The stranger hesitated. And then he answered her.
“My name is River of Silver Mountain Clan.” He smiled a little. “We call you Sun-Hair.”
“Um?” Arden began, but then River looked sharply to the side. If he’d had ears, they would have pricked. Baz’s own threat sense skyrocketed, but a moment later Lexie appeared out of the rain. He hadn’t heard or smelled her, with the flood thunderingbehind him and the air filled with the wet, fresh smell of rain and mud.
“Baz!” Lexie called. “Arden! Good, I found you. We didn’t see any sign of Fern downstream, but Declan shifted and he’s checking out the?—”
She broke off sharply at the sight of Fern in Baz’s arms. In that same instant, Baz realized River had taken advantage of the moment of distraction to step back among the trees and vanish.
“Damn it!” Baz snarled. “Arden, did you see where he went?”
“No.” Arden moved even closer to Baz, which meant she was pleasantly pressed up against his side. She cautiously stroked Fern’s wet hair. “Is that bad?”
“I don’t know! I don’t like having that guy running around here when the clan’s not all together.”
Lexie joined them and also put her hand on Fern’s forehead, then her neck. “She’s freezing. Baz, what happened?”
“I don’t know what happened!” Baz snapped. His usual easygoing calm had disintegrated under the pressure of his clan’s danger and his bear’s uncharacteristic defensive rage. “That guy who was at the bonfire showed up carrying her. He said he found her—” He paused.
“By the old well,” Arden supplied.
“The wishing well?” Lexie asked.
“I don’t know. Here, I want you to take her.” Baz carefully transferred Fern into Lexie’s arms. “You said Declan is doing—uh—the thing he does?”
Lexie nodded as she adjusted her grip on Fern, resting her clan-sister’s head against her chest.
Well, Declan would be fine as long as he could manage to stay out of sight. With all the rain, that shouldn’t be too much of a problem, but Baz needed to have a talk with him later. Knowing that the wild forest shifters were hanging around the town’sborders to this extent, Declan had better be damn careful if he wanted his secret shift form to remain a secret.
“Get Fern inside and get her warmed up,” Baz told Lexie. “Arden, go with her.”
Arden turned swiftly, jerking her hand back from Fern’s damp forehead. “What? Where are you going?”
“Checking the perimeter. I need to make sure the flood’s not going to threaten us and that guy’s really gone.”
“I’m coming with you,” Arden said firmly.
“No. Go with Lexie. It’s safer.”
“Look, guys,” Lexie said. “I’m not going to stand here holding my injured friend while you fight. I’m taking her to my place; it’s closest, and we have lights and heat. If you see Declan, send him my way.”
She turned and slogged away through the rain, hunching over Fern to try to keep some of it off her.
Baz’s newly awakened alpha sense tore him in two directions. Go with them. Stay here to check around and make sure the situation was safe.
How could Uncle Alec, the clan alpha back on the Pinerock ranch, stand to feel like this all the time?
Arden touched his arm. “I feel safer with you. Please, let’s just look around, and then we’ll both go back and make sure Fern is okay.”
He had to admit that having Arden where he could keep an eye on her made his bear feel better about the situation. “All right. But stay close to me. I want to look at the place where that River guy found Fern, make sure he’s not still hanging around.”
And also, not incidentally, to check for any signs that Fern’s “accident” had been engineered by someone else. Someone, say, who wanted to ingratiate themselves into Baz’s clan by returning their lost clanmate to them.
“Do you know what he meant when he called me Sun-Hair?” Arden asked. She stayed close to Baz, nearly plastering herself to his side.
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s the blonde in your hair.” He loved those streaks, the shine that never quite took it over. Like veins of gold in granite rock.
“No, I mean, why do they have a name for me?”
