Pack witch, p.7
Pack Witch, page 7
part #5 of The Splintered Bond Series
I heard a distant shout of, “Ida, keep out of it,” from outside, and realized Julian hadn’t been all that far away. At least not with an open window and shifter hearing. “Stay out of my business.” He was coming closer.
“What do you mean?” I asked, knowing she didn’t have long to explain. “What price? The end?”
Ida closed the small window again, a pained grimace marring her sweet, rounded features. “I shouldn’t tell you, but I will. Julian’s dying. When he arrived at the Alpha’s Den, I wasn’t sure if he’d make it through the week. I brought him here to see if you could help patch him up with your magic, enough to give him the strength to go home once more, to see his homeland before he dies.”
I stood abruptly, my blood cold. “Dying?” It couldn’t be true. He’d made love to me the night before so powerfully, so perfectly.
Her voice was a whisper now. “I told you he needed your help. The tattoos trapped his magic inside him. It’s eating him alive. He’s in agony, day and night. If he didn’t claim you last night, I’m fairly certain he refrained out of honor, to protect you.”
“I wish that was the truth. But I try not to lie to myself, Ida. I don’t have a wolf,” I whispered back, forcing the painful words out. “He… he didn’t want me.”
“You think he won’t mate you, won’t want you, just because your wolf is sleeping?”
I let out a long breath. “Sleeping? She’s almost gone, Ida. What if he tried to claim me, or I tried to claim him, and… nothing happened? Or worse, what if he ended up tied to me, and his wolf suffered even more? It’s for the best.”
She snorted. “That’s a load of bullshit. You’ve never balked at trying to heal a shifter, girl. Not even when they were past hope. You never give up until their last breath, no matter how much it drains you. I’ve seen it a half-dozen times.”
“This is… different,” I finished weakly. This wasn’t just any patient. It was Julian. He was more dangerous than any wounded bear, than any rogue shifter. They could only kill me.
Julian could crush me. He’d done it before.
Ida bristled, her wolf rising in her eyes, making them glow. “You made a vow to me long ago, that you’d try to heal any shifter I brought you, if you could. I need you to heal Julian, Zinnia. He’s my new granddaughter’s only living relative. He’s a true friend of our pack, and the only father figure those two rascals out there have. Heal him.” Her voice had risen now, and I matched her tone.
“Heal him. All right then. How? His wounds are old and deep, and magical—”
“So is your bond. Do what you need to, and then…” Her eyes twinkled with mischief. “Then kiss it better.” She made a couple of movements that suggested using my tongue and possibly my pelvis to achieve the intended result. It was ridiculous.
“Ida!” I slapped a hand over my mouth, but a hysterical giggle still slipped out.
She winked. “A true healer wouldn’t shirk at using whatever medicine was needed.”
“You want me to…” I couldn’t say it out loud; the boys were close enough to hear.
Ida’s eyebrows danced. “You may want to get rid of that dress. I’ll have my grandson Finnick order you some fancy pants from the city. Maybe a sexy nurse outfit. I saw one in a catalog that would make a male rise from the dead.” She finished just as Julian burst through the door, panting. His eyes were wild, his cheeks flushed as he glared at my friend.
“Ida! What in the hell—”
Ida jumped up and smacked his forehead with one hand, like she was disciplining a naughty pup. “Respect your elders, boy!” His jaw dropped, and I slapped a hand over my mouth to suppress another giggle. She winked at me again. “Right, you’ll stay here with Zinnia. She’s vowed to heal you. I’ll take the boys.”
“No!” I shouted, panicking. I couldn’t be left out here, alone with Julian. “They need to stay.”
“Gotta make renovation!” Bo yelled from outside. “We ain’t leavin’!”
“We’re all stayin’,” Leroy agreed.
Julian blinked at me. I blinked back. The thought of being here with him, touching him, healing him, was as appealing as it was terrifying. I’d thought I would only have him once… Maybe this was a prayer answered. Maybe I was being given a few more moments of bliss, in exchange for my magic. I just had to make sure to protect myself, my heart, for when he left. Because he would leave.
I would be alone again, but at least I would have memories, and my honor. I would fulfill my vow to Ida’s pack to try to heal him.
The door slammed shut, shocking both of us out of the frozen moment. Ida had left, her grumbles fading as she moved swiftly away from the cabin, and then at last, we were left in silence. I moved to the hearth, stoking the fire for something to do other than stare at the male who had shaped my life.
The cabin had always seemed perfectly sized before. Now, it felt like we were both trapped in a shoebox. Come on, Zinnia. You’re a healer. You know what to do. I sighed and turned to face him. “Ida says you’re in constant pain.”
He stared at the floorboards, but his hands were in fists at his sides. “Ida talks too much.”
“Is it true? Tell me.”
After a moment, he lowered himself to the edge of the bed, the one room growing even smaller as it filled with his scent, and his presence. “It’s true.”
I waited, pulling herbs from my boxes on the table and brewing two cups of tea. “Go on, then. I need to know everything.”
“The tattoos have always hurt, but I learned to ignore the pain. The skin is tight along the scars, but it wasn’t until the battle a few years back, when I was shot with silver bullets and cut with more than one silver blade, that the real pain started. It was the kind that I’d felt when Camellia put them on.” He rubbed his hands over the sheet. “On a bad day, anything that touches me on one of the tattoos—clothing, casual touches, even the wind—can feel like razors slicing into me. My magic… it’s pooled just under the surface, but it keeps trying to escape.”
His clothing hurt him? I narrowed my eyes as his fingertips traced the pinker scars that dotted his shoulders, arms, and ribcage. “Those are all from silver?” He nodded. “They’re recent?” Another nod. “Take off your shirt.”
I handed him the cup of tea. He took it and did as I instructed. I moved beside him, opening a jar of salve I’d made and dabbing some on my fingers, but hesitated.
“Does it hurt when I touch you?” Had it hurt him to make love to me?
His eyes met mine and held them. “Yes and no. But if you’re asking if you can touch me, yes, Zinnia.”
I pursed my lips, wondering how I was going to make it through the next few minutes, or possibly days, trying to strengthen and heal him. “I’ll put this on the silver scars first, before I address the tattoos. It’ll numb them a bit, and soften the tissue,” I explained. “I have a feeling…” I didn’t say what I thought; if it was true, this was going to be a long, bloody day.
He sipped the tea as I worked, with the scent of mugwort and rosemary from the salve, as well as the mint and borage in the tea, perfuming the air. He was a perfect patient, holding still as I rubbed each scar, feeling for what I feared I would find. I closed my eyes, connecting with the small well of collected power inside me, allowing it to drift over his skin, trailing like mist over the arm where my finger probed.
“Shit, that hurts,” Julian gritted out.
I fought to keep my face serene. What I was about to do would hurt even more. I unwrapped the sharp paring knife I kept in my medical kit, laid the sterile dressing to one side, then stacked some clean muslin cloths on the table. I put my own tea down, knowing I needed an empty stomach to do what came next.
“I’m afraid this will hurt more. If I’m right, it may not be your magic that’s hurting you. It may be—”
“Silver,” he breathed. “You think there’s silver inside me.” I nodded, and he extended his arm. “Get it out, please.”
The next hour was brutal and embarrassing, but not because of Julian’s reactions. He showed his years of discipline as a warrior and held still for every cut I had to make, every small grain of silver I removed. No, I was the one who wasn’t able to keep calm, tears running down my face, my nose dripping until I had to tie a cloth over my face like a mask to keep working. I had begun my task with lower reserves than I’d had in a decade, both physically and magically, and it was all I could do to keep on and not show my exhaustion. I was certain Julian thought my shaking hands and pallor were because of the grisly procedure and not my true weakness.
When I finished, Julian was covered with blood, and a tiny mound of silver—no more than a pea-sized pile—lay on a bloody rag beside our seats.
“Is that all?” His voice was strained as I dug past one of the silver scars toward the crook of his elbow. I pulled out one final, infinitesimally small piece of silver, the scent of the metal fouling the air around us. I let out a breath, then sent my magic out again, the tendril searching… and finding nothing.
“That’s all,” I whispered.
“Thank you,” he said and ran for the door. The sound of retching was the last thing I heard before I passed out again.
Chapter 11
Julian
“Sergeant, you okay?” Bo hovered over me as I vomited only a few yards from my mate’s front door. “Look at all that blood on him, Leroy! Those’re knife marks… What’s the witch been doing to you, Alpha?”
Bo’s quick rage had me wiping my mouth and barking an Alpha command. “Quiet.” They both shut up, which helped somewhat. I rubbed my hand over the cuts she’d made, relieved they were already healing up. “She was removing silver.”
“S-silver?” Leroy handed me a cloth and a cup of water. I nodded my thanks and rinsed my mouth, spitting on the ground before I explained. “You mean to tell me you’ve been carrying silver inside you for years now? Alpha, you coulda…” He went pale under his tan and swallowed hard.
“I probably should have died by now,” I completed for him, as Bo helped me to sit on the broad, flat-topped boulder. The wind had picked up, and the shush of pine needles carried over the distant burble of the river… but not the more present growl from Bo’s stomach. “You two need to eat.” I wasn’t sure if I had the strength to stand. “Where’re the rations?”
Bo glared at his friend. Leroy scrubbed at the back of his neck. “Um, well, it’s like this… You know how I eat when I’m nervous? And last night was one of those times when everything seemed to be goin’ tits up—”
Bo elbowed him in the gut. “Goin’ wrong, you mean. And one of those wrong things was that Leroy ate all his rations and mine, too.”
“I was asleep,” Leroy protested weakly. “Sleep eating. I can’t help it.”
“I can duct tape your hands shut every night,” Bo grumbled. “You ate every last crumb. I’m starved.”
“Well, you two know how to hunt,” I began, then stopped. “Shit. No, you can’t hunt.”
“Ah, why not?” Leroy asked. He’d already shucked off his shorts, ready to shift.
“Because Miss Zinnia’s friends are out there,” Bo explained for me. He frowned at Leroy. “And she could come out here any second. Put your clothes back on. She’s a lady.”
Leroy’s mouth opened and closed like a fish. “But then… doesn’t she have some non-friends out there? Like, a really mean old elk or… a total asshole turkey?”
Bo snapped his fingers. “Geese. There’s never been a goose born that wasn’t a rat bastard, if ya ask me.”
I shook my head, thinking. “Plants, boys. She’s a vegetarian, and as long as we live here, on her land and around her friends, we are, too.” Ignoring their stares of horror and their spluttered protestations, I turned back to the cabin. I hadn’t heard any movement from inside, and my wolf was worried and pacing.
“Bo, I’m… I’m scared,” Leroy hissed, pulling his clothes back on. “A shifter eating plants. It ain’t natural. Maybe we oughta head back to the Alpha’s Den.”
Bo laid a hand on his arm. “I can’t. It’s my recuperation, Leroy. My punishment from the Moon Goddess for hurting Miss Zinnia. It’s like Grandma Ida told us when she made us re-stain the porch floors back at the house. Sufferin’ builds character.” He sighed deeply. “I just hope it don’t build so much character, we die from it.”
Leroy pulled him away. “Let’s go find some vegetables, then.”
I gave a nod. “There may be some wild garlic down by the river, or dandelion greens.”
I left them arguing about what wild plants tasted best, and went inside to check on Zinnia. She was sleeping on the bed, her long hair half-over her face. I perched beside her and moved it gently away, wondering at the softness of it. Ignoring the surge of magic that rushed to the skin where my hand came into contact with her.
She’d asked if it hurt when she touched me. I hadn’t known how to explain that it was agony and ecstasy combined. That the only pain worse than having her skin on mine was the moment it was removed, and I was alone again.
But I’d hurt her so much worse. I’d rejected her, left her suffering, chasing me.
For some reason, her words to the boys echoed in my ears. “I’d recommend wearing shoes.” I stood and moved to the bottom of the bed, where a beam of sunlight from the window was pouring across her lower half. Her legs were perfect, but her feet…
If I hadn’t already thrown up everything I could, I might have been sick again. I hadn’t seen this in the night, couldn’t have known to look. The bottoms of her feet were scarred beyond belief, all the way up the sides of her heels. Her little toes were the worst, but the thick, rough scars made a slipper-shaped mass on both small feet.
I didn’t have to hear her say it to understand. She’d run after me; her wolf had probably driven her to run in whatever form she could hold.
I’d done this to her. The one creature in the world I would have never wanted to damage had lived her whole life hurting.
Restitution. The word that the boys couldn’t seem to get right rang in my mind. I had to do the same: make restitution to my little star. Ask her to heal me, but make sure she had whatever she wanted from me as well. I had wealth, after years of living on a shoestring, with no one to spend my pay on. I had power within the packs. I had connections. I owed it all to her.
I took in her lithe form, the threadbare dress covering her perfectly formed limbs, the way her lips curled into a smile as she dreamed. My mouth watered to kiss her again, even if it was agony. “I’ll never hurt you again, little star. Never again.”
Not even if it meant my own death.
Chapter 12
Zinnia
The sunlight woke me, moving over my body in a warm caress. I stretched lazily, but didn’t open my eyes immediately. Instead, I listened.
This time, I wasn’t alone. Soft snoring, and the scent of cedar and ink had me sitting up with a smile. Julian slept in my rocking chair, his torn shirt and sweatpants doing nothing to hide the power of his frame. I let myself stare for a long moment, savoring the feeling of waking with another shifter in the house. Especially this one.
I peeked down at my side, feeling a familiar slither as Urchin lifted her head from her nap as well.
Years ago, I’d insisted that Ida and her whole pack leave me alone as much as possible. In exchange for solitude and safety, I’d made the vow to give whatever magic I could when she needed it. I’d thought I loved being alone, but taking in Julian’s muscular body and drawing his scent into my lungs, I was able to recognize the lie.
“Your eyes are so beautiful.” My gaze lifted to Julian’s face. He’d stopped snoring while I stared and was drinking me in as greedily as I had him. I blushed at the heat in his gaze. “You’re stunning. Like some kind of forest nymph.”
I rolled what I knew were perfectly ordinary eyes and swung my legs over the edge of the bed. I still had on the horrible house dress, but I slipped it off now, standing naked before him. “I’m a fifty-year-old woman with a little bit of magic, and a full-length mirror that shows me exactly how I look, Julian. I’m not beautiful or special. There’s no need to flatter me.” I turned to look at myself in the long, walnut-framed mirror, a gift from a pack member two years before when I’d helped his mate heal after delivering twins.
The mirror didn’t hide anything. I had scars no shifter would carry, from living a life as a magically gifted human. Small nicks littered my arms, while my hands and fingers bore old burns from cooking pans and from distilling tinctures and boiling down ingredients for my salves. My hair was long and fell in waves around my breasts, and the curls at the juncture of my thighs were still lush and dark. I supposed I had some golden flecks in my brown eyes, and good, straight teeth.
My nipples beaded as Julian’s gaze blazed in the reflection. He stood, stalking toward me. He stepped behind me so his body loomed over mine. At five foot eight, I wasn’t short for a woman, but he was over six feet, and wider than any shifter I’d met, other than the Mountain Alphas.
“Look at you,” Julian purred into my ear, leaning down to wrap his hands around my waist. “How could you think there was anything imperfect about you?” He lifted my hands in his, turning them palm up, then down. “Ida told me a little about you on the way here. She said you were a witch who took care of the children of the pack and the injured. These hands saved the lives of pups and healed the suffering.” My hands dropped to my sides as he moved his hands to my hair, his fingers trailing lightly over the length of it to linger at my beaded nipples. “These are the most perfect breasts I’ve ever seen in my life, and this?” One hand moved lower, cupping my mound firmly. “This is the closest to heaven I ever need to be.” He leaned down to nuzzle at my neck and froze, making a choking sound.
