Marked By Magic by Christa Wick

Chapter Nine

Joelle Perry'svoice crackled over the radio hooked to Denver's belt.

"Navarro's team just cleared checkpoint," she said. "Over."

"Copy and over," Denver replied, his gaze on Esme as she studied the maps spread out on the table he had brought into the room.

As far as he could tell, Esme was a steel wall, ten-feet thick and completely impenetrable in her concentration. It wasn't clear if she was actually studying the maps. The smooth, fixed lines of her face and unblinking gaze suggested she was looking inward.

He peeled away from the wall he had been leaning on for the last hour and left the room, quietly shutting the door behind him. On his way up to the ground level, he told the wolf at the bottom of the stairs to stand guard directly outside Esme's chamber. Finding another wolf, he told him to take up the post he had just left unmanned at the bottom of the stairs.

Reaching the front porch, Denver drew a deep breath. The scent outside was crisp and fresh, unlike the mix of odors clinging to the mansion's interior. While the latents had set to work removing the stink of the dark magic lingering in every piece of furniture and in the wood and stone that made up the floors and walls, it would take more than a day to erase it.

On a more immediate and practical level, Fray's team had carted the stained mattresses in the main room on the ground floor into the woods. Denver's first instinct had been to burn every last scrap of the material, but he couldn't risk attracting attention from the neighboring properties, especially with smoke that would be visible at a much greater distance.

At the same time the mansion was being made habitable, Jet and Colt worked through the day using chainsaws and vehicles to clear the drive at the two locations where Esme had uprooted massive oaks to stall the Hunters.

After briefly visiting the locations just to marvel at what she had done at such a distance and with great precision, he helped fix the gate, where Joelle and Zed served as second shift sentries, their positions selected to keep them out of view of any passing vehicles.

Picking up the sound of Navarro's van navigating the long drive, Denver's wolf scratched at the back of his skull. He could hear the engine, hear it drop to idling intermittently. The pattern didn't make sense. The drive was cleared. There was no reason to stop on the way up to the house.

Unless something was wrong inside the van.

Using his radio, Denver tried to reach Navarro. Nothing, not even a squawk. He tried Joelle next.

"Was anything wrong when Navarro's team stopped at the gate?"

A short silence followed his question.

"Well," Joelle started then fell silent again, much like Navarro's vehicle coming through the trees.

"Joelle—" he snapped then drew a sharp breath, giving her time to speak.

"I could hear the cub starting to get upset. He asked if they were giving him back to the bad man and saying he was sorry if he had done anything wrong."

Chest squeezing tighter and tighter, Denver waited for her to stop talking.

"Copy, over," he snapped, stepping off the porch. His heart rammed the back of his ribs again and again. He hadn't wanted to send the cub away, but it was an order he had made to every clan fostering the boys. In most cases, every cub had left with a security detail that included the foster parents who had opened their hearts to him.

That hadn't been possible with Oscar. Denver would hold the guilt in his chest for the rest of his life. He just hoped the boy would forgive him one day.

The van came around the last turn, lurching from one side of the drive to the other. Able to see Bucklee in the driver's seat, Denver stiffened at the look on the young wolf's face.

He bounded for the van as Bucklee slammed on the brakes a few feet from the porch. A low, feral growl issued from inside the vehicle. It was a child's growl, not that of a fully grown wolf.

After the sounds coming from inside the van, the next thing to slam Denver's body center mass was the scent of freshly spilled blood. It came from more than one source. The unique signatures held in a wolf's blood meant he could recognize that Otter, Navarro, Tanner, and Mathis had been recently injured.

None of the mingling scents suggested that Bucklee or the latent accompanying the cub had been hurt.

He reached for the side door as Iris ran onto the porch and a fresh fight broke out inside the van. Oscar snarled. The latent inside the van repeated the boy's name with a pleading voice, then Navarro swore, more of his blood perfuming the air.

Denver jerked the door open. A small, furry black cannonball hit Denver center mass, knocking him off his feet. His ass hit the ground. His head slammed against the side of the porch. He immediately jumped up, his gaze quickly taking in the state of the adults in the van.

The wolves were starting to heal on their own. Some of the wounds would take a witch's touch to speed things up, but there was no injury so bad that lives were at risk.

"Which way?" he shouted, not seeing where Oscar ran after hitting him.

No one answered, but he heard the crash of Iris through the woods and caught a glimpse of Michelle Ripley running after her.

He jabbed a finger at Otter, helping Mathis out of the van.

"Take him to Esme," he ordered, seeing that the cub had sliced across Mathis's eyes. "Then find us."

Tanner didn't need or seem capable of heeding instructions. He was already running into the woods—in search of his mate and not the cub.

"The rest of—" Denver stopped short at seeing Navarro pull Otter away from Mathis. Catching Denver's gaze, Navarro tapped the bag strapped to his body.

The cryptex.

"Join us as soon as you can," he barked at Navarro, then raced with Otter into the woods after the others.

The cub's scent was easy to catch, but hard to follow. Small for his age, Oscar could slide between gaps in the terrain, forcing his band of pursuers to split up, each half racing around an obstacle in opposite directions, never knowing which direction the cub might have taken.

After half a mile of running in circles, Denver shouted for everyone to stop.

Michelle turned a furious gaze on him. Tanner stood by her side, ready to break in the same direction as his mate.

"Mathis!" he barked into his hand radio. "You still with Esme?"

"He is," Esme answered for the injured wolf. "But Oscar cut deep. It will take hours, not minutes, before he can see again."

"It's you I need, baby. Can you see me and the cub right now?"

Nothing but static filled the air for half a second, but then she responded.

"He's almost back to the house."

Relief flooded Denver's chest, the sensation hitting him so hard he had to correct his balance or fall to his right like one of the oaks Esme had ripped from the ground.

"Navarro just left the building to rejoin you. He's closest to Oscar's location," she said. "I'll radio him."

Not waiting for instructions or permission, Michelle ran for the house. Tanner followed after her. Denver signaled the others, then followed, quickly overtaking the latent and leaving everyone to catch up.

Reaching the mansion, he radioed Esme again.

"Do we have him?"

"Not exactly," she answered. "He's in the house, but not through any entrance we can find. And I can't do this three-dimensionally from the cellar."

"What?"

"I can't tell what floor he's on," she said. "And I feel that there are more secret passages than what we saw Quentin escape through."

Biting back a swear word directed at Quentin, Denver signed off and went inside the building. He raced around the first floor, searching for the cub's scent but finding only those of his team and the latents, plus the odor of the dark magic they hadn't been able to completely cleanse from the building.

He shouted Oscar's name, then stopped when Michelle entered the house and joined him. The cub hadn't laid a claw on the woman. Suspecting Oscar would respond better to her voice, Denver nodded at the woman.

"See what you can do."

She called the boy's name, trailed her fingers along the walls, then got down on her knees and planted her palms against the floor at the same time she looked at the ceiling.

"Michelle and Oscar just merged," Esme said over the radio. "He's not in the basement, I can feel that much."

"Stairs," Denver hissed in an urgent whisper, signaling Michelle and Tanner to follow him up the once grand staircase, half its balusters missing like teeth knocked out in a violent bar fight.

A door slammed above them, followed by the sound of furious scratching that suddenly ceased the second Denver's boots hit the second floor landing.

Reaching the same spot she had stood on one floor below, Michelle stopped, turned a circle then shook her head.

Like every other hall in the house except for the basement, the walls were divided in panels. Denver and Tanner pushed at them as they walked the length of the hall, sniffing for how far the cub had traveled.

Too clever for the adults chasing him, the boy had run the length of the hall more than once, his scent as detectible at one end as at the other.

"Here," Esme called over the radio, her voice breaking with emotion. "He's with me."

With his body threatening to revert to its alpha state, Denver hit the top of the stairs, vaulted over the teetering rail and dropped to the next floor. He took off as soon as he landed, heading for the stairs at the back of the house that would take him to the basement.

As he ran down the hall, he looked for where Oscar's hidden passage was located. Unlike the two floors above, large blocks of sandstone formed the cellar's walls. Their alignment was rough and no part of their lines looked like a seam where the block could be moved.

Stopping short of busting down the door to Esme's chamber, Denver paused long enough to calm his wolf and slowly open it. The first thing he saw was Mathis sitting on the floor, just to the side of the door. Thankfully, there was no sign the cub had clawed another pound of flesh from the wolf.

Eyes spelled shut, Mathis pointed in the direction of the altar.

Denver toed the door open the rest of the way. His gaze landed on the floor in front of the altar. Esme must have pulled the sheet off the creature because it was wrapped around the boy. He was tucked tight against her, his right hand curled against his mouth as if he wanted to suck his thumb, but knew he was too old for the act.

Seeing Denver, fresh tears escaped Oscar. The cub lifted his gaze to Esme, his question tearing at Denver's heart.

"Why can't you be my momma?"