Page 76 of WitchCurse
You shouldn’t take that,I admonished him. We had no idea what the darkness would do to him.
It’s from this world? All of these?He leapt on another shadow, tearing into the gelatinous bits of it.Outside like peppermint marshmallows, inside black licorice, strange. Not filling at all, is it helping you?More of the shadows began to run, trying to escape, but most were too engorged from overfeeding they lumbered rather than skittered.
They are delightful,I told him as I launched myself at them, devouring down the gooey bits, shoving the darkness toward Toby, and shedding the excess life energy back into the ground. It was a natural cycle, the ground accepting the excess magic like it had long been starved.
Since I could hear Toby, sense him hunting them on his own, and him shoving energy into me, I kept focused on the hunt, thrilled to be free of worry for a few minutes. It was like being that wild child again, heat burning in a furnace of power, but nothing unbalanced. The ground sprung to life beneath my paws as I leapt into batch after batch of cheeky shadows.
We ran about, chasing the slow shadows, although a few were small and quick, and those were the best, as launching after them reminded me of hunts of old. Toby seemed to echo my joy as he stalked in the opposite direction, hunting, devouring, and feeding me all the warm gooey bits of wild magic from this world, but keeping the darkness.
When I glanced back Toby’s way, expecting to find him in a merry hunt, as I could feel his pleasure over the raging battle, part of the shadows running and him catching them, like a game of cat and mouse, but I froze when I saw him, horrified. He was an enormous thing, covered in spikes of ice, and snow blanketing his fur.
Toby…I muttered through the bond, fearing he’d be lost by the rising pull of theHuntinfection. Had I not freed him of that with our bond?
He turned his wolfen gaze my way, which blazed bright and gold, full of my power, and life.Feed, he demanded, shaking his fur, sounding like ice breaking, though he was still the monstrous thing twice my size now.
Was it the darkness making him this way? The next handful of shadows I devoured and kept the darkness, storing it away behind the barrier, much to his ire. He would not give me any of the dark bits he took, only shoving the strength of the wild magic into me. Instead of storing the extra wildness, I cast it back to the earth watching things sprout and grow, until the earth pulsed with life again, aching with the strength of development and renewal on its sleepy winter bones.
It was near dawn when we’d finished. The bounty of the area making me tired, sluggish, and wishing for a long nap. I cast off the energy I could, added to shields, and even sent batches through the bond to Nick, though I could barely feel him in the distance. Toby was a giant thing, much like legends in books Nick had loved about the wolfen monsters that hunted the northern realms of this world.
Toby sneezed, shaking again, and eyes began to light up on the edge of the woods. I jolted to my feet, having not sensed them coming at all, but we were surrounded by theHunt. Dozens of them, some wolves, many not, but all on the edges of the newly awoken land, watching with red eyes.
He looked their way, more in irritation than worry, set his muzzle to the sky and howled. I flinched, it was a sound unlike anything I’d ever heard, deep and guttural and filled with command. Not the howling like the wolf pack did on its group hunt nights, but like the stories of a banshee wail, calling for death, or foretelling it.
TheHuntbeasts moved as one, vanishing into the darkness as though frightened away. Toby’s gaze found me, eyes a mix of gold-ringed blue. I tried to sense for the darkness he took, but couldn’t distinguish it like I could within myself.
Mortals are a mix of dark and light,Toby said lazily as he approached me.It is why they are creation and destruction, not all that unlike the kitsune, if only on a smaller scale.
But kitsune were magic, most mortals were not.
Change to your human form, he commanded.
I frowned, but shifted with ease, wrapping my mortal clothes back around me for added warmth, though the heat of my magic still raged like it hadn’t in centuries. Standing in the open area which beat like a heart, funneling strength and life into the ground, I couldn’t help but wonder at the entire process. I had never shed power back into the ground in Underhill, it hadn’t been possible, as if the terrain of Underhill had been dead, or at least barren, and couldn’t accept the life I could provide. But here in the mortal realm, I had the option to keep it, and grow into something massive, uncontrolled, or feed it back. It couldn’t be that easy, could it? Eating the shadows and restoring life to the mortal realm? It was a job too large for one kitsune, but gave me hope that maybe, just maybe, I’d have a chance of holding the monster at bay.
Do you feel out of control?Toby asked.Darkness demanding freedom? Hunger raging?
No. Not at all. Though my body still ached like it was healing the long centuries of abuse. I felt the wind on my skin, and life thrumming through my bones. I waved a hand at him. “But at what cost? Can you turn back into you? Or are you forever stuck as aHuntbeast?”
He shook again, the ice shattering and his form returning to that of the regular wolf. Then he shifted, body changing from wolf to human, never as quick or flawless as the kitsune shift came, and it looked painful, but he stood before me as himself a moment later. Unabashed by his nudity, even in the cold he crossed the distance to reach for me. Taking my face with his hands, he kissed me.
I breathed deep, tasting the warmth of him, finding him pulsing with heat rather than ice. Maybe it was okay that he took the darkness? I couldn’t imagine what the giant well of it I had stored for millennia would do to him, but small trickles might be okay. I sank into his kiss, enjoying his touch as he wove his fingers beneath my shirt. His body pressed against me, and I wondered if it was okay to want more?
“Feels nice to not be dying?” He asked against my lips, a smile on his face.
“My skin feels alive, yes.” Heat pooled to my groin and I pulled him in tight against me, enjoying the sound of pleasure he made.
He reached up to grip my braid, wrapping the length his fist and using it to pull me closer. I’d always thought of him as thelittlewolf because compared to the alpha he was small, but in human form he wasn’t much different in size than me, not as broad or muscular as Nick, but firm and strong. Toby plastered himself to my chest, his other hand taking a firm grip on my bottom to grind himself against me. He was happy to be there, my wolf.
“So happy to be here,” Toby said, nipping the edge of my chin. “Sadly, as much as I want to hold you down and slide into this raging heat of yours,” he sighed as images of the act filled my mind. “You need to make up with Nick.”
I blinked. “What?”
“I can’t have you before he does, it wouldn’t be fair. If this is going to work, the three of us, there has to be boundaries, rules, and Nick is madly in love with you.” Toby slowly released his grip on me and stepped away, the space between us chilling instantly in the wind of the early morning.
“And I love Nick,” I said, thinking the words a bit silly, as mortals said them often without meaning.
“Do you really?” Toby asked. “You care for him, I can feel that, but do you love him?”
“You’re not worried for yourself?” I asked, recalling the many novels Nick read that were modern world romances. Love was a strange concept in this world. The alpha loved the little fox, that was a mated pair, fate binding them together until madness was the only alternative to their love.
