Page 37 of Kin of the Wolf

It would have been easier as a wolf, and I almost reconsidered, certain that with all the magic in the area and more coming from the medallion I could take that form. But I might forget what we sought then and be lured off by the desire to hunt.

Soon, the cave grew wider and taller, enough that I could stand fully, though the lumpy ground, the rocks slick with algae or who knew what, made doing so a challenge.

More glowing mushrooms grew in clumps, and patches of moss or some kind of similar vegetation also glowed, green instead of blue. They congregated near a pool that emanated magic of its own. The water was dark, though, with no hint of illumination, save that of my medallion reflecting off the surface. Something fuzzy carpeting the roof of the cave created a white glow up there. This whole place was magical.

Duncan padded forward and took a few licks from the pool.

“I’m not sure that’s a safe place for a drink,” I said.

Unlike the stream outside, the pool was still and might have been stagnant. Even if it was a spring with fresh water flowing in,all the glowing growth around it made me think of radiation. Then there was also the magic that welled within the pool.

When Duncan looked back at me, his eyes glowed red.

I swore and jumped back, alarm surging through me. Again, my blood heated my body with the promise that I could change if I needed to.

I swallowed. Did I need to? Duncan merely gazed at me. Other than his eyes, nothing about him changed, and, even as I watched, they faded back to their normal brown.

“Yeah,” I croaked. “Definitely don’t drink the water.”

His tongue lolled out, and his eyes crinkled with humor.

“Maybe that’s the reason the wildlife around here has red eyes.” I wondered if they were drawn to the pool over other sources of water. “Do you think it’s linked to the dogs and wolves that attacked us in town? Could Augustus know about this place? I’ve heard of some werewolves that can control other animals, though I wouldn’t have guessed my cousin had that talent. It’s more of a wise wolf kind of thing, a gift those with the power to heal and manipulate nature have. But maybe he knows about this place and learned to use it to his advantage.”

I imagined Augustus bottling some of that water to take and give to animals. Did it do more than turn their eyes red? Maybe it made them more susceptible to commands or other types of magic.

Duncan sniffed a mossy patch by the water, then looked at me again. With significance in his eyes? I wasn’t sure, but when I stepped closer, the medallion’s light playing over the moss, I noticed a couple of scuffed spots where chunks had been torn away, revealing dirt beneath. Because someone had been in here recently?

“My mom said something about cave paintings,” I said, reminded of why she’d sent me here. “And thought I might learnsomething more about the medallion and how to draw upon its power.”

Duncan sat on his haunches, as if to say he would wait patiently for me to figure things out.

“You’re a good companion.”

His tongue lolled out again as he lifted his snout.Obviously,his expression seemed to say.

Smiling, I held the medallion away from my chest and directed it toward the dirt and stone walls of the cave. Before the silver light shone onto them, they appeared bare, save for a few black squiggles that may have been made with a piece of charred wood. But when the medallion’s illumination beamed upon the stone, a number of outlines appeared. They were of paw prints,wolfpaw prints. Of different sizes, they glowed back at me with the same moonlight-like illumination as the medallion.

The ceiling also glowed with paintings. Wolf heads looked down upon us from above. At the back of the cave, a pack of wolves chased a deer behind a boulder. It was the paw prints that called to me though, pulling my gaze back to them.

One of medium size—might that have been a match for my own foot, were I in my wolf form?—drew me, and I lifted a hand. Some certainty told me that this was what my mother had wanted me to see. Also, I sensed that touching it might give me answers.

I rounded the pool, careful not to step in the water, and climbed over the uneven ground, picking my way past rock formations that jutted upward to impede progress.

When I laid my hand over the paw, a startling surge of power rushed into me. It hurled me backward with the force of a hurricane gale.

Silver light flared so brightly that it blinded me. I flailed as power propelled my body through the air until it dropped me to the ground, my head clunking against a rock. The illuminationbrightened and brightened, its intensity overwhelming me, and I lost consciousness.

12

The brilliant light faded,and I found myself in a dim forest, rain falling from a gray sky as I looked at my mother’s medallion. It had been around my neck, but now it hung from a tree branch, the wolf on the front howling and glowing faintly. I walked toward it, but the forest around me disappeared.

Suddenly, I was in a sunlit market with hundreds of dark-skinned people around stalls where street vendors hawked everything from scarves to grilled meat on skewers to glass art and carved wooden knickknacks.

An out-of-place pale-skinned man in a safari hat meandered past the stalls, a distracted look in his eyes as if he were daydreaming. A child pickpocket reached for him, but the man had the wherewithal to swat the probing hand away. He turned toward a stall, and I gaped with surprise. It was my ex-husband, Chad. And on a table in the stall lay a hodgepodge of knickknacks, including the ivory wolf case.

Hell, was thatreallyhow he’d found it? I’d assumed he’d been lying, that something so valuable wouldn’t have been for sale in a street market. What about that story about how it had come froma vampire’s castle? No, Radomir had said it had beenstolenfrom the vampire’s castle. If that was true, it had taken a long journey before Chad found it.

His eyes locked onto the case and sharpened, and he twitched, as if a hand had slapped his cheek, knocking him out of a trance. Gesticulating and waving American money, he negotiated with the vendor. A twenty-dollar bill was all it took, and he walked away with the prize.

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