Page 29 of Wolf Spell

Then Luke waved to the pentacle made of skulls. “Though no doubt this nonsense helped enrage and empower Loren’s soul. I guess that’s her skull in the centre?”

I swallowed hard. “She was burned alive. It could be…”

A chill shuddered through me.

Was it Lisa’s skull?

Lycaon touched my arm. “We will need to put all these souls to rest.”

We jumped, startled at the sound of something smashing into the warding that Luke had set up.

On the other side of Luke’s diaphanous barrier, the dark shadows of werewolves threw themselves against it.

I tried to stop shaking. “This may be a stupid question, but how do spirits have a physical presence, slamming against the barrier?”

Luke raised his brows and shrugged. “Energy. They’ve been manifested with nefarious power, that power is what you’re hearing. They won’t get in. They don’t have the power of my blood. But it won’t last long.”

I pulled the spell bottle from my pocket. “Is that Marrock’s pack?”

Lycaon’s voice was hoarse as he strode over to it, peering up close. “No. In fact, these are the damned souls of werewolves. Made even more powerful by this infernal pentacle, I imagine.”

Lycaon turned to face the shifter. “Luke? I’d pick the werewolf skulls up, but no doubt they’re hexed. The skulls of the damned, their souls need to be blessed and destroyed.”

Luke nodded. “You want to do this now?”

Glancing back to the warded wall, Lycaon nodded. “Yes. It can’t wait.”

Shrugging, Luke replied, “Ok. I have a trick. Elsa, Lycaon, say a blessing for their souls.”

Confused for a moment, Lycaon screwed up his face, then mumbled a prayer in Latin, whilst I did a blessing for the witch’s skull, whoever she was.

Luke took a long breath, his lean body filling with air, then he bellowed fire, on every skull except the witch’s.

Immediately a calm descended over us. Luke’s eyes narrowed. “Elsa, I’ll leave the witch’s skull to you. Are you ready to get this spell done?”

I nodded. “Aren’t you going to take Austin, Marrock, Grace and Hakon on your back?”

Twisting his lips he mused on my words. “It’s always a risk for me, changing into dragon form. My dragon, as you saw is so big, easily spotted by mortals. It’s far easier to open a loop as I am and whisk us away.”

I turned the small bottle over in my hands. “If it’s easier to transport through a time loop, then why did you arrive here as a dragon?”

With a wry smile on his lips, he said, “To rescue you lot. I find that shifting into a bloody huge dragon and annihilating your enemies with dragon fire generally works fast. Now that’s done, for now at least, well...”

Lycaon bent down, touched the end of a dart that had wedged in Marrock’s arm. Carefully he dabbed his finger tip near the wound then smelt it. He wrinkled his face, leering away.

“Wolfsbane. I’m not sure what else.”

Dismissing it, Luke flicked his wrist. “Don’t panic, mate. We’ll sort them out when I get them home, once this spell is cast.”

He raised his brows at me. “Alright then, Elsa, a drop of dragon's blood? You ready?” He nodded to the warding and continued, “It’s holding but we only have about another five minutes and I need to conserve my energy to get us out of here.”

Lycaon stared at the shadow werewolves. Although the skulls in the pentacle had been obliterated with a blessing, the shadow wolves remained, except now they just peered through, their arms limp by their sides.

“Lupine souls chained to the woods… Who the hell is behind all this?”

The wolf spirit's eyes were just empty eye sockets, like an abyss waiting to suck you in, to consume you. I tried and failed to brace a shiver. They were the type of golem that feeds off your soul.

Trying to keep my voice steady, I already felt I’d bitten off more than I could chew. Turning to Luke, I asked, “did you see many others in the forest? Where are they from? I can’t catch their scent.”

---