Page 44 of Werewolves and Witches AU

Ignorant of my plight, Sarah leans forward to gaze at her reflection in the still water. Despite that I’ve done it before, I still can’t work out what she’s looking for under its surface. Once again, curiosity wins out. Leaning close, I peer over her shoulder to see what she does, but all that stares back is her own image.

I raise my hand, intending to plunge it into the cold lake, but before I make contact, I wake with a start.

Heart pounding, breaths shallow, and room spinning, I jolt upright in an instant.

It takes a moment to orient myself; the room is almost pitch dark, with only the electric light that spills under the door from the hallway beyond to see by. Shuffling in place, the bed beneath me crinkles like a plastic bag with every twitch, but that’s when I remember where I am.

Everything in this house is covered in protective plastic, and the beds are the same. I’d been too tired by the time I’d found the only room that wasn’t claimed by placing a heavy suitcase on top of the bed to bother stripping it off. Neither did I unpack the parcel of bedding that still sits at the foot of the mattress, and instead used my backpack as a pillow.

My neck cracks when I stretch it out, it immediately throbs. Wincing, I grip the back of it with my hand and squeeze. Cautiously, I swing my feet down onto the carpeted floor, then continue massaging the muscles in my neck and shoulders, but it doesn’t improve much.

Stifling a yawn on the back of my hand presents a whole new ache. My entire forearm, from wrist to elbow, feels sore and bruised.

I frown, then a carousel of intrusive memories invades my mind. One after another, they blur by. Time Guy breaking into my room, the purple glow of his magic, and its crackle as he grabbed my wrist.

This is the whole reason I’m here, sleeping on a plastic-covered bed in a house filled with military werewolves. I scratch through my hair, fingers tangling in the knots, as I listen to the muffled noises of my keepers shuffling around in their respective rooms. They all seem a little… unhinged.

Rowan seems different than the other Dogs—more composed—but then again, he’s their leader, and he burst head first through a plate-glass window to take on Time Guy despite that he has no magic of his own. So maybe he’s every bit as unstable as the rest of them, it’s just that he hides it better.

Why is it always the hot ones? I shrug one-shouldered and absently rub the skin on my wrist.

He’s an intimidating man, but his wolf is even more so. When the giant russet-coloured beast had landed protectively in front of me, I’d barely cleared his shoulder, and he’d entirely blocked my view of Time Guy. Well, all but the purple glow of his magic that had been reflected in the polished concrete floor of the coffee shop.

I’d grabbed Rowan’s wolf’s tail instinctively, but when those violet bolts of lightning had bridged the short distance to him, something about our shared contact had prevented them from penetrating even a single strand of brown-red fur.

Time Guy’s Italian accent, when he informed me that the Luna del Lupo must be in my possession because that’s what made me immune to his magic, fills my ears.

Those aggressive crackles had raced over Rowan’s body, and mine, as if they were nothing more than the soft and heavy drops of summer rain. Their patter had bounced from my skin, and all I’d felt was the same strange itching on my left hip that had manifested in our first tussle.

My eyes widen, and my train of thought falls away.

Standing in a rush, I pop the button on my jeans. With one hand, I drag my zipper down, and the other I shove under my waistband.

The incessant buzzing of my phone vibrating with an incoming call stalls my act of undressing. Hands pretty much inside my pants, I turn in a slow circle until… The light from the phone’s display is mostly swallowed by the bedroom carpet it rests on, but it’s still easy to spot in the dark.

Attached to the port in the wall with the charger cable I stole from the barista, my phone continues to vibrate in place until I flip it over, and I smile at the caller I.D.

“Miles,” Ray says immediately. “I’m so sorry it’s taken me all day to get back to you. The Witches Council didn’t leave until about an hour ago, and I’ve only just got home.” He blows out a long breath. “I’ve ordered some food and finally had a chance to read your message. Tell me, what’s this about the discovery of the Lost Colony?”

Wedging the phone to my ear with my shoulder, I fasten my jeans.

It’s such a Ray thing to do—spend all day dealing with something as awful as murder and the Witches Council, but still make time for those lucky enough to be in his life. He’s what Ethel would call “a good egg,” but it’s also what sets him up to be taken advantage of by his dickhead boyfriends. Dickhead boyfriends like our ex-in-common.

I chew my bottom lip to refrain from responding out loud to the thought in my head, but right as I’m about to answer his question, I realise that I can’t. I can’t tell Ray about Roanoke, or Sarah, because Time Guy already found me once when the only personal item I’d had on me was my phone.

Suddenly feeling exposed and vulnerable, my gaze darts out the window to the starlit sky.

Whatever it is I’m mixed up in, it’s safer for Ray if he doesn’t know. I don’t want Time Guy to fold Ray away in the fabric of time.

“You know, about that,” I begin, scrambling for a plausible explanation. “I think it was just one of those crazy dreams. You know, the ones that feel real when you wake up? In fact, it could even have been astral travel. Yeah, probably it was that. I’d been feeling sentimental earlier, so I reckon I went to that heritage site they have out on the Island now—except it was as it was back then—because it’s somewhere I’d visited with Anabelle and Ethel.”

“You had an out of body experience? Milo, that’s incredibly dangerous on your own. I assume it wasn’t intentional? Did you have an anchor? Are you okay?” Ray’s concern, after everything that’s happened these last twenty-four hours, hits hard.

Tears blur my vision, and I take a deep breath as I flop back down on the plastic-coated mattress. “Yeah. No, I didn’t mean to. You know how I am with ‘skilful preparation’—to quote our delightful Coven Leader.”

Ray scoffs down the line. “He’s an idiot. You’ve always been naturally talented, and he has a small and fragile ego.”

I snort a laugh, the action setting free a tear that I wipe away with the heel of my palm. Covering my sudden emotional outburst, I joke, “Thought you were gonna say something else was small and fragile.”