Page 88 of Forbidden Wolf

Tasha

Two weeks had passed since the hellspawn attack on the lycan pack facility. New laws had been agreed so that we could form elite squads that would be trained specifically in hellspawn detection. Scientists were working around the clock alongside Radar to design new weapons. War had officially been declared, and battle lines had been drawn.

The hellspawn had disappeared from the cave network we discovered a few months ago. They weren’t gone, and a deep fear niggled in me that they were regrouping and planning their next attack. I heard their voices constantly as an ambient white noise, and my hands detected a background presence of them. They’d infested the planet while we were distracted with fighting each other. Now it was our job to track them down and exterminate them.

“Hand me up that camera,” Radar said. His left hand had transformed into a claw to allow him to cling to the wall of the cave. He was installing cameras and other detection equipment into the caves so that if the hellspawn returned we would be able to monitor them inside.

I passed the camera up before exploring further. My fingers traced along the wall of the cave, and an involuntary shiver raced up at my back. It almost felt as if the energy of the hellspawn was infused into the stone structure. The voices muttering in my head got louder the longer I touched the wall.

Scratches were engraved into areas deeper into the cave. I bent down to study them, noting that some were merely gouges but some had a pattern to them.

“Levi,” I called, still studying them, my finger tracing over the patterns.

A few seconds later, he appeared beside me. He raised one eyebrow in question as he watched me.

“Do these symbols mean anything to you?” I asked.

He crouched beside me. “Shit. I haven’t seen this in a long time. My grams used to sketch these when I was little to leave messages for me to follow.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a very basic language that lycans used in their wolf forms since we couldn’t write letters with our paws. Our ancestors developed messages that could be left for other lycans to read.” He shook his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. “They don’t even teach this in the schools anymore.”

“Do you think the wolves enslaved by the hellspawn left these?” The memory of the huge black wolves floated into my head. That master hellspawn seemed to prefer black wolves, the chains around their necks the mark of a proud race forced into submission.

Levi scraped the edge of one of the marks before sniffing it. “These are relatively fresh, so it seems the most likely explanation. We’ll need to record these and interpret them later.”

“What does it say?” I asked, curiosity warring with trepidation inside me.

“I can’t remember all of the language, but this set here means danger and to turn back.” He pointed to a set of scratches before moving to another area. “This talks about an enemy in the shadows.”

Levi leaned back to study the markings before he trailed his fingers through his messy hair.

“Radar, we need to record all these etchings,” he said while standing, his eyes glued on the wall.

His reaction told me that we should be worried. The energy of his wolf was still when I normally felt him constantly pacing inside Levi. The silence meant his wolf was carefully watching everything and ready to strike if needed.

“What am I recording?” Radar asked, looking around the cave.

“These scratches on the wall,” Levi replied, pointing to some of them.

Radar’s eyebrows shot up. “What are you thinking?”

“That it is runic lycanese, and those wolves he had with him are enslaved lycans from a long-forgotten time. I’ll need to take them to Grams to interpret, since she taught me the basics when I was little.”

Radar’s eyes widened. “Fuck!”

Levi sighed. “Yeah, tell me about it.”

The entire way home, Levi sat staring out the window of the helicopter, his thumb absently rubbing against the pulse point on my wrist. His expression was pensive, and his forehead wrinkled.

“Talk to me,” I urged when we got to our room.

“When our pack moved to Guyana, my dad’s mum stayed behind. Her mate had disappeared, and she refused to stop looking for him, convinced he was still alive. I was never supposed to know, but he was a black wolf. She told me when she was teaching me those symbols. Dad had been furious with her for showing me them since they’d been outlawed a century ago.”

I sat on our bed cross-legged and watched him pace. “What now?”

“Now I’ll have to reach out to her and see if she’s willing to meet me. Grams was hurt when the pack moved away and has become a recluse.”

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