far enough that she escaped serious injury.’ She didn’t want to read the rest. Not out loud. It would make the tragedy that followed somehow less meaningful. Words like these were meant to be read in private, to oneself. Maybe even never written down. Except that’s not the way the ancient witches did things. If there could be a lesson learned, a new spell derived, an understanding of something hidden, then it was recorded. They never shied away from the lessons learned through hardship, grief and pain. Even their last words they wrote down, bidding those that followed to continue their journey.

  Catellyn had done exactly that. Shelley knew if she turned the page, a different hand would pick up the story. Catellyn, unable to bear her grief over what had happened, had taken her life after her daughter was born. It was her sister’s hand that wrote those words and continued Catellyn’s work in the grimoire. It was a history of all that had gone before as much as a repository of spellcraft and witch lore. Shelley cast her gaze over the grimoires on the tables, the diaries kept by the Pack Witches. They were all so much more than they appeared. She only had to have the ability to see the truth of what lay within. But that truth often remained hidden until another one unfurled its petals to release its secret. Just like this story of the end of Catellyn’s life. Shelley had seen its sadness before, but now, with the knowledge of what she was truly reading about—the birth of the destructive power of Warlock Lightning and what created it—it touched her in a way her readings of these diaries and grimoires had never touched her before.