A Wolf in the Fold

  Callie frowned. “Huh. That could be any number of thousands of women.” She realized everyone was staring at her. “Oh, come on. Do you know how long I’ve been alive? I could have slept with only one guy a year and it’d still be thousands. It’s not like I was a slut. I didn’t have to worry about VD or getting pregnant, and I didn’t actively go out and steal men from other women.”

  “Apparently someone disagreed with you on that last point,” Lina snarked.

  “So all we have to do is figure out how she was cursed and break it, right?” Mai asked.

  Elain hoped it was that easy, but Lacey slowly shook her head.

  “I suspect,” Lacey said, “that this triggered once Callie mated with Daniel.”

  Callie frowned. “Say what?”

  “Whoever the man was, the woman probably considered him her true love. She likely cursed you so that once you met your true mate, it would then kick in. She must have known you were too strong to curse directly, so she tied it to your mate.”

  Lina took a pull on her beer. “Wow. Talk about cold-dish revenge.”

  “So that’s all it is?” Callie asked. “Nightmares? I don’t even remember them. That’s not so bad. I’ll just tell Sir to try to ignore it when I have them.” She nodded.

  When Lacey began slowly shaking her head again, Callie slowly followed. “Aaand you’re about to give me the bad news, aren’t you?”

  Lacey nodded.

  Callie sighed. “I knew it couldn’t be that easy.”

  “I suspect the true nature of the curse has yet to be felt,” Lacey said. “Because when you were cursed, they didn’t realize that when you mated with Daniel, you were giving up your Immortal status and some of the powers that go along with it. However, you also gave over much of your personal power to Daniel due to the special nature of your…relationship dynamic.”

  “Oookay.”

  “Bertholde once told me about a similar curse. After the victim was cursed, once he mated, he began having nightmares that came true.”

  Elain had reclaimed her wine cooler and took a sip. “Do we even want to know?”

  “For example,” Lacey continued, “he dreamed about one of his nephews drowning.”

  Elain’s gut churned in an unstable way. “And?”

  Lacey grimly nodded.

  Mai softly spoke up. “And things kept happening until he finally killed himself to stop the carnage?”

  Lacey nodded again.

  “But…how?” Lina asked. “How could someone have those kinds of powers to make nightmares come true? Wouldn’t they have to be really strong to start with? Sort of like me?”

  Lacey walked over and sat on the log on Callie’s other side. “Well, part of it was the power of the curse. But the victim was strong in his own right. He was born into a dragon Clan, but he wasn’t of full dragon blood. He was Baba Yaga’s great-grandson.”

  * * * *

  Silence settled over the women. A shit-ton of things rolled through Elain’s brain, like a mental tsunami so overpowering she couldn’t verbalize any of them.

  Kitty spoke first, staring at Callie with a thoughtful look on her face. “He’s not just her mate, he’s her Master,” she said. “Not to mention he’s a damn strong Alpha wolf. Whoever cursed her, the curse wasn’t strong enough to override her need to obey and protect him. At least, in terms of the curse. That’s why she can’t remember the dreams even though he’s ordered her to.” She looked at Lacey. “Until they finally get bad enough to where they will eventually override her ability to block them.”

  Lacey nodded. “Likely.”

  “Fuck!” Callie screamed. She stood and paced the clearing. “What the hell? I want to know who the fuck did this to me. We need to break it. I can’t go hurting the people I love.”

  “Calm down,” Lina said, deep in thought. “We’ll figure this out.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know, babe.” She turned to Elain. “Thoughts?”

  Elain coughed. “I saw something else.

  “What?” Lina asked.

  Her face filled with heat again. “It was, uh…” She coughed once more.

  Lina scowled. “Spit it out. TMI time has passed us by and left us in the dust. You saw me naked and in labor. Say it.”

  She took a deep breath. “I saw you and your guys making love, and Callie, Baba Yaga, and Gigi were dancing around you.”

  She worried Lina might be irritated. Instead, her friend laughed. “Oh, I bet that was the ceremony where we created the Tablet.” She grinned. “Yeah, that was pretty hot.”

  Carla spoke up. “That’s likely a clue.”

  Everyone looked at her.

  “Well, obviously Callie’s subconscious is at war with what’s going on. Maybe it’s giving us a clue about what to do to fix things and remove the curse.”

  “Maybe,” Lacey agreed. “But before you three start dancing around her, we might want to do a little research first. Trying to break the curse without knowing more about it is a sure-fire recipe for disaster.”

  Callie looked morose. “I’m afraid to even go to sleep now.”

  “I don’t believe a few more weeks will be an issue,” Lacey said. “However, if we do the wrong thing and it somehow frees the curse—”

  “Oh,” Callie said. “I get it. Bad, bad things can happen.”

  Lacey nodded.

  “For every answer we get,” Mai said, “every inch we claw forward, it feels like we take five steps back.” She looked around at everyone. “Are you even sure I’m supposed to be here? I feel like this is some sort of mistake. Like Baba Yaga got it wrong. Lots of people have dreams of precognition and aren’t Seers. Humans, even.”

  “You’re exactly where you should be, dear,” Lacey assured her.

  “It’s not one inch forward and five steps back,” Lina said as she stood and stretched. Then she started dancing. “It’s the Reality Rumba. We just have to keep dancing our damn asses off, that’s all.”

  “Should I tell Sir all of this yet?” Callie asked. “He’s going to want to know what happened.” Elain felt sorry for her friend. The former Immortal looked absolutely miserable.

  Lacey patted her on the leg. “We’ll all go talk to him together.”

  * * * *

  The women cleared their men out of the living room before talking with Blackie. Lacey took point filling him in. Elain realized the Alpha wolf needed more than a beer after the women finished updating him.

  Elain brought him a water glass and a bottle of bourbon and handed them to him. “Help yourself.”

  “Thanks.” He poured himself a couple of fingers, thought about it, then filled the glass to the brim.

  “Are you all right, Daniel?” Lacey asked.

  He took a couple of swallows, wincing. “Not really.” He glanced at all of them before his gaze finally settled once more on the old Seer. “So if we don’t get this curse taken care of soon…”

  Everyone stared at Lacey.

  “Exactly.”

  “Look, we’ll get right on it,” Lina said. “We’ll figure out something.”

  “How long do we have?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” Lacey said. “That you’ve been together as long as you have and she’s resisted this far, I think a few more weeks won’t…” She didn’t finish.

  “Won’t kill anyone?” he offered. “That’s what you were going to say, right?”

  “Sorry. I wasn’t thinking it through until I realized what I was saying.”

  “Look,” Callie said, “Gigi will be here tomorrow. I’ll try to talk to Babs tonight, if I can. We’ve got some pretty darn smart brains amongst us all. We’ll figure this out. I have faith in us.”

  “Glad one of us does,” Mai quietly said.

  When they all looked at her, she shrugged. “I’m sorry, but I feel woefully inadequate right now. I can’t blow anything up or read anyone’s emotions. I’m limited to visions that I’m not entirely sure are accurate. I don’t understand why
I got picked to be part of this. I still say it’s some sort of mistake.”

  Callie got up and went over to where she sat on the couch and hugged her. “I felt like that early on, too,” she said. “It was so damn long ago, but I remember that much. That’s a feeling you might as well get used to, because no matter how long you live, or how powerful you get, you will always think that in the back of your mind.”

  “Gee, thanks.”

  “I didn’t mean it like that.” She looked at the room. “9-11. What I wouldn’t have given to stop that. I didn’t know about it beforehand. Same with Oklahoma City. Or the Holocaust. There wasn’t anything I could do to change it. Any of it. All of it.”

  She stood and circled the room, arms crossed over her chest, hands rubbing her arms. “You don’t get to pick and choose what happens. It sort of comes to you, the things you’re supposed to do. That’s what you have to focus on, the only things you can focus on. Otherwise, it’ll drive you crazy.”

  “Already a pretty short trip,” Lina snarked. “I could walk there from here without breaking a sweat.” She randomly pointed. “It’s like, right there, across the street from here.”

  “But you aren’t a Seer, Callie,” Mai argued. “You’re a…whatever you are. You have powers I can’t even imagine.”

  “Actually, we were Seers before we were called,” Callie said. “All three of us. Not to say you won’t develop more powers of your own, either. I didn’t get really powerful for a while. I started out kind of like what you are now. The three of us, our powers amplified through each other. Over time, they grew.”

  Daniel drained his glass, closing his eyes as the liquid burned down his throat. “I think it’s time to call it a night,” he said, his voice hoarse from the liquor. “We’re not going to get anything done tonight anyway.”

  After bidding everyone a good night, Elain headed to her bedroom. Brodey was already dozing, softly snoring on the far right side. Ain sat up reading the newspaper, and Cail was watching TV.

  Elain slipped between the two of them.

  “Feel like talking about it?” Ain quietly asked.

  She pondered that question.

  No, she didn’t feel like talking about it. Not right then, at least.

  “Can we talk about it in the morning?”

  “Sure, babe,” Ain said, setting his newspaper aside. Cail switched off the TV while Ain got the bedside lamp, dropping the room into darkness as she snuggled tightly between the two of them.

  From the far side of the bed, Brodey let out a loud snore.

  “I’m going to muzzle him one day,” Cail softly snarked.

  Chapter Nine

  The evening before Christmas Eve, Gigi sat on a lounger on the lanai and listened as Lina, Elain, Mai, Callie, and Lacey told her about discovering the curse. Elain still wasn’t sure what to think of the middle former-Immortal. She hadn’t spent a lot of time around Gigi and didn’t know much about her except the little she’d gleaned from Callie.

  And they’d seen precious little of Oscar Chaudhuri, the Bengal tiger shifter, since he’d claimed her as his mate. Right now, in fact, he was inside the house and closed in Cail’s study, deep in discussions with Ain, Mark, Wally, and Blackie about mega-Clan stuff.

  When the women finished telling their story, Gigi used her index finger to trace a random pattern on the arm of the lounger under her right hand.

  No one interrupted her thoughts. Finally, she spoke. “Exactly what are you asking of me?”

  “Information,” Lina suggested. “Hints. Advice. Anything.”

  Gigi leveled her ice blue gaze at Lina. “If you already know it’s a curse, then you know more than I do.”

  Callie sounded wearier than Elain could ever remember hearing her. Like the spark and spunk had dissolved from her spirit. “Gigi, please. You know what I’m asking.”

  She sat up and pulled her long, red hair back. Swinging her legs off the lounger, she put her hands on her knees. “You’re asking me to help you lift a curse you basically called upon yourself for screwing someone else’s guy.”

  It wasn’t a question.

  Callie cocked her head and arched an eyebrow at Gigi but didn’t respond.

  Eventually, Gigi’s face reddened. “Okay, so fine, I guess you’re not the only one guilty of that over the years.”

  “Thank you,” Callie drawled.

  “I’ll admit, this one’s a doozie,” Gigi said. “Lacey’s right, I’ve only heard of something like it being used one other time. Doesn’t mean it wasn’t used more often, but that’s the only instance I personally know of.”

  Elain sensed Lina making a concerted effort to hold back her irritation and snark. “Great, but that’s not information we can use to help us get rid of it.”

  “Ah, but I think I know something that can be of help.”

  “What?” the other women asked.

  Gigi smiled. “I know who threw the curse on the other victim.”

  Hints of desperation broke through Callie’s voice. “Who?”

  “A cockatrice.”

  Lina was up and bolting for the sliders leading into the living room before anyone could react. “Wait here,” she called over her shoulder.

  She returned a moment later, her iPad in her hand and frantically thumbing through it. She had a wild look in her eye and no one interrupted her.

  A few minutes later, she grinned. “Aha!” She turned the iPad around and held it out to Gigi.

  Gigi took it, frowning at first as she read the text. After a few moments, she slowly nodded, swiping through pages and nodding harder and faster until she also smiled. “Yes. That’s it.”

  “Great,” Lina said. “What does it mean?”

  Gigi looked up at her. “It means the curse can be removed, but it needs to be transferred into something else.”

  “Transferred? Like into what?” Callie asked, taking the iPad when Gigi handed it to her.

  “What is that?” Elain asked. “And what the hell are you talking about?”

  “It’s one of Bertholde’s old books,” Lina explained. “We scanned them in. She’d researched the old curse and was pretty sure she’d come up with a way to fix it if she ever came across it again. Zack cross-referenced it with a spell that was in the cockatrice spellbook we recovered from Lenny’s camp in Yellowstone.”

  “Again, I ask, transferred into what?” Callie repeated.

  “Ideally,” Gigi said, “it would be an inanimate object you could then destroy. I suspect considering how long it took the curse to activate without it fading, and how strong it is, that this curse is way too powerful for that option to have any hope of working. Or, if you were really vindictive, you could transfer it into someone else. Or some other living creature. Or even return it to the person of origin.”

  “The last point isn’t very likely,” Callie said. “Not if it happened so long ago.”

  “Exactly,” Gigi agreed.

  “An inanimate object like another stone tablet?” Lina asked. “Something like that?”

  “Maybe,” Gigi said. “There’s just one catch.”

  Mai groaned.

  “Isn’t there always a catch?” Lina asked.

  Gigi continued. “It has to be done right the first time. If you screw it up, it can get loose and escape into someone you’re not wanting it to infect.”

  Elain snorted. “Too bad we don’t have Abernathy here in front of us.”

  “Or my uncle,” Mai agreed.

  Shaking her head, Gigi tsked. “Nope. Bad karma, that. You do not practice dark magick. You really don’t want to deliberately shift it into another human, other than the point of origin, if you can help it. Returning it to the person of origin isn’t considered dark. But deliberately shifting it to someone else not involved with throwing the curse would be dark.”

  “What do you mean it can get loose?” Callie asked.

  Gigi crossed her legs and leaned back, propped up on her arms. “It’s not a sentient spirit, like a wraith. Th
e curse was formed from a malevolent intent called into corporeal form through a sacrifice.”

  Mai looked confused. “Sacrifice?”

  “Human sacrifice,” Callie softly clarified, now looking decidedly ill.

  Elain could sympathize. She felt downright sick to her stomach.

  Gigi nodded. “Whoever threw the curse siphoned off a portion of the victim’s soul and implanted it as part of the curse.”

  “Holy fuck,” Callie whispered.

  “Wait,” Elain said. “You mean to tell me someone was so pissed off about losing a guy that they were willing to kill someone innocent in the process of cursing Callie over it? Why not just kill Callie?”

  Gigi coughed. “Well, they couldn’t, for starters. She was an Immortal. Although it’s likely the person who threw the curse didn’t realize that at the time. They probably thought she was really strong, maybe a witch or a shifter. The person who threw the curse killed off someone related to whoever the guy was. Likely a sibling, someone young. Maybe one of the victim’s children, or one of their own, if the person throwing the curse was a spouse or lover also related to them.”

  Everyone stared at Gigi, stunned into shocked silence.

  “Look,” she finally said, “I’m not saying whoever threw this curse had all their marbles.”

  Lina snorted. “That’s an understatement.”

  “But that’s part of what makes this so damn strong,” Gigi continued. “There’s already a black mark on the person’s soul. Nothing left to lose. That’s part of what’s interwoven into the strength of the curse.”

  “Is this something that happens a lot?” Mai timidly asked.

  “I wouldn’t say every day,” Gigi said. “But this is a cockatrice specialty. Not just this spell. I mean magick that makes normal black magick look positively white in comparison.”

  “Once you go black, you never go back,” Lina snarked.

  Everyone stared at her.

  “What? Oh, come on. I couldn’t have been the only one thinking it.”

  “Okay,” Callie said, “this is ridiculous. I’ve never slept with a cockatrice. For starters, those mofos smell worse than Wally in the rain, and that’s on a good day. I would have known it. No offense, Kitty.”