WITCHES OF WOLF CREEK: TRUTH

Chapter 15: Neeve

Tyler has his head resting on my stomach. Emmitt is curled up against me, his face buried in my hair. I’m lying naked in Tyler’s bed, or so I understand it was his. I caress his head with my fingertips, wondering how I got here. I don’t like wolves. I hate vampires. They and we have nothing in common. The law is clear.

But that was before. Before I killed a sorcerer by burying him alive. Before my friends and I got into this mess. And to whom do I owe it? This question haunts me. Since this woman committed suicide at our feet, my life has changed. And not just mine, but those of Eli and Six too. And while danger awaits us, here I am in beautiful silk sheets, cajoling wolves.

"You’re thinking too much," Emmitt says, inhaling the scent on the back of my neck.

"And how do you know I’m thinking?"

"I feel it."

"I feel it too," Tyler remarks, wrapping his arm around my waist.

I sigh. Within days, my life changed. I find myself in a bed, surrounded by two fashion models whose fangs grow at the full moon. Our caresses were limited to kisses and a few touches, but I’m pretty well placed to agree from the start that this is a new and dangerous situation for me. I am with two men in a bed. Worse, I’m with two wolves in a bed!

We don’t mix...

OK… I was going to never break that rule, except here, and as Emmitt places feather-light kisses on my shoulder, I suddenly find this law really racist. Wolves now seem to me to be an unknown species, which deserves the trouble of reaching out to them. Nothing in Tyler’s or Emmitt’s demeanour suggests anything humiliating, or whatever adjective relates to this dusty, vindictive law. However, it runs through my head and I refuse to throw away twenty-eight years of education for two handsome, muscular men with protruding canines. Though…

"How long have you been part of this pack?" I ask, running my fingers along the back of Tyler’s neck.

"Since we were born," he replies.

"We’re only two weeks apart, Tyler and I," Emmitt remarks.

"So what? Do you do everything together?"

A silence passes. Emmitt raises his head, and Tyler immediately imitates him. I feel the coolness hit my shoulder as their gazes meet.

"We’ve always done everything together," Emmitt says, before curling up against me again.

I smile and run my hand behind Tyler’s back, while Emmitt kisses me under the ear.

"And me, where do I fit in all this?"

"Between us," Emmitt says hoarsely against my neck.

I chuckle.

"Have you done this before?"

My question is relevant. They know what I’m talking about. Not that I lack experience, but damn it, two wolves!

"Not for a long time..."

"Since when?"

Tyler lets out a laugh. Emmitt imitates him.

"We lived with a woman a few years ago. It didn’t last."

"For what reasons?"

"She was marked by a wolf from another pack."

"What is marked?"

"As a wolf, how can you not know that?"

"I know nothing of marked!" I said, wanting to make up for what could be a monumental blunder. "But for you Southern Wolves, maybe things are different, I don’t know?"

"Commitment. A marked wolf is no longer available to anyone. And if it’s marked, it’s final."

"Marked? Bitten, you mean?"

Tyler lifts his head, stares at me for a moment, and cups my face as if looking for answers in my eyes.

"It’s irreversible," he says, "and neither Emmitt nor I will. Sorry darling."

What he is talking about? I don’t want to be branded. His reaction concerns me. What does he mean?

"Save yourself the trouble, I have no desire that you mark me. I am still young!"

"Youth has nothing to do with it. Love, the irrational attraction of a wolf for a wolf, is reciprocal and indelible. You’re hot, Neeve, damn it, Emmitt can confirm that, but he and I won’t mark you."

But what the hell is he talking about?

"Uh, that should be fine, then."

"So much the better."

"At least, as long as my friends are well and you don’t treat them like captives."

"It’s necessarily a little."

"For what reasons?"

"You’re not one of us. You are strange and smell strange. Personally, it appeals to me, but it’s… atypical. Dangerous…"

"Dangerous?"

Emmitt brings his hand up to my stomach. His fingers trace a circle around one of my breasts. He performs this gesture with a slowness that liquefies me. His eyes contemplate my chest as if he had never seen one. I should realize how out of place this situation is. However, I feel good in the middle of these two colossi. Tyler runs his arm up my leg, and nothing seems more normal to me than lying next to the majestic wolves that are Tyler and Emmitt.

"How come no wolf marked you in the North?"

I smile at this question. How else? It is posed with tenderness, and there is mixed with it a curiosity that I guess is affectionate. I feel those things. I even feel them clearly in Tyler and Emmitt. They want me. The experience and carnal touching in the bath have certainly already revealed that to me, but the sincerity of this question proves it to me completely. Emmitt wants to know more about me and it’s not for the pack. He wants me for himself and his cousin and needs answers. Why am I sure? I would not know how to say it. Why do I feel this strange mixed emotion of repulsion and envy? Because I’m a witch.

It’s clear though! I didn’t have s*x with Tyler and Emmitt. Each of us wants to go further, I would be very hypocritical if I said otherwise. But they are wolves. Wolves! Beings from the shadow world, who hunt during the full moon, who live in packs, isolated, and for whom I should feel disgust. But this isn’t the case. Far from it. I now know that Elinor is fine. Let’s take care of her. I’m more worried about Sixine. I felt that she was turned upside down by her meeting with Jaxson. Rarely have I seen my best friend so… upset. I don’t think she realizes what’s happening to her.

On the other hand, what I experienced about her behaviour, while she defended Jaxson in front of an Alpha and his pack was unique. Sixine is the wisest, the most thoughtful of our trio. The one for whom injustice is intolerable, the one for whom it matters. Not many of us take these things with as much heart as Six. However, she comes from a wealthy family. The Shadwe belong to the elite of sorcerers. Descended from a centuries-old lineage, they are the masters of sorcery in the western United States. Admittedly, the Mona’s position themselves as their equals on the scale of the most powerful, since Elinor’s father is the master of the North Carolina coven and Lord Raven, Sixine’s uncle, that of Virginia. The influence of these two families on the richest territories in magic is recognized all over the world. And although the Shadwe and Mona families both shine by the eminent positions occupied by their members in the established hierarchy, the Foris’s, my family, are not left out. Our dynasty is also old, but it is more discreet. Only its longevity through the centuries owes it to be a family recognized by the community. We have nothing extraordinary except our love for nature and our ability to enjoy the benefits it brings. An existence that I cherish now, whereas it had seemed insipid to me a few years earlier. Adolescence… And mine was both long and late. I remember that time and my history with Levenach…

"There was a wolf," I tell Emmitt, my fingers running over his shaved head, "but the story didn’t end well."

Tyler lifts his head, nuzzles my hair, and presses a kiss on my neck.

"The wolves of the North are mad."

"We should thank the wolves of the North," suggests Emmitt.

I giggle.

"Northern wolves may not have fallen under my spell, but southern wolves have good taste."

The two start laughing and hug me. Damn… I already know that I’m going to succumb. In reality, as I am, skin to skin, in the middle of the two Betas of the pack, I have already done it. It is at this moment that I realize that the laws of sorcerers have been engraved in stone without the real reasons being known. At least, yes, we know them. They are even taught from the first year at the Wiccard Academy. Wolves, vampires and sorcerers instinctively repel each other. And have done for centuries. But, today, wolves don’t look so different from sorcerers, except in their way of life. Besides, I want to know more about it.

"Were you raised in this place?"

"As soon as we were born," Emmitt replies.

"How so?"

"A wolf who gives birth to wolf cubs must guide them, educate them. The learning is mainly about how to behave in the pack, the history of our community, but also hunting and everything related to our animal part. Isn’t that so in the North?"

I take a while to answer before saying:

"Of course yes."

Then I think of my mother. She’s not a wolf, but I still see her walking with me in the forest. I am small and I run. My mother laughs and sings. We are in communion with nature. Suddenly I miss her. My mood darkens. What must she think of my disappearance? And my father? This tall sorcerer holed up in the woods, who prefers fishing to coven meetings...

"Elinor, Sixine and you will be fine with us," Tyler said, suddenly snapping me out of my thoughts.

"For the moment, nothing can assure me," I reply.

Emmitt sits up, and Tyler too. Suddenly, I feel exposed. Naked in front of them, wolves that I don’t know, staring at me and holding me back. But are they really holding me back?

"What I mean," I continued, "is that I haven’t seen Elinor. I don’t know what happened to Sixine, and your sumptuous bodies are derailing me from my goals."

"And what are they? Your… goals?"

To hide. Understand why they want to kill us, my friends and me. Learn more about wolves. Because yes, I want to know more. Even if our reception deserved more delicacy, something in this cave inspires confidence in me. The desire to share moments with Tyler and Emmitt. The desire to get to know this world that has been portrayed to me as hostile since my childhood.

"I’m hungry. First objective: to eat."

Tyler’s lips curl. Emmitt laughs. Then they get up and put on pants and a T-shirt. I imitate them with the clothes that the first brought me. Tyler steps closer and holds out his arm to me. Emmitt does the same. I shake my head and catch them, and here I am leaving the cousins’ room to enter the corridors that I surveyed a little earlier as a wolf. I have no trouble remembering the kitchens, and I understand that Emmitt and Tyler are well aware of this, since I arrive in the large room without being blindfolded. In front of the brand new oven range, where this time a single pot is simmering, stands the old gentleman I met when I was looking for Elinor.

"Lyle, do you have anything to serve our guest?"

The old wolf turns and gives me a big smile.

"A real redhead! I knew it."

Emmitt and Tyler sit at the big table and, with a wave of his hand, Lyle invites me to do the same.

"You’ll have to gain strength if you want to share these two kids," he throws me.

"Hey!" Emmitt protests. "Don’t start breaking balls, Lyle!"

"Leave it, Emmitt, he’s old and jealous."

Lyle hits the back of Tyler’s head with a friendly clap and laughs.

"Jealousy?" he said. "Yes, it must be that. When you are my age, you will understand. Enjoy while you wait."

Lyle prepares a plate for me and pours a mixed salad on it which looks delicious. I throw myself on it, after refusing the meat that the cook offered me. I’m a vegetarian, although oddly enough I feel an almost irrepressible urge to sink my fangs into the steak that just disappeared from view.

"Thank you, it’s great!"

"At your service, my dear."

We are interrupted by a troop of wolves, including Jake, who pauses when he sees me at the table with the cousins. An athletic woman with long brown hair takes his hand as he analyzes the situation.

"I’m Macha," says Jake’s companion.

"Hi. I’m Neeve."

I smile at her. The benevolent look on her face reassures me.

"Are you really going to live with them?" Jake asks, raising an eyebrow.

Tyler and Emmitt lean back in their chairs at the same time and watch him. A heavy silence drags on, so I make it a point to answer for them, since after all, I am the first concerned.

"We’re getting to know each other," I said. "Nothing is set in stone, is it?"

A small, high-pitched laugh escapes my mouth, and I can’t stop it.

"There, you know everything, Jake," Emmitt says. "We’re getting to know each other."

Jake squints and watches the three of us, and then laughs before going to greet Lyle.

"What’s this?" I inquire. "Your canteen?"

"Yeah."

My gaze roams the vast hall. The imperfect rock of the walls, the worktop, the household appliances, and the large table where I am seated. The place is unusual. Wolves come and go after eating a bite. They don’t hang around long, and Lyle watches everything and everyone with a sharp eye.

"Do you go to Wolf Creek to do your shopping?"

"Well, yes, it’s the closest to here."

I understand then that I have probably already met wolves without knowing it. I venture to explore the subject a bit.

"But... isn’t this the stronghold of North Carolina sorcerers? I heard that there are many there."

"Yes, it is," Lyle replies enigmatically. "The oldest families of sorcerers live there."

"You know them?"

"In name only. We don’t mix, you know that, Neeve."

"Yes of course. I just wanted to make sure it was the same down south."

"It’s the same everywhere in the world!" says Emmitt. "Didn’t your mother teach you that?"

"Yes... but I haven’t travelled much."

"I don’t advise you to do it outside of our territories."

"Disgusting creatures, sorcerers," Tyler finishes.

"sorcerers are what they are," Lyle tempers them. "You must not approach them. The Monas and Shadwes would be happy to turn you into goats at the first opportunity. It is for this reason that we remain discreet when it comes to sourcing. Three wolves. Any more, and we’d be spotted and exposed."

"sorcerers have never been real dangers before," Emmitt explains to me, after finishing his plate, "unlike those vampires."

"Do vampires give you trouble?"

"Vampires are always a problem."

"How so?"

"They kill. And since the area around Wolf Creek is protected by magic, local vampires tend to visit the forest on full moon nights. We always count disappearances."

"Do they kill wolves?"

"Anyway, we think it’s them. Females, every time. But what we don’t understand is how they find us. Shortly before you arrived, we thought it was because of the Virginia pack. Cooper ordered to capture two wolves and a scout from this pack to find out for sure. They tended to forget the borders of their territory. But we drew a blank, and before we could push the interrogations, Jaxson screwed up and released them."

"Is that why he was almost sentenced to exile?"

"Yeah. Your girlfriend Sixine gave Cooper a golden opportunity to moderate the verdict, without being considered weak among the pack. Which relieved him. He’s his brother, after all."

"But an Alpha’s responsibilities should come before family considerations," Tyler says. "They must, for the good of the pack."

I have the impression that the subject is sensitive. Also, I decide to change quickly.

"Is he taking good care of Elinor?"

Tyler and Emmitt share a smile that I don’t understand, but both nod reassuringly. I imitate them and get up. My hands go up in front of each of them. It doesn’t take long for them to realize that this gesture is an invitation. The silent invitation of a witch fallen under the spell of two wolves.