Wolfsbane (Howl #3) (14 page)

Norm took a step closer, inches away from Luke’s face. “We told you to stay
out of our territory . . . but it
doesn
’t look like you’ve left yet.”

“That’s because we just had to come say goodbye to Orkos and Kyana,” Colby spoke up. Samara couldn’t tell if he was
intimidated by them
or not. If he felt anything like her, he was probably more nervous that the Vyka were on their way to the den right now. They needed to get out of here, quick, before Jason and his pack had
a
motive
to hurt Kyana and Orkos, too.

“Get the hell out of here and soon,” Martin growled
.
“If you ever come back anywhere near our territory, I
’ll make you wish you didn’t
.” He
exited the den, and Norm turned to follo
w him, eyeing
their pack as he left.

“What the hell,” St
eve said once they were gone.

“What the hell is right,” Colby added. “I think
you’re correct,
Sam. We don’t need to worry about them. They seem to be
more talk than anything else.”

“No, I think you’re wrong. They’re more than just talk,
” Kyana groaned, shaking her head. “
Can somebody please untie me?”

Samara got down on her knees and began unknotting the ropes
that held Kyana
in place in the chair.
“I can’t believe they tied you up. What happened exactly?” Martin had already given his take of the story, but she wanted to hear it from Kyana, too, to get a better idea o
f what they were dealing with.

“They
came here looking for you—just like they said
,”
Kyana explained
. “And then they hit my father over the head with this chair before tying me up. They actually seemed
more interested in hurting me . . .
probably because they saw me at the nightclub with you. But then Papa got in the way
. . . H
e tried to protect me from them.” Shivering at the memory, she glanced down at her dad, who still hadn’t
risen to consciousness
yet. “Do you
think he’s going to be okay?”

“Of course he’s going to be okay,” Kyle replied, his lips dancing ever so slightly, as though he wanted to smile, but knew that he shouldn’t. “He wasn’t in wolf form when they hurt him. And they did
n’t shoot him, either, right?”

Kyana nodded. “You’re right, they didn’t.” She breathed a sigh of relief,
obviously remembering
that there was no way a werewolf could die through a physical altercation like this when they were in human form. “It
just startled me is all.”

“I can only imagine,” Samara commented. “Are there any doctors around? Do you think you can get him to one? He proba
bly does have some injuries.”

“I’ll call someone to come check him out,” Kyana replied, grabbing a cell phone from a pile of rocks in the corner of the den. Samara realized for the first time how strange it was that Orkos was old school, believed in living in dens and not sending his daughter to a public school—and yet, he had a cell phone. It almost seemed hypocr
itical.

After Kyana asked someone to come over right away, she glanced down at her hands. “There’s something tha
t I need to tell you, Samara.”

“What is it?” Samara asked.

“I asked my father, before he was injured, if it would be okay for me to become an Ima,” Kyana began. “He told me it wasn’t. He said that I must stay here, and continue belonging to the pack that is rightfully mine
. . .
the p
ack I was destined to be on.”

“I’m so sorry, Kyana,” Samara began. “But maybe it’s what’s best for you. I know you’ll miss Josh, but . . . it probably would have been really hard for you to leave your
family and your pack, anyway.”

Kyana shook her head. “No, it wouldn’t have. I mean, yes, I would miss my father . . . and my brother. But the truth is, I don’t feel like I really belong here. I want to be part of a pack that’s more modern—one that wil
l let me make my own choices.”

“I understand,” Samara said gently. “Maybe, eventually, your father will change his mind and allow it. Have you given Josh your phone number so that the
two of you can keep
in touch?”

Kyana nodded, pushing a strand of her silky, black hair behind her ear, which a turquoise feather earring dangled from.
“Yes, we will keep in touch.”

“I hate to cut this short, but we really should get going. We don’t want the Vyk
a to find us here,” Luke said.

“The Vyka are in Alaska?”
Kyana asked, surprised to hear the pack that Joe McKinley had belonged to being mentioned.

Colby nodded. “Yes, they’re here to try to kill us . . . unless we can get to them first. We should be going. I wouldn’t want you to get caught up in the middle of this. As it is right now, they might track our scents
back to your den.”

“
You need to go to someone e
lse’s den—or house, or whatever,
Kyana,” Josh urged her. “I don’t want the Vyka to find you here. It would just kill me to know that they hurt
you. I want you to stay safe.”

Kyana nodded. “I will go to my brother’s den. They won’t find me there.” She paused before adding, “You stay safe, Josh.”
She took a step closer to him.

Josh wrapped his arms around her, pulling her fragile body into a close embrace. Kyana touched his cheek with one of her hands before giving him a soft, gentle kiss on the li
ps.
“Goodbye, Josh.”

“Bye, K
yana,” Josh said breathlessly.

“I can smell them. Their scent’s
starting to get
stronger, so they must be
getting
closer. We need to get out of here,” Chris said, headin
g for the opening of
the den.

Everyone said goodbye to Kyana and follo
wed him.

“Where are we going to go?” Colby wondered out loud. “We need to get out of here, but we’re probably going to run
into them. Do we have a plan?”

Samara thought to herself. She’d never considered what they were going to do once they faced Jason again. She knew that they needed to kill him before he could kill her, but how would they stand a chance if he was so heavily involved in black fighting
? The last time they’d even ca
me close to hurting him, he had disappeared into thin air right in front of their eyes, and there was nothing that they could have done to stop him. “I
guess our plan is to wing it.”

“
That sounds like a well-crafted plan,” Kyle commented sarcastically. “No offense, Sam, but I think we need to come up with something better than t
hat.”

She thought for a moment before coming up with a new plan. It wasn’t much for them to work with, but it would have to do. “Okay, here’s our plan. We all stick together . . . and we stay hidden for as long as we can. Once one of them does spot one of us, let the others know. And then we attack, quickly so that they wo
n’t even know what hit them.”

“Sounds l
ike a plan to me,” Colby said.

Luke agreed. “Yeah,
I think it could maybe work.”

“It’s better than any other
plan we’ve got.
” Kyle sighed.

“Considering we don’t have any other plan, at all,” Josh pointed out to Kyle, “
I suppose it will have to do.”

Samara glanced at Steve and Chris for approval, and they both simply nodded. “Okay, then, I guess t
hat’s what we’re working with,” she said. “
Now, ta
ke cover.”

They all darted across an open field to the heavi
ly wooded forest next to them.

Samara’s shoes crunched over the snow-covered ground, and she glanced through the shadows that were casted from the trees that loomed above them. She walked ahead of Luke, holding his hand, mostly to comfort herself
.

We’re going to get through this, you know,
Luke told her.

She glanced over her shoulder and shot him a small smile.
I’m glad that one of us is confident about it, at least.

I am confident. You’re a good Alpha. You just need to believe in yourself more,
Luke told her.

I’ll keep that in mind.
Samara was about to tell him how much she really appreciated his encouragement when she heard a twig snap on the other side of the forest. The musky Vyka scent wafted into her nose, and she knew that Jason or one o
f his pack members was nearby.

We all need to change to our wolf forms,
Samara said through mind-speak, allowing al
l of her pack members to hear what she was saying.

No, that’s a really bad idea, Samara,
Colby said.
If we change right now, there’s going to be blue smoke everywhere. It will tip them off to where we are. We’re better off just staying in human form.

Samara hadn’t considered this idea, but she knew that Colby was right. At least right now, without the blue smoke drifting through the sky as they all changed,
they had a chance of remaining hidden in the woods. Plus, the wolfsbane was keeping their scents hidden right now; if they changed, they wouldn’t have their necklaces to keep them protecte
d when they were in wolf form.

Okay, guys, Colby’s
just made a point to me privately,
Samara told her pack.
We shouldn’t change if we want to stay hidden.
They’ll see our smoke.
So, don’t change to your wolf unless you absolutely have to. In other words, not unless you find yourself face-to-face with a Vyka.

I hear someone walking behind me,
Chris
said, his voice full of panic.

Samara felt herself panicking, too, her grip on Luke’s hands tightening. Remembering that only she had heard what Chris had said since she was his Alpha, she told her pack members,
Hide! They’re coming!

She crouched down on the ground, hiding beneath a tall tree, and Luke crept down beside her. She hoped that it would provide enough cover for them; if Jason came anywhere near the tree, she wasn’t sure what they were going
to do.

It didn’t take long for her to hear the footsteps that got closer and closer to her. The
sound of feet crunching into snow was
soon followed by voices, which she couldn’t hear clearly at first. As they got closer, sh
e could make them out better.

“I know they’re here somewhere,” someone said, and their voice sent shivers down her spine
. The voice belonged to Jason.

“I don’t know. I don’t smell them anywhere,” another familiar voice said, and Samara cringed. It was Seth. Her brother was talking to Jason and r
eally helping him look for them.
Was it because he wanted to find them . . . or because he had to find them
unless he wanted to cause issues with his Alpha?
Either way, the thought made her feel uneasy, and Luke squeezed her hand a little tighte
r, which calmed her nerves some . . .
but the fact that her brother might be on Jason’s side now, inste
ad of her own, still remained clear in her mind.

“They have to be here somewhere,” Jason continued, crunching on the snow and breaking the twigs beneath his feet. “We’ve scanned the whole area. I know for certain that they haven’t l
eft yet. How could they if they think there’s no plane to take them back home
?” There was a mocking tone to his voice, and i
t made Samara grit her teeth.

“Well, maybe one of the guys will find them if we don’t,” Seth replied. “We do have twenty pack members now. If one of us doesn’t find them, you would think
that one of the others will.”

Twenty pack members? Holy shit,
Samara thought. The last time she’d seen the Vyka, the only pack members they’d had besides Jason and Seth were Declan, Mark Stevens, and Ethan Miller (until she’d killed him, that was). How had they gone from four members to twenty pack members in
such a short period of time?

The realization that there was no way the Ima would be able to fight and be able to win a battle with the Vyka now that they were so outnumbered hit her, and she bega
n to feel sick to her stomach.

Jason laughed a sinister laugh. “It doesn’t matter that we have twenty members, Seth. Most of them are useless. You and Declan are my
strongest boys. The other guys, well”---he
lowered his voice, not wanting
the rest of his pack members to hear him—“
they’re just basic werewolves. Sure, they can fight and all, but t
hey can’t fight the way
we
do.
”