Authors: Sage Domini
But she wasn’t done with him. Their mingled passion was spilling down h
er legs and she caught it with her fingers. He watched her tongue taste what they had made and he felt himself getting ready to want yet again. She kissed him sweetly, then abruptly bit into the smooth skin of his neck while he roared with feral desire and roughly sought her backside. She resisted and backed into a wall, bidding him to follow, then leapt up to snake her legs around his muscled torso. And yes, he was fully in her again, thrusting, pounding, shaking the walls of the cabin and the soul of the earth.
Deston
awoke with a start. He could not have told how many times they had joined or when they had finally fallen into a tangled sleep. His keen eyes could see fairly well, though he knew it was still the thick of the night. Alicia sighed lightly in her sleep, one arm flung over her serene face. He knew why he had woken.
She stirred, reached for him in
sleepy reassurance. “What is it?”
He didn’t want to ask her why she had be
en snooping around at the pack’s perimeters. He wanted to continue to push away the intrusion of reality forever and just escape with her. Deston punched a fist into the floor. All that messy ugly history of her people and his people, all the blood grudges and futile wars, what had it to do with them?
Everything.
Alicia sat up, fully awake. He knew she was waiting for him to speak. “Why were you there?”
She wasn’t hesitant with the truth. “Scouting. They know, you see. About the murders. They know the
pack elders are losing control.” She sighed. “If the pack goes wild, the truce is dead. That was always the case.”
Deston
felt bleak. Loyalty and guilt tugged at him. What was left of his family was back there in the desert. He could barely force himself to ask the question. “What will they do?”
This time she didn’t want to answer. “You know.”
Something else occurred to him. “They will assume you were murdered. By
the beasts
.”
She shook her head. “No. Magda will sense that I am still alive.” S
he sighed. “But it won’t make any difference.”
“They will come anyway, to avenge you and to
dispose of the threat.” He spat. “Witches. Great protectors of mankind and all that high minded bullshit.”
Alicia was silent.
Deston needed to say the words. “I need to go back.”
She gave a little cry and he smothered her mouth with a
desperate kiss. He felt her tears and licked them from her cheeks. “Just to warn them. The elders need to hear it from me. Kristoff, he can’t be trusted not to use the situation to his advantage.”
Her voice had a wry edge.
“Can’t you call them on the phone like a normal person?”
Deston
chuckled and drew her close. “My sweet love, we are not normal. Nor are we people.”
***
Alicia awoke in his arms and was sorry to see the first light of the day’s sun. Deston could not be dissuaded. He would also not allow her to accompany him, promising he would return by the next moon rising. She lay still as Deston breathed evenly beside her. She would not deprive him of his rest. When she had finally slipped into an edgy sleep, her slumber had been poor. Magda’s cold, disapproving eyes swam before her. Magda had always had little patience for witches who succumbed to the baser needs of nature. This clandestine affair would be indefensible.
S
he lied to me.
Since Alicia’s tender, half-forgotten girlhood, Magda had been guardian and teacher. She had been old even then, shriveled and dry, a wraith of life whose sinews remained in operation because of a cold certainty that a duty must be perf
ormed until the last drop of warm blood was exhausted. She had always warned Alicia and the other sisters that all werewolves were
beasts
without exception,
no better than mere animals and far more dangerous. Only they, the witches, stood between this moral scourge and tender mankind. The apprentice trials were meant to bleed the emotion from them so they could fulfill their purpose as the guardians of the frail majority who populated this world. Finally in the middle of the last century, witches had rid the world of the bloodsuckers, the walking dead. Would they now forsake the truce and destroy the wolves as well?
Rick
Deston was none of these things she had been warned of. He posed no threat. So how much of the rest of it was true?
Alicia gently touched the sculpted muscles of his chest.
Don’t leave me, my love.
Alicia
feared her restlessness would disturb him. She slipped on his flannel shirt and found her shoes. The day was dawning bright. Taking a brief flight was out of the question. So, a short walk then. A brief sojourn in the quiet wilderness to mentally relive their hours of passion before she returned to see him off. The earth had a red tinge to it, the vegetation thicker and greener than central Arizona. Tall, dense trees lined the perimeter of the campground and so she wandered into their cool depths.
***
Deston smelled her before he opened his eyes. His gut tensed. Instinct called the wolf, but a more lucid, human part of his mind resisted as he felt the peril of sharp metal as the base of his belly.
“Hello
, lover boy,” Ryah purred as she tightened the legs which straddled his naked middle. She pushed lightly on the knife and he felt the skin break enough to release a drop of blood. Her light hair was filthy; streaks of dirt and blood painted her face. But it was her eyes which were most terrible. They alone held her wolf, amber and evil. They hated him.
Alicia
.
His senses told him she was not inside the cabin.
She bent forward, hissing in his ear. “Did you think we couldn’t follow your scent?”
Deston
did not move. “We?”
Ryah
tightened her grip on the large knife. Of course, wolf to wolf she could not have vanquished him. But with the knife…one errant twitch from Deston and he was sure she would gut him with glee.
“Yes,
we
! The rest limped away, more interested in survival, but Kristoff and I would not allow a traitor to live.”
“Traitor?
” Deston was baffled.
Ryah
growled. “Yes you! Fucking traitor and your witch whore!” She nodded triumphantly at his surprise. “Yes, we know. Now I’ve had a human or two in my time and their bodies can be so sweet and pliant, but you FUCKED A WITCH!” She screamed the last few words. The sharp bones of her knees dug deeper into his side. Her mood changed suddenly. Her eyes fell. “They came for us,” she said gloomily.
Alicia…and
Kristoff.
The thought of what Kristoff would do to his sweet Alicia nearly caused him to lose his sanity, but if he wanted to be of use to Alicia he needed to dispatch this threat first. The room was very hot; sweat beaded in every crevice of his body. He spoke softly to Ryah, who was now shaking, a string of saliva stretching from her thin lips. “What happened?”
Ryah’s
mouth dropped and she moaned. “There were so many of them. The fire came from every corner of the sky. So much screaming. Some got away.” Her eyes narrowed. “And some didn’t.”
Deston
’s mouth had gone dry. His mind’s eye saw the destroyed pack, the blood of his wolf brethren as they were taken by the fire brought by the chanting witches. Sick bile rose in his mouth. “Ryah, I-“
“NO!” Ryah screeched. “Don’t you FUCKING TALK TO ME!” She leaned forward. “
So after all your arrogant self-righteousness you are just an animal ruled by your big prick.” She ran the knife along his scrotum and sobbed. “I hope her cunt was cold and dry.” She sniffed. “Fool, she couldn’t have wanted you! Witches don’t feel.” Suddenly she brightened. “But even now Kristoff might have found her.” Ryah laughed, a ghastly sound. “Oh, and won’t he shred that fat witch in a thousand pretty ways…”
Distracted in her glee, Ryah allowed the knife to slip.
Deston was waiting. In a lightening flash he was the wolf. One powerful limb toppled Ryah to the hard floor in a spill of bony legs and smoky clothing. She gasped and tried to retain her grip on the knife. Her eyes widened she beheld Deston the wolf. He had leapt from the sweaty bed and was crouched before her, teeth bared.
“Where is he?”
Deston growled.
Ryah
rose, cackling. She let out a piercing howl and became the golden she-wolf, a snarl of hair and rage. He was the stronger, but her hatred was fueling her. She lunged for his throat and managed to snag the skin of his neck. He flung her off mightily, her body hitting the thin wall of the cabin, cracking the plaster. She gave a small yelp of pain and rolled back to her feet. Deston smelled his own blood, but knew the cut wasn’t deep. The devil only knew where Kristoff was, if he had found Alicia. Deston figured he had little time; he must end this quickly.
Ryah
crouched and prepared to pounce again but Deston was quicker. He charged at her, reaching for the vulnerable expanse of her throat.
She had not even time to whimper
as he tore a gaping hole in the soft place under her snout. She fell, blood gushing, body twitching. One deep yellow eye regarded him with utter loathing and then closed forever.
Deston
did not have time to feel relieved. He must find Alicia. He broke through the front door of the cabin. The wolf could reach her more quickly. He tried to clear his mind of terror as he ran.
***
Alicia was sitting under a canopy of evergreen, listening to the small wisps of wind sifting through the branches. The harsh medallion of the sun had nearly risen completely. She should get back to the cabin, back to Deston.
She was brushing the dirt from her legs when a mighty force knocked her to the ground. There, looming beneath the sky, a vision of snarling malevolence, was a wolf. A wolf far larger than a wild wolf, and epically more lethal.
He changed back into his man form and she cried out. She recognized him.
“Witch slut. I shou
ld have torn you apart.” Kristoff leaned heavily on her arms and she grimaced in pain. “Yes, we brought down some of your crone sisters but they killed more of us.” Kristoff was panting, his hot breath grazing her chest. He gazed at her body in disgust. “What did he find in a cold witch to make him abandon his own people?” He forced her legs apart, chuckling. “No matter, I plan to find out for myself.”
Alicia’s mind was a frenzy of panic.
Deston, are you still alive??
She felt the pulse
of his Kristoff’s hard shaft on her thigh and her terror changed to revulsion. She fought with her legs, twisting, but he was too strong. He chuckled again, enjoying her fear. Alicia closed her eyes. She must collect herself if she had any chance of living. She summoned all her years of training and briefly saw Magda’s ancient face, nodding. Alicia felt the power bubbling from deep inside and she welcomed its cold spread.
The
werewolf was oblivious. “Before I’m done with you, witch, your insides will be on the outside.”
Alicia hea
rd the rustling in the brush followed immediately by an enraged roar. She felt the whoosh of enormous weight as a blurred shape capsized her astonished tormenter.
My love
.
Kristoff
had recovered in a heartbeat and was crouched, once again a snarling wolf. Deston pushed Alicia behind him and she saw he was bleeding from a wound between his shoulder and the base of his neck. She could not tell how deep the injury was.
Kristoff’s
eyes glowed with wrath. He was crazed with fury. Deston was hurt and Alicia was unsure he could defeat Kristoff. He surely risked fatal wounds to try.
Alicia thrust her arms wide. Her fingers beckoned, her mouth issued the chants. She called to the fire.
A primeval noise of ferocity came from Kristoff. He lunged at her but Deston beat him backwards. Claws slashed and jaws snapped. The two enemy werewolves circled one another in a deadly dance from which only one could possibly emerge.
Alicia fe
lt the wind at her back. The fire in the sky was coming. The two wolves were locked in their battle pose. She must somehow separate them before the fire arrived, for it would not distinguish between good wolf and bad wolf. The fire would take them both.
A great rumbling vibrated the ground and, startled, the wolves paused in their deadly embrace.
Deston looked at Alicia and she willed him to understand the meaning in her eyes. She nodded.
Come to me, my wolf.
And then he was at her side. The wind blew more furiously, a hot breath of justice. Kristoff knew it. No longer the murderous beast, he cowered, melting back into his human façade. It would not matter.
Alicia pointed and the fire did her bid
ding, sweeping over the werewolf as he screamed. Alicia watched the terrible sight of his shape, first man, then wolf, burning without mercy. Deston issued a low growl. She placed a possessive hand on his slick head. “Not you,” she said, “never you.” She raised her arms again and bid the fire to depart. And it was gone in a mighty coil of heat, returned to its waiting earthly den until called by the next witch.