Page 64 of The Wolf and the Chimera
It was as terrifying as it was fulfilling.
“We better go,” Melanie said and eyed the nearby cliff. “Patrols will be here any minute.”
Ryder stared them down, then shook his head and cursed.
“Hold onto each other,” Ryder instructed. “The ripple will try to physically and mentally tear you apart. Just keep repeating our destination in your mind.”
The five of us grabbed each other’s hands and walkedtoward the waterfall. Light and color shimmered in its depths, and its magic swelled louder with each step we took. The water rose higher and higher, until its chilly depths reached my hips.
Mere feet separated us from the magical doorway, and the ripple’s power drew me closer. I braced myself for the maelstrom of magic, and Ryder’s hand squeezed mine. As we ducked under the cascading water, magic consumed me.
The world became a cacophony of screams and whispers, light and shadows, colors and darkness. As we plummeted through space and time, wind ripped at my skin and hair and threatened to pull me from Ryder’s clutches. My coat slipped through my fingers like sand.
Ryder wrapped both arms around me and pulled me closer. His warm embrace was a tether in a sea of chaos.
Ryder is with me,I remembered,to go to Circe’s island. To find my parents.
In the space between worlds, time stretched, but I repeated our mission like a mantra.
Find my parents.
Find my parents.
Find my parents.
In seconds or eons or hours, we hit the ground. Ryder took the brunt of the fall and groaned beneath me. Frosty wind ripped at my wet clothes and stole my breath. I scrambled off Ryder and blinked away my lingering dizziness from the ripple’s travel.
The five of us kneeled on thick, hard-packed snow in an endless tundra. Sleet poured from the murky, gray sky and burned my chilled skin. I squinted against the horizon, but I couldn’t see anything in the unforgiving weather.
“Where the hell are we?” Melanie demanded.
“This is definitely not an island,” Kieran said.
On shaky legs, we stood. Though the werewolves appeared unbothered by the cold, my teeth chattered so hard, I feared I would bite off my tongue. Ryder wrapped his arms around me, and I buried my face in his chest. The sleetslammed into us like needles, and I worried about the guys’ exposed backs.
“Over there,” Ryder said. His voice was nearly lost on the howling wind. “There’s a structure there.”
I wanted to look, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave Ryder’s warmth.
“Should we really wander up to a random building?” Kieran asked.
“My mate can’t stay in this cold,” Ryder grumbled. “There’s no other option.”
Feeling like an even bigger weakling than normal, I tried to disentangle myself from Ryder and be of some use, but he simply swept me into his arms and growled at me. When I looked up, I could barely decipher his face in the onslaught of sleet, much less make out some distant structure on the horizon.
“I-I-I’m,” I stuttered, “f-f-f-fine-uh.”
“Sounds like it,” Melanie said. “Let’s go.”
Ryder and the other werewolves jogged across the frozen ground, and I buried my face in Ryder’s warm chest, until magic—familiar and horrific magic—pulsed in the air.
I stiffened, and Ryder cursed.
“What is that?” Kieran asked breathlessly.
The sorceress.
My lips were too cold to form the words.
