Wulfe Untamed (Feral Warriors #8)(80)

All Natalie saw was grass, trees, mountains, and rain. Mostly rain. Wulfe finally came to a stop and pulled her close. Within his hold, she felt his tension and knew how much he dreaded this.

A chill shivered through her, her own muscles tensing. Despite all the times she’d urged him to do what he had to, now that he intended to call that power through her, she was scared. If the little bit of energy Satanan had pulled had hurt so badly, how much more would this? Most of all, she worried about Wulfe.

She would keep him tethered. She had to.

As his hand pressed against her rain-chilled cheek, pain sliced through his gentle eyes.

Natalie covered his hand. “I love you, and I’m not letting you go. Fair warning.”

He smiled faintly and said nothing, his jaw tight. “It’s not working,” he muttered.

“Do you have to chant?”

“Not for this, no. Strome said I had to reverse what I did the first time. I healed you by calling your wound to me.”

“Was it easy?”

“No. I can only heal a human’s wounds if I want to badly enough.”

“How badly did you want mine?”

“Fiercely.” He blinked against the rain.

“You have to want to give it back to me just as much.” She gripped his hand where it covered her cheek. “Wulfe, I want that wound back. I’ve always known I had some purpose, that I was chosen for this life because I was needed here. I believed, until now, that my purpose was to help people see better and to ensure the children can read. But I was wrong. I’m here because you need me. As your channel key. Perhaps as more. This is what I was born to do.”

“Natalie . . .”

“Just as I believe that you were born for this, too. You were born who you are, what you are, because at this critical moment in time, only a Daemon-wolf could possibly stand against a consciousness as powerful as Satanan’s. This is your destiny, Wulfe. Claim it. Let us both claim ours.”

His gaze bore into hers, searching, finding. His big body sighed, the tension easing out of his shoulders as his spine straightened, as his shoulders fell back. Acceptance entered his eyes though the worry remained.

With a tight nod, he shifted his hand on her cheek, holding the back of her head gently with his other. “You’re right.”

She smiled softly. “Of course I’m right. Now give me back my wound, shifter, so that we can stop those bad guys.”

His smile was fleeting as he closed his eyes. At first nothing happened. Then a throb erupted in her cheek beneath his hand, uncomfortable, but not truly painful, as his scar—the one that should have been hers—began to fade.

Wulfe pulled his hand away suddenly and peered at her with concern. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Now call the power you were destined for.”

“We need a pentagram.”

“Here,” Hawke said. Kneeling, he quickly dug a pentagram in the wet ground with his knife.

Wulfe’s big hand closed carefully around hers, and he led her into the center. Turning her to face him, he cupped her face gently in his hands, his mouth compressing.

“It’s going to be okay,” she whispered.

In his eyes she saw dread, but also the acceptance of the responsibility that he’d been laden with thanks to his Daemon blood. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and covered her wound with his palm. Then he began whispering in a language that sounded like nothing Natalie had ever heard.

Deep inside her, something began to happen. She felt a tingling in her feet that rushed suddenly upward, through her legs, her body, her chest, her neck, then into her face, finally coalescing in the cheek beneath Wulfe’s hand. As the words flowed from his lips in a never-ending stream of visceral sound, he threw his head back as if in pain . . . or ecstasy.

The words flew from his mouth, faster and louder, no longer a whisper.

The tingling in Natalie’s body began to sting, then burn, but she clamped down on the groan that clawed at her throat.

Wulfe’s grip on her face tightened, the words shooting from his mouth, the power rushing up through her, hot and furious, until she feared she would scream. She couldn’t breathe, could barely stand. Too much. Too much.

Suddenly, Wulfe released her.

As Natalie fell to her knees, gasping for breath, Wulfe let out a bark of alien joy. A roar of power and strength, of invincibility and cruelty.

With dread, Natalie looked up into the eyes of a stranger, eyes glowing bright red. Eyes filled with evil.

Chapter Twenty-two

Natalie stared, her vision narrowed from the pain, her heart pounding as the man she’d fallen in love with stared down at her as if he’d never seen her before. She’s promised to keep him tethered, but she’d never had a chance to grab hold! And he was already gone.

No, he wasn’t gone, he couldn’t be.

Closing her eyes, she pushed past the physical discomfort to concentrate on the man she knew, the one who looked at her with such soft adoration, not this red-eyed stranger. She thought of him in his wolf, protecting her with his life. And his gentle, tender touch when he’d made love to her as a man.

Emotion rushed through her, raw and bright, and something moved inside of her, a thick, irregular beat. Not her heart. His. She could swear she felt Wulfe’s heart, covered in shadows.

Impossible. Then again, what was truly impossible in a world with shape-shifters and Daemons?