Chapter 56

Gray

The first thing I feel when I come back to my senses is a throbbing headache filling every inch of my mind. Even though I’m lying down, my muscles are sore and my breath is heavy, sickness clenching my throat. What happened?

I crack my eyes open and blink a few times before I realize that it’s the darkness of night that’s obscuring my vision, not the dark blots of dizziness dancing on the edges of my sight. How much time have I spent here? I try to see anything through the darkness, and the first thing my gaze lands on is a big and weathered red flower trampled into the ground next to me.

Shit. What is this place? I focus on the flower and slowly sensations from the rest of my body start to flood my mind. The heavy weight of my limbs against the ground. My dry and aching throat. The headache pulsating with the fast rhythm of my heart. An itch in the middle of my back. Wait, is it…

I let out a rough whine—and only then realize that my voice is that of a human. I’m sure I fell to the ground in the shape of my wolf spirit. Have I shifted while I was unconscious? With a groggy mind, I try to reach the spirit in my chest, but I hear nothing in response, only a faint echo of its presence. It’s as if my heart is empty without half of my soul, and the sensation finally jolts me upright.

Ah, damn. I close my eyes as the world spins around me for a second, and I have to hold myself upright with my arms, leaning forward heavily. My heart is pounding in my ears, my chest, my throat. My body is hot and trembling from head to toe. I feel sick. I feel…cursed.

I slowly breathe out, trying to calm down the growing fit of panic. As I sit up, the itch grows stronger to the point that it turns into a burning sting. I gather my mind to focus on the sensation, and its location makes perfect sense now. It’s in the middle of my back, right where Hailey left her marks four years ago.

Or was it Paula this time?

I growl as invisible claws dig in the middle of my chest and shake my head. I don’t want to believe it—but isn’t it obvious? The timing, the story, her touches and coaxing words. My vision swims again, bile rising in my throat. I know these sensations all too well, although I’d be happy to forget about them forever.

But why is it happening today? How can it be a coincidence that I break down no more than a few hours after I have sex with Paula? Four years ago, it was exactly the same, and I can’t help but chuckle as I see the irony of it all. History repeats itself.

I swallow the sour taste in my mouth and look up. My head is too heavy for any thinking, and my muscles are shivering in the grip of fever. The sickening scent of flowers is so strong my eyes water, and I sneeze and immediately groan from the sharp pain in my back. I have to get out of here first—I’ll deal with the witch later.

On the second attempt, I manage to push myself onto my knees and slowly stand up despite the soreness in every joint. The moonlight is faint, but I feel its soothing call in my bones and search for its source in the sky to understand where the settlement is. But even as I look at the moon, the wolf spirit remains silent, shrunk into the deepest part of my being. For me, the curse hurts only on my back, slowly spreading further—but for my wolf spirit, the burning pain enwraps it whole.

The point of the curse is to get rid of my wolf, and I force myself to take a deep breath and push myself to walk through the forest before it’s too late for both of us.

It’s hard to force myself into taking even one step, so I focus on the movements of my legs, pushing them one by one. One step, two steps, one step, two steps. I walk like that for some time, and soon enough the steps become almost mechanical and my feverish thoughts return to Paula. The ache in my chest grows even stronger, and I let out a quiet growl—a natural reaction to the wave of anger rushing through my veins.

But what if it wasn’t Paula’s fault? What if she woke up the curse without knowing what she was doing? God, I want to be wrong so badly— but I’ve already reached my limits of trust. After I got to know Paula better, I don’t believe in coincidences anymore.

Paula isn’t just a witch. She’s been taunting and ignoring me for weeks now, knowing perfectly well that I couldn’t stand her—and suddenly, she decides to talk about our connection and pull me into bed with her. If she knows when something dangerous is about to happen, why didn’t she warn me? Why didn’t she stop this before it was too late? I swallow thickly, staring down at my dragging feet. Because everything Paula told me was bullshit.

I bite back a whine rising in my chest along with a burst of heartache and step into a cold creek, my toes digging into the silt. The place is familiar already, so I have to keep moving forward. My human legs are sore from the cold and exertion, sickness clenching my throat with every step. It would be easier to move through the woods as a wolf of course, but the curse is taking up more and more space with every passing minute.

I can barely feel the wolf’s presence behind the burn of it.

I don’t know how long I walk in one direction, making short pauses to catch my breath before continuing with the same determination. It takes maybe ten minutes, maybe ten hours, but finally I catch the first hint of a wolf scent. It’s hard to place it behind the throbbing ache in my legs, so I slump against a tree trunk and take a few deep breaths.

It’s Caleb. The scent is rather weak, lingering on a couple of leaves —he simply passed by an hour or two ago—but it’s enough to pull my wolf spirit out of its agony. Our voices blend into a whimper as I recognize the scent of my pack, my home waiting for me on the other end of it. It beckons me further, and I push myself again, adrenaline beating in my veins. I have to find them, warn them about Paula and her curses, tell them not to… Not to touch me.

I halt in my tracks so sharply that my legs give in from the sudden change, and I slump on the ground, breathing heavily. They shouldn’t touch me, that’s the first rule. Maybe they shouldn’t see me at all —they’ll be so worried. What if the curse spreads to them as well? I breathe in Caleb’s scent and the note of Lily’s tender scent peeks through it, making me close my eyes in a rush of terror.

What will happen to her if I infect her with the curse? Our pack is too young and small for proper support if anyone gets sick. Only Fiona knows how to prepare ointments and draw healing power from her spirit, but her powers wouldn’t be enough to save any of us, including me. The memory of the last time I saw my sister resurfaces in my boiling mind. Vicky had been so worried about me when I got back home that day. I still remember the warmth of her fur when she came to curl into a ball in my bed. And how did I repay her?

I shake my head and look up at the moon. I can’t go to the settlement when I’m so sick. I can’t risk the lives of my family again. But what should I do then? Go to Raywald? Find Asya and Rorie? They are a part of my pack, and I trust them, I really do—but even the thought of talking to witches right now makes me sick. And if I meet Paula there…I snarl into the quiet of the night, digging my fingers into the grass. If I lose control over myself, I could easily tear her to pieces, and that would get all of us into trouble.

So what options do I have left? I look around dazedly, struggling to breathe under the weight of the curse in my lungs, and the answer comes to me on its own.

I have to leave. Whatever happens to me, I can’t put everyone else in such danger. I don’t know what the curse will do to me in an hour, six hours, twenty four—maybe it will go easier on me? Who knows. But what I know for sure is that if I allow it to spread to others, I will never be able to live with it. It would be worse than slow death on my own.

With a pained groan, I push myself up on my legs and turn away from both the settlement and the town. The wolf spirit whines weakly in protest, but I can’t follow its command, especially as it seems to want to send me to Raywald. To Paula? I shake my head. It has gone mad, I see it now. I have to hurry up and get away from the settlement before it gets worse.

My wobbling feet carry me down the slope of the mountain and to the warm ribbon of the highway running through the middle of the valley. I shiver when I leave the embrace of the woods, but I can only go forward at this point—so I cross the road, naked and feverish, and escape everything that I’ve grown to love and cherish.

I’ve never been in the woods on this side of the valley, and I remember why as soon as I stumble into them. The ground under my bare feet is thrumming with magic, and the forest is eerily quiet. Members of the old pack have warned us many times to avoid Rabbit Mountain because it’s always been the territory of witches—but damn it. What is there to lose now? If I meet one, I might at least be able to release all the pain and fury I feel toward Paula and every witch of her kind before following my wolf spirit to the stars.

But I don’t come across any signs of witchcraft even as I go deeper into the woods. At some point however, I feel something that catches me off guard and makes me freeze for a good minute. It’s the smell of a wolf—one I’m sure I don’t know. But instead of feeling hostile or cautious about it, I sense weirdly familiar notes in the scent. Unable to fight my instincts, I follow it without a thought.