Chapter 13
thirteen
There are a few things in life that I would never do no matter what.
Things like, I don’t know—kick a baby, or put pineapple on my pizza, or ride a gigantic monstrous werewolf—that sort of thing.
It was simply where I drew the line, and this was where I found out just how determined I was to stick by this list of things, even though the woman who had been a wolf once and who was an alpha —pretty sure that meant a whole lot more than I was realizing at the moment—insisted that it was safe.
“No.” It was a simple no. A definite no. The kind of no that could simply never become a yes.
“It will be safe. They will not hurt you—you have my word.” She said this before just now.
I smiled politely. “I understand that, but no.”
Maera didn’t get pissed off or anything. Instead, she sighed and shook her head, smiled a little. “Then I guess we’re walking.”
That’s exactly what we did.
The wolves remained wolves, didn’t shift back into men.
Maera said they felt like they could protect us better that way, and I’m sure she meant protect her, but I was glad for it.
They stayed at least fifteen feet ahead, walking slowly, looking about, sniffing the air, and the two of us followed on foot.
I ate nuts and gave her some from my pockets as we did, and we drank the water from the bottle.
We had more food, too—in the backpacks the men had carried.
Apples and meat and bread, but neither of us was hungry yet.
“Here’s a question,” I said as we went. “You scratched me.” I pulled up the sleeve of my jacket to reveal the wounds. They had all closed, the skin over them red and raw, and it still stung a bit when I moved my arm, but I hardly noticed, considering the circumstances.
“I did,” she said with a deep nod. “You wouldn’t have survived the fall into the riverbed without moon magic—which is the magic that makes my kind.”
I raised my brows. “Moon magic. That’s nice.”
“It is. Werewolves weren’t always werewolves. Not sure if you heard the story before.”
Now that sounded like something I very much wanted to hear. “Oh—I haven’t! And I love a good story.”
Maera nodded. “In that case, this is the origin story of the werewolves of Verenthia.” Goose bumps erupted all over me already.
“A millennia ago, maybe longer, our kind was a type of fae, guardians of The Vales, which are thresholds, unseen places between realms, dreams, and death. That is why they had shifting powers—they could switch shape at will. They shared their duty with the dire wolves of the land, until one day the fae king defied the stars, and tried to open a gate meant to stay sealed,” she said, her voice calm, as peaceful as ever.
It was all I could do not to ask her to keep going faster.
“The wolf alpha tried to stop him and was killed brutally in front of both their kinds. As punishment, the stars bound the fae’s soul to the wolf’s, to instinct and hunger, forcing his and all his kind to give way to the wolf under the moon’s call.”
With every word she spoke, my mind painted the picture for me as well as it could.
“With years, the punishment became a new form of power, and a new pact between wolf and man was made, so we learned to coexist. We learned to share the bond of moon magic, and that’s how my kind has lived for centuries,” she finished.
Images danced in my mind’s eye for a moment.
“Wow. That is quite a story,” I whispered, and I looked at the wolves walking ahead in a different light now. As their own beings for real, just like Maera said.
“It is,” she agreed. “And moon magic can only be transferred to another being through an alpha, through bite or scratch. It works immediately, which was why I scratched you. The magic was activated in you before you hit the ground and your bones broke.”
I stopped for a moment. “My bones didn’t break.”
“They did.” Memories rushed to me as she spoke—memories of the pain. The pain that had been everywhere on my body, pulsating in my right leg and arm the most. “You just healed while you slept. The moon magic, and…” Her voice trailed off.
Maera turned to look at me. The suspicion in her yellow eyes was as clear as day.
“And?” I dared to ask.
“And whatever it is that was already inside you.”
Those words.
So damn heavy, they pressed down on my chest.
“I-I-I…” I stopped, took in a deep breath, forced myself to get my shit together. “I already told you who I am by that stream. I’m the Seelie prince’s Lifebound.”
“But you’re a lot more than that.” She said it like she knew it for an undeniable fact.
“I’m actually not. I’m a mortal from Earth. It’s just the binding. Lyall did it accidentally and it…it transferred some of his magic to me, I think.” That was what Rune thought, too—and the only thing that made any sense.
“Except magic cannot be transferred to mortals, not even through life-bonds.”
I swallowed hard. “Maybe it can. I mean, I’m right here, so…”
“The life-bond links us, too, to the dire wolves, Nilah. It’s the same magic.
You shouldn’t have been able to withstand fae magic—and you would have most definitely died the moment I scratched you.
” She thought about it for as second. “I only did it because I smelled the magic in you. Had I known you were mortal at any point in your life, I wouldn’t have. ”
Mortal at any point in your life. The way she said it…
“Something must be missing here, then, because if I really wasn’t just a mortal, or if I had magic of my own or whatever, I’d have shifted, right? I’d have turned into a wolf as well—and I didn’t. You know I didn’t.” She’d been with me every step of the way.
“Oh, yes, I know. I waited for you to shift the first night. I waited, and you never did,” she said.
“Here’s another question—why not just scratch someone before when they didn’t believe that you were an alpha? That would have been plenty of proof,” I muttered, thankful to have a distraction, if only for a moment.
“Because the couple who call themselves pack leaders tricked me. Made a fool out of my pack mates, who were willing and ready to believe them because the Ritual didn’t choose me,” Maera said. “They knew what they were doing. They were prepared. I wasn’t.”
“That sucks,” I admitted.
“But I am alive.” Maera looked at me again. “That sorcerer in the temple.”
My blood turned ice-cold instantly.
Here I’d hoped that I had only made that whole thing up. “He called you a queen. He said he could feel your frostfire.”
I shook my head, suddenly so frustrated I could fucking explode.
“First of all, I didn’t even know sorcerers could be male!” I said. “And second—you saw him! He wasn’t in his right mind. I am no queen—look at me! Do I look like I’m wearing a crown to you? And also, what the hell is frostfire? Because that sounds like a made-up word if you ask me.”
Fuck, I was fuming from the ears, so angry so suddenly my hands shook.
“Male sorcerers are rare, but they do exist,” said Maera, her voice still calm.
“And yes, it’s quite possible that he wasn’t well in the head.
He’d given himself to whatever magic that altar was made of, but frostfire is a kind of magic that the Ice fae possess.
Some of them, not all. It’s like our moon magic, the final stage of magic, quite powerful, indeed. ”
I thought about it for a second. “Well, the only magic I have is that thing you saw I did to your friends. I can just make light and then make things float on air, that’s all.”
“Yes, I saw it. I felt it,” Maera said, and I felt her eyes on the side of my face as we walked, but I didn’t turn to look at her at all.
“It’s fae magic, the same I smelled on you before I scratched you.
Magic that should have killed you even if the prince accidentally transferred it to you with the life-bond. ”
Ice-cold shivers washed down my back. “But it didn’t,” I whispered. “There’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for it, I’m sure there is.” It was the only thing that didn’t let me lose my mind for real right now.
“It’s okay. The stars make no mistakes. If you’re here, it’s because you should be,” she told me.
I laughed, but this time it was bitter. “What, like they didn’t make mistakes when they gave those thresholds or whatever to the fae to guard?”
For a moment, Maera walked in silence, eyes on the ground, lost in thought.
“We might have believed it to be a mistake at the time, but maybe…maybe the stars had planned for us all along. Maybe we were meant to become what we are since the beginning.”
It was certainly a way to look at it. “I’m mortal,” I insisted. “I’m a human being. My mother and father are human beings, and my sister is, too. And once I speak to the prince, everything will be clear and everything will make sense.”
I said all of it as if I really believed it.
“You think he is alive?” Maera asked.
“He has to be. I saw a knife sticking out of his chest, but it missed his heart—it had to. Because I’m alive, Maera. And those who are Lifebound die at the same time, don’t they?”
“They do,” she said with a nod. “But everything is possible through will and magic.”
Words I’d heard before—spoken by Helid, the same man who’d come to my home to convince me to come here.
Part of me thought I might regret that I ever accepted, but…did I, really? Could I ever possibly regret meeting Rune?
The thought of him opened a hole in my chest.
“What’s your plan, Nilah? The Seelie Court must be after you. It’s only a matter of time before they find you. You can’t run from them, not for long.”
“I’m not planning to run. I’m going to Blackwater to find a fae so I can send a message to someone in the Seelie Court. He’ll come find me, and he’ll know how to get me to the prince, how to get to the bottom of this. He’ll know.” Rune always knew.
“Where in Blackwater, exactly? It’s quite a big place,” said Maera.