Page 29 of Witchblood

“You’re not going home?” I called through the window.

“Not yet. I have unfinished business here.” He walked away, leaving me with those cryptic words. I closed the blinds near the sleeping area and dropped down on top of the bed. It smelled like home. Lavender and chamomile, of den and safety. I was asleep before I even realized I’d closed my eyes.

Chapter 13

Idreamt of Felix. He’d brought me flowers. Just some scrap of half-dead buds he’d gotten at a grocery store. An apology for something I couldn’t recall. He did that a lot. Not that it mattered. I’d been annoyed by the flowers as I grew better myself. Thought and all that, I’d tried to remind myself. The dream version of him was kinder, until he suddenly shifted into his wolf and leapt to tear out my throat.

I jerked awake.

Only a pale sliver of moonlight eased through the trailer. All the window shades were closed, though I couldn’t recall pulling them all before I’d fallen into bed. The gentle dance of bugs in the night soothed my anxiety a little. If something like Felix was stalking the darkness, the night would be still.

I lay there for a bit, willing myself back to sleep. Only it didn’t come. Instead uneasiness rose. Nothing around me seemed off. My arm didn’t hurt and the night sang. Still my body ached with a need to get up and run. Fear. I’d been running from myself for almost a year. Running from voices in my head that told me I’d never be safe again.

Pointless.

I dragged myself out of bed and went to the fridge, expecting molded food or an empty space. Only it was full of freshly brewed tea, stacks of veggies and even a package of eggs with a current date on them. At least someone had missed me, I thought, as I poured a glass of lavender lemonade. The taste of it was slightly sour, the bitter edge of magic always seeped through.

The night outside went silent. I froze, listening. My heart began to pound.

Not again. I wasn’t going to keep running. Even when my body told me to run, that death was imminent if I didn’t. If Felix stood outside my door he’d regret coming here. I wasn’t powerful, not in the way a werewolf was. But I was done looking over my shoulder. My supply of books was categorized by type. I had plenty of dark magic books I’d barely touched. Things with alchemy so dark it would have made that anime Korissa knew of look tame. It meant giving up part of my soul for safety. Maybe I was ready for that.

I opened the door and stared out into the darkness. There was a wolf laying at the base of the step-down. He turned his head to look my way, and I caught a glimpse of the stripe of color running down his nose.

“Toby,” I grumbled. He looked back out into the night, but didn’t appear alarmed, just alert. “Someone out there?” Hey Lassie, is Timmy down the well? I thought as I leaned out the door.

I caught Liam’s scent before I saw him so he must have purposely gone upwind. “I thought you said you had to be up early? You should go to bed.”

He materialized from the darkness as though called by magic. “I did. Couldn’t sleep. Had my guards patrolling, but decided to take a shift myself.”

“Guarding me or guarding your people from me? And since when do alphas do guard duty?” I waved a hand at him. He made no sense.

He stepped up to the door, letting just Toby’s body and the strength of my wards separate us. “Can I come in?”

“Absolutely not.”

He frowned. “You’re afraid I’ll hurt you.”

Yes. “No.”

He turned and paced for a minute, back and forth in front of the door. “I’ll sleep out here then.”

I shrugged. “Okay. Night.” I closed the door on both of them, put the lemonade pitcher away and went back to bed. It took me a while to fall back to sleep, but as soon as I did, I dreamt of fangs again and bolted upright. Dammit. I threw off the blanket and stalked to the door. Toby hadn’t moved. Liam sat on the ground, not touching the trailer, but close. He looked up when the door opened.

“If you agree to let my wards lock down your power, you can come in,” I told him.

“Lock down my power?”

“It binds your alpha strength. You won’t be able to shift while in my home and your strength will be no more than human level. You’ll still be able to feel your pack and their bond with you, but you won’t be able to borrow energy or power from them.” It had taken me months to perfect the ward, and I’d used it on my car and every hotel room I’d ever stayed in. The ward even worked on fae. It’s only real limitation was that it had to be bound to a place. I’d tried small objects like lockets, but those failed. I could exclude people individually from the ward, so it didn’t block my ability to shift or use magic, but it would for just about anyone else. The only other alpha wolf I’d ever used it on wasApa. He’d visited often, and after the initial shock of the wards wore off, he seemed to enjoy spending time being almost human in my home.

Liam took a minute to decide, but finally he jumped to his feet and approached the door. “I agree. Inside your home, your rules, so long as I’m not truly separated from the pack.”

I put my hand out, palm up, through the doorway, offering it to him. He took it and let me pull him inside. Toby whined. I felt Liam slide through the ward with my consent. When he was inside, I let him go. He stood blinking, and shaking his head a little, like he was disoriented.

“If you step back outside the feeling will go away,” I told him. “I’ve been told it’s very unnerving for older wolves. If it’s too much for you, I understand.” I left the door open, walked toward the bed, and glared at it. “Inviting you into my home does not mean I’m having sex with you.” Even if I had only the one sleeping space. Maybe I should shift and sleep as a fox. But he’d consented to the ward that virtually stripped him of his otherness. He was still an alpha, still leader of his pack, but inside my trailer, he was little more than human. He’d still be bigger and stronger than me, but here I had power. I was also no longer afraid to use it. No one would ever hurt me in my own home again.

“It’s odd,” Liam said after a minute, “for my head to be so silent. I never realized how loud the wolf was, the pack, and the responsibility as alpha. It’s still there.” He pointed to his head. “Just muted.” He reached out and shut the door, sliding the lock into place. “Can anyone enter? Like if someone just wandered up who had no magic?”

“No. No one can enter without an invite. It would be easier to grate a rock into dust than to get through my wards.” I made my way back to the bed and actually pulled the blankets back. It was a queen-sized bed, the largest I could fit in the space. Right now it felt really small. Maybe Liam would sleep on the floor. I could tell him to sleep on the floor since he’d sort of demanded entry into my home. He kicked off his shoes and followed me to the bed, grabbing the blankets and holding them up for me.