Chapter 4
Zinnia
“Why do my knees sound like someone’s throwing popcorn in a campfire?” I grumbled as I pulled myself off the ground.
Ida snorted as she gathered up her things, repacking the picnic basket. “Just wait. By the time you’re my age, you’ll sound like somebody’s pouring milk on rice cereal every time you stand up.”
I wasn’t sure she’d even noticed my turbulent emotions as we’d eaten and caught up on pack news, but the animals nearby had. The squirrels hiding in the aspens nearby chittered angrily, though that could’ve been because Brigid had landed on a nearby pine branch, watching me closely.
“I’m grateful to you for letting my friends join us.”
“Friends?” I frowned. What did she mean? “Join us? You said meet—”
“Well, yes. He’s not far. I left him and those two empty-headed boys of his a few miles back.
We don’t have to let those two cross the border, I suppose, though the moon knows what they’ll get up to left on their own.
” Ida turned and held her head to one side, the wry smile on her round face dropping when she saw my expression.
“Wait, he’s here? Julian?” His name was a dagger in my throat.
My heart. “No. I can’t. I can’t!” If I saw him again, if he left me again, there was no way I could survive.
It had taken all my focus, and all of my wolf’s life energy, to keep breathing for so long.
“I can’t!” I stepped back, unexpected sparks flying from my fingertips and lighting the dried leaves near my feet on fire.
“Zinnia!” Ida stomped out the burning leaves, darting a worried glance my way as she made certain the sparks were extinguished. “What’s wrong?”
“Everything! I can’t!” Agony ripped through me, the old wound torn wide. I had to run, to escape.
Above, Brigid cried out and took wing. Marta lumbered from the closest grove of aspens, roaring angrily.
The world around me, all of the parts of it I had threaded my life to, that had kept me alive when my wolf had wanted nothing more than to lie down and sleep forever—when she had done just that, too weak to take form in anything but dreams—woke up bristling to defend me.
The hawk wheeled in tight circles over my head and screeched.
The squirrels raced along the branches, ready to jump down.
Even the bees that had woken for the first days of spring buzzed fiercely as the threads connecting me to nature itself, and the underlying magic of the earth, pulled taut, humming with fear and pain, anger and shock.
I wanted to run, but I didn’t even have the strength.
As I sucked in a breath, I knew it was all too late.
His scent found me—cedar, musk, and something darker—and the air ripped out of my lungs.
Twenty-five years hadn’t dulled it. If anything, it was sharper now, a blade of grief honed by longing. My knees nearly gave out.
Marta stood on her rear legs and roared, not understanding what was hurting me, but sensing it.
Ida didn’t understand either. “Get behind me!” she cried out, ripping her flowered dress as she shifted into her wolf form.
She was enormous, every bit as big as a grizzly, and far bigger than Marta, who was only a black bear.
Dominance poured off her in waves as the massive wolf advanced on my valiant friend.
Marta stood her ground, even with her recently broken back foot.
“No!” I shouted, throwing myself between the two of them. Marta’s shadow fell over me as she bristled and grunted, confused. I’d healed her paw as much as I could, but the bones inside were still fragile. I didn’t want her landing on it with her full weight.
Ida backed down, giving a disgruntled snarl. But before I could explain that the bear was just another one of my rescues, and not a threat whatsoever, two other wolves appeared and attacked.
Small, lean, and both of them dark as shadows—though one had splashes of white on his feet—they tore into Marta viciously.
How had they crossed the border of my spell? It shouldn’t have been possible.
My own wolf couldn’t answer the call to help. But my long-banked anger did. “Leave her alone!” I lifted my hands, calling on the world around me to assist.
There wasn’t much to answer my demand, but there was enough.
Long, trailing roots of the summer grasses lay in the earth itself, and they woke, zipping out of the ground and winding around the wolves’ back feet.
The hawk dove, joined by a dozen smaller birds, their small beaks shining red as they pecked at the strangers’ muzzles.
Trees shook, letting loose pinecones like sharp-edged missiles.
The strange wolves yelped, dodging and stumbling, almost as if their feet were too big for their bodies…
Children. They weren’t fully matured shifters at all.
I took a deep breath, fighting for calm. The nature magic was usually slow to respond, though it had leaped to my defense quickly enough today. Finally, though Marta still reared up on her back legs in front of me, growling fiercely, the rest of the world settled.
I let out a shaky sigh, thinking the worst had passed, just as calamity struck. One of the wolves darted forward one last time, and Marta swiped out with her paw, connecting with his snout. She gave a groan as her foot buckled beneath her and she fell on her side.
The midnight-black young wolf bared his teeth and leaped at the same instant I flung myself between them to protect her. I threw up my arm just in time—protecting my throat—and white-hot pain exploded as his teeth sank deep.
Ida’s wolf yelped in alarm. Marta tried to rise again, frantic as the scent of my blood filled the clearing.
The wolf who’d bitten me let go and stumbled back, panting, ears pinned, eyes round with the unmistakable panic of a pup who knew he’d done something very wrong.
I felt the same panic, pulling on all the magic around me as hot blood warmed my upper arm and side.
I drew on every thread I could, on the barrier itself, fighting to heal myself.
Then suddenly, another wolf was there, a massive charcoal-gray one with a silver nose and ears, and markings that tinted the fur in odd patterns. The beast was almost as large as Ida, but far more dangerous—to me at least. More than strong enough to force his way through my magical barrier.
This was the creature who’d howled in my nightmares for twenty-five years and slunk along the edges of my vision as I walked the mountains. He was as familiar as my own face in the mirror, yet a complete stranger.
Julian.
He took in the scene: the two smaller wolves, fallen. Me, in human form, bleeding. Ida had retreated a few steps and was shifting back, probably knowing I’d need her human hands to help staunch the blood. But he didn’t wait for her to change and explain. His eyes landed on Marta and saw an enemy.
Julian jumped over me to get to the bear, or tried to. Somehow, I managed to straighten and grabbed him mid-leap. I threw my arms around his neck, pulling him toward me, toward the ground and away from the bear. “Stop! The bear is my friend!”
He gave an odd, confused yelp at the shout, as my hand wrapped around his front shoulder and closed weakly around a patch that was hairless, like he’d been wounded there with silver or magic.
My fingers met his flesh, and electricity shivered through me for the split second we were connected before he landed half on top of me, half on the ground.
It was a sensation I’d felt before, but from the absolute shock in his amber eyes as he jumped up to face me, he had no idea what had just happened.
I blinked at Julian, blood still rhythmically oozing from the bite on my upper arm. He blinked back.
Huh, I thought, as darkness closed around me in the middle of the sunlit afternoon. The younger wolf had managed to hit an artery. That pup will make a good hunter someday.
Though I wouldn’t live to see it. I was too weak to draw any more magic to me, too injured to heal myself. So I closed my eyes, almost glad that death was pulling me into the comfortable darkness. I wouldn’t live to be rejected again either.
I closed my eyes, sorry that the young one would blame himself for my death. But I’d lived a long time, and I was tired.
The scent of my mate around me, fresh cedar and musk, and the weight of his wolf’s body on mine, a comforting feeling, made it almost worth the pain. I could pretend for just a moment, that he had come for me at last.
That he accepted me. Even loved me.