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As I walk up to it, it hisses, snapping its teeth at me.

Yeah, not today, Frankenstein.

I lift my bare foot, then slam it down on its face, grimacing as the sharp, jagged edges of its head cut into my skin.

What’s one more injury at this point?

I draw my foot back and bash it in again. And again.

Somewhere along the way, I begin to scream my rage, and I think I may be crying, and I don’t care. I don’t care because my body feels like this is the last bit of energy I have.

I pulverize the creature’s face until nothing remains.

And then I limp my way back to the girl.

I still don’t know her name.

I want to laugh. We both nearly died three times over, yet I don’t know her name, and she knows even less about me.

Then I do laugh, and I think I’m still crying.

I’m losing it. I know I am.

I bend to pick her up, and it’s not going to happen, my muscles are too tired, my body too spent.

Still, I manage to scrape together enough of Memnon’s power to lend me the needed strength.

I haul the girl into my arms and stumble toward the boundary separating witch from lycanthrope territory. With a final lunge, I cross the line.

I fall to my knees on the other side of it, Nero next to me.

My arms loosen, and the girl slides out of them.

And then I pass out.

CHAPTER29

I am cloaked in darkness,my mind wrapped in it like a blanket. It only pulls back slightly when I hear a low warning growl from Nero, who’s curled against my side.

I fight my way back to consciousness, rousing only enough to lift my hand in additional warning to whoever is approaching.

My eyes meet the brown eyes of a wolf. As soon as I see it, I drop my hand.

Not a witch.

In the back of my mind, I note the irony that even bloody and weak, I feel safer right now in the presence of a predator than I do a witch.

“It’s okay, Nero,” I whisper.

My familiar quiets, though he’s tense behind me.

The wolf paces forward, and if it’s interested in eating me, I’m F-U-C-K-E-D because I’m not moving. I don’t think I could even if I tried.

The wolf takes a few steps forward, then soundlessly shifts. In its place stands a naked older man.

He rushes over the last of the distance before kneeling at our side, uncaring that a panther is mere feet from him. I can’t see the man’s expression, but he must smell the blood on me. I’ve lost a lot, I think…

I don’t know what we must look like.