Tracking the Bear (Blue Ridge Bears Book 1)(30)

He began to circle the ridge, attempting to get behind me and nearer to Lucy. I adjusted my position, shielding her from view. Luke’s lips pulled away from his teeth. They were already coated in a sheen of dark blood. I just hoped to God it wasn’t human.

“Chance,” Lucy muttered. “Chance, you can’t kill him.”

Now? She wanted me to show him mercy now, when every indication said he’d kill her, if he got the chance? I blew out a breath, ruffling her hair. She made a face.

“I know, I know. But he’s important, Chance. Not just to me.”

He was important to everyone, apparently. I had no idea why Frigg and the Aesir wanted him dead, but they’d made their point pretty damn clear. On the other side of things, the Vanir must want Luke alive. All the clues that I’d been unable to make sense of earlier suddenly clicked into place. Lucy’s lies about Freyr in the bathtub, her insistence in keeping her history with Luke quiet. She didn’t just want to save his life, she had to. She’d been compelled, the same as I had been.

What consequences lay in store for her if she failed the Vanir? What more could they take from Lucy?

Luke Elmsong made his way slowly down the slope, sizing me up. A low rumble began in his throat, as he approached me. I was bigger than he was, though not by much and the spirit of the berserker who possessed his body would not care about the pain. He had a singular focus. Kill the enemy and acquire the prey.

Before I could stop her, or even process what she was doing, Lucy ran out in front of me, right into the path of the oncoming bear.

No!

Luke charged, and time seemed to slow to a crawl. In only a few loping steps, he’d be on her. In one savage strike of teeth, he could tear out her throat. And then, like Keith Page, she’d fall and her brain would have twenty seconds to process the pain, the fear, and the fact that she was dying.

Luke skidded to a stop only a few feet away from Lucy, as an orb of silver-white light materialized in the air between them. Even I skidded to a halt, digging furrows in the ground beneath me. What was this? More Aesir interference? Was Frigg so set on Luke Elmsong’s death that she was prepared to do it herself?

The light coalesced into a four-legged shape. It was huge, and easily dwarfed Lucy. Its fur was white, though it looked grey in the light of the full moon. It turned slowly to face her, its phantom back toward the suddenly cautious form of Luke’s bear. It lowered its ursine head to nudge Lucy’s shoulder.

Lucy stretched out a shaking hand to touch the polar bear’s snout. To my surprise, her hand did not phase through the conjured beast, and she stroked shaking fingers over its face gently.

“A gift,” she whispered. “This is your gift to me. Thank you, Freyr.”

And she stepped forward, into her bear. The she-bear split into a dozen tiny stars that drifted slowly down over Lucy, landing in her hair, on her cute upturned nose, and her still outstretched hands. The soft silver glow seeped into her skin, and she seemed to radiate light.

Then the glow dissipated and she collapsed, sprawling on the ground between us. Luke was still closer to her than I was, and I forced my frozen limbs to move forward.

He still reached her first, and my heart constricted painfully, waiting for the blow that would end her life. The enormous black bear had been shaken by the sudden appearance of another, and didn’t seem to know what to make of the prone form on the ground before him. He nosed once at her hair, snuffling along her throat. It licked the injured flesh curiously and sneezed.

Luke took his sister’s jacket hood between his teeth and began to drag her away, shuffling back up the slope the way he had come. I followed. Despite his sudden change in demeanor, I couldn’t risk leaving her alone with him. He was a killer, and nowhere close to having control of his bear.

Another hot slash of pain caught my attention and I turned halfway around to see the cause. There was another damned wolf biting my ankle. I snarled and slashed at the air between us, hoping it would let me go. Every second I wasted, allowed Luke to drag his sister another few feet away from me.

The first wolf was joined by another, and then another until I had to turn completely around to face them. Wolves were pests, cowards who normally attacked from behind. They wouldn’t like their odds if they faced me head on.

The Alpha wolf was in the clearing once again, and human. It took my human brain several crucial seconds to realize what my bear brain had not. The human shape was weaker, nearly useless in a fight, but it had several advantages over animal form. Opposable thumbs, for instance.

In his hand, the Alpha wolf balanced a sizable slab of rock. He bared his teeth in a fierce grin of triumph.

“Odin sends his regards.”

The step backwards I managed before the rock hit me was the only thing that stopped the blow from caving in my skull. As it was, it clipped me hard on its way past and I stumbled onto my side. My vision swam. My pulse slammed through my veins, and I couldn’t hear the wolf’s approach.

The wolf knelt by my head. “Your woman is as good as dead.”

No. No, no, no. My thoughts were jumbled, tripping over one another in the chaos of my head. No. She’s gone. He has her. He has her and they’re going to hunt them both down. Get up! Get up, you worthless son of a bitch!

But I couldn’t force my legs to move. The Alpha wolf drew a back a meaty fist and hit me hard on the opposite temple. The blackness stole over me, silencing even the screaming panic of my thoughts.