Page 19 of Empowering the Wolf's Heart

He turned to stare at me, his eyes glowing golden for a split second as his lips pulled up to reveal lengthening fangs. "Did you poison her?"

There was a low growl in his voice that made me step back. Fear flushed cold through my veins as I remembered his vice-like grip around my neck. "No, nothing like that. I shouldn't have said anything?—"

"But you did. Explain," he said, his voice a command which made my hand twitch to salute. Or grab a blade to defend myself. I clenched it behind my back.

"She needs help with her heart. A mage stone should take care of it, or hawthorn berry tea day and night for at least three months."

He stared without blinking. "How..."

"Please don't ask," I said, my voice dropping into a near whisper.

A low woof came from Ran’s saddlebag. It broke me free of whatever awkward trance we'd gotten into and I went to free the pup. He licked my face and squirmed, nearly falling from my grasp. I chuckled, kissing the little guy on the forehead, happy to see him so spry. I set him on the ground. He tottered over toWolfie, nearly falling on his face as his paws didn’t want to keep up with his momentum.

“My target isn’t coming. You’re free to go.”

I would’ve considered Shen being Hood because he oozed a killer’s confidence that made my skin prickle, but I’d seen the Prince of Wolves in a parade when Hood killed the Twenty-Fourth Blade.

Wolfie paused in dusting off his jacket as if it were giving him something to do other than face the pup gamboling at his legs and licking his feet. “Care to repeat that?”

I stared at him. “You. Are. Free. To. Leave.”

His eyebrows furrowed, confusion gracing those otherwise dark eyes. “What?”

I threw my hands in the air. “Are you a few prickles short of a mulberry? Leave. Scat. Get out of here!”

“I am not a mule to be prodded to pasture,” he replied, sitting on a rock and throwing a leg over the other as if it were some throne.

I stared at him, my mouth open. “What are you doing?”

“Did you not say I am free?”

“Yes?”

“Good. Then I am staying.”

I choked on my spit. “No, you can’t!”

He raised a brow. “Oh?”

“I-I—” My brain scrambled for a reason. I thought he’d immediately jump for freedom, wanting to get rid of the pesky Red who’d kidnapped him. Or that he’d try to kill me. This? This is the last thing I expected.

“You are entertaining. I do believe I shall stay awhile. Besides, who will feed the pup should I leave?” We both glanced down at the pup, who was gnawing on a bone—where’d he find that?—beside a curled up and sleeping Ran. Yes, unicorns apparently sleep laying down and curled up like a cat. Odd, that.

I swallowed a hint of bile. He had a point. “Take the pup with you. I’ve no use for it.”

The pup paused his gnawing at my words, blinking up at me with soulful eyes. I tried to stop my heart from breaking at the hurt there, but gosh did it stab into my chest. It’d be better this way. I’d brought enough wild animals home, then released them. My parents wouldn’t allow another. Especially not a wolf pup who seethed of magic even if I wasn’t sure what he was.

“You—an assassin of magic—would let a werewolf and a magical creature of interest waltz out that metaphorical door without a second glance?”

I shrugged, pricking at a mole on my arm with the point of my blade. “You aren’t my objective.”

He leaned back, and I felt those hard eyes boring into me. “You are a strange creature, Red.”

“I’m nothing. Now please, leave,” I said at long last. I was tired, bone weary, and ready to go home and take a long nap. I’d have to reevaluate my plans and figure out another way to find Hood. My shoulders nearly slumped in disappointment, but I held them up through sheer force of will. Plans always had a way of falling through. It was how you dealt with it and grew that mattered.

“No.”

The one word broke through my haze of wishing for my bed. I blinked up at the werewolf still lounging on his stone throne. “Pardon?” I asked.

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