Bayou Moon (The Edge #2)(86)
Author: Ilona Andrews

She was his mate.

The wild in him scratched and howled, demanding her, demanding to taste her, to touch her, to take her away somewhere safe, where there would be only him and her. He stared at the Mire pines. It was not a sure thing. She hadn’t promised him anything. Her mood might have changed, and he might have missed his chance.

And tomorrow they would be in a fight for their lives.

Cerise was coming up the stairs. He listened to the sound of her steps, light and fluid. She came to stand next to him, looking at the woods.

"I’ve heard," William told her to save her the trouble.

"How good is your hearing?"

"Good enough."

"It would mean a lot to me if you would brief my family on the kind of enemies they could expect."

She made no move to touch him. He was right. She had changed her mind. "Sure."

"Tonight will be very busy for me," she said. "The afternoon will be very busy, too."

Fine. He got the message. She didn’t want him to bother her.

"There is an old storehouse on the edge of our lands, past the wards. We use it to dry out herbs. Because it’s past the ward line, the family rarely goes there. In about a minute I’ll walk down these steps and head to that storehouse. If someone were to wait about ten minutes, so nobody would get suspicious, he could meet me there."

It took him a minute. She was inviting him. "Where’s the barn?"

Her eyes sparked with a wicked gleam. "I’m not going to tell you."

What the hell?

Cerise arched her dark eyebrows. "It’s too bad that you don’t have any dogs, Lord Bill. If you had one, you could track my scent and chase me down, like a hunter. Through the woods. Imagine that."

She turned and headed down the stairs.

Bloody hell. He loved that woman.

Ten minutes later, two hundred yards separated William from the main house. Far enough. He shrugged off his shirt. His boots and pants followed. For a moment William stood, savoring the feel of cold air on his skin, and then he let the wild out.

His body buckled and twisted. His spine bent. Fur sheathed his legs.

William inhaled deep, letting the breath of the forest permeate him. Excitement flooded him, turning him stronger, faster, sharper. The sounds of the swamps amplified in his ears. The colors turned vivid, and he knew his eyes had gained their own glow, the pale yellow fire fed by magic.

William tossed back his head and sang a long lingering note, a hymn to the thrill of the hunt, the pulse of prey between his teeth, and the taste of hot blood, spilled after a long chase. The little furry things shrank back into their hiding places, between the roots and into the hollows, sensing a predator in their midst.

Cerise’s scent tasted sweet. William laughed in the quiet wolf way and broke into a run, falling into a longgaited, smooth rhythm. He had an appointment to keep with a beautiful girl who had agreed to meet a changeling in the deep woods.

A wolf howled. Vur stirred on the branch. It had been nearly a week since Spider sent him and Embelys to spy on the Mar land. He was sick of the outdoors and doubly sick of spending his time in a tree.

Movement. His round yellow eyes fixed on a small figure running at full speed out of the woods. She dashed across the clear ground and ran into a rickety old barn.

Vur reached over and pulled the tangle of dried moss and shredded cloth that served as Embelys’s robe. She uncurled, the swirls on her arms and face fluctuating, as she unconsciously mimicked the cypress bark that had grown damp overnight.

Her body bent to an unnatural angle, until her head was level with his. "It’s her."

Vur nodded. A single spotted feather fluttered from his shoulder. Spring was in full swing and he was molting again.

They watched the barn door swing closed.

"Should we take her now?" Vur asked.

"It’s foolish of her to leave the house alone," Embelys said. "She’s meeting someone."

Embelys’s hand snapped, and she dragged a squirming bug into her mouth, crunching him with obvious pleasure. "Besides, she’s skilled. And unlike Lavern, I find being sliced with a flash painful."

"Lavern is dead." Vur shrugged, sending two more feathers floating to the tangled roots of the cypress.

"My point exactly." She pulled back, settling on the branch, her legs hugging the trunk, and rested her head against the bark.

"So we wait?"

"We wait."

A giant black wolf sprinted to the barn from under the trees.

Embelys hissed.

The wolf leaped. His body twisted, his bone and muscle wrung like a length of dark fabric. Fur shed, melting into the air as it fell. Arms stretched, legs elongated, rocked by convulsions, and a nude man rose from the dirt. He shook himself, and for a moment Vur saw his face and his eyes, hazel, still glowing.

William the Wolf.

The man slipped into the barn.

Vur sat petrified, afraid to move.

William the Wolf. William the murderer. The changeling beast who hunted the Hand’s agents. The only man who stood against Spider and lived.

Slowly the fear melted. The Wolf was only one man. Just a man.

"We have to warn Spider," Embelys whispered. "He must know."

"You go. I’ll stay."

"Are you mad?"

"I can glide. He can’t. I’ll watch over him. Go."

"Suit yourself."

She twisted, disengaging from the trunk, and slithered down, speeding along the forest floor.

Vur gathered himself, calculating. William was just a man, a man who was meeting a girl, for sex. He would be satiated and sloppy afterward, and the poison on Vur’s claws was very potent. If he timed it just right . . . The head of William the Wolf would assure he was set for life.

WILLIAM glanced through a small window. The storehouse was freshly swept. Bundles of herbs hung drying from the rafters, spicing the air with bitter fragrance. He caught a glimpse of Cerise’s dark hair as she headed up the ladder to the second story.

He backed up, took a running start, and leapt, scrambling up the wall to the roof. The small attic window was open. Inside Cerise unfolded a quilt over a pile of hay. He dove through the window and rolled to his feet.

Cerise froze with a quilt in her hands. Her pale shirt hugged her breasts. Her long dark hair spilled over it in a glossy wave. Her dark eyes, framed by a fringe of long eyelashes, widened. "You’re naked!"

So pretty. Must have the woman.

He pulled the wild back. No. Not yet. He had one shot at this.

William circled her, stalking, tasting her scent, watching her watching him. "Do you like what you see?"

She tilted her head, spilling her long hair over one breast. Her gaze traveled slowly from his face down to his toes. She took a deep breath. "Yes."