Page 60 of Freed Wolfsbane

The man bares his teeth at me and refuses to even look at the paper I’m holding out to him. “What do you not understand, girl? Private. Property. Now leave.”

My stomach sinks at his vehemence. Sure, we have the map to the hidden portion of the city, but we have no idea how to access it or what we’ll find once we get there. Someone like the shifter guy, who apparently hates our guts, would be super useful to help us navigate it.

I blow out a breath and try again. “Could we rent one of your boats?” Maybe offering to pay him will make him like us better.

Apparently, I said the wrong thing because the man seems even more offended. His eyes start to glow an eerie purple color, and his muscles start to bulge under his plain linen tunic. Staring me down, the man snarls, “I cannot be swayed by money nor anything you have to offer, girl. Now leave before I make you.”

Growls sound around me, my mates not liking the threat any more than I do. But I can’t focus on that because Dido seizes control of my body. I seem to stand taller as the legendary queen booms, “Descendant of Zorus, your commitment to your mission is commendable, but you are needed for a new, extremely important task. I require access to the part of the city that is obscured by magic. Will you show us the way?”

The man’s eyes go comically wide and lose their purple color. “My queen?” he asks, his voice high-pitched with surprise. He looks like he’s about to pass out, his tanned skin turning a sickly green color.

Dido dips her head regally, her grace when she controls my body continually surprising me. “Yes. I am Dido, the first queen of Carthage. Will you help me?”

Who’s Zorus? And who is this guy?I ask.

Dido gets a faraway look in her eyes in my mind, like she’s longing for a time long since gone.“Zorus was the gatekeeper of Carthage. He kept the city secure and protected our inhabitants from invaders. One of the traits of his unique magic was that his eyes glowed Tyrian purple when he was upset or threatened. It makes sense that one of his progeny is guarding the secret part of the city.”

Why do we need him to show us the way? Wasn’t this here when you ruled?

“This part of the city must have existed while I was alive and was the location of our castle. However, before my death, it was not obscured by magic or separated from the rest of the city. It makes sense that things expanded and changed after I no longer ruled because Carthage was fairly young at the time of my death.”

“Of-f-f course,” he stammers as he drops into a low bow. “I am at your service, my queen.”

At his willingness to help us, Dido fades away. The old man still doesn’t move from his uncomfortable-looking bow. “Um, you can get up now if you want.” He straightens and looks at me expectantly. “And you can just call me, Briar. I’m one of Dido’s many times great-granddaughters, but she’s reincarnated into me. What’s your name?”

“I am Jad. Why do you want to see the cloaked portion of the city? It was once beautiful, but it is now overrun with Knights of Aeneas soldiers.” His mouth pulls down at the corners at the thought of the Knights. I don’t blame him, because the Knights suck.

I glance at my mates, wondering if I should trust this guy. Dido seems to, but I don’t know if it’s wise to reveal our plans to a stranger. Malachi stares at the man critically for a moment before giving me a subtle nod. None of my other mates object, so I tell him. “We’re trying to find the source of the curse that keeps female wolves from shifting and break it.”

Jad gasps in surprise. “What makes you think the source of the curse is in there? That part of the city has been abandoned for at least a thousand years.”

Handing him the map, I let him look over it for a moment. His brow furrows as he hands the weathered paper back to me. “According to letters we found in my family vault, Dido’s final resting place is the source of the curse. Another letter helped us find that she’s buried in a hidden part of the city, which I guess wasn’t cloaked in her time?”

He shakes his head. “No. The veil went up before the Romans sacked the city in the third Punic War. This was to protect the most historically important parts of our city. Some Carthaginians continued living here until a thousand or so years ago, and my family never stopped guarding this entrance, even though we were unable to stop the Knights from moving in through the back. All this time we have been searching for her tomb, a closely guarded secret. How did the map maker find it?”

I shrug. “I’m honestly not sure. My grandma Livy didn’t leave us all that much information, other than instructions to find the curse and destroy it.”

Jad’s face falls from learning that I don’t have any more information on how Livy found the burial site. If she were still alive, I’d ask her because I bet it was a pretty wild story. Anything involving the curse is.

Rubbing his unruly white beard, Jad nods to himself. “I will help you access the concealed part of the city.” I grin and start walking toward one of the boats. His sharp voice stops me. “Not here. We need to approach it from the back. The front entrance is heavily guarded by Knights. They’ll pick us off before we even get to the city proper.”

I try not to let the disappointment show on my face that we can’t just get this over with. “Oh. So we can’t leave from here?”

“We have to leave from a different dock, and we should not cross the veil until night falls. That will keep the Knights from noticing us as easily.” Jad limps back to the boathouse, his cane clomping against any rocks it hits. He disappears inside.

I exchange confused glances with my mates, but none of us make a move to follow him. If he wanted us to come into the boathouse, he would’ve said so. I, for one, don’t want to piss off our only way to Dido’s tomb, so I stay where I am.

After several minutes, he emerges from the small plaster structure, clutching a scrap of paper in one hand. He shuffles over to us and thrusts the page at me. I take it and see a neatly written set of coordinates scrawled on it.

When I look up at him questioningly, Jad says, “Meet me at that location at seven this evening. Do not be late. The waters around the veil get rougher and more dangerous the deeper into the night you try to sail them.”

“We can do that.” I give him a small smile that he tentatively returns. His face then turns serious once again as he heads off to inspect one of his boats.

While we portaled here at seven in the morning our time, it’s already four in the afternoon in Tunisia. We have a few hours to kill before we meet back up with Jad. I guess we do have some time to explore the city after all. With a grin, I practically skip down the sandy peninsula and toward the incredibly interesting architecture.

* * *

“I kinda expectedhim to be here early with his insistence on us being on time,” Bastian remarks from where he sits on the dock. His legs are dangling over the crystal clear waters as we watch the last rays of light fade from the sky.

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