Arthur grumbled something vaguely insulting under his breath, and Chase set off with a grin, some of the Nordan wolves falling into line behind him.
Pausing a moment, Arthur looked down at the snow beneath his boots. Slowly, his gaze tracked upwards, to the tips of the pines, to the mountains beyond.
They were out there somewhere. The hybrids. They threatened everything Arthur held dear. His pack. His town. His territory.
His mate and child.
A fierce growl bubbled in his chest, and he shook his head violently. No. No, he couldn’t afford to get lost in his instincts. He needed to keep his head on straight.
But still. He could feel her at the other end of the bond, anxious and waiting for him. Without thinking, his feet started moving towards her.
“Witch,” he muttered into the cold air, “what spell have you put on me?”
Chapter 15 - Dani
By the time Arthur made it back up the hill, Dani had worn a path between the kitchen table and the sink.
She’d tried reading. Tried knitting. Tried doing the exercises Edith had shown her to smooth the magic out under her skin. In the end, she’d defaulted to chopping garlic and tomatoes she didn’t strictly need, because the house felt wrong when it was quiet and she had too many thoughts rattling around in her bones.
Aurelia had fallen asleep on the window seat and then jolted awake again when Chase came in with an armful of films on battered discs he’d declared “cultural education.” Now she was curled at one end of the sofa in flannel pajamas, damp hair braided down her back, arguing with him about which “classic” they were watching first.
The bond shifted.
Just a fraction, like a compass needle twitching. Arthur, moving through town. Irritated. Tired. Not injured. Not in immediate danger. The knowledge shouldn’t have mattered as much as it did. It loosened something in her chest anyway.
Edith’s voice from that afternoon slid in under the relief.
He hates what witches did to his people. He hates that he wants what he was told would ruin him. That doesn’t vanish because you spent the night together.
Dani set the knife down very carefully.
She could still feel the echo of those fireflies in Thistlehouse, the way Edith’s eyes had gone wide with something like pride and horror. The weight of power in her hands.
She wanted to believe Edith was wrong. Wanted it enough that it scared her.
The front door opened downstairs. Boots thudded in the hallway. A muttered curse as he knocked something he’d left by the wall. She forgot, for one ridiculous second, that she was a grown witch with a teenage daughter and a hybrid crisis to worry about, and her heart did the stupid lift it had done when she was eighteen and heard his tread in the corridor.
“That’ll be him,” Chase said unnecessarily. He’d felt it too, even without a bond. Pack were like that.
Aurelia sat up straighter. “Does he look mad?”
“He always looks mad,” Chase replied. “It’s his resting face. Don’t take it personally.”
“You say the sweetest things,” Dani murmured, wiping her hands on a tea towel.
Arthur filled the kitchen doorway a heartbeat later.
He was still in the coat he’d worn to the clearing, snow melted into dark patches on the shoulders. His hair was tied back in a rough knot; a few strands had come loose around his face. The tension in him hit her before she saw it. His wolf rode very close to the surface, restless, bristling.
His gaze swept the room. Landed on Aurelia first. Softened, almost imperceptibly. Then it caught on to Dani and stopped. Something hungry and uncertain moved under his ribs; she felt it echo in her own.
“You’re late,” Chase said, because he had no survival instinct.
Arthur grunted. “You’re in my kitchen.”
“You’re welcome,” Chase replied, unbothered, “I fed your child, your mate, and your black hole of a fridge. You owe me.”
“He does make a good sauce,” Aurelia offered, as if giving a character reference in court.
