Dark Lies (Magic Side: Wolf Bound Book 3)

Savannah

Jaxson and I stayed in human form while we scouted ahead so that we could communicate with Harlow and the agents—one of the many things that annoyed him about the operation.

We left the roadblock behind and started down the dusty two-track road on foot. The wolves padded silently along the side, while the agents crept behind us. For all their effort to stay quiet, to my ears, it sounded like the agents were stomping.

No wonder Jaxson had wanted to run an all-wolf operation.

It wasn’t the agents’ fault, of course—I’d never realized how heavy-footed I was until I’d turned into a werewolf. You had to be able to hear how noisy you were to correct it.

Hopefully, those psychos are all focused on their ritual, Wolfie said.

I crossed my fingers.

As we walked, Jaxson scanned the trees along the sides of the trail, as did the wolves. We had no intention of getting ambushed ourselves.

While the old road was dark, it wasn’t unnavigable. The diffuse glow of towns in the distance reflected off the low clouds, giving them a dull pinky-gray glow. That was, all except to the south, where the clouds were pitch black and pooling in a circular eddy right above the spot where the graveyard should be.

Not a good sign.

A quarter of a mile down the road, something pricked at the edge of my senses, and I froze.

Harlow raised her hand to stop the agents behind us. “What is it?”

I concentrated for a second. “Chanting. In the distance.”

Jaxson nodded. He could hear it, too. It was nearly inaudible, almost drowned out by the sound of our breathing, but my wolf senses were highly tuned. I could feel it almost more than I could hear it, a deep, rhythmic pulse of wrongness.

We moved along the road until the sound grew clear—gruff voices chanting words not meant to be shaped by human tongues.

Harlow tapped her ear. She could hear it now, too.

We proceeded cautiously along the washboard road, clinging to the side beneath the shadowy trunks of the trees.

Moments later, Jaxson stopped us and sniffed the air. “One of the bastards is close. Has to be a sentry.”

Thankfully, we were approaching from downwind, or he’d have smelled us, too.

I turned from him to Harlow. “Let me investigate. I’m quiet, and I can move under the cover of darkness.”

Without hesitation, Harlow passed me one of the sleeping potions they’d brought. Then she raised her arm and held her shirt sleeve taut. “Rip my sleeve with your claws. If there’s a sentry and you can get a jump on him, poor a little potion on the cloth and hold it over his mouth.”

I wavered for a second, then extended the claw on my index finger. I pierced her sleeve and tore it a ways down. She finished tearing it off and passed it over.

“I’ll come with,” Jaxson whispered.

I shoved the cloth in my pocket. “You can’t see in my darkness.”

“I’ll hang back, then, in case things break down. But I’m going to come. Two pairs of eyes and ears are better than one, and we are not separating.”

I remembered Billy’s cabin and nodded.

Jaxson and I clung to the edge of the road, treading softly on the grass and avoiding the fallen leaves and loose gravel as best we could. Maybe without him at my side, I would have felt trepidation, but his presence surrounded me like armor.

I was ready to do this.

We’re ready to do this, my wolf reminded me. But I wish we could shift. Paws are so much better for stealth.

I could tell she wasn’t bitter but just wanted to be a part of things. I sent her warm thoughts of praise. Yeah, boots aren’t ideal, and your senses are better. But we need to use my magic. Who knows, maybe we’ll get to run one of these bastards down.

Hopefully. I’m in a mood to give someone a good chomp.

The road ahead began to glow with a faint light as we approached. Jaxson stopped me and pointed.

Straining my sensitive eyes, I stared as hard as I could, trying to pierce the darkness. Finally, I saw it—a faint silhouette of a werewolf standing beneath the trees a few hundred yards ahead. I nodded.

Jaxson’s eyes locked on me. Ready?

I pulled out the potion, and using every ounce of control I had, I uncorked it silently. With a quick shake, I doused a little on Harlow’s shirt sleeve, then handed Jax the stopper and potion.

He corked the bottle, then briefly grabbed my shoulder, giving me a look that said, I can be there in two seconds flat.

I pulled the shadows around me and moved along the edge of the trees, inching closer to the sentry. With every footfall, the chanting grew louder, but I still moved as quietly as I could—there was no accounting for werewolf hearing.

Partway there, I reached down to grab a stone, but I wobbled and had to brace myself on the ground with my outstretched fingers.

Shit. The sleeping potion. I could smell it faintly on the cloth—a marshmallow scent—and it had to be affecting me. I held the cloth as far from my body as I could and pushed through the dizziness.

As soon as I found a good throwing stone, I proceeded on.

Within a matter of footsteps, I was so close, I didn’t dare breathe. The biker was silhouetted by light streaming through the trees ahead, but I didn’t take my eyes off him to check the source. Our element of surprise counted completely on this, and I couldn’t let my guard down.

The biker froze, looked up, and sniffed. Shit. The scent of the potion was too potent.

Without hesitation, I tossed the rock behind him. He spun, and I sprang.

With my werewolf speed and my Swiftleys, I was on him in half a breath. I clamped the cloth firmly over his mouth and nose and wrapped my left arm around him.

Help me hold him! I called to my wolf.

Vitality flowed through my veins as her power merged with mine, and we clenched down with a strength I’d never had in human form.

He fought, but I was stronger by far. He bit into my hand, but I held back the scream that tried to escape and pressed harder, trying to muffle his sound.

Finally, he weakened and began to slump.

Normally, I would never have been able to support the weight of a two-hundred-fifty-pound man, but with my wolf’s strength, I pushed power into my legs and was able to lower him gently to the grass.

As his head rolled to the side, I finally let myself have a full breath.

The chanting pounded against my eardrums. It was eerie and insidious and sent a shiver down my spine.

While I quietly positioned the sentry on the side of the road, my fingers brushed the grass, and I paused in surprise. Something was wrong with it.

In the pale light streaming through the trees, the grass seemed peculiar. Since I was concealed in a cloud of shadow, I slipped my phone out and flicked the screen on to illuminate it. The grass was a faint green and infested with some kind of strange moss or lichen.

Something about it made me feel deeply uneasy. A thought came to my mind unbidden: Corpse grass. Welcome to the land of the dead.

It wasn’t the voice of Jaxson or my wolf, but rather a young woman’s voice. With all the apparitions that had haunted me, I didn’t have time to contemplate the source.

Putting the grass out of my mind, I left the damp cloth over the biker’s nose. Hopefully, that keeps him down for the count, I told my wolf.

I rose and peered through the trees, but I couldn’t make out the source of the dull light ahead. I’d need to push on, so I stepped out of my cloud of darkness and waved Jaxson forward. The wound on my hand where the sentry had bitten me burned, but I could feel that it was healing.

After a moment, Jaxson crept out of the shadows and joined me. “Nice work.”

A tingle of pride ran down my spine. I hated it, but I yearned for his praise and delighted in his approval.

Turning quickly to hide my blush, I pushed the cloud of shadows ahead of us and led Jaxson along the edge of the road. Finally, we neared a clearing, and I lowered the veil partway so we could both see the source of the light.

A dozen chanting bikers ringed a blazing bonfire in the center of an open field. Tumbled and broken gravestones cast long shadows over the infested corpse grass like dark arrows pointing back to the fire.

And at the center of it all was Dragan. He had a new body and a new face, but I could sense his familiar, twisted presence all the same.

A deep melancholy pressed in on me. I’d known it would be him, but some part of me had hoped that I’d truly killed him in the Dreamlands, that the man here was an impostor.

I craned my head and stepped slightly to the side, immediately gripping Jax’s hand. “There are two people bound at his feet. This is a blood ritual.”

He bared his teeth and squeezed my palm. “Then we’ve got no time to lose.”