Compelled (13 page)

Thorn gave me a side glance.

“They don’t get out much,” I said. “Tamara really needs to find them husbands.”

After everyone met Thorn, we went inside for tea. I was tempted to ask Tyler if he knew about the peep show he gave the twins, but doing that in front of my mate wasn’t the smartest idea. He didn’t appear all that pleased and even passed me his cellphone with an expression that said, “Do I make the call or you?”

With a grimace, I dialed home. Dad picked up on the second ring.

“Have you found her yet on that farm?”

“It’s me, Dad.” I waited for it, even cringing for the blow.

A long sigh. “Natalya, of all the foolish things to do!”

I caught the sounds of footsteps on the line, of others surrounding Dad.

This wasn’t gonna be good. At all.

“Where is she?” one person snapped. Maybe Aunt Olga. “I can hear her breathing on the line,” she said.

“How could she do this to her grandmother? Her grandma is worrying and practically near the grave. What an ungrateful girl.” That had to be Aunt Vera. Grandma always had some ailment of some kind when one of her relatives didn’t do something the family expected. I waited patiently to hear that grandma was blind and deaf and perhaps slowly heading for her deathbed.

Then the crackled overseas phone conversation turned to swearing in both English and Russian. My cousin Inna had nothing on Aunt Vera when she was livid.

“You can’t be serious! She is really there?” Aunt Vera spat. “That little troublemaker better not come home anytime soon.”

The sharp sounds of someone snatching the phone made me pull the phone away from my ear. That kinda hurt. “Where are you?” Mom’s voice was pretty easy to make out. Normally it was honeyed, but now I was getting the full brunt of her anger.

“I’m in Russia,” I admitted. “I’m
harasho
.”

“Harasho?”
She stretched out the word as much as possible, her voice rising into a shriek. “The pack alpha had to come after you and move heaven and earth to get there, and you call that
fine
?”

This was going nowhere fast. Explaining myself wouldn’t help Thorn. Listening to them berate me would only make it harder for me to save Thorn. And if my father got on the phone again and commanded me to come home, I’d feel compelled to comply. He was my sire and still had a measure of control over my behavior. But I felt more compelled to stay and discover the secret to save Thorn’s life.
 

Time to end this conversation.

“Oh, no, the reception is going bad.” I made hissing noises into the phone. “Sorry, I gotta go. I’ll try to call later.”

I hung up on them, hoping they wouldn’t have a fresh grave waiting for me in South Toms River.

After hanging up on my family, and then ignoring every call and text message that came afterwards, the next three weeks passed quickly with Thorn at my side. He didn’t do much, merely watching over me while Tamara trained me. I noticed she had become far more polite with him present.
 

This particular morning he didn’t get up, deciding to lay in bed and rest.
 

“I’ll be fine,” he reassured me. “I’ve never had a vacation like this. I’m gonna enjoy it while I can.”

I hope he was just saying that for my benefit and not because he wasn’t feeling well.

The farm had been quiet all night into the day. Whatever had attacked us the day after I’d arrived hadn’t showed itself again. I took that as a good sign. There’d be less for me to worry about.

“What attacked you?” Thorn asked me that night before bed.

“I don’t know. I was in the middle of the field with Tamara when something spooked her. We were just standing there and then I heard something in the woods. It seemed pretty big, like a large animal. We were upwind, but there wasn’t any scent I recognized.”

Thorn’s face appeared thoughtful.

“You need to be careful around here.” He made me look him in the eye when I tried to look away. “There’s something out there. I’ve gone out a few times to try to track it, but I never get a good trail. Almost like it leaves for a period of time then doubles back when we stop paying attention.”

I nodded. “I’ll watch out. Anyway, she told me we’d work on the earth today. We can do that inside the house.”

“Be careful,” he advised.

An hour or two later, Tamara had me in the house in the sitting room.

“Do you know why I’ve chosen this element to be the last one for you to learn?” She stood not far from me.

Not really, but I wanted to sound like I’d been listening, so I tried to say something intelligent. “The others hadn’t been too complex. But I suspect when it comes to changing matter itself, like ourselves and the earth, that’s a tall order.”

She pursed her lips. “You could say that.”

She opened her palm to reveal dirt.

“What do you want me to do with that?” I asked. Hopefully, she wanted me to toss it outside where it belonged.

“I want you to feel it.”

I had a feeling this was coming. I took the offered soil and pretended it was glitter. Shiny glitter didn’t feel this grimy, though.
 

“I want you to close your eyes and just listen. Not with your ears per se, but with everything. Listening is the hardest part for us, since, as werewolves, we don’t know how to listen to what the spellcasters can hear already. You’ve been touched by magic of some kind. I can sense it on you. So, you’ll have to listen carefully.”

Did she mean the goblin magic caused by Bill or something else?

She began to recite the words and I followed along like I always did during a lesson.

After some time, my palm warmed and an array of other sensations ran along my fingertips. From wet to warm to scalding. It was amazing.

“What is this?” I finally asked. I told her what I felt.

She scooped the dirt from my palm and placed it back into a flowerpot near the window.
 

“That is dirt from a very special place far south of here where there are tropical forests and volcanoes. What you’re feeling is the residual magic in it. Everything in the earth has some kind of negligent pull, but if you touch the
right
things, there’s a lot more.” She offered her hand.

“Go on,” she must’ve seen the confused look on my face. “Take my hand.”

Her grip was strong when I grabbed her hand, but I quickly caught on to what she meant. An electric hum pulsed from her fingers into mine, growing stronger each second. My breath caught as my knees buckled and I collapsed on the floor. My vision blurred. A fire boiled inside Tamara, so hot, I let go of her.

“What was that?” For some reason, I felt weakened after touching her.

“That was me drawing from you. The sensations you felt was the same thing I felt when I touched you. It was our untapped potential.”

I blinked, trying to take it all in. But why had she hurt me? “But why did you take away my power?”

“As a lesson.” Tamara crossed her arms. “A valuable one. You can take from yourself as a source, but others can steal what you have, too.” She approached me as I crouched on the floor.

“I don’t like that.”

“Are you willing to take from others to save your husband? Playing with the magic from others requires a little finesse, though. I don’t think you’re ready to do that.”

“I’m not willing to do it, either,” I finished for her. I had enough of a bad taste in my mouth after what Nick did to me.

“Your husband barely made it outside today,” she said softly. “Do you want the tools necessary to survive long enough to figure out how to remove curses? You’ll need strength to do that, Natalya. More strength than your weak body can imagine.”

She said the word “weak” like a swear word. My fists clenched and I wanted to smack the smug look off her face.

She extended her hand. “Take back what I stole from you.” She poked me, and I couldn’t suppress the growl stirring in my chest. “Do it!” she snapped.

I snatched her hand and waited for the pull. The tug didn’t take too long. I spoke the words again to manipulate matter.

And I took more from that bitch than she took from me.

As strength returned to my limbs a bitter taste raked the back of my mouth and dizziness smacked me hard. But I didn’t let go of her.

“You learn fast,” Tamara said with a chuckle. “A stubborn bitch, though.”

“Takes a bitch to know one,” I remarked, not bothering to hold in my rising anger.

As the day wore on, the lingering effects from the spell made it hard to touch anything or anyone. In particular, the house itself. The whole place and its inhabitants were weird. I still couldn’t forget that scream from the other day or how the house shuddered when that creature attacked us. Luda had said something important. Something about beings trapped inside the house. As to what she meant, I didn’t know. Questioning Tamara came to mind, but if I pried too much, would she force me to leave?

Tamara had too many secrets, but I had no choice but to stay unless another opportunity came up. Also, even though I had grown to dislike her, I had to admit one thing: I knew more now than I did when I first came here. I just wished I knew how to manipulate the darkness inside of Thorn. I wished I knew how to pull out what ate away at him and protect him.

But even Tamara didn’t know how to do that.

With a slight sense of accomplishment, I settled into bed that night and wrapped my arms around Thorn.

Chapter 13

Instead of daylight tugging me awake, it was a hand over my mouth that yanked me out of slumber. Thorn leaned in close to me and whispered, “Don’t move.”

He kept his hand over my mouth. In the darkness, I watched his eyes shift toward the window. I froze, slowing my breathing as much as I could.

What the hell had spooked Thorn?

Then the moonlight filling the room vanished as something covered the window. After a few seconds, it reached the roof and the moon’s glow bathed the room again.

Something big as hell had come for us.

Thorn uncovered my mouth.

“I wish that had been a squirrel,” I whispered.

More creaking echoed along the rooftop. A form passed over the window, that of a man. With a deep inhale, I caught a whiff of cinnamon.
 

Spellcasters. And maybe their monster minions. And they were all over the freaking house. They’d made it past whatever barriers Tamara had erected.

My breath hitched painfully and heartbeat sped up, but Thorn pressed his hand on my stomach for reassurance.

“Not now,” he said softly.

I closed my eyes to hold back my anxiety. I wasn’t weakened anymore.

A creak outside our door drew our attention. Had they come inside already? Thorn shifted to rise without sound, but failed. He wasn’t as stealthy as he used to be.

The door opened without a sound, and I was prepared to pounce on the goblin blade, but the face we saw was unexpected. It was Tamara.

“We’re surrounded,” she whispered. Her words were simple, matter-of-fact. “You need to leave the house. I can draw them away, but you won’t have long to run.”

“Who is here?” Thorn asked. He pushed me to put on my clothes.

“The warlocks don’t trust their minions anymore to do their dirty work. They’ve come here personally to take me out.” She sighed, her eyes appearing tired for a moment. “I’m rather disappointed they sent weak ones.”

My mouth dropped.
Holy shit.
Actual warlocks had come here to attack us. I reached for the goblin blade. The weapon had already transformed into a metallic, golden box that could fit in the palm of my hand. Was this the same box I used when I was in Atlantic City fighting Roscoe’s warlock? I didn’t know how it had worked last time, but the goblin blade had disarmed a warlock. A rather handy trick.

“What about the twins and Tyler?” I asked.

“I’ve already spoken to them. Tyler will follow them to the south. You’re going north.”

A thud against a wall to the east of us shook the house.

“They’re persistent.” She coughed and brought up a handkerchief to her mouth. When she pulled it away, there was blood on the cloth.

“What’s wrong with you?” I asked.

“Does she always ask questions at times like this?” Tamara rushed to hand me my backpack.

“There isn’t enough time to tell you how often.” Thorn finished dressing. “How much time do we have during your diversion?”

“Not long, unfortunately. Two inexperienced spellcasters is a lot for even me to handle. Once they breach the spells protecting this house, all bets are off. It will be just me and them.”

I reached out and touched her hand. “Are we meeting up somewhere?”

Thorn tugged my hand to leave the room with Tamara behind.

“Just worry about now, girl. We got bigger problems than figuring out what will happen tomorrow.” She shoved us toward the stairs. “Go to the cellar. Down there will be a door. Hold your breath as you go through and you’ll find a path to safety on the other side. Lock the door behind you, though, and don’t look back.”

Thorn nodded. “Safe journey.”

“To you as well. If you travel along the closest main road north toward
Bol’shoye Tsvetochnoye
lake, you’ll enter Finland and find the
Yhdeksän Männyt
Pack in a small town called Nuijamaa near the border. Their alpha is an old friend of mine, and he’ll protect you.”

The trip down the stairs was hard going with Thorn’s weakness, but we made it. Offering to carry him wasn’t even a question. I’d never belittle him like that.

By the time we reached the staircase for the cellar, we noticed the dwarf had taken this path, too. This must have been how he escaped with the twins. Upstairs, the house shuddered as if the roof would come down any minute. The lights flickered and the air was saturated with the sticky sweet scent of cinnamon.

At the far end of the dank cellar was a door I’d never seen before. Where I’d once seen rows of preserved food in jars was now a dark wooden door made from large planks. The knob was made from tarnished brass with deep scratch marks in the metal. I helped Thorn across the room and soon we reached the door.

“Are you ready?” I whispered to him.