Of Wolves and Wardens by Sylvia Mercedes

I stare into the face of looming death.

I don’t feel any fear. I don’t feel anything. All feeling, all sense has been knocked from my body as I lie in the middle of that table. I can do nothing but struggle to catch a breath and stare into that gleaming, faceted eye.

The demon raises its head. I have moments left. Less than moments.

I wonder if I’ll feel liberation at the point of death. Or will the pain be too great?

“Hey!”

A voice, bright and clear as a bell, breaks through the dull thudding in my head.

“Over here, you big ugly!”

Is that . . . Brielle?

The gemstone eye blinks. Turns.

The next instant, it’s as though something has blossomed from its center—a quivering stem with a fletched, feathered flower. I stare, lost in wonder at that sight, unable to comprehend what it is I’m seeing.

Then the demon utters a terrible cry and lurches backwards, huge hands tearing at its face. It screams and screams, and some strange dark force bursts from its core. That force spreads fast, like the rippling of water disturbed by a stone. It washes over me, vibrating through my bones. It’s magic—ancient magic. More ancient than anything I’ve ever before encountered.

For a moment, I think it’s killed me.

The next moment, I blink again. I’m still alive. What’s more, I feel a surge of strength that wasn’t there before. Rolling, knocking platters and bowls every which way, I push through chairs and land on all fours on the ground. I shake my head, force my eyes to clear, my mind to focus. When I look up again, I see the results of that dark shockwave.

The garden—it’s gone. Completely gone. Barren nothingness surrounds us, not unlike the nothing contained within the walls of Elorata Dorrel’s home. This whole world, this whole domain . . . it was nothing but illusions as well.

I squeeze my eyes shut then open them again, trying to force my vision to clarify, to make sense of the murk around me. When I look again, two things stand out crisp and clear to my sight. The first is Brielle, standing some thirty yards away, her bow still up, her arm still poised from the arrow she’s just loosed.

The second is beyond her. The gate. Our escape.

Another horrible shriek shocks me from my stupefaction. I whirl and look back at the demon just as it yanks the arrow from its bloodied eye socket. It swings its heavy head around, searching for me, its jaw sagging, and a long, forked tongue flicking through sharp fangs.

I’m already in motion.

Pulling myself up, I lumber on all fours, staggering at first, then faster and faster. I make straight for Brielle. She sees me coming, and her eyes widen. She lowers her bow, starts to turn, to flee.

I’m already upon her. Scooping her up in my arms and racing across that emptiness for the gate. I run on only my hind legs now, but even so I’m faster than she would be on her own. Holding her against my hairy breast, I feel the fingers of her free hand tangling in my fur. Her other hand still grips her bow, and thankfully she has the sense to keep it up and out of my way.

An inarticulate cry bursts from her lips. In the same instant, a pungent stink of pure fear rolls out from her pores. I don’t need to look to see why. The pound of the demon’s feet reverberates behind me. It’s gaining on us.

If I’m wise, I’ll toss the girl to one side, leave her to face the demon on her own, leave her to distract it while I cover the last of this distance to the gate on my own and dive for safety.

But I hold the girl a little tighter, tuck my head, and run. The gate looms before us, taller than I realized. I feel the change in pressure in the air behind me, and I know with the instinctual knowledge of all prey that my predator has just sprung, that it even now flies through the air, straight for me. I feel the scrape of claws against my back, slicing across the flesh of my shoulders . . .

Then I’m through the gate arch, through the thin place in reality, and tumbling head-over-heels.

I cannot think, cannot breathe. I can do nothing but tighten my arms around the girl. Flashes of green and light and dark flare across my senses.

At last, the fall ends. I lie at the bottom of a steep incline, my head throbbing, my vision spinning. Beneath the stench of fear, I detect the many layered scents of the ancient forest all around me. My chest rises and falls as I struggle to regain my breath. But my lips twist in a smile.

We made it.

We’re out of the demon’s garden. Back in Whispering Wood.

I close my eyes again, and for a little while, simply concentrate on breathing. Slowly, my numbed awareness clarifies, and I realize my arms are still wrapped around a small, bony body. A body which lies on top of my chest, fingers curled in the long fur of my neck, face buried in my shoulder. There’s a subtle change to the smell of her now when I breathe in. The fear is still there, of course, thick and putrid. But underneath, there’s another, subtler aroma. Something like . . . comfort. Trust.

It should be impossible. Utterly impossible. But the smell is there. My werewolf senses don’t lie.

She feels safe in my arms.

My chest tightens. My breathing, already ragged, hitches uncomfortably. In that moment—however brief, however foolish, however wrong—I don’t want to move. I just want to lie there, hold her, and feel that trust. Feel as though perhaps . . . I even deserve it.

But it’s not real. I dare not indulge these feelings.

Closing my eyes, I force my arms to relax their hold on the girl, to drop away to my sides. “It’s all right,” I growl, my voice a dreadful rumbling in my own ears. “We’re safe now. We’re out.”

Am I imagining her fingers tightening their grip in my fur? I must be. For the next moment, she utters a little growl and lifts her head, giving it such a ferocious shake her brilliant hair pulls free of its knot and tumbles about her stern little face in tangled snarls. My breath catches in my throat.

Before I’ve had a chance to recover, she rolls off me, landing hard on the ground with a little, “Oof!” She grimaces and adjusts how she lies so that she’s not on top of her quiver. There she remains for several breaths, staring up at greenery overhead so thick one can barely catch a glimpse of sky. A single stray sunbeam makes its way down, lighting the lower part of her face. Drawing my gaze straight to her parted, panting lips.

What is wrong with me?

With a snarl, I heave my awful, bestial body upright, shake out my coat, and sit back heavily on my haunches. The morning is much progressed by now, and I’m well on my way to full-bodied wolfhood. Already, I’m finding it harder and harder to concentrate on a human arrangement of thoughts. My mind wants to slip into animal ways of reasoning. Smells. Tastes. Urges . . .

I growl again, turning away from the girl, and look back the way we’ve come. “No sign of pursuit,” I say. My voice is scarcely understandable. I’m not even sure I’m actually saying what I think I’m saying.

But Brielle seems to understand. I cast her a sideways glance and see her close her eyes and shake her head. “It wouldn’t follow us,” she says. “Not out here. A creature like that needs its domain to exist. Maybe there was a time it could venture out. Not anymore.”

A sudden image flashes through my head—an image of Elorata Dorrel standing just within the boundaries of her house, close to the gate but never too close. Is she like this demon then? Something too old and too frail and too evil to survive beyond the strict boundary lines she’s drawn for her existence?

Brielle pushes a tangle of hair out of her eyes and back across her forehead. A little unsteady, she gets to her feet. “I suppose we’d better be off,” she says.

“Yes,” I agree. Then, “Too bad we didn’t get that apple.”

She casts me a look, one eyebrow upraised. Reaching into the front of her tunic, she withdraws a small gold object, so perfect and glittering in that single beam of sunlight, it looks more like a dream than reality. But no. Of everything in that demon’s garden, this at least was real all along. The tarathieli—the apple of the goddess’s tree.

My heart plummets at the sight. At the smell. For as I draw the delicate perfume emanating from that ripe, golden fruit into my nostrils, I recognize it. I’ve encountered that scent before, mixed with other things, but identifiable.

I know now what Granny intends to do with her prize.