Chapter 14 Stefano
STEFANO
Icupped my hands and Morgaine the raven flapped her wings and landed softly in the palm of my hand. I could feel the fluttering beat of her heart and see her clever, dark eyes studying me. I reached for her sleek, black wing and she pecked at my fingers, squawking.
“What do I do?” I waited for any kind of response, but she simply continued to stare at me unnervingly.
Finally, I pressed a fingertip to her back.
“Here?” When she didn’t attempt to bite my finger off, I grasped one of the feathers on the raven’s back and tugged sharply.
The feather came clean away, a drop of red blood at the tip where it had been torn from her flesh.
In a flurry of wings and sharp talons, Morgaine transformed once more, returning to her human form.
“How do you do that?” I asked, unable to hide my curiosity.
“It’s one of the abilities my mentor taught me,” she replied, absently.
She did that a lot, I had noticed. Played down her talents; self-deprecating and coy.
Was it a ploy to lower my defences and make me easier to kill once the bond was broken?
Whatever her motives were, I knew the best way to ensure my survival was to build a rapport, to get her to open up to me.
So, I would keep her talking as long as I needed.
“Your mentor?”
She nodded, her gaze distant. “Merlin. He’s long dead now. He was a powerful sorcerer, and the first teacher I had in the craft, but not always on the right side of things.”
Intrigued, I asked, “What are your other abilities?”
She tucked the willow vines and the feather—which didn’t appear to have stripped a single hair from her dark head, let alone disappeared an eyebrow—into her satchel.
I caught a glimpse of a black, furry creature inside the bag and realised she was carrying the cat from the cottage.
No wonder I’d felt my eyes itching for a while now.
“They’re all connected to life and the natural world. Most witches never learn to transform, but those who do can usually only become one type of creature.”
“How many can you turn into?”
Her expression was neutral, but I could tell from her body language—the way her shoulders rolled back and her chin jutted—that it gave her pride to say it out loud. “Four.”
“Four?” I replied with an appropriate amount of admiration and surprise. “What are they all? I’ve seen a squirrel and a raven. Let me guess, a black cat?”
She narrowed her eyes. “No, a fox and a deer. And that’s a hurtful stereotype.”
“Then what was that in your bag?”
She looked a little peeved. “That’s just Kipper. He was Rosemary’s cat, and he has nowhere to go now that she’s dead.”
Guilt stabbed me in the chest, and I changed the subject quickly. “Is that how you still look so young despite being five hundred years old? You can transform into a younger woman?”
From the way her mouth puckered, I guessed I’d got it wrong. This rapport building wasn’t going quite how I’d planned.
“Not exactly. My healing magic prevents me from ageing. It’s a combination of the two that allows me to change my features slightly, when I need a new identity.”
I feigned shock. “Why would you need a new identity, Morgaine? Are you on the run from the law?”
She rolled her eyes, but I’d managed to draw a tiny smile from her. I shouldn’t have felt so much pride in that.
“I have to become someone new and move from coven to coven every few years, before anyone realises I don’t age. This isn’t my real face, not the one I was born with.”
I tilted my head and studied her. The elegant length of her neck, the curve of her cheek, the warm hazel eyes. “What does the real Morgaine look like?”
Colour rose to her cheeks as she met my gaze. “I don’t know anymore. I can’t remember.”
A light breeze blew a strand of dark brown hair across her face and I instinctively reached out to tuck it back behind her ear.
She didn’t move to stop me, or take her eyes off mine.
Until a rumbling growl made us both turn sharply.
Twigs snapped and snarls surrounded us as a pack of large wolves prowled towards us, teeth bared, strings of saliva swinging from their jaws.
I leapt into action, drawing my short sword from my belt, and pushed Morgaine behind me.
I didn’t wait for the wolves to attack, I struck out, catching the first one off guard as I slashed through its neck with my blade, cutting off its pained howl.
Another lunged for us, and I kicked out at it, before slicing downwards with my sword, both hands on the hilt.
Morgaine’s voice reached my ears, low and rhythmic, repeating words I couldn’t quite hear or understand over the snarling and snapping.
She must have been attempting to ensorcel the wolves.
I kept swinging, my arms aching under the strain, my breath coming in grunts and pants.
I killed the final wolf with a roar, sending a spray of dark blood across the forest floor.
How had I not heard them approaching? Too distracted by the witch and her manipulations, even her beauty was nothing but an enchantment designed to lure men in. I mentally kicked myself for falling prey to her magical machinations.
Then my heart stopped at the sound of Morgaine’s gasp.
I spun around to see another, smaller, wiry creature with black and grey fur, slinking from the shadow of an oak tree.
Its maw dripped with saliva and its eyes were cloudy, it looked sick or malformed, somehow.
It struck out at Morgaine, and I moved without thinking.
Before I knew it, I was between her and the wolf, sword raised horizontally in preparation.
When the animal pounced, I thrust my blade into its milky eye, but a searing pain lanced through my forearm.
The wolf’s canine tooth had pierced my flesh, and blood now gushed from the wound.
I put a foot on the now dead wolf’s head and withdrew my sword, staggering slightly as I wiped the blade off on my sleeve.
“Stefano, here.” Morgaine gripped my other arm and helped me to take a seat on a large boulder. I felt hot and feverish, lightheaded.
“Something’s wrong with those wolves,” I managed to say, but it felt like there was wool in my mouth and ears. The wolf’s saliva must have poisoned me.
“Give me your hand,” Morgaine said firmly, taking my injured arm and wrapping her fingers around it without waiting for me to react.
She brought her face close to the seeping wound and sniffed.
Then she rummaged in her satchel and pulled out a jar and a roll of bandages.
She opened the lid and scooped out the green sludge and slathered it onto my injury.
I yelped at the sudden pain and cold, and tried to pull my arm free, but she was stronger than I’d realised.
“Stop struggling,” she bit out. “I’m trying to help you before we both die of blood poisoning.
” She wrapped the bandages around my forearm, then placed one hand on my chest, over my heart.
I squinted at her, swaying slightly and seeing double.
But then a cool, soothing sensation rushed through my bloodstream and I breathed out, feeling instantly better.
“What’s in that thing?”
“It’s just a herbal remedy. Burdock, yarrow, pepper and beeswax.”
I sighed, feeling drowsy. “Smells like home.”
“You didn’t have to do that, you know.” Morgaine wasn’t looking at me, and I almost didn’t catch her quiet words.
“Do what?” I could hardly form a coherent thought, so weakened by the poison was I, and lulled by the medicine and Morgaine’s magic.
“Jump in front of that wolf,” she replied. “I had it.”
I let out a dark laugh. “Oh, you had it, did you? That was you in complete control, about to be savaged by that wolf?”
She flicked her dark hair behind her shoulder. “You know, I could have turned into a bear and torn them to shreds.”
I frowned. “You could?”
She let out a throaty laugh. “No, but I still had it.”
The magic and the poultice had made me sleepy—or perhaps it was the blood loss. I closed my eyes and rested my head back against the boulder.
“We should make camp here for the night, I don’t want to move you until you’re feeling better. We’ll find the clearing in the morning, and tomorrow night will be the new moon.”
“At least we have all these new rugs and blankets,” I said, gesturing blindly at the dead wolves all around us.
The next night we’d perform the ritual and the bond would be broken. All I needed to do was survive until then, and I’d be free of this confusing, maddening woman. Just one more day.