CHAPTER 3

HE JOGGED NEXT TO PEANUT as Julie steered her down the overgrown street. They were moving northeast on Lawrenceville Highway, heading into Tucker. Since the city was now his territory, he took the time to learn about it. After the first Shift, when planes no longer worked and highway travel became dangerous, the industries looked to railroads for shipping. With buildings in Atlanta falling left and right, Tucker became the industrial hot spot for about fifteen years, growing fast until the newly built factories also decayed and fell. This was all ancient history, as far as he was concerned. Now Tucker stood abandoned, all but claimed by the wilderness, as the people pulled in to the heart of the city.

All around them dark ruins stabbed through the growth. A flock of school buses rusted, abandoned in some old parking lot. The remnants of a gas station, all but swallowed by dense kudzu, hunkered down to the right. Two owls sat on the remnants of the Exxon sign, waiting for some hint of movement. This would’ve been an ugly place without the green, Derek reflected. Sharp, rusted, trashed. The plants softened it, hiding the disfigured land underneath the happy leaves. Even the old power lines, dead for years, looked cheery, wrapped in vines and dripping small white flowers like garlands.

A creek had broken free of man-made restraints, flooding the road as it found an easy path down the paved highway. The water ran only a couple of inches deep, three at most, but he didn’t like to get his feet wet, so he moved on the right side, where debris and soil deposited by the water formed a natural shore. Tiny fish darted in the clear stream. He smelled deer. A few moments later he saw them, too, drinking from a stream: a group of three does. Two were pregnant. They raised their heads, looked at him and Julie, and took off.

“Cute,” Julie said.

She’d turned grim after they left Pillar Rock. He decided to yank her tail. “Delicious.”

“Seriously?”

“Mhm. Later on I’ll come back here and eat all of the deer babies. I’ll be big and fat.” No werewolf or human hunter would kill a pregnant doe or a doe with fawns. Do that often enough, and you risked your food supply. Then come winter, where would you be?

“If this is you trying to be funny, stop.”

He grinned at her. “You wanted jokes.”

“What kind of a joke is that?”

“Wolf kind.”

“You really need a girlfriend.”

Not that again.

“What about Celia?”

It took him a moment to figure out which Celia she was talking about. The Pack had four, and he interacted with three of them. It had to be the redheaded Celia. Before he separated from the Pack, she’d developed a persistent habit of thrusting herself into his daily routine. He could explain to her that every time Celia encountered him, he registered her noting his face with a calculated satisfaction. She scrutinized his scars and judged him to be disfigured enough to be desperate. Celia craved power and safety. In her head he was perfect because he would stay, and be faithful, and he would let her hold the reins, since nobody else would have him. The single time they’d spoken in private confirmed it. She’d told him that unlike most women, she didn’t mind the scars and that he didn’t have to be alone. That she would have him, even if other women wouldn’t. He’d stepped into her space then and held her stare. It was the dominating look of an alpha, and it communicated everything without words: He was neither weak nor desperate. She’d told him that if he touched her, she would scream, and she’d fled. He’d let her go. That had ended that.

“Celia is pretty.”

“No.” That was explanation enough.

“Then Lisa?”

He had to cut this short. Of all the topics she could’ve picked, this was the last conversation he wanted to have with her. He’d spent months learning to read people’s emotions. He knew exactly what to say. He forced a smile. “You’re a sweet kid, Jules, but don’t worry so much. When you grow up, it will make more sense.”

Her expression shut down, like someone had slammed a window into her closed. He’d drawn a line between a child and an adult and rubbed her nose in it. She would be mad at him for a while now. It was still better than discussing his love life.

The road took them deeper into Tucker. He smelled a skunk, raccoons, two roving bands of dogs, feral cats, and a big male bobcat that happily sprayed around. He didn’t smell humans. Nobody had passed this way for quite some time. If Caleb Adams had taken the rock into Tucker, he hadn’t come this way to do it or he’d had a giant bird carry him.

They traveled in silence for half an hour, when Julie turned off the road and steered her horse to the remains of a three-story building. She stood up in her saddle, grabbed the crumbling brickwork, and pulled herself up. He took a running start; jumped ten feet in the air; bounced from some rebar; ran across a narrow, half-rotten beam; and offered her his hand to pull her up. She gave him a look studded with broken glass. Right. Still mad.

“Come on,” he said. “You’re wasting time.”

She ignored his hand and pulled herself over the edge onto the rotten remains of the third floor. He gave her space.

She raised her hand and pointed to an area in the distance. “There. It’s in the center of that place.”

He peered at it. Remains of some industrial complex, and a large one—at least two dozen big buildings, maybe more, some almost whole, others down to broken stretches of walls connecting to nothing. An accidental urban labyrinth. The soil around it was darker, the texture of it different, rougher somehow. Odd shapes rose among the ruins, some glowing with pale pink and blue. He couldn’t quite make them out.

His instincts told him the place was unlike anything he’d seen before. And it felt bad. Pillar Rock made him wary, but this place felt worse. He didn’t want to go in there, but most of all he didn’t want her walking into it.

 Like the dark soil around the ruins, Adams was a blight, a corruption that had already cost the Iveses their lives. The blight had to be purged. Curran had told him once, “Every time you see a problem and walk away from it, you set a new standard.” The problem was right there, and letting Caleb Adams butcher a family to get his hands on a magic rock wasn’t a standard he cared to set. They would take care of it. It was time to cut the warlock’s little power trip short.

He still didn’t like it.

They circled the former industrial park, drawing a wide arc around it. Adams would expect them to come from the southwest. They approached from the north instead. The wind blew from the south, and he liked being upwind of his prey. They hid Peanut in the nearby ruins. With her backpack gone, Julie resorted to her backup bag, a small satchel she carried on her back.

From above, the walls looked shorter. Up close, some rose as high as ten feet. Giant mushrooms shaped like five-feet-high bay boletes, with pale blue caps the size of large umbrellas, clustered by the walls, their pores radiating a pale pink glow. The odd dark texture he’d seen from the top of the crumbling building turned out to be leaves—strange, purple-black plants no more than five inches tall, each a bunch of triangular leaves on short stalks. They blanketed the ground completely, spreading from the ruins like a puddle of spilled ink in an almost perfect circle, and they had to pick their way through thirty yards of them to get to the solid asphalt. He’d almost stepped on a rusty jagged spike sticking out of the dirt. Julie followed his footsteps, trusting his senses and another walking stick she picked up. Even so, they were barely ten yards in, and she’d stumbled once already.

The plants stank too. A heavy metallic scent that sat low, pooling near the ground. His nose would get used to it eventually, but for now he went scent-blind.

“Stop,” Julie whispered.

A needle of alarm pierced him. Derek froze in midstep, his foot hovering above the ground, carefully stepped back, and raised his hand. She put the walking stick into it. He crouched and used the stick to push the leaves aside. A metal bear trap lay open among the leaves, the old-fashioned kind with a pressure plate and heavy-duty steel jaws armed with metal teeth. A chain stretched from the trap, snaking its way between the leaves. He glanced in that direction and saw an old, concrete power post. It had to be fastened around it. He’d seen these traps before. They weighed over fifty pounds, and the metal teeth would go straight through the bone.

“Adams did something,” Julie whispered. “There is a blue stain of magic on the trap. It’s faint and hard to see, but I’ve got it now. It’s not witch magic; it’s something else. Something really old. The whole field is seeded with them. Let me take the point.”

They were sitting ducks out there. The faster they went through, the better.

He nodded.

A whine tore through the air, and a sharp spike of pain punched into his chest, exploding into white-hot, mind-numbing agony. Silver. The poison bloomed inside him, the agony ripping at him, spreading too fast. He didn’t waste time glancing at the wooden shaft protruding from above his heart. Dropping flat would do no good. No cover.

The second arrow whined, only half a second behind the first. He thrust himself in front of Julie. It sank into his stomach. Silver exploded inside him. The detonation of hurt almost took him to his knees.

“Run!” she yelled at him.

If he tried to run back, they would be finished. Too much open ground behind them. They had to run forward, toward the bowman and to the shelter of the brick walls. If he pulled Julie behind him, she couldn’t keep up. If he carried her in front of him, she would get shot. All of this flashed in his head in a torturous instant. He dropped, his back to her, grabbed her legs, shoved her on his back, and dashed forward to the ruins just as the third arrow sliced into the ground where he’d stood a moment ago. That was the only way the bulk of his body could shield her.

“Right!”

He turned right, sharp, almost falling, and sprinted. The pain ate at him from the inside, devouring his innards with burning fangs.

Another arrow whined and missed.

“Left! More left! Right! Straight!”

He shot out of the field of leaves into the shelter of a brick wall and smashed into it, unable to stop himself. The old bricks shuddered but held. He barely felt the impact. The fire inside him consumed all other pain. The silver poisoning spread as the virus that nourished his body died in record numbers. His legs shook, and he couldn’t stop the trembling. The pain was spreading too fast. The arrows had been coated with silver powder.

He grasped the arrow shaft in his chest, focused on the brilliant spike of agony inside him, and pushed, forcing his dying muscles to obey. Julie’s hand closed over his. He let go, and she pulled the arrow gently, carefully. His body fought him, trying to escape the pain. The world hovered on the edge of blackness. He snarled. The white spike vanished.

“Next,” she said, grasping the second arrow, but he was already pushing with clenched teeth. It came free, but the suffering remained.

“Derek?” She looked into his eyes.

“Powder,” he ground out.

Her face went white.

They had to move. They were too exposed here, and the shooter knew exactly where they’d fallen. He forced himself to his feet.

“Wait.” She dug in her bag.

“No time.” He pulled her up and leaned to glance around the wall. The night was empty. He moved, running quiet and fast. The silver burned its way through his veins. There was no time to expel it now. His body would either overcome it or die trying.

He ducked into the shadows, weaving his way through the maze of half-walls, aware of Julie next to him. They had to get to shelter, a higher ground, somewhere he could collapse for the few minutes he’d need to bleed himself. Somewhere hidden.

He smelled pungent smoke of burning herbs, too layered to parse into components. A thicker odor, dirty and hot, overlaid it. Some sort of animal, and more than one. Three, no four distinct scent trails, and below it all another scent. He took a whiff of it and recoiled. The scent was pure fear. It hit him deep in the gut, squeezing. He breathed in shallow quick breaths, trying to get a grip against the thought-killing primal panic.

Julie gasped. He turned. They’d come far enough to see around the corner of the larger wall. Beyond it, in a clearing, a circle smoldered on the ground, the scorched ground still smoking. Julie moved toward it before he could stop her. The revolting scent grew thicker. He followed, trying to shut down the terror snarling in his mind. The wall on their right ended, and Julie darted across the space. He cursed inwardly and followed.

She knelt by the circle, sheltered from view by the corner of the building. Charms and bundles of herbs hung from the bricks, each strung by a wet thread that smelled like flesh.

A wooden pole rose from the ground just outside the circle. Dead animals hung on it, each nailed to the wood with a long iron nail. A rat, a squirrel, a cat, and above them a wolf head smeared in fresh blood. Above the head, an arrow protruded from the wood. The arrowhead looked crude, almost ancient.

The wolf head stared at him with dead eyes, as if saying, “Hey buddy. Don’t fret. You and I are the same. There’s no pain where you’re going.”

Great. He had to bleed himself before the pain dragged him under or he started seeing things that weren’t there.

“He summoned something,” Julie whispered, her eyes wide. “He killed a wolf and summoned something very old.”

He pointed at the herbs. “Are those wolf guts?”

“Yes.”

A deep eerie howl rolled through the ruin. He jerked. Run! Run now! He had to go. Dogs were coming and they would run him to ground. He was in the open, exposed, but he could outrun them if only he ran now, fast and hard, into the woods. . . .

Julie grabbed his face with her fingers. “Look at me,” she whispered, her words urgent and fast. “Look at me!”

He pushed her hands away, but she put them back, her fingers cold on his skin. She caught his gaze. He stared into her brown irises.

“Derek! He summoned a hunter. The animals on the pole are your prey, and you are the hunter’s prey. This whole place is one giant magic trap, and it’s trying to make you act in your assigned role. The hunter will sic his hounds, the wolf will run, and the hunter will chase and kill it. It’s the way things were done for thousands of years, but you’re not all wolf.”

Another howl cut at him, like a sharp blade slicing at the nape of his neck. Woods . . .

Her hands held his face, her eyes two bottomless pools. “You’re human. You’re not all wolf. You don’t have to run. You’re human. Look at me. You’re Derek. If you run now, you’ll die.”

If he ran, she couldn’t keep up.

“You’re human, Derek.”

Her voice severed the welling panic. He felt reason returning slowly, slipping through pain and instinct. The things that howled would find them soon, and he was in no shape to fight. “We have to get to shelter.”

She let him go. “If you run, the spell will lock on you, and you won’t be able to break away. Don’t run, Derek.”

“I won’t.”

He turned around, fighting dizziness. A building—an old warehouse— loomed above the ruins to the right. It was obvious, but he didn’t care. They needed shelter. He pointed to it. She nodded.

A sharp, triumphant howl sliced through the night. A hound was feet away, and it had just caught their scent.

 

TO THE LEFT, THE WALLS CAME together under a sharp angle, leaving only a narrow gap, half-choked by rubble. Anywhere else would put them into the open. He pointed to it.

Julie reached into her sack and pulled out a plastic bag of yellow powder. He took a deep breath and thrust his hoodie over his nose and mouth. She tossed the handful of wolfsbane into the air and backed toward him. They slipped into the gap. It terminated in a solid wall less than ten feet away. To the right, another wall. Above them, metal bars crossed. He could break them, but not without making noise. They were trapped in the twelve-by-twelve-feet space.

He went to ground. Julie lowered herself next to him. They peered through the gaps between broken bricks and dirt. Something grunted low and deep just behind the corner. Something big.

Derek lay completely still. The silver had eaten a hole in his chest and was trying to reach his heart.

Another grunt, harsh, loud. A beast ran into the open, huge, at least three hundred pounds and covered with long, coarse brown fur. In a bad light, he’d mistake it for a boar: It had the bulk, the shape, and the enormous boar jaws armed with tusks and massive teeth. But it had no hooves. Its legs terminated in clawed paws.

He had no idea if the wolfsbane would work on it.

The boar-hound snarled under its breath, sucking in the air. Small vicious eyes stared, unblinking. The creature took a step closer to the gap.

Next to him Julie held completely still. She couldn’t take a hound. She’d need a spear. The tomahawks wouldn’t do it. He had to fix himself fast or neither of them would get out alive.

Another step.

Another.

He reached for his knife.

The boar-hound inhaled, searching for their scent, and recoiled. It snorted, pawed at its nose, snarled, and squealed like a pig.

His ears caught the sound of heavy hoofbeats drawing near.

The boar-hound grunted, circling the smoldering ring, trying to get away from the wolfsbane.

A massive shaggy horse came into view, carrying a rider. Derek’s view gave him a glimpse of a leather boot and a leg in brown pants. Derek dipped his head, trying to get a better look. The hunter wore leather. Big, at least six eight, larger, broader, probably stronger than a normal human. A hooded cloak of wolf fur shielded his back. The invisible hackles between Derek’s shoulders stood on end.

The hunter turned, showing his face. Around thirty, white, long brown hair. Hard. Weather-bitten. Light eyes. A long ragged scar crossing the nose bridge. Something with claws had marked him, but must’ve died before it finished the job. Derek bared his teeth. He’d make him choke on that fur.

 A tall bow of wood and bone hung over the hunter’s shoulder. The hunter raised an arm shielded by leather. A shriek tore through the night, and a bird dropped from the sky like a stone and landed on the arm. Ugly, bearded, big, with a vicious beak. Didn’t look like any bird he’d ever seen.

The hunter studied the boar-hound, then raised his head and surveyed the area. His gaze passed over their shelter. He peered into the gap. Derek looked into his eyes. Magic rolled over him in a dark cold wave, dousing the agony of silver with ice, and he saw a long, frozen winter night under the moon. He felt the cold snow under his paws. He smelled his own blood, bright and hot, as it fell onto the snow, and heard the long, undulating howl of hungry hounds.

This is the way it always was. This is the way it had to be now. He had to run, run into the trees, before the arrows and hounds found him.

Nice try, asshole.

The urge to run was overwhelming now. It was taking all of his will to just stay still.

A moment dripped by. Derek waited. He was a wolf. He had all the patience in the world.

The hunter whistled softly through his teeth. The boar-hound shook its head and moved on. The hunter turned away, tossed the bird back into the night sky, and the massive horse resumed its steady walk.

They lay still for another three minutes before they quietly slipped out of the gap. Julie grabbed his hand, pointed to the pole, to herself, and up.

Lift me.

He grasped her legs and held her up. She plucked the arrow from the pole and they melted into the night.

 

THE BIG BUILDING GAPED OPEN, its front wall gone, scattered in pieces on the ground. Half its roof was missing, but the back offered shelter. He was limping now, running slow even for a human.

“Almost there,” Julie whispered.

He squeezed one last burst of movement from his body. He was shutting down.

“Almost there,” she repeated.

He followed her across the dirty floor to the metal staircase leading up, up the stairs and to the far corner of the empty building. He sagged to the ground. She dropped beside him, yanked a small knife out of the sheath on her waist, and pulled his hoodie off. Her eyes went wide.

“It’s over your neck.”

He knew that already. The flesh over his neck and chest felt dead. When she touched it, he felt no pressure. The skin on his chest had turned duct-tape grey.

Cutting the chest wouldn’t do it. The silver was still in his bloodstream and moving up. If it hit his brain, he would die. He had to expel it before it reached that far.

He snatched the knife out of her hands.

“Don’t!” she gasped.

He slit his carotid artery. Blood sprayed in a black-and-red mist. He smelled the metallic stench of dead Lyc-V.

A howl, close, almost to them.

Julie whipped around and dashed down the stairs, her satchel in her hand.

Blood kept gushing in a heated flood, drenching his shoulder. Normally Lyc-V would’ve recognized the neck cut as fatal and sealed it nearly instantly, but the virus that granted his regeneration was dying in record numbers. He bled like a human, getting weaker with each beating of his heart. His hold on consciousness was slipping. His brain, starved of oxygen, was going to sleep like a dying fish. He hooked his claws into reality. A normal human would’ve been dead within seconds. If he could stay conscious, if his heart pumped enough silver-poisoned blood out for Lyc-V to recover, if the silver didn’t reach his brain, he might survive.

Below, Julie drew a circle with white chalk around the stairs. A ward, a defensive spell. He doubted the chalk alone would hold the hounds or the hunter. She pulled the arrow from her bag and scratched a second line into the concrete floor, making the second ring inside the first chalk line.

The boar-hound appeared in the gap where the front wall used to be, silhouetted against the moonlight. He willed himself to move, but he could do nothing.

Julie yanked a small squeeze bottle out of her bag and poured a puddle in front of her, inside the circle.

Get up, he snarled at himself. Get the hell up.

The boar-hound let out a triumphant snarl of pure bloodlust.

Julie dropped into the circle on her knees. He saw a small flame of a match being struck. The puddle ignited.

The boar-hound charged. It came like a cannonball, snarling, giant maw open, tusks ready to rend.

Julie thrust something into the fire.

The hound covered the last ten feet.

Julie jerked the object out of the flame and held it up in front of her like a shield.

The boar-hound slid to a stop, its pig eyes fixed on the hot arrow in Julie’s hand. The creature pushed forward and recoiled, as if striking an invisible wall.

He slumped in relief. The wound on his neck was closing. He was still alive. Now it was just a matter of time, and she had just bought them some.

The boar-hound howled. In the distance, three other voices answered.

He wasn’t sure how much time had passed: seconds, minutes. But the wind had changed, and he smelled the second hound before he heard it charge its way into the building and slide to a stop before Julie’s circle. Third and fourth followed. He heard the bird, saw it as it flew over him, circling, and then he heard the hunter’s horse.

He heard the rough sound of metal striking stone. She was chopping at the arrowhead with her tomahawk.

The pain in Derek’s neck had ebbed. The edges of the gray skin shrank, turning pink, not fast enough but it would have to do. She had done her part. It was time for him to do his.

In the darkness of the second floor, he slid his shoes off, then his pants.

The horse clopped its way into the building.

“You cannot break it,” a deep male voice said.

He looked down. The hunter stopped his horse midway down the floor. The four boar-hounds lined up between him and Julie.

Here you are, asshole.

“The arrowhead’s stone. This is stainless steel.” She sounded determined. “I’ll shatter it.”

Derek rose quietly in the shadows.

“That is my first arrow. The arrow is eternal and so am I. As long as there are humans and their prey, I will exist.”

“Go fuck yourself.” She smashed the tomahawk into the arrow.

Now. The change dashed through him, the brief pain welcome and sweet. His muscles tore and grew again, his bones lengthened, his fur sprouted, and suddenly he was whole again, stronger, faster, seven feet tall, a meld of beast and man. The burn of silver was still there, but now just a razor-sharp reminder of the pain and the need to kill its source. He smelled blood. His three-inch claws itched. He heard eight hearts beating: five animal, one bird, and two human. He wanted to taste the hot, salty rush of blood pounding through their veins, to open them and feel them struggle in the grip of his teeth.

The wild within him roared. The thing that nearly turned him loup—the one he kept at bay with monthly trips to the woods, with meditation, with exertion, with running until his legs could no longer carry him—that thing broke free and it was hungry.

“Choose a side,” the hunter said.

Her voice rang, her words defiant. “I choose the Wolf.”

“Then you die.” The hunter pulled the bow off his shoulders.

Not today. Derek leaped over the iron rail. He landed among the hounds and opened two throats, tusk to tusk, before they realized he was there. Blood gushed—glorious, hot blood, straight from the heart. The wild sang within him. The third beast tried to gore him, but he hurled it aside like a rag doll. It hit the wall with a loud thud, whimpered as it slid to the ground, and lay still.

An arrow whistled through the air. He grasped the fourth beast by its neck and jerked it up, holding the struggling animal like a shield. Arrows thudded into it—one, two, three—and sank deep. He hurled the creature at its master. The horse reared, screaming. The hound met the hunter’s fist and fell, knocked aside. It scrambled to its feet and ran to Derek, limping. The remaining hounds, two slashed and bleeding and one favoring its front leg, rushed him. He dodged the first, letting it rush past him, and landed on its neck and bit. His teeth closed around the spinal column and crushed the cartilage. He tore a mouthful of flesh and bone and let go. A tusk dug into his hip. He snarled at the pain and punched the creature’s thick skull. It shuddered and he punched again, driving his fist in with all his wild strength. The bone broke. Brain wet his fur. The last hound attacked, unsteady on its feet. The wild roared inside him, so loud he could hear nothing else. He carved the hound’s throat into pieces.

An arrow pierced his thigh. He ripped it out, slashing the wound open before the silver could spread.

The last beast fell. The bird swooped down at him. He snatched the raptor out of the air and tore off its head. Only the man was left. He walked to the hunter. There was no need to rush.

The hunter drew his bow and fired. Derek knocked the arrow aside. Another arrow. He dodged. It grazed his thigh. The burn of silver spurred him on. Derek leaped and took his opponent off the horse with a swipe of his paw. The big human rolled to his feet, two blades in his hands. They were almost the same height: the hunter nine inches over six feet tall, and he fully seven feet in his warrior shape.

Derek licked his fangs. Delicious blood coated his tongue and dripped from his mouth, but he was still hungry.

The hunter became a whirlwind of blades. He sliced and stabbed and cut fast, very fast. Derek blocked, stepped inside his guard, and kicked him in the chest. The hunter flew backward, rolled to his feet again, and charged.

They collided. A blade pierced Derek’s chest, sliding neatly between his ribs, almost nicking his heart. The pain tore at his insides. He buried his claws in the hunter’s gut and tore a handful of intestines out. The hunter twisted the sword, trying to carve his way to Derek’s heart. Derek stepped back, pulling himself off the blade, and the hunter chopped at his right arm with the other sword. He took that cut, because he had no choice—it nearly cut through the bone—and raked his claws across the hunter’s face. Blood poured into the hunter’s eyes. The big human lunged, his right sword striking. Derek moved to the left, letting the blade whistle past, locked his right arm on the hunter’s wrist and smashed the heel of his left hand into the man’s elbow. The joint snapped, breaking. He jerked the blade from the hunter’s suddenly limp fingers and rammed it into the hunter’s mouth.

It was a good sword, sharp and solid. It made a lovely sound as it split the hunter’s mouth, then his throat on its way down. The hunter’s heart fluttered like a dying bird, then stopped.

Derek raised his head to the sky. Above him the moon watched through the massive gap in the roof. He opened his bloody jaws and sang. The high-pitched howl rose up, riding on the moonlight, rolling through the night, and all who heard it would know he had made his kill.

He shook the corpse, hoping for more fight, then took the dead man’s head into his mouth, but the hunter didn’t move. His heart was still. He tossed the dead hunter aside.

There had to be something left to kill. There was still one heart beating.

He turned and saw her sitting in a circle. She looked . . . good.

He walked to the circle. She didn’t move. She just watched him with pretty brown eyes.

He ran headfirst into a wall. He couldn’t see it, but it was there. He looked down and noticed a white chalk line between him and her. Magic.

He circled the ward, probing it with his claws. The invisible wall held all the way around. He stopped in front of her and crouched, so they were level. His voice was an inhuman, ragged snarl. “Let me in.”

“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

“Let me in.”

“Maybe in a little while,” she said. “Once you cool off.”

“I’m all cooled off.” He wanted into that circle.

“In a little bit.”

He backed away and ran full speed at the circle. The wall held.

“You really can’t skip the hunt,” she told him.

It took another four tries before he decided he couldn’t break through the wall. He kicked the corpses for a while, but they didn’t put up a fight and the horse had run off. He thought of tracking it down, but he would have to leave her and he didn’t want to. He finally settled for stretching out by the circle and looking at the moon.

It soothed him until his breath evened out. Slowly the rational thought returned. His body hurt in too many places. He wished he could fall asleep, but if he let himself go now, he would sleep like the dead for several hours while his body healed the damage. He couldn’t change shape either. Most shapeshifters could deal with one or two changes in a day and then it was nap time, whether you liked it or not. He was stronger than most, but he didn’t want to tempt the fates. He’d spent so much energy fighting the silver, a change could shut him down for good, and he didn’t have that luxury.

Caleb Adams was still out there.

The deep purple of the night sky was slowly fading to lighter blue. The sunrise was coming.

The wild had gotten away from him. It was always like this—he remembered what he did only after he had done it. It always felt right while he was doing it. Sometimes he regretted it, although mostly he didn’t. He did today.

“Derek!” she sounded alarmed.

He sat up.

“The rock is moving.” She pointed right. “He’s taking it somewhere!”

He shook himself. “Come on.”

She squinted at him.

“I’m cooled off,” he told her.

She reached over, rubbed the chalk line, and stepped out. Her scent washed over him.

“Which way?” he asked.

“East,” she said. “No, wait, southeast. He’s going back exactly the way we came.”

“Sorry I scared you,” he said as they left the building.

She rolled her eyes. “You’re not that scary.”

Relief washed through him. He bared his fangs at her, pretending to snarl.

“Ew. Drool. Nothing you do scares me, Derek. Deal with it.”

“I’ll have to try harder then.”

“You do that.”