Page 7 of The Serpent’s Shadow

Chapter 4

Grim

MY LARGE HEAD CONNECTEDwith the invading wolf square in the side, sending him skittering and rolling across the clearing with a whine.

The three other wolves spread out, darting away on their hind legs so they could surround me in a half-circle.

I roared, shivering the trees with the brutal sound, and launched back on my legs to stand tall. When two wolves charged at me from either side—Edda and Olaf—I focused my energy on the eldest Torfen, the girl, and swiped my paws at her.

Edda barely managed to sneak under my vicious claws, raking her smaller nails down my leg as she streamed by. Olaf came in from the other side—

I growled, dropped to my legs, and kicked out, catching Olaf in the face.

With blood spouting from his snout, the wolf catapulted into the air, end over end, and landed on his back before force-shifting into a human.

Human, I thought vaguely, remembering that I, too, was a human.

It did not feel like it during moments like these, which were becoming more frequent as the days passed without any sight or sign of my little sneak.

Olaf lay on his back, staring up at the canopies of trees and the blue sky overhead. Naked, groaning in pain, he coughed and had a dazed expression on his bleeding face.

I had half a mind to stomp all my weight onto him, cave in his chest, and stop his heart. Put an end to one-fourth of the Torfen scum at Vikingrune Academy once and for all.

“Kollbjorn!” a voice yelled behind me.

My focus on Olaf blurred. I turned to the voice. Sven Torfen was on one knee, hands raised, scuffed up and also nude after shifting into his human form.

At first I thought the man was in a pose of submission, which was insane for someone of Sven’s temperament and stature. Then I recognized he was kneeling because he was favoring his left side, wincing—he had been the wolf I initially headbutted.

He pumped his hands at me. “Peace, bear. We have not come to harm you.”

If I didn’t know any better, it sounded like a tinge of . . .fearin his voice. The proud bastard would never admit it, but it gave me twisted satisfaction knowing he was frightened of me.

I shook my head, trying to focus my scattered animosity at the wolves, who had barged in on me like enemies.

Enemies, I thought, mulling the word over. A bearish growl mixed in my head.These are . . . not them.

Tilting my head, the blanket of rage that had settled over me slowly dissipated. The two Torfens still in their wolf forms—Edda and Ulf—stayed on the peripheries, raised on their haunches and ready to pounce.

My eyes flickered to them, left and right, to gauge my next move if they attacked.

“Sister, brother,” Sven said, standing to his full height. “Stand down.”

Edda and Ulf glanced at their brother and slowly, hesitantly shifted into humans. My eyes landed on Ulf’s large frame first, before glancing over Edda’s muscled form and heavy breasts.

I sniffed the air with a snort, smelling nothing but human scents. Their odor, sweat, and essence permeated my senses. Gone was the earthy, ripe stench of wolves in the air—the thing that had set me off in the first place.

I didn’t trust anyone these days. It was getting worse the longer things went without Ravinica. I hated every moment of my time at the academy without her.

The swelling anger inside me simmered. From a boil, it became a bubble, and then I simply felt tired.

I shifted out of my bear form, joining the other four in their states of undress. Four men and a woman, standing naked in a clearing in the forest as if we were about to partake in a midday ritualistic orgy.

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