Hexes and Wolves Page 2

  Shit. I’d gotten completely distracted when there was a manhunt going on right outside my door. Swearing to myself, I gulped the rest of the coffee down and set the empty cup on the tray.

  Time to play little red riding hood, only this time the wolf was getting hunted.

  Why, Queen Lucy, what big teeth you have, I thought, amusing myself as I rushed to get dressed.

  Chapter 2

  Lucy 2:1

  Once I left the sanctuary of my room, I was assaulted by an invasion of bodies rushing about. Viran was standing beside my throne, shouting orders. She put me in the mind of one of those social media memes that declared the world was full of idiots. Normally she looked immaculate, not a hair out of place, even when she was in motion. Now, her bangs were off center with a few strands sticking straight out. Her natural blush was a deep red instead of the subtle pink that reminded me of snow white and her hair was not dark, like the story, but was completely void of color—white like freshly bleached printer paper. I’d never truly appreciated condescending crap, but I was ninety-nine percent certain that if she had a personal media account somewhere, there was at least one post expressing the exact outrage she embodied at that moment, only directed at some average Joe who spent their time with their heads in the clouds. She saw my approach and instead of halting her expletives, her voice rose with more gusto and pulled me out of my thoughts.

  “They’re all as slow as underlings in the daylight!” she yelled, gesturing in the air with weird, erratic signals. My eyes regained full focus and I squinted at her, trying to decode what she was doing. I finally concluded that she was doing her best to stress her point, but it made her look like she was struggling to swim in mid-air.

  “Viran!” I called, trying to keep a neutral expression. “I need a list of prisoners and their details. We need to prioritize who we’re going after first.”

  She drew a folded bundle of paper out of back pocket and flipped it forward into my palm. “Done. Here they are. I suggest we hunt your wolf first. There is also a rough sketched map toward the back of the stack.”

  I huffed louder than necessary on purpose. “I’ll worry about the wolf; you guys round up the rest before they get out of here. Speaking of which, how big is this place?”

  “It’s huge. There are a total of eight floors and we’re currently on lock down so no one is getting out, but it will still take time to search everything,” she advised me, then muttered, “hopefully. Because if they get out there,” she motioned behind her even though there was nothing but a wall, “we’ll never find them. Hell is bigger than Earth. A lot bigger.”

  Now that I had gained her attention, many of the guards and people she had previously been shouting at had moved away. Some had fled from the room altogether. She was pretty scary when she got down to business, I could hardly blame them.

  “How much bigger?” I asked, stressing each word. I’d never considered where hell actually was. People say down there, and it brings up ideas about the entire thing being under the ground we walk on, but that wouldn’t make sense. Humans knew what was under them, increasing heat sure, but not an entire place filled with beings. Scientists who studied the Earth would have found it by now if it were that easy to access.

  She opened her mouth to answer, but I held my hand up to cut her off. “Actually, I don’t even know where hell is located. Can you give me a mini crash course in under a hundred words?”

  Nodding, she continued, “Hell is its own plane of existence. It’s connected to Earth but only through gateways, like the one you came through. When people die, their energy is attracted to these places and they filter through. Heaven is the same way. It doesn’t matter which one they end up in, heaven or hell, because we have waiting rooms where the dead are judged and then they are transported on to their correct afterlives.”

  My jaw dropped. “So, you mean that some of the people in our awful waiting room, that is set up to torture people, are actually meant to be in heaven?”

  She nodded, obviously not grasping my shock. “Yeah, but we send them up as soon as we weigh them.”

  I shook my head, trying to process what she said. “On second thought, I think I’m going to need more than a brief conversation to understand all of this. What I do know is that I’m changing the way we process people stat; that’s terrible. We might have the Dalai Llama or some other humanitarian in there right now standing around being tortured for no reason at all! I’m also going to have a talk with Cain since this is something I should have been told right away, for pity’s sake. Mistakes are one thing, but it’s like we just torture everyone because we can.”

  “Yeah, it’s happened a time or two. But, not to distract from something you obviously feel strongly about, we have more important matters to deal with,” she said, snapping me back to the present situation.

  “You’re right. We need to handle this first,” I admitted.

  She had been very patient with my questions even though she was clearly trying not to hyperventilate over everything going on.

  “You seem stressed out, do you need help? I could ask one of the guards to be your second in command.” I suggested.

  Her face mimicked something out of Alice in Wonderland, skewed and full of horror, as she said, “No thank you. I’m fine, your highness. Besides, they already have ranks, I came in and complicated the system. However, the previous commander is someone I know and trust. He would make a good personal guard for you while I try to sort this mess out and find the missing prisoners. It seems the two guards I posted outside your room when I left have proved themselves to be useless since you arrived without them. They were supposed to follow you if you left.”

  Then she hefted a thumb at a very serious man waiting across the room. He was taller than me by a head and had a scar running down the left side of his face that accented his oddly pink complexion.

  He noticed her motion and began stalking toward us like he had a mission.

  “Okay. It was only a suggestion. I know you have it under control,” I said with my hands raised in surrender, with my eyes still on the pink guy. Even with her refusal, my words seemed to calm her back down which made me happy. Well, calm was subjective considering the original mood I had found her in.

  “This is Gruff, he was in charge before me,” she said to me and then turned to him.

  “You’re to make sure that the queen stays safe and in one piece. If anything happens to her, I will gut you before you can scream for help. Also, I’m firing two of your men, you may need to hire replacements.”

  To his credit, he simply nodded with no look of surprise or fear.

  “Did you say Gruff?” I asked, unsure if I heard her correctly. That was a weird name to give someone, but I shouldn’t have been overly surprised. I’d heard plenty of strange names since I’d been here.

  The man nodded again. I smiled at him, and he nodded a third time, but didn’t smile in return. Maybe his face was broken, but I doubted it. Guess you can’t be tough and smile at the same time.

  He fell into step behind me, ready to mimic my steps no doubt, as I flipped the papers open and found the map which looked like it could have been written in Russian. Only it wasn’t because it was just my lack of map reading skills barring my understanding. Geesh, where was Google Maps when you needed it? I pretended to know what I was doing to save Viran anymore undue stress.

  “I’m going to start down here and work my way out. I’ll let you know if I find anything.” I pointed to a random spot on the map as I spoke and then lifted my head with feigned confidence as I started down toward the elevator. I had no idea where I was going, but I’d figure it out when I got there.

  Just as I was almost to the shiny metal doors, Glib popped up beside me. I had no idea how I didn’t hear the little ball of enthusiasm approaching, because he was bouncing per usual.

  “Queen Lucy! Please be careful!” he exclaimed. Bless him, his forehead was creased with concern.

  “I will, I promise,” I told him, which seemed to ease out the wrinkles just a bit.

  Then he did something that completely caught me off guard and made me stagger a few steps. My back pressed into the elevator doors as I was assaulted with an awkward, but warm hug from the little creature who had done nothing but shine as a beacon of kindness since I had gotten here.

  I patted him on the back and then rested my hands against him because there was no way to hug him with our height differences. Then slowly, I wiggled from his embrace, because it was clear he had no intention of letting my legs go for a while.

  When Cain had been poisoned, it was Glib that had been there to keep me grounded enough to pull me from a murderous rage with his absolute trust and concern.

  I stared into his face as he gazed up at me with eyes that shimmered with unshed tears waiting to fall.

  “Stay with Viran,” I softly order. “If anything happened to you, I couldn’t handle it. Okay?”

  He nodded rapidly and backed away a few feet.

  Gruff must have hit the button because the elevator opened as if on cue. I watched as Glib waved us off as the doors slid closed, my own hand up and moving in response to him.

  Lucy 2:2

  Since the elevator opened almost directly across from the doors to my suite, I had never paid much attention to the rest of the floor. A quick glance around while traveling from the lift to my area had been all. I noticed now, that each passage way ran on endlessly in either direction, doors lining the walls every so often. What I hadn’t noticed was how the hallway opened into another section, making the place take on the shape of a giant T. If you weren’t paying attention, you might have thought it was just another door instead of an additional pathway. The walkway itself was roomy, expanding out at least ten feet from wall to wall.
As far down as I could see, the paint was plain white, lined with dark red doors adorned with brass doorknobs. Hell definitely had a theme, boys and girls. The brass looked very similar to gold and there was a plethora of it hanging from everything, along with red. The only thing that wasn’t the color of fresh blood was my throne. It was midnight black, but it had gold on it too.

  Steeling myself, I grabbed the knob on the closest door that wasn’t my own and opened it. I couldn’t see anything in the dark enclosed space, so I poked my head in, leaving my body outside in case I needed to run away. I swear I was simultaneously the bravest and most chicken person wrapped up all into one. With my powers gone, I had nothing but my swanky round house kicks to save myself. Well, that and Gruff who was very good at standing quietly and letting me do my own thing. Why I didn’t think to bring a weapon was beyond me. Oh yeah, there was so much going on, I didn’t have time to think about it.

  My courage was fading fast, so I yelled, “Yoo-hoo? Anyone in here?”

  There was no answer, but I hadn’t expected one. I imagined some huge scary criminal peeking out from behind a dresser yelling over here and chuckled to myself to alleviate my irrational fear. Maybe I should shout Marco and see if I get a polo in reply. When I thought about criminal masterminds, I always imagined them having super intelligence for some reason, which was how the movies usually played them out to be. Yeah, I needed a weapon. I closed the door and turned to go find one, only to see Gruff staring at me like I had lost my mind.

  “That one's clear,” I said as I strode past him like everything he had just witnessed was completely normal behavior. I turned my back to him and let the huge grin that was threating to break come free. My mental billboard was scrolling, Queen of Hell Yells Marco At Escaped Prisoner and Gets Murdered, as if I needed any help being ridiculous without my subconscious piping in.

  Ignoring my brain, I moved back toward my room. Asking Gruff for a weapon after that display of nonsense was beyond my confidence levels. Once I reached my personal area, I twirled around looking for something dangerous to wield. Guns were a big no for me since I’d never used one. They didn’t seem hard to shoot, but after I couldn’t even aim at the crazy guy on my throne with my fire, I figured I should stick with something basic. Maybe there’s a knife somewhere… I didn’t really have training with those unless you counted the hours I spent chucking the switchblade I got from the flea market at cardboard when I was fifteen. If you did, I was a down right blade master for all the good it had ever done me. Throwing a knife at a person was probably a lot different than throwing one at a box.

  “Hey! I was just looking for a weapon to defend myself with. Is there a knife around here?” I asked Cain and he strode out of the bathroom.

  “Yeah, somewhere I’m sure. Hang on, I’ll go see if I can find one. You could also just ask the head guard who seems to be following you like a shadow,” he said.

  For a moment I had forgotten about Gruff. He had taken up a station against the wall where he could watch me. I squeezed my right eye shut at Cain and shook my head.

  Cain gave me an odd look, but then tilted his head. I made at least fourteen strange facial expressions while trying to silently communicate that he needed to change the subject. I wasn’t even sure what I was trying to say after the third one, but it was amusing so I kept going. He finally shrugged, then he turned and briskly left the room. It only took a few minutes, he was back surprisingly quick.

  With a grin, he handed me something out of a survival show. It was at least a foot long including the handle. Sweet mother of… this was a damn sword, not a knife! I kept my features flat and bounced it in my hand twice, trying to look convincing, but dropped it right at my feet and yelped as I jumped, spreading them apart while I flung myself backwards at the same time to avoid getting cut. Somehow, I managed not to impale either foot. Praise Jesus. I glanced over at my guard and still, no smile. I’m pretty sure I would have done more than smile at my fumble.

  “Do you have anything smaller?” I asked, my furrowed brows betraying my embarrassment.

  This whole not having magic to defend myself thing was going to get old, fast. I didn’t like being a helpless queen. At all.

  “I’m not sure, let me go ask,” he said and headed back out the door. To his credit, he hadn’t laughed at me or made me feel stupid.

  He returned just as quickly with the prettiest red handled switchblade I had ever seen. It had holes down its handle to increase grip and it was shiny. Be still my heart. I flung my hand out expectantly and smiled big enough to look maniacal.

  Cain chuckled this time. “I’ve never seen a woman so excited over a knife before.”

  “You shush and hand it over,” I replied, and he complied.

  I stood there inspecting it, then flipped it open and shut again a few times. This time my “getting a feel for it” was genuine, and it was nice in my hand, balanced. Almost as if a little of my independence and control had been returned to me in the form of this sleek little blade, I felt a glow spread over me. Now if I could just keep from cutting my fingers off, I’d be golden.

  Closing it one last time, I sprung forward into his arms and hugged him as tight as I could. He was muscular and twice my width, so it wasn’t an easy feat. The way he grunted, and actually moved, instead of being his normal rock wall self, from the weight of my body pressed against his made me realize he still wasn't completely well. In my excitement, I had forgotten.

  “Oh shit, I’m sorry!” I apologized.

  “It’s okay, having you in my arms makes me feel much better,” he said, dismissing my antics. As I shifted, I realized he was telling the truth because his face wasn’t the only thing delighted to be pressed against me. That was twice this morning that he had saluted me. I wasn’t sure if I felt embarrassed or smug at his eagerness, but maybe it was both.

  I pulled back, so I could see his face.

  “I can see that,” I said coyly while I winked and tilted my head toward his crotch.

  Cain pulled me back and almost savagely crashed his mouth to mine, devouring me without mercy while I reveled in every second of it. His soft lips were hot and hungry, and I could sense he wanted more. His need set my body on fire, while his fingers massaged the back of my neck. Then his tongue did that thing where he tasted my lips, causing my knees to nearly buckle. That had to be the sexiest move ever.

  Releasing my mouth, he tilted his head and pinned me with a heady stare. “Watching you flip that knife around was sexy as hell.”

  I eased myself out of his arms and moved my hips in a sway, teasing him, until I was a few feet away. “Oh yeah?” I asked while wagging my eyebrows. Then I flipped the knife opened and closed again.

  He stalked me with his eyes, first glancing between my mouth and my hands, and then once more back to my mouth like he wasn’t sure what he wanted to see more. Within a breath, he was stalking me with the rest of his body. Edging closer, waiting for an in, between each flip of my blade. Only I wanted to be caught by my werecat, so I made it easy, and on the next close, I paused long enough for him to act. Cain didn’t have to be told twice; he was pressed against me again, his strong arms pulling me up against his hard chest. The intoxicating scent of oak trees and Earthy musk coming from him forced an indulgent moan from my throat.

  “You’re so fucking sexy,” I breathed through open-mouthed kisses along his jaw.

  Cain didn’t speak, he didn’t need to. He just sucked my flesh into his mouth over and over again, biting electrifying trails that told me he felt the same way with his touch instead of words. We slowly backed up toward my bed and as I felt the backs of my legs hit the edge, the door crashed open, making us both jerk away from each other.

  “Your highness! The wolf has been spotted! Viran said to tell you!” a guard who I had never seen before yelled through gasping rasps and pants. He must have run all the way here.

  The news was enough to extinguish a little of the heat building between my legs but not enough to wipe away my annoyance.

  “Okay, thank you. Give Viran my thanks, too,” I said tersely.