The Black Wolves of Boston (eARC) Page 25

  Seth stared in horror at the body.

  Anger came from deep inside him. He struggled to hold it in, to control his beast, even as his wolf fought to come raging out. It pressed his skin, hot and restless. It wanted to destroy everything in its path in blind rage.

  He backed away from the body, hands pressed to his eyes to block out the sight, panting as he held in the wolf.

  Around him, he felt the Thanes lose control. The scent of the Source grew heady. Fabric ripped loudly as one shifted to wolf.

  "Stop it!" he shouted, putting power behind it. There were too many people here that the Thanes could harm, starting with Albany's grandsons. "Stay in control! You are the King's Thanes!"

  Hoffman was the weakest of the Thanes. He was on his hands and knees, back bowed. He'd taken off his suit coat; his shirt burst open across his shoulders, showing off his tribal tattoos.

  "Hoffman!" Seth roared.

  All but one of Albany's grandsons had fled.

  "Idiots!" Albany gestured at Isaiah who was closest to the body. "Cover that up!"

  Isaiah snarled at the old wolf. "We need to give him a proper funeral."

  "Fine." Albany brushed past him. He reached for the canvas tarp lying to the side. "There's no need to stand and gawk at him."

  He tugged on the fabric. There was a loud metallic snap. Something flashed out of the carcass and lanced through Albany's heart. His grandson screamed as the old man dropped to his knees. An angelic dagger was buried to the hilt in his chest, its gleaming point sticking out his back, blood pouring down the blade and onto the floor.

  Albany's alpha pulsed, furnace hot, through the room.

  It hit his grandson and the man became the Source, blindingly bright, for several seconds. He howled wordlessly. The earth echoed the sound, magnified a thousand times.

  The new Marquis of Albany transformed into large gray wolf. He smashed through the wall and ran.

  Seth took off after him. The newborn marquis was close to feral. The man was lost in the Source, leaving the beast in control. Without the human wielding the magic, anyone that the wolf bit would become a feral. Each feral would need to be instantly killed, or they'd create more. It would be a quickly escalating problem. Seth had to catch Albany and submerge his wolf into the Source.

  The Wolf King had taught Seth what to do when his Mexican grandfather died, but in the end, he wasn't needed. Seth knew what to do---in theory. He'd practiced on Cabot and a handful of Thanes pretending to be feral. Thanes were not scared animals. They never ran from him. They didn't have the potential of an entire territory at their call.

  Seth chased after the wolf as it fled toward the crowded main street. The animal had the advantage of four legs and being in the heart of its territory.

  Albany rounded the corner. A blue Ford pickup did a violent U-turn to follow.

  "Look at the size of that wolf!" the driver shouted as the windows slid down.

  "It's a saber-tooth!" His passenger was fumbling with a rifle.

  Neither one seemed to realize that Seth was running beside them. The pickup was on a lift kit so he was mostly hidden from them.

  The passenger leaned out the window with the rifle. "Hold it steady!"

  Seth rammed his hand through the door's body and flipped the pickup. The truck went tumbling into the opposing traffic. The men's frightened screams and the desperate squeal of brakes and the loud crash of the accident behind Seth tore at him. He hated that he'd hurt the hunters, maybe even killed them. If they'd been loaded with silver and killed the new marquis, then the power would jump as far as it needed to find a new heir. Somewhere Seth wasn't, a different grandson would transform. He needed to protect this wolf to prevent that from happening.

  Halfway down the block, disaster struck. A door to a law office flung open just as the wolf reached it. A man in a business suit walked out, talking on his phone. The beast and the human collided. They went down into a tumbling, snarling heap.

  Two wolves scrambled to their feet.

  The newly changed feral wolf was only the size of a German shepherd. It was a dirty yellow without any markings. It looked more like a rabid dog than a wolf. It crashed back into the building that it just exited as a human. The marquis charged down the street.

  "Isaiah!" Seth prayed that the man was within earshot. "Isaiah! There's a feral on the loose!"

  "We've got it!" Isaiah roared angrily somewhere behind him. "Just deal with the marquis!"

  The Thanes had no hope of stopping the marquis. Isaiah clearly hated the reminder. They could, however, kill any feral that was spawned.

  Albany darted down a narrow alleyway, across a back parking lot and leapt a fence. Seth charged after him. Beyond the area became more residential with single family houses mixed with two-story apartment buildings. The wolf wove through yards, through hedges, over fences. Every time Seth thought he could grab hold of the marquis, the wolf would dodge out of his reach.

  The neighborhood ended abruptly in the large, busy parking lot of a strip mall. The anchor store was a huge supermarket.

  "No, not toward crowds of people," Seth shouted.

  Albany charged towards the grocery store. The glass door didn't open fast enough; the wolf crashed through in a spray of glass. Beyond were dozens of shoppers at the checkout lines. They scattered, screaming.

  The wolf saw fleeing prey and charged after it.

  "No!" Seth tackled the wolf.

  They plowed through a display. The air went thick with the scent of Fruit Loops as cereal boxes exploded around them. They rolled, the wolf thrashing in Seth's hold, trying to break free. Under them, the loops crunched.

  "Be human!" Seth shouted at the struggling wolf. He pushed the wolf down, back into the Source.

  Seth was afraid it wouldn't work. In theory, a marquis at the heart of his territory was stronger than any Thane. The newborn lord, though, was lost in alpha amnesia; the human part of him had been swept away by the Source. With his humanity also went the ability to form a coherent resistance.

  "You are human, damn it!" Seth shoved the wolf down, back into the Source. "Be one!"

  The beast shifted to human. The new Marquis of Albany lay panting in the crushed cereal, gazing about in confusion. When Seth had inherited his father's power, it felt like he had just been born. He came to his senses in the throne room with no idea what had happened seconds earlier. His entire life wiped clean to a blank slate.

  Seth kept hold of the man. "You're safe. No one is going to hurt you. There is no reason to run."

  Albany looked to be in his early twenties. He had the old lord's grey eyes and strong nose. Instead of silver, his thick straight hair was dark brown. He panted with fear. "What? What's happening? Where am I?"

  Seth glanced about. He hadn't seen the name of the store as they crashed into it. "A supermarket. Aisle five. Utica."

  "Utica?" The lord pronounced the city's name like he'd never heard of it.

  A police officer came around the corner, pistol leveled. Seth could smell the silver loaded in the gun. He locked down on a growl of anger; the officer shouldn't be able to guess that either of them were wolves as long as Seth kept his composure.

  The officer barely glanced at them. His gaze darted everywhere, trying to spot the wolf he knew was somewhere in the store. "Where did it go? Where's the wolf?"

  "Out the back!" Seth pointed toward double doors that lead into the employees-only area of the store. Someone had fled that way; the doors were still swinging in their wake.

  The officer stalked toward the door, gun ready. Seth kept still, not wanting to draw his attention back to Seth and Albany.

  "My hands look so weird." Albany wriggled his fingers, staring at them with concern. "Are hands supposed to look like that?"

  "Shh," Seth whispered. It was the first question Seth could remember asking Alexander when he became the Prince of Boston. Lost in the amnesia, the wolf seemed to be the true version of his body. It made his long, hairless fingers seem alien to him.
"Your hands are fine."

  "You didn't even look."

  Seth glanced at the man's hands. Five fingers, all where they were supposed to be. He held up his own hand, just like Alexander had. "See. Mine is just the same. This is the way you should be. Don't think about it."

  Thinking could trigger a shift back to wolf. Seth could feel the animal within the man; close to the surface and restless. With the police so close by, Seth didn't want to risk the man transforming back to a beast. Luckily, most of the shoppers had fled the store, so there was no one to see that the man was naked.

  Just like Seth, after the hands came the bare feet.

  "My toes look weird too," the new lord said.

  "They're fine." Seth hauled Albany to his feet. He needed to get the man to safety. Seth didn't know, though, who he was or where he lived.

  "Why am I naked?" Albany asked.

  Continued echoes of the worst day of Seth's life. In the beginning, Albany might be blissfully unaware of his grandfather's death, but slowly his memory would come back.

  "Let's see if we can find you clothes." Seth guided him to the end of the aisle and scanned the overhead signs. Sometimes supermarkets carried T-shirts and underwear. The next aisle was canned fruit, dried beans, and pasta.

  "Who am I?" Albany asked. "Where are my clothes? You know---it's illegal to run around buck naked."

  "Yes, I know." They had to find clothes for Albany quickly. Seth could only keep control of his wolf through continuous physical contact. "You're the Marquis of Albany."

  "What the hell does that mean? What's a marquis? What's my name? Why am I in a supermarket naked?"

  A man came to a sliding halt among the broken glass of the front door. Behind him, the police squad car sat abandoned, lights blazing, radio crackling and hissing out reports of multiple wolf sightings.

  "Boston!" The newcomer was another grandson of the old Marquis. "Oh, thank God! I was afraid Ewan had gone feral."

  A name. That was a start. "Your name is Ewan." Seth pulled Albany into the first aisle, out of sight of the door. "Give him your clothes. We can't let him get arrested."

  "Right." The newcomer started to strip off his clothes. "I'm Cameron Keir."

  "Ewan? Ewan what?" the new lord asked.

  Cameron gave Seth a bewildered look.

  "It's alpha amnesia." Seth wondered why a possible heir didn't know this. Hadn't Albany braced his family for the inevitable? Or did the old wolf think he'd live for a dozen more decades? "He won't remember anything about himself for several days."

  "Right. Sire told us. He expected the king to be here, making sure everything went right." Cameron stripped off his lightweight Giants football jersey and the long sleeved T-shirt under it. He pulled the jersey back on and held out the T-shirt. "Your name is Ewan Aillig Keir."

  "Aillig?" Ewan shied away from the offered shirt. "You've got to be kidding. Who names their kid that?"

  "It was the name of the first Marquis of Albany," Cameron explained. "It's a longstanding family tradition. Everyone gets tagged with it, in one way or another. It's my middle name too."

  Seth intercepted the clothing. It could be simply the scent of another wolf, or there might be ancient history there. Alexander delayed returning from Belgrade because he was worried someone would kill the new prince. Seth traded the T-shirt for the gray polo he was wearing.

  Ewan sniffed at Seth's shirt. He found it acceptable; he pulled on the polo.

  The problem, then, wasn't the scent of another wolf.

  "You're cousins?" Seth wished he knew more about the Albany family tree. All he knew was that most of Albany's obvious heirs had been pruned.

  "No." Cameron pulled off his hiking boots. "He's my little brother. Everyone always thought the next Marquis would be me or my cousin, Dan. Ewan was always so quiet and agreeable; people didn't think he was strong."

  "Was?" That made it sound like Cameron thought of his brother as dead. Was he planning something?

  "They're going to have to change how they think." Cameron took off his belt. "Sorry about the shirt; Ewan hates my cologne. He says werewolves shouldn't wear perfume. I don't wear it for him; my girlfriend loves it."

  Seth tented the front of the borrowed shirt to sniff at it. The fabric smelled of amber, musk and citrus of some expensive cologne. Living in New York, Seth had grown used to the reek of perfumes. "You date a human girl?"

  "No!" Cameron gave a surprised laugh. "She's part of the Syracuse pack. She just likes smelly things: candles and soap and all that crap. I know it's weird for a werewolf. She's quirky, but that's what I love about her. I want to marry her, but Sire wouldn't let me. Syracuse is just a barony. Sire..." Cameron's voice broke with grief. "Sire said that if I inherited the alpha, the king would simply dissolve my marriage. Alexander would shift my children to Syracuse pack to prevent them from inheriting Albany. Sire said it would be less heartache never to go down that road in the first place."

  If that was really the case, then Ewan was safe with his older brother. Cameron didn't want the alpha and was strong enough to protect Ewan until he regained his memories.

  Cameron stripped off his boots, socks, and blue jeans. "Should I give him my underwear too?"

  "He can go commando." Seth was no longer sure which direction the bed and breakfast with the Porsche lay. "Where are the cars that you came in?"

  "Across town at the hotel. I've got keys to the Land Rover. I'm not sure who drove the Phantom."

  Nor did Seth know how to get back to the hotel where he'd met the old Marquis. They needed to get the new lord to safety. "Lead the way."

  * * *

  The rest of the Albany pack were huddled beside the cars when Seth reached the hotel. They were all older than Seth, some by a dozen years, but they seemed like a pile of unhappy puppies. Only one had the wherewithal to pace back and forth beside the pack's vehicles. Strong enough to ignore the comfort of the huddle, too weak to leave it by a dozen feet.

  The youngest man staggered to his feet, tears streaming down his face. "Is it you then, Cam?"

  "No, Keegan," Cameron pulled his sobbing cousin into a hug. He raised his voice to address all his family. "Ewan is the new marquis. He's got alpha amnesia. It's up to us to keep him safe until he's back on his feet."

  "Ewan?" the pacer growled. "Ewan? We're screwed."

  "Shut up, Danny," Cameron snarled. "You know he didn't choose it. The power goes to whoever can hold it."

  The two were nearly equal in dominance. They glared at each other, neither flinching away.

  Dan proved himself the weaker by dropping to pure logic. "It went to the closest person to sire when he..."

  "It goes to the person who can hold it," Seth stated coldly. "There is nothing you can do to influence it. All the Wolf King can do is move people out of the pack, so they're not connected to the Source at that point. Ewan is the new marquis and that is the end of this discussion. Which one of you has keys to the Phantom?" Seth pointed at the Rolls Royce parked beside the Land Rover. He didn't want Ewan near the body which was best moved via the SUV.

  "I do," Dan said.

  Seth had hoped that one of the other men had the keys. It couldn't be helped. "Swap keys with Cameron..."

  "Look, kid, we don't have to listen to you."

  "Dan!" Most of his cousins cried out in surprise and fear.

  "This is not his territory," Dan snapped. "We're Albany. We don't have to obey some little kid."

  Seth looked hard at the man, making him drop his gaze. "I am here as the King's standin to make sure the new marquis is safe. You will do what I tell you to or I'll make you."

  "The king doesn't know yet, so you can't be here as..."

  "Kneel!" Seth put power behind it.

  Dan dropped to his knees, whimpering.

  "Hey!" Ewan shifted between Seth and his cousin. "No. Don't. Don't do whatever you're doing. Stop..."

  Seth stepped back to strengthen the impression that he was backing down. Ewan had the alpha instincts ev
en though he had no clue what was going on. He'd protect what was his. It came at a cost; as Albany's power flared to counter Seth's, the concerned look on Ewan's face gave way to confusion.

  "Who are you?" Ewan scanned the parking lot. "Where are we? Who am I?"

  "You're Ewan." Cameron put an arm around his little brother. "I'm Cameron. It's okay. We're going home."

  "Every time he's stressed, it will make the amnesia last longer," Seth kept his voice low and nonthreatening. "He needs to be home, safe, surrounded by familiar things. We don't have time for fighting over who can tell who what to do. Someone needs to take the Land Rover and go to the coffee shop and get your grandfather's body. Now."

  The Albany pack flinched back at the thought of facing their dead.

  "Can't the Thanes..." Keegan started to ask.

  "The Thanes are dealing with a feral." Seth glossed over the fact that Ewan created the feral. The man wouldn't be able to handle the guilt of knowing what he'd done. "Once it's taken care of, they need to focus on finding the Wickers."

  "We should be finding the Grigori that did this," Dan growled.

  "The Grigori didn't do this." Seth stomped on that. Even if Jack wasn't currently viewing the Grigori as packmates, the last thing they needed was a war with her family. "That trap was set by Wickers."

  "That was an angelic blade..." three of the cousins started.

  "With no Grigori attached. Each set of blades are made for the Virtue that wields them and the first strike the weapons make are into their own bodies. It's the magical wound that opens them to their Source. They are their blades. A Grigori wouldn't have left one of their blades unattended, where it could be taken or destroyed. They're irreplaceable. The Wickers must have killed a Grigori for their weapons. It's probably how they killed Samuels at the barn."

  "Or the Grigori are working with the witches," Dan muttered.

  Seth never thought he'd be glad for the last three years of dealing with Isaiah and the Thanes. It taught him how to calmly talk in the face of sheer stupidity. "The witches left the blade as a trap so we would attack our allies instead of coming after them. It's a false flag maneuver and needs to be ignored."