Page 47 of WitchCurse

How was that possible? We’d taken over theHunt? Bound them to us and transformed them?

Liam changed to his human form and stepped up beside Toby, clothing himself in magic, and hand hovering over my wolf’s fur. He didn’t touch, not without permission, and I could tell he was suppressing his energy both as alpha and as kitsune mate to keep from agitating Toby.

“Do they still live?” Liam asked, gazing out at the group. And the answer wasn’t easy. The fae were much like myself, blighted in darkness, half faded, and blank-eyed. Dead? Mostly dead? The wolves…they were a different story. A spark of something dancing within them that I couldn’t really understand, but I knew little of wolves.

Toby stared at them with my sight, studying the lines of magic and seeming to send the image back to Nick for clarification. Their thoughts bounced between them for a moment, too fast for me to catch. A flurry of words, symbols, and general emotion. I took that time to soothe more energy into the sundered wound of Toby’s separation from his wolf. The two pieces of the whole slowly mending, though the tear a bit jagged, edges of the river floating up to find foothold, like stones placed.

I touched a memory of something. A flurry of movement in one of the metal beasts, pain, and darkness. Car accident, Toby briefly defined. The face that hovered over him causing a slew of emotions, though I didn’t recognize it. Not even among Liam’s pack.

Because he was a coward.Toby clarified and shoved the memory back.Stop trying to mend me and heal yourself.

I wondered what he meant until I suddenly felt the throb of a dozen wounds. How had I gotten hurt? I blinked through the stars of pain pummeling my head and found myself with Nick in his bed again.

“Sorry. I was a bit overzealous,” Nick said as he mopped at my blood, staining his sheets with the gold spill. “A lot of draining symbols lit up when Toby began to send you power.” He sucked in a breath, pressing the cloth to one egregious wound on my side, near the lower edge of my hip. “I tore away the symbols not as delicately as Toby seemed to remove them before.”

He grabbed the edge of a sheet and began ripping it into pieces to catch more of my spilling blood. It didn’t matter. I wouldn’t die from blood loss. “You don’t know that, not here in this world. The rules are different.” He pressed wild magic over my wounds, as if I were toast to be buttered, but the touch eased the sting, and the bleeding slowed.

“TheHunt?” I wondered after a few moments of breathing through the pain, healing rarely painless.

“Mostly dead, I think,” Nick said. His eyes blazed gold for a moment, like he was looking out through Toby’s sight this time. “The magic locks something inside. They are trying to decide if there is enough life left of the wolves to rekindle them, or even who they belong to. Liam is not happy about missing wolves being unreported, and he doesn’t recognize any of them. The fae…feel like darkness. I’m not certain how to explain. I can touch something in them. I think Toby can control them, at least for the moment. Whomever sent them might regain control.”

I thought about that for a few minutes, startled by the rising warmth spreading through my bones. The heat of the room, blankets, and Nick’s body close to mine easing a lot of the chill. Unusual as we’d had centuries of nothing helping at all. I ached, like I’d waged a war for weeks without rest. Every bone and muscle throbbing, exhausted and trembling. Parts of my body hurting that I’d forgotten existed in years of endless numbness.

Nick cupped my face, turning my chin to look at him. “I removed almost two dozen symbols. There are hundreds more. I was hoping to remove enough to keep them from draining you completely.”

I blinked up at him, feeling weak as a kitten. He could cleave me in two with ease, calling my oldgodkillersword to his side as I’d gifted it to him ages ago. Then he’d be free of me. Dead himself, probably, but in that moment, it would have been okay, I was warm, and not alone.

“Toby’s right. You do think the strangest things.” Nick fit himself over me, pressing me into the bed, adding to my warmth and giving me more of the fae magic in small batches, healing the wounds as well as recharging my body. I lingered on the edge of sleep for a few minutes, feeling decadent to be warm and safe within his arms. There was a snarl in the distance, the wolf headed back our way. I blinked up at Nick, wondering if he felt that aggression too. Was Toby angry I was touching Nick?

Nick snorted. “I suspect it’s you he wishes to claim.”

“What?” I wondered. Didn’t the wolf want Nick?

“He has me,” Nick said. “It’s you he’s dancing around. The bond making a statement of ownership, but not an actual claim. At least not in his mind. Our little alpha needs to claim his pack.”

Alpha? I felt a rush of heat from Toby as he stalked closer. The leashed beasts close behind, like strangely animated puppets. Neither Liam nor Sebastian followed, both keeping to their territory and not trying to push the boundaries of ours. I didn’t know what to make of the situation. Used to hiding for years, avoiding people, and basking in loneliness, what did I do with a pack ofHuntbeasts?

Mine, Toby clarified.They are mine.

I gave him that, unwilling to argue or try to wrestle control from him, not even certain I could. The removal of some of the symbols made me sleepy beneath all the pain.

Healing,Nick clarified, sending Toby the thought too.I got some of the bigger ones, I think?

Toby’s mind eased into mine. Not a sword or dagger demanding access, but more like a surgeon with a knife raised and ready.

Too many mortal books, Nick said softly. Things he read often filtered to me, etched into our bond to keep the memory strong.

Toby touched an old image, a faded reflection of a memory, finding it like he’d been looking for it. One of Zephyr, me chained to his bed, bound in ice and magic. I had fought him until the magic stripped away the last of my strength. The memory no less painful than living it. I sighed, not wanting to show them my brutal past. It was done and over, why dwell in the pain?

Because it’s where you hide, Toby snarled. More pain shot through my hip; symbols broken as though scratched away by invisible claws. I bled again, magic shifting, and everything hurt as I sucked in air, breathing through stars crossing my vision.

No more,Nick said.He needs to heal first.Nick seemed to carefully pry Toby’s thoughts free of mine, separating us and I relaxed again. Boneless, exhausted, and filled with heat. Nick mopped up more blood, and I could only watch him through half-hooded eyes, wishing I were well enough to explore the texture of his hair, and the warmth of his skin.

“Soon,” Nick promised.

Toby’s wolf growled again. A sound that reverberated through me, awakening my groin in a way I hadn’t experienced in centuries. The sound of dominance and anger, oddly alluring. Jealousy that I longed to touch Nick? I wasn’t sure my body would last long enough for any sort of play.

Be ready for me, Toby said.