The Witchling Apprentice

  Cassie would have just about had a heart attack if Jared hadn’t made a perfectly-timed appearance, already in full swing at Ryder. His fist only connected with Ryder for a moment before Jack stopped him from continuing.

  “Ryder, tone it down,” Jack ordered.

  Ryder just smiled at Jared.

  “Sorry about that jerk,” Jared apologized to Cassie. She didn’t trust any of the three guys, but Ryder just made it on to her avoid-at-all-costs list.

  “How do we get up to the greenhouse without setting off the charms?” Jack asked.

  “We need the key from Mrs. Anton’s office,” Cassie replied. “If the doors are unlocked the normal way, the spells are inactivated.”

  Jack flashed away, leaving Cassie with Jared glaring at Ryder. Jack came back with a ring of keys jingling on his finger. Cassie nodded and led the way upstairs. Breaking into the school was weird, but it wasn’t like she owed the coven anything. They were almost as bad as Jack and his scary friends.

  Cassie waited at the door to the greenhouse while Jack tried each key one by one. Finally, he got the door open, but he paused. He turned to Ryder first.

  “They’re yours to take care of,” he told him. Ryder gave his sinister grin and took off down the stairs back the way they came.

  “We have some company, so pick it fast,” Jack told Cassie.

  Cassie weaved through the rows of plants and to the back where they had a full garden. Castilleja mollis grew best on the ground with other plants in the same family. Cassie knelt as shouting grew outside the door, and pushed through the plants to find the right one. Jack stood guard behind her as she did so.

  “Got it,” Cassie said, taking just enough to finish her spell.

  Jared offered her his hand to stand and Cassie took it. Grabbing the leaves, Jack shoved them in his coat.

  “Time to leave,” he said as the door burst open.

  Cassie’s heart skipped a beat as the room grew dusty and all she saw were large clawed hands hanging at the side of the person who’d just entered.

  “I’d advise you to take your hands off my mate,” Nate growled.

  Cassie looked down and noticed Jared was still holding her hand from helping her stand.

  “Your mate? Seems you can’t keep track of her, so maybe she isn’t yours after all,” Jared replied smugly.

  “I found her here,” Nate replied as he silently stalked closer, just as quietly as he had in the barn.

  Jared tightened his grip on Cassie’s hand.

  “Where we come from, we don’t mate without consent. Did you ever explain to Cassie what you were getting her into when you marked her?” Jared asked. His voice was steady, but he sounded upset.

  Having no clue why he cared so much, Cassie stared at him. They planned to do the same to her, but in a much more permanent way.

  “Cassie, I’d advise you to step back. This won’t be pretty when I get done, and I don’t want to get you dirty,” Nate told her. The blue flashed in his eyes.

  “Two on one and you’re worried about her getting dirty?” Jared taunted. “If I were you I’d worry about yourself.”

  “I’m not worried about that, even if it was two against one, but I didn’t come here alone,” Nate replied.

  Nate best friends, Nic, Jones, and Owen entered the greenhouse behind him. Owen dropped the severely beat-up body of Ryder on the ground. None of them were partially transformed, but they looked menacing nonetheless.

  “If you wanted to give us more of a challenge, you could send someone else besides this one,” Owen complained, kicking Ryder and causing him to moan. “But then again, any time I get to beat on him is a fine time for me.”

  Jack looked around the room before nodding to Cassie. She had no clue what that meant, but she didn’t want to go back with him. There was no way to tell him without giving away what she overheard.

  Jared nodded to Jack and dropped Cassie’s arm.

  “I’ll be back to rescue you later, princess,” he teased, just before Jack grabbed him and disappeared.

  Nate didn’t even hesitate, just lunged forward and grabbed Cassie. She already knew Jack couldn’t take two people at once, so she was more than grateful to hold onto him. Jack flashed back in to grab Ryder before anyone could stop him.

  Nate stepped back and cupped Cassie’s face. He checked her over quickly, and then looked into her eyes. She could feel the worry pour off him, but she just smiled.

  “Guess it does work.” She leaned her forehead into Nate’s chest.

  Nate gave a sigh of relief and pulled her close into a hug.

  “No answers?” he asked.

  “They planned to bind me to their whole clan. They thought they could trick me into it,” Cassie complained. Owen gave a grunt of disgust at the suggestion.

  “Let’s get you home,” Nate told her as he put his arm around her to lead her away.

  Nate and Cassie passed the guys as they waited, still on alert. Cassie looked back to ask Owen a question when she noticed him cover Nate’s mouth with a cloth. Before she could protest, Nic did the same to her. She tried not to take a breath, but it was futile. Her world dimmed.

  Cassie’s sense of sight was the last to clear when she finally regained all her senses. Nate was beside her, holding onto her. She could feel his touch and hear his breathing as he worried.

  “Let your eyes adjust,” he told her.

  The room slowly came into focus. It was dimly lit, but Cassie had no clue where they were. The walls were lined with shelves that held supplies from everything like paper towels to floor polish—more of a closet than a room.

  “Why did he—” Cassie meant to ask more but finally realized a few things she didn’t notice the first time. Nate was topless, and she was handcuffed to him. Cassie quickly looked down and was relieved to find she wasn’t topless like he was.

  Nate laughed. Cassie shook her head. How could he laugh in a situation like this?

  “Okay, let’s start with: why are you topless?” Cassie asked, glad the dim room hid her blush. It wasn’t as if she didn’t like looking at him without a shirt, but she was baffled as to why he’d be that way.

  “They need to display the mating mark on me before they bind us,” Nate replied.

  “What?” Cassie asked in shock. Nothing made sense.

  “From what I can tell, they ordered Owen and Nic to save you and then take us.” Nate touched Cassie’s face, still looking her over as if he were worried she might be hurt. “What did your cousin do to you? When I finally felt your message to come, I was scared of what I’d find. You felt terrified.”

  “First let’s get straight about the whole topless thing, and whether I should be worried that they’ll be back to remove my shirt,” Cassie added.

  She didn’t know how he knew how scared she was and wanted him to think she was stronger than that. She was still confused as to why they were in some sort of storage closet and used that as a distraction to her feelings.

  “I can hear them every now and then. They’re at least two rooms over that way.” Nate motioned to the left wall with his free left hand. “And, no, they already pulled your hair up, and if they hadn’t knocked me out, I’d have killed them both for touching you. There’s kind of an unspoken rule about touching another’s mate.”

  “Hair up? Remember, girl who was told nothing.” Cassie pointed to herself.

  Nate smiled.

  “To do the bonding ceremony they have to show that we both carry the same mark, our mark. Yours is on your neck and mine my back,” Nate explained. He turned slightly for Cassie to see his elaborately marked-up back.

  “Wow, when did you get that done?”

  Cassie had seen Nate shirtless more than a few times since he played on all the sports teams and was constantly running around the school and gym with the jocks, but she had never seen a tattoo on him, and she would have noticed one as big as that one. The marking spanned his entire back, even wrapping around his rib cage and peeking out the front a
long with lines that streaked down past his elbows.

  “The same time you got yours.”

  “Wait, you mean I get a mark a couple inches that only skinwalkers can see, and you get a full-body tattoo?”

  Nate nodded. Cassie really didn’t know what to think of that.

  “It’s not normally this large. The size that appears has to do with the people bonding together,” Nate explained. “I wish I had been awake when the guys took my shirt. Maybe I would have been able to talk them out of being idiots.”

  “So this is bigger than usual?” Cassie touched the lines with her free hand. They were a dark color, but the dim light didn’t let her see them completely.

  “No. Let’s put it this way. My father is the alpha of the clans, and his is about the size of a plate,” Nate explained, holding out his free hand to show the size.

  Nate’s was more than double, or even triple that. Cassie thought it was bad that everyone who saw her neck knew she was with Nate, but his was even more definite.

  “I’m sorry …” Cassie didn’t know what else to say.

  Nate laughed again.

  “Sorry? Why? This more than proves my status in the clan. No one can dispute it now,” Nate replied. He didn’t seem to care at all.

  “So the markings have to do with the bond?” Cassie asked, mulling over her cousin and his blond friend, Ryder.

  “Yes. It’s an indication of your strength and mine together,” Nate answered, unsure where the question was leading.

  “So if I overheard my cousin mention that I was the next seer for the coven, and hence the reason they’re trying to take my powers, would that have something to do with it?” Cassie asked.

  Nate’s eyes grew bigger and then he let out a hearty laugh.

  “Glad this can amuse you,” Cassie replied sourly, not understanding his delight. The coven was going to drain her power as soon as they did the bonding.

  “Man, this makes much more sense now. When we were kids, I always wondered how you knew stuff you shouldn’t know. Before I could ask you about it, my father forbade me from being your friend.” Nate shook his head as he took it all in.

  “Do skinwalkers that bind the seer get those markings?” Cassie asked.

  “I wouldn’t know. They don’t let the seer have a mate,” Nate replied. “Never in the history of the skinwalkers has the seer ever had a mate. Well, they were right about one thing—this is going to change everything.”

  Cassie couldn’t tell if that was a good or bad thing. Her mysterious powers seemed to attract everyone. But it wouldn’t matter much longer. She would be useless if they wanted to take them from her. She had no way to fight back.

  “Why did your cousin bring you here?” Nate asked, changing the subject.

  “He was having me make the spell I made to pass the exam again. He didn’t have Castilleja mollis, so we had to break into the school to get it,” Cassie explained.

  “What did you learn from your cousin about stopping the binding?”

  “That they want to bind me to their whole clan instead of one person. They didn’t want to help me,” Cassie explained. “I’m not sure there’s even a way to keep from binding to join the coven.”

  “Umm, I brought you guys a friend, but now see maybe that wasn’t the best idea,” Whitney said from the open door behind Cassie. Jack was standing beside her friend.

  Jack shrugged.

  “The jig is up I guess.” He lunged for Cassie, but Nate stepped between them just in time. Jack touched Nate and together they disappeared.

  Whitney looked in horror at the scene. Nate was there one minute, and gone the next. Cassie stared at the dangling handcuff. If she had been holding Nate’s hand, Jack would have never been able to take him away.

  “We have to get to him now,” Cassie told her friend.

  “He just disappeared,” Whitney added in shock, still staring at where Nate was just standing.

  “Yes. My cousin is a witch—warlock—whatever you want to call him. And he isn’t someone I want to leave Nate with,” Cassie added, fearing for Nate’s safety. Ryder was unstable, but she didn’t know who else was now with Jack and his friends.

  “A male witch? Impossible,” Whitney said, still in shock.

  Reaching up to her taller friend’s face, Cassie put a cold hand on each cheek and looked straight into Whitney’s eyes. “They took Nate. We need to go now and get him back.”

  Whitney blinked twice, coming out of her shock.

  “He took Nate,” she repeated as she came back to the situation at hand. “Then good thing I brought these with me.”

  Whitney handed Cassie some invisibility potions they had made the summer before to sneak past her uncle. They had taken weeks to make, but they had perfected it by the end of summer when they had nowhere to go.

  Cassie grinned.

  “If this can fool one skinwalker, I sure hope it can fool the rest,” Cassie added, dabbing the liquid on her face and arms. Whitney did the same and reached back to take Cassie’s hand. The potion made them invisible, but not ethereal. They still needed to make it out of wherever Cassie had been imprisoned.

  “We’re in the school. They plan to hold the ceremony here at midnight,” Whitney explained. “There are guards outside the room, and more patrolling the halls and the school grounds. We need to make it to the tree line before I can partially transform without anyone knowing, and can take you anywhere you need to go.”

  Cassie nodded her invisible head. It was time to go get Nate back. She didn’t really want to go back to her cousin, but she couldn’t leave Nate there. He might be able to get out of it himself, but she got the distinct feeling Nate was as much as prize as Cassie was.

  CHAPTER 12

  Whitney was right. Skinwalkers were everywhere, and it wasn’t just the students from the school. There were adults wandering around also patrolling the area. When they made it to the tree line, Cassie didn’t feel safe enough to break the spell, so they continued to walk farther into the woods. It cost them time, and Cassie wasn’t sure how Nate was faring with her cousin and his friends. It didn’t matter, though; if they didn’t get away successfully, then they couldn’t help him at all.

  Whitney finally stopped. She mumbled the counter spell, and it worked on her first try. She was always better at magic under pressure.

  “Time to get going. Where do we find this wonderful cousin of yours?” she asked.

  Cassie shook her head. “I wouldn’t describe him as wonderful.”

  “Ahh, come on. Ryder is Owen’s cousin, so yours can’t be any worse,” Whitney added. “And a male witch. Why did he have to be on the bad side?” Whitney pouted.

  “Bad side?” Cassie asked. She got the feeling Jack and his friends weren’t good people, but the way Whitney said it made it all sound like a superhero comic.

  “Yeah. Ryder is a wendigo,” Whitney replied.

  “Wendigo?”

  Whitney just shook her head. “Guess loverboy didn’t cover that topic yet. I don’t know how you’re keeping it all together without knowing anything. When we get time, we have to sit down and go over all of this. They should have never left you in the dark,” she added. “Now on to finding your mate.”

  Whitney’s eyes turned a brilliant green color, and her body seemed to gain a bit of mass. Cassie jumped a little at the change. She wasn’t exactly used to the partial skinwalker form and had a feeling she would never be.

  “Sorry. Partial transformation will help us here. Once you tell me where to go, in this form I can get us there faster than a car,” Whitney explained.

  “Head out past Miller’s Diner. About half a mile farther is a path big enough for a truck, but it doesn’t look like a road. The house is right there, so we should stop on the road out of town. By the way, that’s cool that your eyes can change so many colors,” Cassie added as her friend bent over and motioned for her to hop on, piggyback-style. Cassie would have laughed if they had time to sit around thinking about what they were
about to do. It had to have been at least eight or more years since Cassie had a piggyback ride.

  “Change color?” Whitney asked as Cassie climbed on her larger friend’s back. It was a good thing that even partially transformed Whitney was more than six inches taller than Cassie; otherwise it would have been a bit awkward.

  “Yeah. Normally your eyes are a steel blue-gray color, and then they turn green for a partial transformation, and then electric blue when you’re a tiger,” Cassie explained.

  “I’m not a tiger,” Whitney replied, and gripped her legs. “Hold on tight.”

  Cassie couldn’t get another word out as she was forced to squeeze her eyes shut from the wind whipping in her face. She had never been on a motorcycle before, but she got the feeling that it was close to the same experience as getting a piggyback ride from her almost-monster friend.

  She didn’t have time to process what she had just heard from Whitney before they were standing on the road, facing the pathway to the house where Jack had brought Cassie.

  “I’ll scout ahead. I’m pretty quick, so I’ll be right back,” Whitney told her before Cassie could stop her.

  Moments turned to minutes. Cassie waited, but Whitney didn’t come right back. A feeling of dread settled over her. It took less time to go from the school to the other side of town than it would to reach the house. Whitney still wasn’t back. Cassie peered down the pathway. It looked like a well-walked path, but not a driveway. She knew that was deceptive. There was a house and a barn back that way.

  Cassie took a deep breath and began walking down the path. Whitney wasn’t coming back. Cassie could feel it in her bones. She was only halfway there when her cousin appeared before her.

  “So nice of you to join us, lovely cousin,” Jack said.

  Cassie stopped and stared at him.

  “Where’s Whitney?” she asked.

  “Your lovely female accomplice who was, uninvitedly, snooping around my house?”

  “Where is she?”

  Jack shrugged. “Guess you should come with me to find out.”

  It wasn’t like Cassie had any other option. He turned and didn’t bother to look back to see if she was coming. Cassie followed behind him at a distance, keeping her eyes and ears alert. She hoped Whitney would just appear, even if she knew it wasn’t going to happen. With a flick of his hand, Jack dissolved the illusion of the forest and led Cassie toward the large barn instead of the house. Cassie paused at the door as he casually entered.