Page 22 of The Wolf and the Chimera (The Witch and the Cowboy #3)

Elle

As the sorceress’s magic ripped through me like a tidal wave, I stared into Ryder’s eyes and willed her to stop.

I imagined myself as a block of ice so thick and strong, no amount of the sorceress’s fire could melt me.

For so many years, she had taken from me—my freedom, my magic, my life.

Because I was born to be her pawn, I had let her shape me into a scared shadow of myself.

I wouldn’t be scared anymore.

Ryder—crouched and vulnerable and shaking with cold—tethered me to who I wanted to be. Unlike everyone else on this earth, he believed in me. I held onto that belief with every fiber of my being.

I would not fail him.

I would not fail myself.

With one last look into Ryder’s gaze, I squeezed my eyes shut. Instead of running to the recesses of my mind like I normally did when the sorceress took over, I sought her out. In the darkness of my thoughts, she appeared before me.

It was like looking into a funhouse mirror that only reflected the most twisted parts of myself. The sorceress wore my body, but her sinister smile was not my own, nor was the menacing stance she positioned herself in. I lifted my chin.

The sorceress had access to any of my thoughts she wanted.

It was time to return the favor .

I stared at her sweat-lined forehead and willed myself into her thoughts. A cacophony of sights and sounds swallowed me whole.

Wearing gold-plated armor, I stood on a battlefield and blinded my opponents with light. Around me, witches wielded other elements with deadly precision.

I laid in a bed and stared at a chestnut-haired, sleeping man I loved so much, I wondered if my chest would burst from the force of it.

I was encircled by witches but only met the eyes of one. As fair-haired Cordelia chanted a spell that weakened my magic and shortened my breath, I gripped the remnants of my existence and vowed to end her someday.

The sorceress shoved me out of her thoughts so violently, I landed in a heap at her feet in my mind.

Congratulations, pet, she hissed. Are you pleased with your new trick?

I stood, and the sorceress took a step back.

You want your werewolf’s help? she asked. Fine. Take it and see where it gets you. I’ll be back when our power is at full strength, and we can actually have some fun.

With that, the sorceress receded and took all my magic with her. I opened my eyes, and dizziness flooded me. My limbs tingled from the sudden absence of magic, and I swayed.

Moving with speed only a werewolf could muster, Ryder caught me. Sighing in relief, I let him lead me to the creek’s shore and gently set me on the pebbles. When he sat beside me, I leaned against his warm shoulder and closed my eyes. I was blessedly alone in my mind.

Melanie interrupted the silence. “So, can I ask what in the gods’ names just happened?”

Ryder growled, but I lifted my head and smiled at the tactless she-wolf.

“What happened,” I said, “is that the sorceress got a taste of her own medicine. She didn’t like it.”

“Are you all right?” Ryder asked .

My body ached from the constant shifting of forms, and my head hurt from the force of battling the sorceress, but I had never felt better.

“I did it,” I whispered. “I stopped her.”

Ryder grinned. It wasn’t a smirk or a half-smile, but a full-blown grin that revealed dimples on both of his cheeks. I smiled in return.

“You’re incredible,” he replied.

“This is very touching,” Kieran said, “and we can all agree that Elle is a badass, but I have to say the waterfall is regularly patrolled, and we’re bound to get kicked out of here any minute.”

“Right,” Ryder said. “Lyall doesn’t want any of his underlings getting near the ripple in his backyard.”

“You recognize its magic too,” I said.

“What’s a ripple?” Bo asked.

“There’s no time to explain,” Ryder said and stood.

He held out his hand to me, and I fought with every ounce of my control to pretend he wasn’t naked. As I stood, heat snaked up my neck and burned my cheeks, but I didn’t let my gaze drift from his face.

“We need to go to Circe’s Island,” I explained. “It’s where my parents always said to go if we got separated.”

Ryder nodded. “Where you go, I go.”

Warmth flared in my chest, but Kieran cleared his throat.

“You might want to put some pants on first,” he suggested.

My traitorous gaze dipped, and my face flushed.

Great gods…

Ryder spoke in a low voice. “I don’t know. Think I need pants, Ellie?”

Melanie and Bo— curse their werewolf hearing —laughed, and I spun around, facing the waterfall to hide my embarrassed face.

“Good thing I grabbed the jeans you ditched,” Kieran said. Footsteps sloshed through the water. “Since your mate can’t keep her eyes to herself.”

The wolves chuckled, but I sobered. Power thrummed in the air and buzzed against my skin. When a warm hand clasped my shoulder, I jolted.

“Easy,” Ryder said. His gaze drifted to the waterfall and back to me. “So, where exactly is Circe’s Island?”

Water splashed, and Kieran and the other wolves stood at our sides.

“And, who’s Circe?” Melanie asked.

“I’ve heard that name before,” Bo said.

“She’s an ancient being who was exiled by the gods to her own dimension,” I answered.

Though the others shared cautious looks, Bo nodded.

“Some say she was the first witch,” he said.

“Many don’t know of her.” I studied the quiet, behemoth werewolf. “Part of her punishment was the erasure of her existence from the history books.”

Bo shrugged and smiled softly. “You’re not the only one who likes to sneak around the Sovereign’s library.”

“How do your parents know an exiled, ancient witch?” Melanie asked.

“Yeah,” Kieran added, “and should we really be knocking on her door?”

I sighed and gritted my teeth.

“I don’t know how they’re connected to her,” I admitted. “I only know that she promised them and myself a safe haven. Like many things, the situation’s details were kept from me.”

I stared into Ryder’s brilliant, amber gaze.

“You don’t have to come with me,” I said. “I know how foolish it sounds, but I can’t walk away. I just can’t.”

Ryder growled, and his eyes glittered with power that settled on my skin like a warm touch. Kieran and the other wolves squirmed in discomfort, but Ryder paid them no mind. He clasped my face with gentle hands and pressed a kiss onto my forehead .

“Where you go,” he repeated, “I go.”

“We’re coming too,” Kieran said.

I started, but the wolves’ faces were lined with grim determination.

“Ripples are dangerous,” I argued. “This whole idea is dangerous! I don’t know what exactly we will be walking into. I can’t ask you to follow us—”

“You didn’t ask,” Bo interjected and crossed his burly arms. “Doesn’t mean we’re not coming with you.”

Panic welled in my chest. Risking Ryder’s life was frightening enough—I couldn’t risk their lives too.

“No,” Ryder ordered. “Not only are we going to some mystical island across dimensions, but you three can’t risk the wrath of the Sovereign. I doubt he would permit this little excursion.”

“Which is why we have to follow you,” Melanie argued. “We have to do everything in our power to stop you from leaving, which will get us sucked into the ripple in the process.”

“Exactly,” Kieran agreed.

Ryder fumbled for a response, and I shook my head. “It’s too dangerous—”

“You’re my brother’s mate,” Kieran said. Emotion pooled in his forest green eyes, “which makes you and your family pack—pack sticks together. We’re going with you.”

My throat clogged, and tears burned my eyes.

Was this what it was like? Having friends? Having a pack?

It was as terrifying as it was fulfilling.

“We better go,” Melanie said and eyed the nearby cliff. “Patrols will be here any minute.”

Ryder stared them down, then shook his head and cursed.

“Hold onto each other,” Ryder instructed. “The ripple will try to physically and mentally tear you apart. Just keep repeating our destination in your mind.”

The five of us grabbed each other’s hands and walked toward the waterfall. Light and color shimmered in its depths, and its magic swelled louder with each step we took. The water rose higher and higher, until its chilly depths reached my hips.

Mere feet separated us from the magical doorway, and the ripple’s power drew me closer. I braced myself for the maelstrom of magic, and Ryder’s hand squeezed mine. As we ducked under the cascading water, magic consumed me.

The world became a cacophony of screams and whispers, light and shadows, colors and darkness. As we plummeted through space and time, wind ripped at my skin and hair and threatened to pull me from Ryder’s clutches. My coat slipped through my fingers like sand.

Ryder wrapped both arms around me and pulled me closer. His warm embrace was a tether in a sea of chaos.

Ryder is with me, I remembered, to go to Circe’s island. To find my parents.

In the space between worlds, time stretched, but I repeated our mission like a mantra.

Find my parents.

Find my parents.

Find my parents.

In seconds or eons or hours, we hit the ground. Ryder took the brunt of the fall and groaned beneath me. Frosty wind ripped at my wet clothes and stole my breath. I scrambled off Ryder and blinked away my lingering dizziness from the ripple’s travel.

The five of us kneeled on thick, hard-packed snow in an endless tundra. Sleet poured from the murky, gray sky and burned my chilled skin. I squinted against the horizon, but I couldn’t see anything in the unforgiving weather.

“Where the hell are we?” Melanie demanded.

“This is definitely not an island,” Kieran said.

On shaky legs, we stood. Though the werewolves appeared unbothered by the cold, my teeth chattered so hard, I feared I would bite off my tongue. Ryder wrapped his arms around me, and I buried my face in his chest. The sleet slammed into us like needles, and I worried about the guys’ exposed backs.

“Over there,” Ryder said. His voice was nearly lost on the howling wind. “There’s a structure there.”

I wanted to look, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave Ryder’s warmth.

“Should we really wander up to a random building?” Kieran asked.

“My mate can’t stay in this cold,” Ryder grumbled. “There’s no other option.”

Feeling like an even bigger weakling than normal, I tried to disentangle myself from Ryder and be of some use, but he simply swept me into his arms and growled at me.

When I looked up, I could barely decipher his face in the onslaught of sleet, much less make out some distant structure on the horizon.

“I-I-I’m,” I stuttered, “f-f-f-fine-uh.”

“Sounds like it,” Melanie said. “Let’s go.”

Ryder and the other werewolves jogged across the frozen ground, and I buried my face in Ryder’s warm chest, until magic—familiar and horrific magic—pulsed in the air.

I stiffened, and Ryder cursed.

“What is that?” Kieran asked breathlessly.

The sorceress.

My lips were too cold to form the words.

The spine-tingling power was as recognizable as a reflection, but it wasn’t coming from me.

Did she somehow escape?

Did coming here free Medea?

The torrent of sleet paused, and sunlight heated my skin. I lifted my face. In front of an icy castle, an achingly beautiful woman approached. She wore a loose, ivory gown that trailed behind her. Colors glinted off her shiny, midnight hair, and her eyes glowed red with power.

Just like mine do when I use my magic

She smiled. “Welcome, dear chimera. I’ve been waiting for you.”

Circe.

Behind the mystical woman, the glacial doors of the castle were thrown open, and my heart stopped.

As my parents barreled toward us, I scrambled out of Ryder’s arms and raced to meet them.