Page 52 of Cursed Wolfsbane

This only antagonizes Kai, who crowds Briar against the wall next to the door. He puts one hand around her throat and leans in until their faces are practically touching. The mage takes a step toward them, red sparks shooting from one hand. I groan atthe clusterfuck this is going to turn into if they both don’t chill the fuck out.

“Kai! Saint! Can you both take a step back and calm down?” Both Kai and Saint whip around to look at me. Kai doesn’t let go of Briar, and Saint doesn’t let his magic recede. But it’s a start. “Saint, Kai’s an alpha wolf who’s worried about his mate. He would never do anything to hurt Briar. Without a completed mate bond, Kai’s a bit more volatile, so cut him some slack. Kai, Briar was doing her best to solve the problem. She didn’t think about how her actions would make you feel. You can ask for more consideration in the future without shouting and pinning her to the wall.”

Briar is gaping at me in surprise, Saint lets his magic die down, and Kai steps back from Briar and hangs his head. I let out a relieved breath when the tension ratchets down.

“I’m sorry I yelled at you, Briar,” Malachi whispers. “You were bleeding, and I lost it because I was worried. Xander’s right. I should’ve kept my cool.”

“It’s okay, Malachi.” Briar walks over to him and leans her head against his chest. Kai tangles his fingers in her hair and holds her to him for a moment. “I’m sorry I didn’t think about you being freaked out by the cut and me bleeding.”

“You’re forgiven, baby girl.” Kai holds her for a long moment before stepping back. Briar turns to look at Saint.

“Uh, I guess I’m sorry for thinking about barbequing one of your wolves?” Saint asks rather than states. Briar looks at him for a moment before bursting out laughing. At her pure laughter, the rest of us can’t help but join in, diffusing the remaining tension. After getting his mirth under control, Saint moves over to Briar. “Can I heal this for you?”

She gives him a nod. He murmurs something, and the cut starts closing up. I can smell the strong peppery scent of magicin the air as Saint uses healing magic. Once the cut is all healed up, he casts another spell to clean the blood off Briar.

“Thanks.” Briar inspects her hand for a moment. That makes me realize that the craziness of Briar partially shifting got lost in all the chaotic aftermath.

“Briar, how’d you partially shift?” I ask.

“Um, I don’t know.” She shrugs at she looks between her hand and me. “Dido just did it for me. Why?”

“Partial shifting isn’t something shifters can do—or at least it wasn’t until you,” I amend.

Her eyes widen, and then her features fall. “Of course it isn’t. Why would anything I do be normal?” She looks like she can’t decide whether to cry or break something. I didn’t mean to make her feel bad with my question, but I did anyway.

Trying not to let my frustration at myself boil over, I rack my brain for something to make her feel better. Bastian beats me to it. “Pretty girl, normal is boring as fuck. Your partial shift is one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. That’s an awesome and hella useful ability to have.”

Briar takes a deep breath. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. We should take a look at what’s in here.” She avoids eye contact with Bastian and walks over to the door, letting Kai go first before following silently.

A frown tugs at my lips at her response, but we need to focus on the task at hand. I’ll see if Kai or Bastian will talk to her more about it after. We all know they’ll do a better job at talking to her than me. I have chronic foot-in-mouth syndrome when I’m around Briar, but I’m working on it.

Shoving my hand through my hair, I mentally fortify myself for whatever we’re going to find behind this door. I’m the last one through, but I still suck in a breath in shock at what I see.

CHAPTER 24

BRIAR

Walking through the bloodsucking door, I enter a large oval room. I’m on the second floor, so I can see the entirety of the breathtaking space.

A giant oval skylight dominates most of the ceiling, and it’s ringed by smaller circular ones. Walnut shelves line every wall of the entire four story tall, massive space, which is all one big room. In the center of the oval room are rows of plain dark wood tables. Green banker’s lights sit on the bare tabletops, providing additional lighting to study the tomes.

“Holy shit,” Bastian breathes as he gets a good look at the room. It’s an understandable reaction because this was so not what I pictured when the letter said we needed to look through Dido’s family library. I thought it would be something more like my dad’s office, not half a freaking football field of books. There’s no way this gigantic library fit in the small building we entered without the help of magic.

“How are we going to find what we need?” I ask no one in particular. It could take years to look through the thousands of books in here. We don’t have years to waste.

“Why don’t we start with the reference desk?” Saint suggests. I look at where he’s pointing and see a circular wood-paneled desk directly opposite the landing we’re currently on.

“Sure.” It can’t hurt anything to look there.

Unless it’s booby trapped.

Then it would hurt a lot.

Here’s hoping there aren’t any nasty surprises waiting for us. I follow Saint, and the Wyldharts trail behind me as we make our way down the stairs and across the center of the room. The only sound in the room is our soft footfalls on the blue carpet tiles.

When we arrive at the dark wood paneled desk, Saint goes around back to look at the various papers arranged in neat stacks on the tabletop. I gawk at the room that seems even bigger from the first floor. I can’t believe how many books are crammed in here. By their bindings, most of these books are hundreds, if not thousands, of years old.

“Aha!” Saint holds up a yellowed sheet of paper with flowy cursive writing on it. He brings it over to me, but it’s in Latin. Thanks to Dido, I can apparently read Phoenician, but I still can’t understand Latin without a dictionary and a lot of time.

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