Amora! I shout. Hard right. Now!
She doesn’t reply, but her lupine form immediately cuts sharply to the right and darts into the thick copse of trees. Where was this blind obedience weeks ago?
Fucking women.
I don’t realize I’ve “spoken” that aloud until Malix snickers and replies, Can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em.
You’re still on my shit list, I tell him with a growl. For having sex with her against my command.
Despite the danger of the situation, Malix still manages to shoot me a tongue-lolling grin. Twice.
Amora crashes into the undergrowth, and Frost follows after. His larger size lays waste to the trees and branches, opening up a hole large enough for me and Malix to pass through after them.
The forest floor here is so overgrown that Amora has vanished into the shrubs, which was exactly what I was hoping for. Frost snarls and comes to a sliding halt, sticking his snout in the air to scent her.
We take advantage of his distraction and leap on him.
Malix slams into his shoulders, and I go for the head, teeth latching onto one of Frost’s ears. Between us both, we manage to wrestle Frost to the ground, though he begins to thrash like he’s having a seizure. I cling to his ear, cringing when I taste fresh blood on my tongue. Frost slams me into the ground twice on a background of feral snarls. Malix scuffles with him, digging his teeth into Frost’s throat.
I can’t hold on!Malix shouts. Shit!He’s too strong!
I struggle to get my feet beneath me and shove at Frost’s thick skull to pin him to the ground. His hips and lower legs buck and kick. Malix takes a blow to the head and yelps, sailing away into the shadowy undergrowth.
Frost flings me off his bloody ear. I hit the ground hard and brace myself as he lunges. He lands on top of me, fangs bared—
And a dull, hollow thud echoes over the night’s insect song.
Frost stiffens. Then his eyes roll back into his head, and he collapses to the ground next to me.
Amora stands over us in human form, her chest heaving and a thick tree branch clutched in her hand, the heavy end of it resting on the ground. I know from experience that Amora swings a tree branch like a goddamn Major League baseball player. I had a concussion for days after she did it to me.
Her wide green eyes meet mine, then she looks down at Frost’s unconscious body as it slowly shifts to human form. She lets out a little cry that tears my heart wide open. Her fingers convulse and the branch falls to the ground, then she sinks to her knees, looking haunted. Horrified.
I’m not sure what’s upsetting her more in this moment—the fact that Frost has turned into a monstrous beast or that she just knocked out a recently resuscitated man.
I grit my teeth. This entire situation is just fucked up.
Malix and I shift back and quickly track down some thick vines to use as makeshift bindings. We wrap Frost’s ankles together, then bind his hands behind his back, using some of the handy knot tricks Frost himself taught me. I’m not sure they’ll hold if he wakes up, but hopefully Amora hit him hard enough to keep him down for a while.
After checking his pulse and the lump on his head to make sure he’s not too badly injured, I stand, brushing my hands free of dirt. Turning away from his sleeping form, I glance down at Amora where she’s still kneeling on the ground.
“We need to get going,” I say gruffly, averting my gaze so I don’t focus too hard on the hurt in her eyes. I already let my emotions get the best of me while Frost was unresponsive and not breathing. I can’t go back to that place right now. Shoving my emotions down, I tell Malix, “Get him on my back. I’ll carry him.”
“You just carried him like fifteen miles,” Malix argues.
“And I’ll carry him fifteen more,” I snarl, glaring at him as my carefully locked down emotions rage out of control again. “Get him on my back.”
Before he can argue further, I shift to my shadow wolf form and lower to my belly.
Amora scrambles to her feet as Malix leans over to reach for Frost. She hurries around me and goes to Frost’s feet to help lift. After a few moments of him sliding all over my back, they finally get him in a good position, and Malix throws another length of vine around my chest to anchor him in place so that Amora won’t have to sit behind him and hold him steady.
Then Amora and Malix shift back to wolf form, and we’re on the move.
We travel hard, leaving the mountains long before the sun starts to lighten the sky. After a while, we start to pass through farmland, patches of colorful crops and fallow fields dotted by lonesome farmhouses and barns.
Out here, it’s going to be more difficult to find somewhere safe to rest. These houses are occupied by working families, and the first four or five we check out have lights burning and dogs barking inside. So we journey a bit farther, bouncing from house to house as the hazy early morning sky begins to lighten even more. I want us undercover—and Frost locked away for our safety and his—before the rest of the world wakes.
Finally, we come across a two-story white farmhouse with peeling paint and a giant wrap-around porch that’s clearly empty. There are no cars in the drive, no animals in the pens out back, and the barn door swings on creaky hinges in the light breeze. A farm that’s fallen on hard times, maybe, and a family that ended up somewhere else.
Whatever happened here, it makes no difference to me.
Malix and Amora untie the vines securing Frost and pull him off my back, then I shift and walk up the rickety porch stairs to put an elbow through the window beside the door. Glass shatters and rains down at my feet, and I brush away the excess before reaching through to blindly grope for the lock.
One click, and we’re inside.
It’s musty with disuse and smells faintly of mildew, but the furniture is all still here. I pass down a dark hall into the kitchen and poke around in the cabinets—plenty of non-perishables, and the water and electric are both still running.
After one fucking hell of a night, at least luck seems to be favoring us.
Malix joins me in carrying Frost down into the cellar beneath the house. The place is split into two rooms, one with an ancient washer and dryer and all the HVAC hardware, and the other filled with work benches and an array of tools.
“The hot water heater,” I grunt, lifting Frost’s shoulders. “The pipes should be strong enough to hold him.”
Malix nods, and we manhandle Frost’s bulk into the corner next to the water heater. We settle him on the floor as gently as we can, given the fact he’s as boneless as a rag doll.
Once Frost is settled on the stone floor, Malix steps back and brushes off his hands.
“I’ll find some rope or something,” he says quietly, then strides back into the workroom.
I stand stiffly over our brother, staring down at his pale form. A massive bruise is forming just above his right temple, and his shadows jerk and wave irritably all over his naked body.
He was dead. The excess shadows Quinton forced into his body destroyed him like parasites from the inside. He had no heartbeat. The warmth was fading from his skin.
It’s a fucking miracle he’s alive.