Blood for Wolves (23 page)

“And now I have the two creatures
that might take that away from us. I can’t kill you, of course. I shall simply
lock you away, encase you in a magic shell where you shall neither age nor die.
I can’t have either of your souls returning to cause my future regime any
grief. All thanks to my loyal Wolf.”

I looked to Wolf again. He stared
back, impassive. She couldn’t be right. He was on our side. Except…he’d brought
us to this place instead of Marianne’s village. He’d been after Marianne from
the start. A sinking feeling went through me. I thought he was fighting the
werewolves outside. But now he was here, standing at her side, not a scratch on
him.

 “No,” I breathed. He had to be
lying. I stared into his gold eyes for some type of recognition. Some sort of
clue to what he was doing. There was nothing there.

“But you knew we were coming,” I
said, my voice catching for a moment. “You planned a trap for us. Wolf was with
us the entire time. How did you know?”

Wolf brought up his leg, resting
his foot on the chair arm. He hiked up his pant leg, revealing the gold band around
his ankle. “She gave us these for a reason. We can communicate with one another
through them. My Mistress has known about everything all along. We were all
looking for the girl. I just got lucky and found her—and you—first.”

Suddenly the magic made sense. Every
time they’d communicated I’d felt it. I just never knew what I was feeling. The
night the moon was on the cusp of being full—he’d been talking to her.

“But,” I sputtered, unable to let
myself believe it, “but you came after me when I… You found me. You said I was
your mate.”

He cocked his head at me. “I was
imprisoned by humans. Sentenced to death by humans. Did you actually think I
would take one as a true mate?”

My stomach rolled. I wanted to
throw up.

“Do you even know what your role of
Guardian means?” he continued. “My Mistress warned me, which is why I had to
tread carefully around you. She said you were fated to kill any who try to harm
the girl, and that you have the power to rally others to help in your cause.”

The Mistress patted Wolf on the
head. “That’s why I was concerned about you. I worried you would get ensnared
in some righteous little Guardian net.”

“No, Mistress. I am much stronger
than that. She may have been able to summon her brother, but I was able to
summon her here.”

She laughed. “Such a delightful
little half-wolf you are. I never would have expected such cunning from you.”

“Indeed, my Mistress. I am very
crafty.” He bowed.

“Then what was that by the lake? What
was that?” I demanded, lunging forward in the werewolves’ grasp.

A mean smile curled Wolf’s mouth. “I
had to make sure I got back in your good graces, didn’t I? I just didn’t know
it would be so easy. Or so sweet.”

I shook my head, speechless. There
was no way this could be real. He couldn’t be saying these things, not after
what I’d felt. What we’d felt. It was impossible.

“Shame I didn’t get to finish what
we started in the barn, my scared little lamb. That was the best part of this
whole façade.” His eyes flared red for a moment.

 A sharp pain lanced through my heart.
I fell forward and let out a breathless cry.
What the hell?

When I was able to look up again, I
found Wolf staring at me strangely, as if trying to figure out what was wrong
with me.

“No!” I shouted at him once I’d
recovered. “You liar. You promised. You gave me your word!”

Tears filled my vision as I
strained against my two captors. Rage quickly replaced my despair. He’d
lied
to me. He’d
betrayed
me. I wanted to kill him. I screamed louder than
I’d ever screamed before, thrashing and kicking, jerking my arms against the
two werewolves that held me. The fact that I was helpless made me angrier and I
fought like a berserker, kicking out and twisting around. In front of me, Wolf
snarled.

“You liar!” I yelled. “You
liar!
You bastard! I should have let them burn you! You son of a bitch!
I should
have let them burn you!
”

I whipped my head around, bringing
my teeth down on one of the werewolves’ hands and sank my teeth into his
fingers. He barked in surprise and let me go. I swung my fist around and
smashed it into the other’s nose. His grip loosened enough, and I pulled my arm
free and charged at Wolf. I didn’t care that he had fangs and I didn’t. I
didn’t care that he might kill me here and now. Whatever happened, he’d already
hurt me too deeply for me to care. I wanted to hurt him as much as possible
before I went down.

But I didn’t get the chance. I made
it four feet before something flattened me to the ground. The werewolves. I
still didn’t care. I glared up at Wolf.

“You’re no better than a human!
A
human!
”

And then I was even too exhausted
to be angry. My heart hurt, my wounds hurt, I wanted to go home, and for once
in my life I wanted wolves to die. I burst into tears, a sobbing, pitiful thing
on the ground before a powerful woman and the man, the wolf, I’d fallen in love
with. The traitor I’d fallen in love with.

The woman laughed, ice tinkling
over glass. “She insults her own kind. What a strange creature she is.”

The two werewolves picked me up. I
didn’t help them. I let my feet drag on the ground.

“Take this sad little thing away,”
the woman said. “I’ll deal with her later, after I lock away the girl.”

The brute at my right grunted and
then gave me a sadistic wolf grin as he licked his hand where my blood had
smeared his fur.

“No!” the Mistress yelled. “Don’t,
you fool!”

The werewolf’s eyes suddenly went
wide and he gagged, clutching his throat and keeling over.

“She’s poisonous to us you imbecile!”

But it was too late for the
werewolf. He choked and crawled over the ground before going still. I stared at
him, momentarily jarred from my despair. After a few moments, another werewolf
came up and took my arm, but kept his grip away from my wounds. The Mistress
made a disgusted noise and turned her back on the dead creature.

“Someone clean that up, please.”

Two more werewolves took away the
body. Even Wolf watched it with an astonished look. He’d tasted my blood before
and was still alive. He’d even said it tasted sweet.
Traitorous bastard.
I let my head drop as the tears came again.

They removed me from of the chamber.
Behind me, Wolf spoke.

“Now that I have proved my loyalty,
my Mistress, would you be so kind as to remove this?”

We traveled back through the halls
before they dumped me into my cell again. I crawled up to sit on the stone
ledge protruding from the wall. I buried my head in my hands and tried to stop
crying. I wanted to shake him, shake him until he couldn’t see straight and
scream “Why?” into his face over and over until I got an answer. I peered
through my tears at the cell door. It looked more like a fence, made of wood. I
let my head drop. I was still wearing Wolf’s coat. I had half a mind to take it
off and throw it across the room.

“Caroline?”

I looked outside the cell door
again. “Alex?”

“Jesus. Thank God. It is you. Are
you okay? Are you hurt?”

“No. I’m all right.” The biggest
lie in the history of mankind. My body felt like it was freezing and burning up
at the same time. My heart had been split in half like a ripe peach.

“God, I thought they were torturing
you up there.”

My screaming. “No. I was just…” I
choked on a sob and tried to swallow it. “Wolf…”

“What? Is he hurt?”

I shook my head as though Alex
could see me. “He’s a traitor.”

“What?”

“He led us here. He was…on their
side. All along.”

“He’s working for them?”

Not thinking, I nodded and said
nothing.

Alex took my silence as a yes. “That
son of a bitch. But…we saved his life!”

I didn’t want to talk about it
anymore. “Where’s Marianne?”

“She’s in here with me, hiding
under my coat.”

I leaned back against the curved
wall of the cell and wiped tears out of my eyes. Time to be strong. I couldn’t
crack now. We had to find a way out of here.

“Marianne?” I called. She didn’t
respond. “Marianne, I’m so sorry honey. I’m not a very good Guardian, am I? I
keep getting you into all these awful situations.”

A meek voice barely made it to my
ears. “It’s not your fault.”

I almost started crying again, but
managed to keep it under control. “I should have listened to you about the
wolves.”

For a long time we were silent. The
only sound the crackling of fire torches and the occasional shuffle of a
werewolf passing by.

Then Marianne said, “My mama used
to say to me that sometimes bad things happened because they had to. Otherwise
we wouldn’t know anything. She said it’s because of the bad things that we
learn.”

I almost smiled. Wise little fairy
ring girl. I stared out through the wooden slats.

“Your mama is a smart woman,” I
told her.
We’re going to get out of here. I’m going to get us out of here if
it’s the last thing I do.
The old witch’s words echoed in my ears.
“You
will stop reaching for the stars and wait until the end of time and cry in the
dark. Or perhaps the opposite will be true.”

Well I certainly wasn’t going to
sit and cry in the dark. No one was coming for me. Fine. I was used to being on
my own as it was. Besides, I was Marianne’s Guardian, damn it, and I was going
to do things right for once.

I rummaged through the pockets in
Wolf’s coat. Each one seemed to have something. His map. A length of twine. Wilted
lavawort. Dried gum leaves. My matches.
The bastard stole them!
Pieces
of jerky wrapped in an oil-stained cloth. The small pouch of iron filings.

I gazed around the cell. It had a
domed shape, made of stone aside from the door. The door itself looked old, but
not old enough. I got up to rap on the wood. Sturdy. No amount of brute force
would work on it. In the far corner sat a trough of murky water that had
probably been there since the place was constructed. I went over the items in
my mind. A crazy, half-baked plan began forming. I had no idea whether or not
it would work, but figured I had no other choice but to try. I pressed my face
against the wood slats. Neither Alex nor I had guards. All I needed was for the
werewolves to stop patrolling or whatever it was they were doing. A passing
werewolf snarled at me. I gave him the finger.

The moment the area was clear, I
pulled out the matches and lit one. I held it under the wood of the door. If I
could get the whole thing on fire, they’d have to let me out. And if they
didn’t, the door would burn down and I could get through. Absurd, but it was
all I had.

Except the wood refused to burn. Under
the weak flame of the match, it charred but didn’t catch. I swore to myself. There
had to be some way of getting this to work. I needed a stronger flame, a more
sustained burn.
Cloth! The dried lavawort and gum leaves!

I started going through the coat
again when a set of werewolves showed up. The lock to Alex’s door opened.

“No!” Alex yelled. “Get away from
her!”

Marianne screamed. I plastered
myself to the door.

“What are they doing?” I shouted. “Alex?
Marianne?”

I kicked the wooden slats, but they
didn’t budge. I switched tactics and heaved my shoulder against them, backing
up several steps each time and slamming into them with all the force I could
gather. The locks clicked again and Marianne’s crying soon faded away. I
shouted angrily and crashed into the door again.

 “Caroline! Caroline, stop!” Alex
yelled.

Perhaps he was afraid I’d hurt
myself, but I didn’t care. I had to get out. I had to get Marianne away from
that bitch. Away from Wolf. Out of here. To safety. It was my
job
.

“Care, stop! What is she going to
do?”

“There’s a woman. Wolf called her
Mistress. She’s in charge of all the werewolves.” I kicked at the door fiercely
one last time. “She wants to start a war between wolves and humans, and she
wants all the wolves to become werewolves. She thinks it’s great being an all
powerful werewolf or something.”

“So why does she want Marianne?”

My gaze darted around my cell. There
had to be something in here I could use. “She said something about Marianne
being the one to break some curse that wolves are under. She wants to put me
and Marianne into some kind of magic coma so we can’t interfere, and no one
like us will ever be born again.”

I spotted my pack, lying sad and
neglected under the stone bed. I guessed they’d thrown it in after finding
nothing of use. Suddenly an idea struck me.

I snatched up the pack and tore
open the back to get to the aluminum stay bar. I pulled it out, a piece of shining
metal curved to fit against my back and better help me carry the pack. It would
bend, and if I turned it the right way, I might get my idea to work. I had no idea
if it would, but I sure as hell would try. If there was one thing every camper
and hiker trusted out in the woods, it was their equipment. I used the stone
ledge to bend the strip of aluminum one way, then another to form a step-like
shape. Then I slipped over to the edge of the door and reached through the slats
with the stay, feeling around for the locks. If I could hook it just right…

Left, left, right, up.
The
bar locks clanked together as I manipulated the stay, trying to slow the
beating of my heart.
Focus, Caroline, focus. Left, left, right, up.

“Caroline, what are you doing?”

I ignored Alex for the moment and
kept working. Each angle, each turn was difficult to handle. I couldn’t see
what I was doing. I hoped the noise wouldn’t alert anyone. I panted, pressing
into the door, forcing the stay around.