‘You know I didn’t want it to be this way,’ Jared told her through the bond as the wind whipped past her face, making it impossible to hear anything.
‘I know,’ Cassie replied. And she did know. He was completely serious about not forcing her into anything, and as far as she saw it, he wasn’t. His father was the one forcing her.
Jared slowed down.
‘Here already?’ she asked.
‘Close enough.’
Cassie slowly opened her eyes and adjusted to the moonlight that lit the woods around her. There was enough light to see dimly, but she had nowhere near the sight of Jared. He didn’t seem to even notice the dark around them. Jared moved to set her down, and Cassie clung to his neck.
‘No shoes, remember?’
Jared held her and scooped her back up. ‘Sorry. I forgot. I never wear shoes anymore. I’m always transforming and wrecking them, so I just stopped wearing them.’
‘Well, no super monster feet here, even if I come from night humans,’ Cassie added, readjusting her arms inside Jared’s coat. She wasn’t looking forward to the cool air when he finally did have to set her down.
Cassie saw the bodies standing around before she saw the stones. Several stones—at least ten feet high—jutted out of the ground. The men who were waiting around stood amongst them, facing what Cassie had to assume was the center as she could see faces in the distance between the men whose backs she saw. As they neared the men, the ones she saw were on the outer edge. There was a ring of men standing shoulder-to-shoulder with a large empty space in the middle—at least thirty feet in diameter. There were flat stones where all the men stood, and Cassie saw that she wouldn’t need shoes at all.
Jared gently set Cassie down behind the men.
‘Do you feel any magic?’ Jared asked.
Cassie closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
‘Yes. Someone created a casting circle of power with the men of the circle inside it,’ Cassie explained.
‘And what can we do about it?’ Jared helped her with her potions before, but now that she could see inside his head, it was more of a physical help because he knew nothing of magic.
‘Where is your father?’
‘Standing directly north,’ Jared replied. It was his spot at every function.
‘Can we come in on the south side, directly across from him?’
Jared took her hand and walked her around the circle clockwise from where he had set her down. He stopped outside the men, and she looked at the ground. There, behind the men who formed the inner circle, was a stone with magic etched into it.
‘Do you see that stone?’ Cassie sent Jared a picture in her mind.
‘Yes,’ he replied.
‘That writing needs to be scraped off and then the spell will be incomplete. It would be even better to hit all four ordinals to the circle, but just one should weaken it enough to make whatever he had planned not work,’ Cassie explained.
‘Where should the other ones be?’
‘I can’t tell from here,’ she replied.
‘Could you tell from inside the circle?’
‘Yes, but you wouldn’t be able to pay me to cross the line while those are intact. I have no idea what my cousin can do.’
‘Or your uncle,’ Jared added, looking around. ‘Do you trust me?’
That was a loaded question. Did she trust him? The old Jared, her friend, growing up? She trusted him. Wendigo Jared she kind of trusted, but not the same. Right now? She wanted to trust him, but he had to do whatever his father told him. It was hard to trust with that.
Reaching down, Jared threaded his fingers through hers and held her hand.
‘No. I don’t follow his rule now. He’s the alpha, but you come first. We are bonded. He can’t make me do anything to hurt you because it would hurt myself,’ Jared explained, not minding that she just mentally admitted she didn’t trust him.
Cassie took a deep breath. Jared was looking for her trust.
‘Gonna fill me in on what’s coming next, or do I just wing it?’ There wasn’t much more she could do. The spell was etched in stone.
‘Nope. Just let your mate take care of all this,’ Jared replied and gave her a wink.
Jared led Cassie up to the south side of the circle. She felt the magic pulsing off the circle and really didn’t want to know what spell was cast there. Her reflection spell would only give them one chance, and it probably wasn’t best to use her trump card at the beginning of the night. Jared paused as he stood on the stone with the symbol etched into it. She could feel inside him as something switched. It wasn’t until she heard the scratching at their feet before she looked down to see his long sharp claws running across the symbol. The power behind the circle cast melted away.
‘Guess that will do,’ Cassie replied.
‘Not quite. I don’t like taking chances, so I will let you go in the middle and make my way around to the other ones before we do this.’ Jared leaned down and kissed her forehead.
“I’ll meet you in there,” he promised out loud.
The men standing inside the now defunct circle moved out of the way to let Cassie pass.
Jared kept behind the circle while urging her forward. Taking a deep breath and holding her head high, she entered the ring of men, at least they were still in the form of men, but she knew each person there was really a wendigo. She preferred they stay as men.
Jared walked around the circle slowly, breaking it along the way.
‘Where is the west one?’ Jared asked. Cassie was happy to not have to look at the wooden post she was approaching and turned to watch him instead.
‘The blond-haired guy, two more ahead.’
Jared paused and scraped his nails across that rock, too, destroying the second spell that had been placed.
‘The north one is behind your father,’ Cassie added.
He didn’t head that way, but turned and walked back the way they came.
‘East one?’
‘Behind the guy that looks like he’s ready to transform,’ Cassie added as Jared neared the man. His eyes kept flashing to red, like he had no control over the beast inside of him.
Jared scratched out the stone before going behind his father to do the same. Cassie stopped walking to the center of the circle. A large, almost completely circular stone made up the center of the circle of men. Cassie didn’t want to even touch it. She could feel the evil coming off it and the blood which had been shed. Hundreds of people had died there. Glancing at the post protruding out of the middle of the stone, she saw that chains and a rope hung from it. Jared finished scraping out the spell and messing up the circle of power. It was safe for them to be inside it now. Jared moved to his father’s right side while Ryder stood at his left.
“Grand entrance as always, Son,” Ben said more than loud enough for everyone to hear. A couple of the men in the circle chuckled.
Jared gave him a grim smile as he looked to Cassie standing in the middle of the circle.
Ben waved his hand. “Go to her; you won’t be any fun until you’re with her.”
He spoke like it was a big, friendly meeting; not a bunch of blood hungry monsters who were standing around licking their lips like they would be getting a taste of Cassie soon. She was more than happy to take Jared’s outstretched hand. Moving behind her, he wrapped his protective arms around her waist.
“I take it you still want to bond instead of feed on her?” Ben asked, and a few more of the men chuckled.
“That’s never been a question,” Jared responded seriously, even if his father was joking or not.
Ben shrugged. “Oh, well. What can I do? I raised him to be strong and independent, and this is what I get. Fine. Get the show done so we can move on with other details.”
He acted like he was bored, but his eyes said otherwise. He still was assessing Cassie and making a decision about her. Jared turned Cassie in his arms so that her back was to his father, then lowered his head to her and placed his nose t
ip to tip with her own. His large brown eyes stared at her.
Jared’s memory flowed from him to Cassie. They were young, maybe six or seven, and Nate was home sick. Cassie and Jared were alone and ran around the park on their own while John was sleeping on a bench. Jared had asked John to watch them because he hoped he would fall asleep. It was fall after all. Cassie and Jared had just barricaded themselves under one of the slides with the sand piled all the way up to the steps. Beyond their feet, no one would have been able to guess where they were. The space was small, and if alone, one would have been able to hide, but together, they were squished into it. Cassie and Jared had been having much fun under the steps as they never could fit all three of them under it.
‘That was the first time I realized I didn’t want to share you with Nate. I didn’t want to have to share you with anyone. That was the day I realized that maybe I wanted you to be more than just my friend,’ Jared explained.
Cassie smiled at him. She could see it through his eyes, but with the bond, she felt it also. He had loved her much longer than she knew. Cassie hated that her memories had been taken from her, but even more so that she could have ever forgotten Jared. He was as much a part of her childhood as anything else.
‘Ready to act your heart out?’ Jared asked.
‘Hey, you’re the one that has to do the acting. I just need to play along,’ Cassie reminded him.
Jared pulled his head back.
“Should we tie her up?” one of the older wendigo asked, licking his lips.
“Yeah, she looks like she might be a fainter,” another one added.
Jared ignored them, and Cassie tried to do the same. It was much harder to ignore Ben’s presence behind her, though. He was staring intently, and even without looking at him, Cassie could get a feeling from him. He was anxious and starting to doubt Jared and Cassie again. Even Jared had noticed.
After pulling a pocket knife out of his pants, Jared flicked it open and handed it to Cassie blade side away from her. Staring at him, she took it.
“Um, yeah.” She wasn’t exactly sure what she was supposed to do. They had been planning what to do if something went wrong, but didn’t spend any time going over what was supposed to go right.
Jared held out his hand.
“Since I get to feed on you, only fitting you get to make the cut on me,” he explained.
‘Serious?’ Cassie asked across the bond, looking at his hand first and then his eyes. She hadn’t even considered that she would be doing that.
‘Serious.’
Cassie took his hand in hers. Images flashed before her eyes of the future she had seen. His hands were almost the same, but slightly different. They were the same size and shape, but rougher. His life had been harder this time than it should have been, but she liked the outcome much better. Cassie held the knife above his palm but stopped. She couldn’t do it. No matter if it was an eye for an eye, she couldn’t cut him.
Smiling, he reached up with his other hand and touched her cheek. “Never could be mean. Glad to see that hasn’t changed.”
As Jared took his hand away from her face, he put it on top of her hand holding the knife, pressing the blade into his hand. Cassie would have squealed if there weren’t many people watching. Jared released her hand then flicked the blade shut. Cassie squeezed her own hand, which had the same cut forming on it.
‘Shoot. I didn’t think of that,’ Jared told her.
‘Can you smell it?’ Cassie asked. She had been ready for it and kept her hand shut the whole time.
‘No. I felt it as it cut you, too,’ Jared replied.
Cassie tried to not let out a sigh. Ben was behind her waiting for any reason to swoop in and stop it from happening.
“You first.” He held up his bleeding hand for her.
Cassie took his hand and quickly licked the blood off it. The cut on his hand had already closed up, which meant hers was healed as well. She didn’t dare unclench her fist, though, in case the dried blood gave it away.
Jared dropped Cassie’s hand as he began to move behind her. A few of the men snickered when he did so, but Jared ignored them. He stopped directly behind her and brushed her hair off her neck, exposing the main vein they liked to feed upon. Cassie knew exactly what was coming next.
‘It won’t hurt,’ Jared tried to reassure her.
Cassie turned around in his arms, knowing what she would be facing. “If we are going to do this, we aren’t having secrets,” she told a shocked Jared.
His shock instantly faded as he gazed into her eyes. She still had nightmares about the wendigo that had hunted her, but she was being brave now. She needed to see that side of him. She needed to be able to let go of the part of her that still looked at him and saw his leopard instead of the wendigo. She needed to see the real Jared.
“You know I have to transform to do this,” Jared replied, touching her face gently.
“That’s okay.”
“But the wendigo scare you,” Jared added. “Cas, I know how you feel about us.” And he did know. Cassie couldn’t hide it from him if she tried, but she didn’t try. He could see into her mind now and knew exactly what she went through.
Reaching up with her free hand, she touched his face. Even though she didn’t know him like she once did, he was still Jared. Deep inside of him was the same boy that had been her best friend. Deep inside was the young man that would have gone to every length to find a way to be with her. That much of him didn’t change.
“Yes, the wendigo scare me, but that’s just it. They scare me, not you. You could never scare me.”
Jared’s lips were kissing her before she could even react. Cassie heard chuckles and a few cat-calls around her from the men who were watching. However, the noise around him didn’t stop Jared from kissing her. Cassie held onto him when he finally pulled away.
Taking a step back, he slid his hand into hers. The young man with chocolate eyes and dusty brown hair melted into the same monster that haunted Cassie. His body morphed with his legs elongating and popping backward and fur sprouting on him from head-to-toe. His long, sharp-clawed hand still held her, being careful to keep her from the edges of the claws. Cassie looked up into the beady red eyes and didn’t even flinch. He was identical to her dreams, but she didn’t feel the fear that came with that day. He looked like the monster, but he wasn’t the monster. Inside, Jared was still the pure heart that Cassie had grown up with. Jared was still Jared behind the fur.
‘You really don’t fear me,’ Jared said across the bond.
‘Because you are still you.’
Cassie flicked her hair back and tilted her neck, knowing exactly what had to come next. The guys around the circle hungrily licked their lips, but Cassie didn’t look away from Jared. He slowly leaned down closer to her. She felt his breath upon her neck but didn’t flinch. It was Jared after all, no matter how he looked.
Jared was right. Cassie didn’t even feel it when he bit into her. She only knew when it happened because she was connected mentally with him. Slowly pulling back, Jared recalled what it felt like only hours ago when he first transformed. Cassie stood still and watched in awe.
His black fur receded as he morphed back into a more human shape. His body bent back into shape while the wolf-like face receded into a cat-like human face. Jared changed slowly and stood up to his now full height. He looked directly at his father and his father nodded to him. All the men around them erupted into cheers.
Ben nodded to Jared when he took Cassie’s hand and led her over to the spot in the circle waiting for them. Jared was standing at his father’s right hand. Ben patted Jared on the back before taking Cassie’s hand in his own, pulling her cut hand loose from her own grasp, keeping it shut.
“Welcome to the family, Cassie.”
He turned her hand over where the blood was dried and licked it.
“Go get the main course,” Ben called across the circle to the guy standing right near the south stone, which was marked. The men in
the circle waited, talking to their neighbors before Ben turned back to Cassie and Jared.
“I don’t know how you stopped yourself from draining her. She tastes much better than all the previous witches we’ve fed upon,” Ben commented.
Jared looked to his father. Cassie got the distinct feeling that the we Ben used did not include Jared. He had explained more than once that he only drank hospital donated blood, and had never fed on anyone before binding to Cassie.
‘You said to bind by tonight. We didn’t disobey your orders,’ Jared told him mentally.
Ben smiled. ‘I didn’t mean you had to bind her that way.’
Jared kept sneaking a peek across the circle where the men behind the circle had parted, and the one that had gone away was making his way back.
‘What way?’ Cassie asked Jared.
‘He thinks we had sex,’ Jared replied, keeping his eyes on the people approaching.
‘What?’ Cassie felt her face turning redder than it ever had. She had been trying to convince Ben she and Jared were in love, but she wasn’t thinking of taking it that far.
“I’d love to have a couple dozen grandbabies.” Ben chuckled as Cassie turned even redder. “And the sooner, the better. Our clan has gotten smaller over the years.”
Cassie would have continued to be mortified, but she finally realized what they were doing across the circle. The man who just left had entered with a girl whose hands were tied in front of her. She had cuts up and down her bare arms, and she was wearing an outfit similar to Cassie’s, except it was strapless.
“Help me please,” the girl begged each person she passed. “I was trying to get away from the coven. I didn’t know this was your land. I’ll go away. I promise I’ll never come back. I promise.”