Chapter 28: : Chapter 28

My eyes fluttered open, and I gently closed them again as I did my best to hide from the day.

At least my dreams had been free of demons and sorcerers and monsters. It had just been me and Jaxson, running free as wolves, with nothing to fear. Of course, that suggested a whole host of additional problems I didn’t want to face this morning, either.

My jaw stretched wide in a yawn, and I forced my eyes open. Soft morning light filtered into the room, and dust motes softly danced in the rays. There was a peace in my soul that belied the danger that hung over all our heads. We’d disrupted the sorcerer’s plans, but he was still out there, most likely scheming up a way to take revenge.

I stretched out my legs and froze.

Something was wrong.

I snapped my head down. Everything was fur and paws.

With a yelp, I leapt up, or tried to. My four legs tangled in the sheet, and I flipped over and out of bed with a thud.

I twisted and scrambled as I tried to disentangle myself from the sheets. Finally, I struggled free and paced back and forth.

I focused my mind, straining with the human part of my being that was now trapped inside the wolf.

Nothing happened.

I felt the wolf’s frustration as she took control and began to investigate the room.

I gritted my teeth and tried to shove her aside.

My wolf didn’t yield. Not even a hair on my body quivered. She was as stubborn as a—

Steps sounded on the stairs. God, no. Had someone heard my yelp and the following thump on the floor?

, I said to my wolf.

I let out a sigh of frustration, but it came out as a wolfy snarl.

Someone paused outside the door and my breath caught. “Savy? Everything ok?” Casey said. “I heard something fall.”

Panic seized my mind. I couldn’t speak as a wolf—just snarl, growl, and howl. A would probably come out as a whimper or sound like a wounded animal. That would have Casey breaking down the door in no time.

“Savy?”

Shit. He wasn’t going to go away. My thoughts raced through my mind like Wile E. Coyote and landed on a single, desperate ruse.

I gave a snort, and then started snoring loudly. It sounded utterly ghastly, but it was as close to a human sound as I could make.

“Holy shit,” Casey muttered to himself. The sound of his feet moved off into the hall. “That girl has one hell of a deviated septum.”

If I’d been in two-legged form, I would have turned bright crimson.

My wolf paced back and forth.

, I pleaded.

Was this how it was for Jaxson and Sam? It couldn’t be. Did they just have more control?

, I commanded.

In response, the wolf shoved my soul completely out of the driver’s seat and jumped up on the bed. She faced the mirror with teeth bared and fur bristling and growled.

I warned my wolf. Casey had to have heard her growl and would come to inspect. Sure enough, his footsteps sounded on the stairs again.

“Savy?”

Panic tore at me as my wolf looked around wildly. The window was cracked, and she darted over.

Oh, no.

I tried taking over, but my wolf pushed the window open and leapt out onto the eaves of the second-floor roof. Our feet stumbled and skittered across the shingles.

Fear tore through my mind as we slid toward the edge, but my wolf took control and planted our feet into the gutter just in time. She gave a low growl.

My mind spun. We were trapped on the roof. Casey had probably heard, and if anyone saw us, they’d shoot first and ask questions later.

Unable to control my rising fear, I submitted and withdrew into the shadows of my mind.

.

My wolf padded quickly over the slanted shingles and landed gently on the porch roof like a wolf ninja. Then, with a burst of speed, she jumped off the roof.

My heart caught as we soared through the air and tumbled into the grass below. Paws digging into the turf, my wolf bolted across the lawn and scurried under the bushes on the far side of the yard as the front door burst open. I could smell the scent of my aunt. Breathing hard, my wolf pressed our belly down on the ground and waited, listening. I tried to call my magic to wrap shadows around us, but nothing came.

Apparently, I was completely powerless in this form, both in terms of control and of magic, and that scared me almost as much as Kahanov did.

Eventually, the footsteps receded, and the door slammed shut, though we waited silently to make sure my aunt was truly gone. Did the house have cameras? I hoped not.

What was I going to do?

, I pleaded.

, my wolf replied, scrabbling out from under the bushes and slinking down the street.

, I begged.

My mind swam. She helped me break out of the sanitorium?

I’d ripped through my bonds, though I couldn’t remember how.

it had been her. I hadn’t been that strong before. Kahanov and the freaks in white coats must have injected me with something.

They were the monsters I needed to stop. I could deal with the wolf later.

, I insisted, desperate for any kind of certainty or plan at this point.

It was a couple of miles to Jaxson’s place. Maybe that would be enough…

A car door slammed up ahead, and a powerful engine roared to life.

My wolf looked both ways, then darted north across 74 Street. At that moment, a Mustang convertible swung out onto the road and squealed to an abrupt halt, pointed straight at us.

“Shit!” someone shouted. “Is that a fucking wolf?”

I recognized the voice. And the stench. One of the assholes from the park.

We ran.

Tires screamed on the pavement as the Mustang roared after us. All I could think of was that barren highway in Wisconsin where this had all started and how brutally that had ended.

If they ran me down, would I come back to life over and over again like the werewolf I’d hit?

My wolf swerved across the street and through the strip of tiny yards that fronted the rowhouses. She leapt and bounded, dodging around the bushes, flower beds, and little iron fences. A hedge of hydrangeas exploded into a shower of frozen petals behind us.

We juked and swerved as a ray of frost hit the ground beside us, sheathing each blade of grass with a thick coating of ice.

I screamed at my wolf.

To my horror, she charged the Mustang. The surprised driver slammed on the brakes, and the car twisted sideways. Its tires squealed and left stinking black streaks across the pavement.

I shouted in my head.

My wolf pounced on the hood, then launched over the guys’ astonished faces, landed in the back seat, and spun, snarling and snapping.

The jerks screamed, flailed at the doors, and tumbled out of the still-skidding vehicle. My wolf bolted out of the car and raced across the street in the opposite direction. We ducked down an alley, jumped a fence, and hunkered down beneath someone’s porch.

I said.

I could feel my wolf’s emotions, and it was hard to disentangle them from my own. Triumph. Rage. Protectiveness.

How was I supposed to relate to this new, very spirted, independent part of me?

We placed our head on our paws and waited until we heard the car drive off.

Some laundry fluttered on the clothesline in the adjacent yard.

I asked.

She readjusted her head on her paws.

I tried to shove my wolf out of the driver’s seat, but she wouldn’t budge. Instead, she slipped out from under the porch and headed north.

I was a captive in my own body, forced to watch as my wolf darted across streets, dodged honking cars, and crept from alley to alley.

Our heart raced, and I could feel her terror as she pushed through the savage human world around us. But she kept going, refusing to let me or anything steer her from her course.

And then, amid my own fear and frustration and resentment, I felt the flicker of a new and strange emotion: kinship.