Page 61 of Bound to Exiles (Rejected Wolf Pack #5)
Through our bond, I sensed Gage, Rowan, and Flint fighting their own battles at the pack house, their alpha instincts in overdrive knowing Freya and Heath were in danger. The Bonded link practically sang with shared delight each time another witch fell, and battle lust converted into regular lust.
The witches around us fell or fled, until only one remained, her face contorted with hatred as she backed away from us.
“This isn’t over,” she spat. “Aliza will—”
She never finished her sentence. Artemis of the Bloody Dawn lunged forward and silenced the witch forever.
In the sudden silence that followed, I became aware of Heath watching me, his eyes wide with a mixture of awe and something else — pride, perhaps. Through our bond, his emotions were complex: relief at our safety, shame at his own helplessness, and beneath it all, a deep longing for his wolf.
“You shifted in battle,” he called out to me as I approached to sniff him, making sure he was okay. “To protect Freya.”
“To protect both of you,” I corrected through the bond, padding closer to him.
He reached out a trembling hand, then hesitated. I pressed my muzzle against his palm, allowing him to touch my fur, to feel the wolf he could no longer access within himself.
“Tell me he’ll come back, Zak,” Heath whispered in a broken voice.
“He will,” I said instantly through the Bonded link, but even I scented my own lie.
I didn’t believe Aliza had merely suppressed his wolf. Those stones allowed for the use of much stronger magic than the simple curse my own coven had placed on me .
Freya licked Heath’s other hand, and he raised it to scratch beneath her chin.
“Your wolf will return,” Freya stated firmly, without even a trace scent of a lie.
“We need to go,” Artemis projected her voice as an alpha. “More witches will come.”
“Artemis will lead you to safety,” I told Heath across the Bonded link.
His hands were still buried in our fur. “Come with us.”
“Gage, Flint, and Rowan are at the pack house,” Freya sent along the Bonded link to us all. “Zak and I will go help them. They’re holding their own against the Frost Fang wolves that the witches are controlling.”
“One of the Frost Fang wolves in the jail regained consciousness enough to tell me where they’re keeping the rest of the stones,” Heath said. “There’s a hidden chamber beneath the pack house, accessible through Gage’s study. That’s where they take the stones of the wolves they’re controlling.”
Freya snarled out her dismay, then said, “If we can destroy them, we might free all the Frost Fang wolves at once, and they can fight back with our help.”
“Then that’s what you should do,” Artemis agreed, projecting her alpha voice. “We’ll get the injured to safety.”
A few pack members of the Bloody Dawn nudged the Frost Fang shifters in human form ahead, urging them to keep walking.
But I froze, realizing that on multiple occasions, Freya’s mental voice had somehow projected like an alpha, flying free of the pack bond so Artemis and the other wolves could hear her.
I stared at Freya in amazement. During our pack run, I’d learned that as a beta, I could only communicate mentally with my packmates through the pack bond or via our Bonded link.
That meant it was effectively impossible for me to communicate with the Bloody Dawn while in wolf form.
It should have been impossible for Freya, too.
“How did you do that?” I asked. “She’s not part of our pack or Bonded with us.”
“Odinswolf,” Freya explained simply. “Didn’t you notice me doing it during the battle earlier? ”
I thought back and remembered how everyone had leaped into battle when Freya had called, “Now.”
“I was a little distracted at the time,” I chuffed, nipping at her shoulder.
She was… remarkable.
Mate, my wolf rumbled. Claim.
Soon, I promised. Freya had chosen me, so I knew it was only a matter of time. Perhaps a time free from battle… if that time ever arrived.
“Go ahead,” Heath said, “If you can’t figure out how to destroy the stones, try to take them away from the witches if you can. At least then the witches won’t be able to control them.”
I growled, reluctant to leave Heath when he was still so vulnerable.
“I’ll be fine,” he insisted, reading our concern through the bond. “Those of us who can’t shift would only slow you down. The pack needs you.”
Freya hesitated, torn by the needs of her mates.
Heath stepped back, his face resolute despite his exhaustion. “Go. End this. The Bloody Dawn will get us to safety.”
With a last look at Heath, Freya and I raced toward the pack house, leaving the Bloody Dawn to escort Heath and the other freed prisoners to safety. But that didn’t mean we left him behind completely.
As we ran, we communicated over the Bonded link.
“We’re falling back to the throne room,” Gage reported. “Too many controlled Frost Fang wolves, and we can’t fight them without hurting them. Dryden’s escaped, but we’ll deal with him later.”
As we approached the pack house, three Frost Fang shifters emerged from hiding. Their shoulders were hunched, their faces gaunt, giving them a skeletal appearance.
Freya’s lightning flickered back to life, her tail swishing with anxiety. “Are the witches controlling you?” she projected her voice to them.
“I ordered them to help you find a different way to the study,” Gage’s voice through the pack bond reassured us.
They gestured to us, and we followed them around the main building to a side entrance .
Inside, the pack house was eerily quiet as they led us down a back corridor. Signs of battle were everywhere — broken furniture, blood-spattered walls, the lingering scent of magic. The Frost Fang wolves led us to a familiar, heavy wooden door.
The Frost Fang wolves stayed at the door, standing guard as Freya and I entered.
“What if I can’t shift back?” I privately asked Freya, concerned that this more primal side of me might have taken hold for good.
“When the time is right, your wolf will surrender control to your human side,” she said.
“There’s a carved wolf head that looks like a book end,” Gage directed us, his mental voice sounded distracted.
Freya easily shifted back to human form. Naked and blood-spattered, she looked down on me like some primal goddess of war.
“Your wolf should let you shift back now that he knows you’ll need hands to search for the mechanism.”
She was right, and my worries proved baseless — my wolf practically punted me into human form. I shifted rapidly, unsteady at the now unfamiliar sensation of balancing on two legs.
After a few minutes of frustration, Freya discovered a carved wolf head on one of the upper shelves. When she twisted it, one section of the bookcase swung inward, revealing a narrow staircase descending into darkness.
“Magic,” I murmured, sensing the protective spells woven around the entrance. “They’ve warded it.”
Freya nodded, her face grim. “Can you break through?”
I assessed the wards, recognizing the very basic spellcraft. “I was already low on magic. This will drain what little I have left.”
“Do it,” she said. “We need those stones.”
Drawing on the dregs of my magical strength, I began unraveling the protective spells and simply breaking the simpler ones. By the time the last ward fell, I was swaying on my feet.
“Zak?” Freya’s voice seemed to come from far away.
“I’m okay,” I managed, though my vision was blurring at the edges. “Let’s go.”
We descended the stairs carefully, alert for traps. At the bottom, we found a small unfinished basement, the walls barren cinder blocks. Glowing crystals adorned the tables along every wall and tucked into every corner. Crates of stones weighed down the large table in the center of the room.
The air thrummed with malevolent energy, making my teeth ache and my fur stand on end. The acrid smell of burnt herbs and something fouler — decaying life force — made my enhanced senses recoil.
I approached the table, examining the stones. Some crates of yellow stones looked dull and lifeless. In the other crates, the glowing symbols carved on each stone pulsed at different rates. Their sickly light cast writhing shadows that seemed to move independently of their sources.
“These are the ones they’re preparing,” I pointed. “And those are the ones they’ve already attuned to specific wolves. If I have to guess, I’d assume their symbols pulse with their heartbeats.”
“There must be hundreds,” Freya breathed, her eyes wide.
“I’m afraid to touch them,” I admitted.
Freya picked up one of unattuned stones, her face hardening as she felt the magic within it. She threw it against the cement floor, but it merely clattered along the floor until it came to rest along the wall.
“How can we destroy so many?”
I shook my head, my magical knowledge failing me. “I don’t know. Your magic is nearly drained, mine is all but gone, and even at full strength, I’m not sure I could undo this many curse stones at once.”
Freya’s expression grew thoughtful. “Tor would probably suggest I draw on my Odinswolf powers.”
“Your lightning magic?” I asked, remembering the crackling energy I’d seen in her fur during battle.
She nodded. “I’ve never been able to control it before. It just… happens. But maybe with your help…”
“I can try to channel it,” I offered. “Direct it where it needs to go.”
Freya took my hands, her eyes meeting mine. “Let’s try.”
Through our Bonded link, I could feel her reaching for that wild, primal power that set her apart even from other wolves. The Odinswolf magic was different from witch magic — ancient, less structured. As she connected with it, static electricity raised the hair on my arms.
“I can feel it,” she whispered, her eyes beginning to glow with an inner light. “But I can’t… I can’t focus it.”
“Maybe… in wolf form?” I asked.
Her lightning seemed to have a mind of its own in that form.