Page 2 of Magic & Secrets (Twisted Magic #1)

As long as humans and the ancient ones existed, magic folk would rise.

Those issues were no longer my concern. My kind had retired after the “Last War.” These days, we lived in the polluted lands left behind by another “Last War.”

As the humming continued, I grew concerned the cave was the ancient one’s mouth and I’d find myself devoured.

Moving closer to the cave entrance, I let my mind wander to my recent dreams. Increasingly, I found myself seeing through the eyes of a female.

Her world made no sense to me. I couldn’t register the faces she saw.

She often spoke in a language I didn’t understand.

Despite the chaotic nature of the dreams, I found them comforting and hoped to feel her again whenever I slumbered.

As my mind lingered on the mysterious female, the storm began to quiet. The sky still rumbled, and heavy drops of burning rain splattered around me. Under the foul scent of fading magic was another more familiar aroma.

I moved warily down the mountain. Though sensing eyes upon me, I hadn’t seen another member of my pack in days. We weren’t social creatures. The mountain’s size allowed us plenty of solitude.

Once below the rocky peak, I moved with more purpose. My wide paws easily traversed the rough terrain. The fading magic allowed me to track the scent of carnage. I knew instantly how the blood belonged to my kind.

Halfway down the mountain, I heard the distinct roar of my pack leader. Tempe’s anguished cries echoed through the dense forest. I triangulated his calls to the base of the mountain.

Haven Junction was built during our first months at the mountain. Thirty cottages surrounded a common area with a store, pub, and meeting area. The place often smelled of cooking meat. Today, I only smelled death.

Racing down the mountain, I leapt over fallen trees and ducked under dense thickets. Several times, I simply smashed through whatever was in my way.

Tempe’s roar grew louder and more frenzied as I approached Haven Junction. His weren’t the calls of a beast readying for battle. Tempe’s roar was one of rage and grief.

Shifting into human form, I found Tempe standing amid the mauled bodies. He was over seven feet, wide-shouldered, and thickly muscled. His inky black hair and beard were overgrown. He stared in horror at our fallen friends and cried out to the sky for guidance.

A heavy bead of rain plopped on my head, waking me from my revulsion. I stalked across the ruined square, where the townsfolk had waged a valiant effort against their attackers. They were outmatched by whoever came to this place with violent intent.

“They barely had time to sound the alarm before it was over,” Tempe growled as I returned to his side. “There are no survivors.”

Fighting the urge to change, Tempe lifted his jaw and grunted at Koda, who appeared from the forest. The Shifter morphed from his gray wolf form and stood near the massacre.

His flaxen hair fell over his eyes and masked his scowl.

Unlike our pack leader, Koda exuded a quiet aura despite the carnage at our feet.

“Do you smell it?” growled an arriving Delta, sounding more beast than man as he began circling the terrain. Nearby, he hunched close to the ground and inhaled deeply. His golden eyes were mostly hidden by sooty black hair.

“I smell Shifters,” Delta rumbled. “Lions and wolves. They weren’t alone.”

Our pack leader lifted his jaw and inhaled deeply. We followed his lead, sniffing for the scents left behind by the killers.

“Vampyres,” I said. “They had humans with them.”

Delta prowled toward the muddy road leading into Haven Junction. “I’ve caught the scent of a Sorcerer. A Necromancer, too.”

Koda studied the wounds of the dead before lifting his sharp blue eyes toward our pack leader. “What madness has the world become for these varied magic folk to collaborate in war?”

Delta muttered, “I’m more interested in why they’d attack us.”

“They didn’t,” I said and gestured at the bodies. “They attacked the Junction filled with soft targets.”

“The Sorcerer brewed up the storm,” Koda said and sniffed the air. “They didn’t want us showing up before they were done.”

“How did their magic blind us?” Tempe demanded in a pained growl. “We have never been fooled by common parlor tricks before.”

“We’ve been out of the mix for a long time,” Delta replied as his golden gaze found me. “The world has likely changed.”

Nodding, I said, “Magic is always evolving in the magic folk.”

Tempe scratched violently at his bearded jaw, drawing blood. “We were designed to be impervious to magic.”

No one dared remind Tempe how the Murade had lied about the Bane Shifters needing special enzymes to survive.

For many centuries, we believed we were unable to live away from our masters.

Tempe and our former pack leader, Bravo, proved the Murade were lying, bringing us one step closer to freedom.

Nothing the human government claimed could be trusted.

Rather than agitate Tempe more by poking at the past, I rationalized, “The Murade might be gone. It’s been a decade since they sent a representative to check on us. How can we know what is happening outside our territory?”

As his fury and sorrow bore down on him, Tempe struggled to remain in his human form. His scent grew stronger. He fought to think like a warrior rather than a beast.

A hundred years was a long time to live wild. We rarely had any reason to take our human form. I sensed my pack leader might be incapable of speaking for much longer.

“Is this vengeance?” I questioned while moving deeper into the village. “We killed many creatures for the Murade.”

Koda frowned at me. “Why now?”

“The Murade might have just fallen,” I replied, feeling a presence watching me. Scanning the woodlands, I somehow sensed the female from my dreams. “Now, our enemies want to make us suffer.”

I considered my former masters. Even during my species’ design phase, the Murade feared we might one day rebel and claim the Territories.

The scientists had ensured we were sentenced to a single generation.

We had no mates and couldn’t breed. Bane Shifters were designed to fight for our masters rather than to battle for a future of our own.

Unlike Tempe, I was oddly calm despite the horror around me. Lately, I’d sensed something tugging at the threads of my consciousness. A feeling of impending dread stirred in my thoughts before slumber.

I was bothered by how cold I felt inside. These were my friends. I had known them for hundreds of years. I was at Haven Junction just weeks ago, sharing laughter with the creatures now gone silent.

Had I lived in the wild too long? Or was this aloofness normal for my species after existing for so long? No one knew exactly how we were designed. How could I possibly understand why I felt so utterly calm despite my loss?

As Tempe finished surveying the damage, two dozen pack members arrived and filled the village. Every one of them had ended many lives in the pursuit of Murade’s goals. Now, the Bane Shifters found themselves under attack by a powerful new magic.

Barely able to remain in his human form, Tempe spoke in a voice more animal than man. “It doesn’t matter who came here or their reasons. We have been attacked! They spilled the blood of our kind. None of them can survive!”

To live without chains, the Bane Shifters chose to make peace with our masters and agreed to hide on the mountain. For a century, we had fought our instincts to dominate and destroy.

As the scent of blood and rage filled the air, the Bane Shifters chose to hide no more.