Page 81 of WitchCurse

Not yet.Patience, I soothed my wolf. I knew that Kiran was still finding his footing when it came to allowing either of us to touch him. How long would it take for us to convince him that his scars didn’t matter? Or the way his skin wasn’t some fae pale milk shade? Who wanted that anyway? It was supposed to be pearlescent for the high court sidhe, but who made that rule? Was it even truth? Kiran was sort of a demi-god, wouldn’t he look like his parents? Had it been the earth god who gave him the fire under his skin? It sounded like the fae goddess had brought summer. Had she been a queen of the light court, or something else?

I had a lot of questions, but sexual frustration didn’t help my focus. I ran as my wolf, exploring the forest, checking the wards, finding nothing. Which was also frustrating, because I could really use a fight to burn off excess energy. A couple of theHuntmonsters to rip up would be fine. And I wanted to experiment with the darkness more, see if it was something we didn’t have to store behind wards, but I didn’t dare go to the remains of the cabin where I’d been changed. Liam’s scent all over the woods told me he had been following me a lot.

When Kiran had fed on the shadows of Nick’s childhood home, he’d shed excess wild magic back into the ground with the ease of raindrops falling. Everything sprang to life, soil pulsing with nutrients that I couldfeelbeneath my paws.

If we shed the darkness back to the ground, what would happen? Didn’t all the parts of the shadow things come from here? Isn’t that why they were in this world at all? It made sense that the balance would require some life and death, light and dark.

Taking the darkness had changed my form to theHuntbeast. I felt it like layers around me, a chill aching through my bones, not painful as much as it seemed to act as a shield. And then the others had arrived, their gazes seeking, almost challenging, and I could see the ties that were easy enough to tug. Puppets. Not dead, but not really alive either. The embodiment of the darkness? Would I become lost if I left the ice shield on for a long time? Or was it something else?

TheHuntwere hollow. Living creatures had a rainbow of ties to my magical sight, but theHuntwere shades of gray. They did not come when I called, and I couldn’t feel any nearby. Would they have been dragged back to the ice queen’s court? How would we even find it? The ties were almost impossible to see unless I was close to Kiran, like they blended with the environment, and I could find them only when I looked a certain way. Was that part of the magic? Some sort of camouflage?

The fae thought of themselves as gods, though they weren’t. Even the mighty sidhe had limits to their strength. Not unlike creatures of this world. Really old vampires could have crazy power, but they couldn’t create worlds. Some of the fae that the sidhe consideredlessercould give life to the soil like Kiran did. But on the level of an acre of land sprouting a full wildflower garden in early spring? That seemed unlikely. Wouldn’t we have seen a lot of it by now if they could?

I needed more information, books anything, and to keep my brain from straying back to Kiran and Nick skin to skin in the camper. The last thing they desired was my wolf barging in on them and scaring Kiran into retreating again.

He wanted us. Those thoughts trickled through the bond easily enough. Did Kiran know how easily he could shut us out? I was enjoying the questioning images his mind came up with when he thought of our trio, and planned to spend lots of time exploring it in the future. As soon as I figured out how to sever the last ties the fae had on him.

I ran a long time, stretching the distance between us, but even that didn’t hide their release from me. Fuck, I wished I’d been there.

You kind of were,Nick whispered through my mind.In my thoughts and his, and hanging along like a creeper.

Jerk, I told him without heat. It was true. I tried to distract myself but if I’d been there, I would have joined in, whowouldn’thave watched? Was there anyone not into some hot man on man action? And the comment about being inside Kiran while Nick drank him down? I wanted that. Fuck!

Soon, Nick promised. He dragged Kiran to his bed, both needing rest and comfort, but Nick ever worried about the continued nightmares.Come home.

That gave me a pause. Why the constant nightmares? One of the remaining ties? Hadn’t we gotten that one?

The nightmares come as soon as he sleeps,Nick said.The drain is more subtle, but constant, especially when he dreams.

I just fed him,I muttered thinking of our play in the forest and the shadows which Kiran really enjoyed.

And the fae will have a mighty feast as soon as he sleeps,Nick acknowledged with a sigh.

Fuck. Then we needed to unravel that tie, or rip it out by the roots.

It’s not safe. Come home. We’ll discuss it after a nap,Nick persisted. He gave me the vision of him running his fingers over Kiran’s chest and snuggling down beside him. Trying to tempt me to give up the hunt. Ireallywanted to be there. But I was also the wolf and that meant a hunt could be as good as sex, plus adding the benefit of protecting my men, and maybe killing a fae asshole. I was all for that.

I had an idea.Can you let the nightmare through?

Nick didn’t like that idea.No.

I don’t want him to suffer either, but I want to follow the tie. They feed on him when he sleeps, through the nightmares, right?What if it leads me to Zephyr? My wolf and I had visions of ripping him apart, and now that I seemed to be able to grab the strings of theHuntand use them, I thought maybe I could make that dream come true.

No.Nick repeated.Come home, it’s not safe.

But I waited, continuing to run, knowing that Nick would get tired and Kiran was already on the edge of sleep. They’d been feeding on him a long time and weren’t willing to give up now.

Toby, Nick begged, his plea sounded tired. Dark had fallen, but I kept moving.

Their end of the bond became heavy in sleep, not an actual weight, but a muting of their thoughts, like Nick was still trying to shield them while they slept. It didn’t take long for ice to creep through the bond, nightmares forming and a single strand glowed. I felt it like a chill, arching down the tie between us. Easy to follow at first because it prickled: pain, ice, and fear trickling through the bond.

Nick would startle awake soon, as Kiran’s nightmares always woke him even though Nick said nothing. Which meant I didn’t have a lot of time to follow that glowing connection. I traced that nightmare drain, first by sensation, then each time I found a glimmer of the strand in my magic vision. No one could see the actual ties like I could, as ropes, or string fading into the distance. Korissa could see the end, where the knot was bound into his soul. I didn’t dare try to pluck a chunk of his soul out to remove the tie and hope he healed like his physical flesh could. The soul was a much more delicate thing, which I knew all too well. My own still trying to heal despite the terrible wound it had suffered.

But those lines of pale, glowing energy always being siphoned from him? Those I could follow, and hoped to find something tugging on the other end that I could kill. Like Zephyr. I hoped the one strand I followed, led to him. I owed him some payback.

I let the chill pool in my gut, taking the edge off his nightmares and slowing the drain. It formed shields of ice around me, making me more aHuntbeast than the regular wolf, but I was still me, peering through the pale moonlight to follow that strand. Not in the same direction as Zephyr’s former court, but it didn’t vanish into an unachievable distance either.

The tie brought me to a barrier. One I couldn’t actually see. I ran into a building or a wall that went in both directions for a while. I followed the feeling of static and a solid obstacle in both directions for some distance, not finding an entrance. Was this the court? Or a ward? It didn’t hurt to touch, though I got a rippling sensation of dread as I walked close to it. Something to keep humans out? Was it an actual place cast with magic to make it look like the forest? Did Liam and Sebastian know how close it was? Were courts easy to move? Or had this been here a while?