Chapter Nine
“Souls are made of more than strings, and when one part is taken, the soul will not rest until the parts are found. You are here to find yours and take them back in blood.” A strange female voice, just like the one I heard when I was marked, fills my mind.
I can barely focus on what she said as my stomach turns, and I barely hold in the sickness that rises in my throat.
All I know is that hearing voices is the first sign of madness—and really it is just proof of what I already knew.
I’m not all with it. But I might keep the talking voice in my head to myself, especially when I apparently need to try to survive the next part of the shitshow that is my life.
The ground is covered in thick brown leaves, I notice as my blurry eyes blink open, my head pounding with the beginning of a headache.
My ears are ringing as I manage to sit up and shake my head a few times, leaves falling out of my braided hair along with stray locks that blow in the wind.
The air smells like damp leaves and something more, something that sends a chill down my spine.
Magic. It’s not the same smoky smell that comes with wolves from the Crone Pack, but instead, it reminds me of the fresh air in the middle of the night, when there is nothing but the breeze and the open night sky.
It’s not snowing, I quickly realize, but my clothes are still stuck to me from the storm we were just in.
It’s cold, like a brisk autumn, and I look up at the trees, which are huge.
The trunks of the trees are big enough to be a house, and the tops of them stretch high into the skies, into the bright daytime sky.
I can just about see the sun flickering through the sheer number of branches and leaves that look woven together with age.
It looks like a forest that no one’s touched in a really long time, and it’s silent.
I don’t like the silence, not in a forest like this, where birds should be chirping.
There are no birds, no sound other than the slight breeze picking up some of the less damp leaves and blowing them along.
Tannith. I quickly twist my bag to my front and unzip it, relieved to see her eyes staring up at me.
“Are you okay?” I ask her, my voice hoarse, and I clear my throat a few times to get rid of the feeling.
“Your eyes remind me of the time we stole the drug pipe from the old orphanage matron, and we smoked it all night. That was a good night.”
She shakes her head a few times like she’s as disoriented as I am. “I couldn’t even feel the beating she gave us.” She laughs, which sounds more like a hiss. “But then you threw up on her, and that was funny. My head hurts, but I’m alive. What about you?”
“Same. I think we’re in the Folkland now,” I mutter, rubbing my eyes, Blackfire’s warning echoing in my ears.
“I’m going to die. Painfully. There goes my hope of dying peacefully, drugged up, and feeling nothing.
” Nervousness works its way into my voice, and I can’t hide it.
I’m terrified. How could I not be? I lie back on the floor, looking up at the trees.
“At least it’s pretty here. I’ve never seen trees like this. ”
“I was absolutely certain that you were going to run your mouth at the wrong wolf and get burnt at the stake. I even had a bet going with our boss, and I doubt the greedy fucker will pay me now,” she jokes.
I think. To be fair, I don’t blame her for betting on my life; I should have done the same for her.
She would have gotten killed by sleeping with the wrong person.
“But it’s depressing to think you’re going to die a virgin. ”
“Hey, you could at least pray for me to have an easy death. Burning at the stake is not nice,” I mutter. “And I don’t think a dick is going to make a difference now.”
“Please. I heard you ask Mistress repeatedly if the stake was still an option. By the, like, seventh time you asked her, she looked like she wanted to cry,” Tannith reminds me. That was an embarrassing moment for us all.
“Well, that’s just on her. She’s obviously never met someone with as many problems as I have. Really, it should be a blessing that she’s met me.” I sniff. “Any suggestions on which way I should run and hide?”
“Nope.” She drawls out the word. “I’m going back to nap because you’re probably going to get killed, and then I’ll die soon afterwards. Yay us.”
“Honestly, your belief in us is spot on. I do not foresee this getting much better. That Blackfire psychopath said he’s going to hunt me down, so I probably should focus on finding that hiding place that was part of my perfect plan that had a zero percent chance of survival.
” I sit up, pulling more leaves off my clothes.
“Kinky,” Tannith mutters. “He really is something, that Blackfire. I wonder what he looks like under his mask.”
I roll my eyes at her. “We have completely different kinks because a wolf like him hunting me down is not something I’m going to find remotely attractive.
He’s a complete psychopath. In fact, all the wolves I’ve met so far are psychopaths.
I wonder if they’re just born like that, and I bet he is ugly under the mask.
” I know it’s a lie the moment I say it.
His jawline and impressive build make me think he is anything but ugly under the cruel wolf mask he wears at all times.
I reluctantly climb to my feet and look around.
There’s nothing but huge tree trunks in every direction.
A few bushes here and there, but I can hear water.
I start walking towards it. Maybe a drink will help with how dizzy and overall crap I feel.
I go to tell Tannith my plan, but to my annoyance, she’s already asleep and I can hear her light snores echoing to me.
Shaking my head, I zip up the bag and begin to jog through the forest.
Eventually, I come upon the water I heard.
It’s a massive river stretching as far as I can see in both directions, splitting the huge forest in half like a crack.
The water’s moving fast, way too fast as it crashes onto the sharp rocks sticking up out of it, and there are no riverbanks to climb down into.
I can’t get close without risking falling off the steep edges and right into it.
I look around, wondering what I possibly could do for a hiding place.
The river, hopefully, should mask some of my scent, from what I’ve gathered about wolves.
Water does that, but it’s not like I can jump in it.
I turn around, ready to leave and walk down the river to find something better, only to freeze. My eyes widen as I come face to face with a wolf that is giant, similar in height to me, with blue paws that look like he stepped into dyed water.
“Hey, wolf,” I whisper. His mouth opens, revealing a row of sharp teeth, and two massive pointed ones at the front of his mouth. He roars into my face, and I scream on instinct.
He snarls once before he leaps my way. I barely manage to jump, crawling across the ground as the wolf nearly falls into the river.
Damn, that would have been good luck. But he catches himself with his claws, digging into the dirt, and he turns around, jumping for me with one leap.
I know I’m done for as his weight lands on my legs, and he bites me.
I scream in pain as he rips through my skin, not pausing as he continues to bite me harder, pulling me along the forest as I desperately try to grab something to defend myself.
He yanks me through the air, dragging me with him, and I cry, scream, and kick with my other leg.
I don’t know why I’m fighting so hard when I know I’m dead.
Nothing works; his teeth stay locked around my leg as he yanks me like a toy across leaves and mud.
For a second, everything blurs, and I see something strange.
Strings of four colours fill the air, dancing like light bouncing off a diamond ring that has hit the sunlight.
I go to reach for the grey string, the one nearest me, just as my back slams into a tree, and I cry out in pain.
Suddenly, the air seems to smell of fresh seawater.
Wait, not just smells like it, it feels like water is brushing against my body in a warm caress.
Sparkling water droplets fill the air, and I look over as a massive white wolf jumps literally out of the river, and the water moves with him in vicious spirals that swim around his body and into the air.
This huge wolf, three times the size of the one that’s currently using me like a tugging toy, and far more nasty, locks eyes with mine. Burning blue.
The new wolf slams into the other wolf, ripping him off me, and his teeth finally leave my leg.
I cry out as pain makes everything haze over.
I watch them fight like I’m in a dream and it’s not real, and it’s hardly a fight at all as the bigger wolf throws the biter into the air and jumps on him.
I hear the crunch of teeth and bones, growls and finally cries of pain as death takes one of the two.
I barely manage to crawl away before I throw up violently into the leaves.
I scream as a hand lands on my shoulder, brushing my braid to the side, and I jump, kicking out with my good leg.
“Careful, little human,” a male warns, his hand easily catching my leg. “I don’t want to lose you to death before we even meet.”