The Silver Siren

“What are we going to do?” Penny asked sadly. 

“There must be something we can try. Another spell, maybe?” he said, looking over at Melissa. She was still desperately searching her notebook. Lana’s whimpers continued and I pinched the bridge of my nose trying to relieve the pressure.

“Allie?” Melissa said, rushing over to me.

“I’m ok,” I said, before everyone went into panic mode. “It’s Lana. She’s going crazy. She wants her mate.”

Melissa’s eyes widened instantly, and her entire face lifted. 

“What?” I asked, puzzled. What was she up to?

“That’s it!” she said brightly.

“What is?” Penny asked, looking equally confused. 

“That’s how we are going to find the Alpha,” she said, her eyes twinkling. “We are going to use the mate bond! One of the strongest natural forces there is.” 

“How?” I asked. 

“By using your powers,” she said. We all looked at her, none of us knew what she was talking about.

“Allie, your powers are unique. And your mate bond with Reece is one of the strongest I’ve ever known,” she explained. “So strong that Reece was able to mind link you, even in his weakened state, his body poisoned with wolfsbane. If you focus all your energy and power into a mind link with him and connect to him, I have a spell that I think will show the location on the map.”

I took a few seconds to think about it. Reece sounded weak in the last mind link, and I wasn’t sure he had the strength to connect again. But it was our only option right now. “It’s worth a shot,” I said.

“Excellent,” she said, “Now focus hard on establishing a mind link and I will cast the spell. It will be just like tracing a phone call.”

I took a deep breath, and concentrated hard on the mind link. Long seconds passed by, and I still couldn’t get a connection. I sighed.

“It’s not working,” I said, deflated.

“Keep trying, Allie” Melissa encouraged. She recited the spell and I tried again. I thought of our pup and my hand touched my stomach.

“Reece. Reece, are you there? Honey, please answer. I need you. And our pup needs you.”

“Allie,” Reece whispered. He sounded so weak; it was torture.

“Reece, hang on. We’ll be there soon,” I ended the mind link and opened my eyes.

“Did it work?” I said immediately.

“Look,” Brad said grinning, pointing at the map. 

“You did it!” cried Penny, jumping up and down and clapping her hands together. A bright green beacon lit up the map, showing us what we needed. I smiled, and a burst of energy surged through me. 

“We have to be quick. He is getting weaker,” I said.

“Ok, let’s go then,” Brad said, “The warriors and Elders are ready.”

“I will get my potions,” Melissa said, rushing to one of the tables to gather vials and bottles into her satchel. 

“Ready?” I asked Penny. 

“Hell yeah!” she yelled, sounding pumped.

“Right, remember to stick to the plan,” Brad said, looking over at the map, “What the…..”

“What is it?” I asked. He walked over to the map to get a closer look.

“Look where the hideout is,” he said, pointing to the map. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

The beacon on the map couldn’t be more than a mile from our pack borders. “But we’ve been looking for weeks,” I said, “How is it possible that we missed it so close to our border?”

It was where I was attacked on my birthday. That’s why there were so many rogues surrounding me so quickly. The base was right outside the border, near the creek.

“Dark magic, remember?” Melissa said, “His witch has been hiding his base for some time. It’s not going to take long too get there so, Brad, can you have the warriors take their protection potion now.”

He nodded and sent the warriors a mind link. When he was done, he uncorked his vial and drank his potion. I grabbed two vials and handed one to Penny. 

“It’s go time,” he said, looking to me and then Penny. “You’re sure about this?”

We looked at each other. I’d never seen Penny look so determined before. She was braver than any of us knew. She nodded yes, and so did I. We drank our potions simultaneously.

“Let’s go,” Brad said, solemnly.

Brad led us out of the room, and we joined the warriors who had gathered outside the training centre. They bowed their heads as I arrived.

“Everyone clear on the plan?” Brad said.

“Yes, Beta,” was the collective response. Brad and I led the way to the tree line. We were to stay in human form until we reached the hideout. Once we were a few minutes from the border, Brad ordered the warriors to stop.

“Hold it there, soldiers,” he instructed. He turned to Melissa, “Time to cast the spell to mask our scents.”

“Yes, Beta,” she said, nodding, and she recited the spell. “Remember this only lasts a short time so you must use it well.”

He turned to address the warriors, “From this point, mind link is our main form of communication.”

Melissa took out a small vial of liquid with a light blue tinge and uncorked it before she brought it to her lips and drank the contents in one gulp. I looked at her, confused. What was this potion for? She had so many, it was hard to keep track!

“It allows me to mind link you and all the other wolves,” she answered my silent questions, using mind link. Wow. She had thought of everything! I smiled at her.

“That’s incredible!” I said, marvelling at her power and skill. 

“Thank you, sweetheart,” she said.

We continued our journey and crossed the border. We no longer had the safety of our pack territory to keep us safe. The land we were in now was actually human land, so thankfully we didn’t have the added worry of trespassing on another pack’s territory. My heart was pumping loudly in my chest and my palms were sweaty. My nerves were going haywire as the reality of what we were about to do hit me. 

Very shortly I would not only get my mate back, but I would be face to face with the wolf who killed my parents. I thought I would be frightened of this moment, but I was strangely confident. There was too much at stake here for there to be any room for fear in my mind. And anyway, I had my own personal cheerleader, in the form of Lana, keeping me pumped up, despite her feeling the separation from Reece acutely. 

I realised I wasn’t the scared, inexperienced child I was a month ago. I was ready to end this and get my mate back. I had lived in fear of Lucien for too long now.

Melissa suddenly stopped and held up her hand. “We are here. I sense dark magic,” she announced.

Brad instructed the warriors to stop, bringing them to a halt.

“Where is it?” Penny asked. 

Melissa rummaged in her satchel and pulled out a small bottle of red liquid. She opened it and said, “Dark forces of power I feel, allow these words to show what is real.”

The red liquid shot out of the bottle smoothly and floated above the bottle for a few seconds before it burst into a thick cloud of smoke that blanketed the forest before us.

As the smoke cleared, it revealed a large one-storey building with a flat roof, made of corrugated iron. The walls were red brick and ivy crept up each wall, camouflaging it somewhat. Two large doors marked the front of the building, but I couldn’t see a single window. This was a prison. I felt Penny shudder next to me as she slowly stepped back in horror.

“How do we get in?” I asked. Once again she opened her satchel and produced another small vial of liquid. 

“Like this,” she said. She drank the liquid down in one. She moved her hands apart in front of her, mimicking the opening of the doors and said, “From what these doors are trying to hide, I call upon the powers to move them aside.” 

The doors slowly started to slide apart. “Be on your guard. Just as I can sense dark magic, Lucien’s witch can sense white magic,” she warned the warriors. 

“I will seek out the witch and try and neutralize her,” she said to Brad, Penny and I.

“Penny and I will come with you. She might be dangerous,” I told her.

“Positions everyone,” Brad ordered, and the warriors started to move into formation for battle. 

Reece

I hadn’t seen it coming. 

I had woken early and was itching to go for a run. Not wanting to wake Allie, I slipped out of bed and changed into some sweats. Although Allie had seemed to have come round to the idea of a pup, I still felt unsettled, and I hoped a run would clear my head. 

It was a beautiful morning, crisp and clear, and after running for a half hour I had started to feel normal again. Maddox wanted to run for longer, so we carried on until our legs were burning. I made it back to where I left my clothes and shifted back to human, grabbing them from the tree and throwing them on. I was close to the border and could see the marker. 

But something didn’t feel right. I looked around. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. There was no one around, but it was early in the morning so I wouldn’t expect there to be anyone around. Everything looked normal. My mind was playing tricks on me. 

And then I heard something near the border. At first, I wasn’t sure what it was. I walked closer to the border and the sound became clearer. It sounded like a child crying. I looked around again, but I could see no one. But the sound was definitely getting closer as I walked towards the border. 

Perhaps a child had been separated from its parents in the human territory and was lost. I had just crossed the border when the crying stopped as suddenly as it started. I listened for another minute, but the sound didn’t return, so I turned around to make my way back to the pack house. 

My mind was definitely playing tricks on me! I started walking away when I heard a faint whooshing sound and felt a hard thump to my shoulder, just below my collarbone. I looked down and saw an arrow buried in my body. Maddox howled in pain.

“Silver,” he cried. 

Shit. A silver tipped arrow. I had to get it out quickly. The silver was burning my flesh, the pain was excruciating. I gripped the arrow firmly and took a deep breath, pulling it out in one quick motion. And then I smelled it. Wolfsbane. The arrow had been dipped in wolfsbane. My vision was starting to blur, and my head was spinning, but I had to make it back over the border. I tried to shift but the combination of silver and wolfsbane had affected Maddox almost instantly and he was too weak to shift. 

I was going to have to do this without Maddox. I started to move but my movements were slow and sluggish. My balance was off and I stumbled. My body tried desperately to get to the safety of the border, but I was getting weaker with every second that passed. A second arrow pounded into my back, knocking me to the ground. 

I was powerless as the wolfsbane seared through my veins. I tried to get up but could only manage to perch on my elbows. I saw several rogues step out from behind the trees. How did I miss them? My tracking skills are second to none. I took a deep breath and sniffed the air. That’s how! All I could smell was the forest, the unmistakable stench of rotting flesh completely absent. I had unwittingly walked right into a trap. Soon I was surrounded by rogues.

“Stay down, mutt!” one snarled, kicking my elbows out from underneath me, forcing me back down on the ground. The wolfsbane was spreading through my body and it was a struggle just to move. I was powerless. They bound my hands and carried me away from the border, a rogue on each limb, my head facing the ground. 

Fuck. This was bad. Maddox had retreated to the back of my mind, too weak to do anything else. I must have passed out because the next thing I remember was waking up in a dark room, chained to a wall. An overpowering stench of rogues filled my nostrils. I could barely move and the wounds from the poisoned arrows were burning from the silver, sending pain shooting to my extremities. 

“Maddox,” I asked. No answer. He was still too weak and unable to heal us. Yep, this was pretty bad. My vision was still blurry, and I could barely move. And without the antidote, the wolfsbane would continue to weaken us, until eventually we would die. I needed a plan. 

Footsteps echoed outside the room. The door creaked opened, and a tall figure entered. As the light spilled in through the door, his face came into view. A scar ran down one side of his aging face, from his temple to mid-cheek, and his dark hair was slicked back. He had the rogue scent, and I knew instantly that this was Lucien.

“So, how are you enjoying the wolfsbane?” he said, laughing.