Joy rushed through me, a strange feeling in the hellscape I was in, but it was quickly snuffed out when I realized what was actually happening. I wasn’t shifting because I had suddenlygained the ability. I was shifting because the liquid pumping into my veins wasforcingme.
Ah, so it seemed that we were doubling down on that whole not-a-good thing.
Although I had no idea why they would possibly want to try to force me into my wolf form, it wasn’t something I wanted to hand over to them. I tried to fight it. I tried to resist, but it was like trying to subvert gravity. My wolf was an inevitable, primordial force rushing toward me, trying to swallow up everything I was.
Once more, I was struck by how much they could pervert everything about being a shifter. My wolf and I were supposed to be two halves of the same coin, working in conjunction with each other. We were the same yet different. One mind, one soul, spread across two forms.
But the drugs were subverting that, turning my wolf into a mindless beast ripping my thoughts in two as it tried to claw its way to the surface. It wasn’t me at all. It was something else.
I couldn’t shift. Icouldn’t. I needed to fight it as long as I could, even if it felt like I was trying to fight the urge to breathe. As inevitable as it seemed, I had totry.
Fur began to ripple down my body, and at that exact moment, the entire world seemed to shake. It was subtle at first, the warning before a storm, but then a true furor broke out.
Was it an earthquake?
No, that didn’t make sense. I was pretty sure we weren’t in a part of America where that was an issue. Whateverwashappening shook me so hard that my teeth—an uncomfortable combination of wolf canines and human bicuspids—rattled.
Everything was a haze of chaos as the lights around me flashed red and the staff straight up fled from the room. I tried to lift my body to see what was going on, but the restraints kept me in place. My fingers were beginning to crack and bend, unsurewhich form they were supposed to be, and I got the impression it was supposed to be painful, but I was so hopped up on whatever they’d given me, I couldn’t really feel it.
I hated how much they messed with my mind. I didn’t know if it was resisting the shift or the chemical cocktail that was causing my thoughts to begin to melt into each other and turn unintelligible. I only knew it was growing harder and harder to think by the second.
Thoughts were sliding into each other, as were the few colors I could make out through the haze of red lighting. My tongue was still sloppily trying to form words, fighting against the flat metal attached to my muzzle that was keeping it in place. Everything was a cacophony, a sheer torrent of sensation and information that my brain simply wasn’t capable of understanding.
But then, like an angel parting through all the fire and brimstone surrounding me, Ven’s face came into view.
She was so beautiful.
I’d always known that, but it struck me in the moment. Everything else was a blurry, confusing mess, but her face stood out in perfect clarity.
I tried to say something, although I didn’t quite know what. Not that it mattered as it couldn’t get past the metal in my mouth. Ven, the specter that she was, murmured something, then very real hands were on either side of my head, undoing the restraints that kept me in place.
Ven produced a key from God only knew where, then undid the rest of the restraints. With every shackle falling off me, more slivers of clarity began to sink in until I could finally understand some of what she was saying.
“Don’t worry, I’m here. We’re going to get you somewhere safe, okay?”
Safe? Of course, I would be safe. I was with her, wasn’t I?
Of course, seeing her meant I was likely in the deep throes of torture, but that didn’t really matter if I couldn’t feel it, right? Even the wolf that had demanded to be let out was easing back, settling into its usual territory within my mind.
“The others are making it safe for us to go, so all you have to worry about is sitting up when you can. Don’t try to speak now. Just focus on your breathing, please? For me?”
The others?
As if on cue, Ricky appeared within my field of vision, along with two other people I’d never seen before. I’d read somewhere once that our minds couldn’t make up new people in our dreams, so maybe I hadn’t slipped into a torture-borne disassociation.
But if that was true, it meant Ven was indeed right in front of me.
“Okay,” Ven said, voice still so soft and syrupy. “We’ve got all the restraints off. Do you think you can sit up?”
Sit up? Sure, even babies could sit up, and I most certainly wasn’t?—
Huh.
I tried to sit up, but my muscles weren’t receiving signals from my brain. I lay there, tongue slack in my mouth, staring up at my four rescuers. If they were real, they had to be having some wild thoughts about me at the moment.
“I don’t think you can,” Ricky said. Even in my messed-up state, I could hear the concern in his voice. “You two carry him. I’ll make sure to clear the path. Ven, you bring up the rear.”
“Will do.”
