but there.
“I can sense him,” she breathed, concentrating as hard as she could on that strange warmth. “He’s—he’s in pain! Something’s wrong, we have to help him, now!”
She charged into the blizzard without waiting for a response. A blast of freezing wind nearly knocked her off her feet. She staggered, boots skidding—and a strong hand caught her.
“I’ve got you,” Rory said. Wystan was at his side, hands upraised, his shield protecting them all from the worst of the ice storm. “Can you find him?”
“I think so,” Darcy panted. “And I don’t think he’s that far. Come on!”
Following that faint pulse, she led them all into the teeth of the storm. Wystan’s shield sparked and glittered, fist-sized hail stones bouncing off it with a deafening clatter. The whole world was blank, white. It felt like they weren’t moving at all.
Fenrir. She prayed that he could hear her. I’m coming. Hold on.
“Bros!” Joe yelled. He pointed into the storm. “Is it just me, or is something out there?”
Fenrir! Darcy’s heart leaped into her mouth. She shielded her eyes, straining to see through the stinging wind.
As though responding to her wishes, the storm slackened. Swirling snow drew back like a curtain, revealing a wavering, shadowy silhouette.
A canine shape, with burning eyes.
“Fenrir!” Edith yelled. “Fenrir!”
But even as she did, Darcy knew it wasn’t.
It wasn’t Fenrir’s huge, bristling black form. This creature was smaller, slighter, with faded gray fur and pale yellow eyes. It was so thin, so frail, that it seemed more like the ghost of a hellhound.
And it was female.
*Please,* said Lupa’s voice in her mind. *Please save my brother.*
“Fenrir let Uncegila possess him again?” Darcy stared at Lupa in horror. “Why?”
*He traded himself for me.* The hellhound’s pointed ears went back. Darcy couldn’t tell whether that signaled dismay, or anger. *And that was too good a deal for her to resist. I’ve had a lot of practice at fighting her, but he hasn’t. She can inhabit him a lot more easily. He promised to give Uncegila his body, if she would return mine.*
“Lupa’s never shifted before now,” said Mort. The tall, gray-haired man stood close to Lupa’s side, one hand resting on her thin flank. He looked as gaunt as the hellhound, his deep-set eyes shadowed. “At first, she was just too young. As she grew, Uncegila forced her to repress her inner animal. Uncegila allowed her to turn a few people, to form a pack—Lupa would have gone mad otherwise, and she didn’t have to transform in order to bite. But later, when Lupa started to question what Uncegila wanted her to do, the demon bound a chain around her neck. She couldn’t transform without throttling herself.”
Lupa lifted her chin. There was a pale scar around her neck; a thin band where the fur gray thin and patchy, as though worn away by a too-tight collar. *After my brother gave Uncegila his body, she used his strength to break my chain. I could finally shift, and be free of her influence.*
“How did Fenrir know that she would actually keep her side of the deal, though?” She could understand why he’d be willing to trade himself for his sister, but not how he could have been so blind as to trust the demon queen. “She could have reneged and kept both of you under her thrall.”
*Uncegila honors her bargains,* Lupa replied with complete certainty. *She can’t break her word, if she gives it. Like a human can’t breathe underwater, or a fish can’t fly. It’s just not in her nature.*
“What’s she saying?” Edith asked.
Rory echoed his mate’s words with a feral hiss. His wings were half-spread, shielding Edith from the hellhound. All the shifters had reverted to animal form the instant Lupa had revealed herself.
Darcy relayed the general gist of the conversation, as succinctly as she could. “You guys really can’t hear her?”
Edith shook her head. “Rory says that shifters can generally only communicate telepathically if they’re similar types. They’re all mythic shifters, apart from Seren. Hellhounds are fae beasts.”
“Then how come I can talk to her?”
“Same way that Fenrir can talk to us. Since you’re her brother’s mate, you’re part of her pack.” Edith glared at Lupa, her hands tense on her chainsaw. “We’re not.”
“No kidding,” Darcy muttered, glancing around at the rest of the squad.
Wystan’s horn glowed, keeping a sparkling shield between them and Lupa. Joe was poised to swat her like a baseball with his huge finned tail. Even Buck had his gun drawn, pointed squarely at Lupa’s forehead.
“I