Page 93 of Blood Magic

“Hi, Kait!”

I looked up as Lennon waved from across the room. She was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen in my life, but I was pretty sure she was barely aware of it. And she wasn’t just physically stunning. The light inside her made her glow, and a person couldn’t be near her without feeling the pureness of it.

She was not just Jared’s seer, she was also the pack’s witchwolf. Jared believed the vampires were the ones with the most magic—it was what made them live. But I believed Lennon didn’t just hold magic, she was magic.

Jared’s beta was right behind her. Eli was black, tall, and fierce. He was also in love with Lennon. I knew he was loyal to his alpha, but I believed that if Lennon asked it of him, he would burn the pack down for her.

Fortunately, Lennon was one of the good guys.

The night came in softly and the adults began to usher the children away. They’d had their parties and treats and fun all day long, and now it was time for the grownups to play.

I was abruptly touched by something so heavy and pleasurable that it was almost painful. It was time.

The alpha took my plate and set it on a table. “Let’s go outside,” he said.

I began to shake. I’d been waiting for this moment since birth. Something I should have gained naturally had been kept from me. The hobbling had twisted me up inside and I knew without a doubt that whatever magic lived inside me was twisted up as well. The council had felt it. They’d known.

And that magic was about to be released, or if not released, activated. I felt it. What had happened in the club was likely just a hint of what would come, and there it was. That was why I was afraid, and why I was excited. It wasn’t only about the moon. It was about everything.

This night was a big deal.

The alpha led me—and his wolves—to the woods. We ran, because there was so much energy we could not walk. Even before we made it to the woods some of the wolves shifted, but I held on to mine because the anticipation was so good.

But then the alpha shifted and threw back his head and howled at our moon, and I could resist no longer. I stood in the clearing, my face raised to her, and I whispered, “I’m yours. Come and claim me.”

And she did. Oh God, she did.

Jared had been right. This was no normal shift. It wasn’t like anything I’d ever known, and I couldn’t have put words to it had I tried. So I didn’t try. I stood there and let the moon destroy me, and I let her put me back together again. Truthfully, I didn’t have a say in the matter. I was hers now.

At last.

When I burst into my shift and howled at her, thanked her, worshipped her, I knew I was different. I could see parts of my fur waving in the cool, moonlit breeze, and it was silver. Not the blue-black of my human hair, but the cold silver of a moonbeam in the winter. Blue, white, and silver.

The pack gathered around me, even the ones who were resentful as humans, and showed me their regard. They crowded in on me, some of them touching their noses to mine, some licking my face, some pushing their snouts into my changed fur. Only when the alpha gave a warning bark of annoyance did they back away from me, but playfully, and then leaped into the air, whirling and playing, some of them sprinting away to hunt.

My wolf, she loved them all.

But especially, she loved her alpha. Even as my wolf, I couldn’t admit that her thoughts and emotions and wants were my own. But I didn’t try to restrain her when she went to the alpha and rubbed her body against his, then lay down at his feet and gave him her belly.

He lowered his muzzle and licked her face and her mouth, then opened his jaws and clamped them around her throat. Gently, though. So gently.

Then he jumped away from her and sprinted into the woods, and she leaped up and chased after him, happy, hungry, and free.

Somewhere behind me, hidden in the pocket of my torn, discarded coat, my cell phone began to ring. The sound was discordant and out of place in the wild woods of Shadowfield, and while I regretted that I hadn’t thought to leave it back at the village, I didn’t for an instant think of shifting to answer it.

I ignored it and ran on and soon, it stopped.

Sometime during the night, as I fed upon small animals and ran and hunted with my alpha and my pack, I thought I heard the distant echo of that ring.

I hoped nothing was wrong.

I was nearly certain something was.

But the wolf was truly free and full of magic and life, and she did not care at all about the outside world. The moon hung heavy and huge and glorious in the sky, watching her children, and perhaps she saw all the secrets of the world. Perhaps she knew what magic lived inside the wolf. Perhaps she knew what nightmares came to life in the shadows of that Halloween night.

Perhaps she knew why the cell phone was ringing.

She would never say.

And the wolf ran on, blissfully happy.