Lori Handeland - Marked by the Moon

As soon as he touched her, the world spun, and by the time Alex opened her eyes, she had legs, fingers, skin. She lay in the snow, dizzy and freezing, doing her best to catch up.

“What can’t you do?” she muttered.

Barlow, who’d straightened and returned to staring at the swirling white, glanced over his shoulder. “What?”

“You can move at the speed of sound.” He snorted. “Almost. You can become invisible.” He shrugged. “Change the shade of your fur.”

“Not sure about that.” He turned again to the storm.

“Well, since you can heal silver, I’m betting turning from a golden wolf to a purple one wouldn’t be any trouble for you at all.”

“Mmm,” he murmured.

“That’s all you can say? Mmm?” She got to her feet, ignoring the burn of the ice against her soles. “You just popped a silver bullet out of your chest, Julian.” Alex threw up her hands. “What the fuck?”

For an instant she considered that Barlow himself could be the werewolf that had murdered her father. He could heal silver; there wouldn’t be a mark on him from the bullet she’d fired on that long-ago night. But if Barlow were the culprit, wouldn’t Edward have mentioned that?

No, whispered a little voice. Because if he had, Alex would have shot Barlow the next time she saw him rather than allowing him to lead her to the werewolf village. And the village was what Edward was after— that and the army Barlow didn’t appear to have.

Alex’s mind whirled. Who was the bad guy? Who was manipulating whom? Who could she trust?

“I don’t know what I can do,” Julian murmured, still facing away from her. “Most everything I’ve ever tried, I’ve done.”

“Maybe that’s why someone tried to kill you.”

Barlow turned then, eyebrows lifted. “They weren’t trying to kill me, Alex, they were trying to kill you.”

“Me? What did I do?”

If possible, Barlow’s eyebrows went higher.

“Lately,” she muttered.

Alex considered what had happened. She’d left the safety of the village; there’d been a sharp crack, which she’d ignored in her concern for George. Barlow had burst through the snowbank, knocked her aside, and then—

Crack!

“You pushed me out of the way,” she said.

Barlow shrugged and didn’t comment.

Why would anyone want to kill her? No one knew her well enough yet to hate her.

It suddenly occurred to Alex that while she had not gotten a good look at her father’s killer, her father’s killer might have gotten a pretty good look at her. But if that was the case, why hadn’t the culprit outed her as a Jäger-Sucher to the others the instant she’d loped into town?

Because to do that would be to admit that he or she had not been the good little Barlow-escue werewolf he or she was supposed to be but had instead been out killing people.

Alex thought it far more likely that the wolf, if it had recognized her—and maybe it hadn’t, she’d been fifteen at the time—would try to kill her. Now someone had.

Which meant her father’s killer was here. Perhaps Edward hadn’t been manipulating her—much—after all.

“Aren’t you the slightest bit concerned?” Barlow asked. “I just told you someone tried to put a silver bullet into you, and you stand there staring into space.”

“Werewolves try to kill me every damn day,” Alex said. “It’s when they try to be my friend that I get a little freaked out.”

“Who said it was a werewolf?”

Alex scowled. “Who the hell else would it be?”

“Let’s find out.”

George appeared out of the ever-thickening snow, his arms full of clothing and boots. He dumped them onto the ground between Alex and Julian.

“Thanks,” Julian said. “Now get inside and stay there.”

The boy opened his mouth to argue. Julian narrowed his eyes, and George snapped it shut again, then spun on his heel and marched away.

Alex snorted and muttered something that sounded a lot like wolf-god. As if that were some kind of insult.

Julian wasn’t sure where George had found the clothes, but he’d done a good job. Certainly everything was a bit tight on him, but Alex’s apparel appeared just her size. Probably because he’d caught the kid staring at her ass on more than one occasion.

And why wouldn’t he? It was a damn good ass.

Julian coughed to cover the growl that rumbled in his chest, then winced and put his hand over the shooting pain. He might have popped out a silver bullet, then healed the wound, but it still hurt and probably would for a good long while. He wasn’t sure. He’d never healed silver before.

Had anyone?

Alex stomped her foot into a second boot and straightened. “Now what?”

Julian lifted his chin, indicating the ice mound where the shots had originated. “Now we see if there are any tracks worth tracking.”

“But the ice—” she began, hurrying to keep up as he strode in that direction.

Julian kicked at the fluffy layer of white. “Snow,” he said.

She smacked herself in the forehead. “Duh.”

Julian had to stifle a smile. Sometimes she amused him.

Alex stopped abruptly and laid a hand on his arm. Julian paused and gazed at her quizzically.

“What if they’re still there?” she murmured.

Julian started walking again. “If they were still there they’d have shot you while I was burning.”

His amusement faded with those words. He might have angered out the bullet; he might have magically healed. But while the silver had been in his chest, while his skin had been sizzling and his hair had been frying, the agony had been beyond anything he’d ever known.

It had made him so mad.

When he’d seen the first shot kick up the snow a few inches from Alex’s paws, rage had sparked, allowing him to burst through the icy bank that had concealed him. Then, when the bullet had slammed into him, his fury had exploded along with the flames.

They reached the looming hill of ice and stepped gingerly around its edge. Then together they stared at the rifle half covered with snow.

“Why would an Inuit shoot me?” Alex asked.

“True. They barely know you.”

She laughed. Julian’s smile broke free, but it faded as he continued to peer at the ground.

“Look.”

He pointed at the tracks—first feet, but then several yards away from the village, out where the snow would have masked everything, the feet became paws. A few yards farther, the wind across the tundra had erased them completely.

“The rogue is both human and wolf,” Julian said.

“Needed fingers to pull the trigger,” Alex murmured. “And paws to get the hell gone. But how did he know what we were planning?”

Julian cut her a quick, curious glance, and she explained. “He—or she—knew we were coming. He brought a rifle loaded with silver. If he was here to eat another villager, no need for a gun.”

Julian stared into the wall of swirling white. She was right.

“There’s nothing else to see here,” he said. “Let’s go.”

But Alex was staring into the storm now, too. “Shh,” she whispered, head tilting, eyes narrowing.

Julian listened, detected nothing, held his breath and tried again. Somewhere out in that swirling white he heard the patter of paws.

He glanced at Alex. She lifted her chin, sniffed. So did he.

Definitely a werewolf. But who? The snow, the wind, all the people who lived nearby were throwing off his nose.

Julian stepped forward, and Alex touched his arm, shook her head; then her gaze tracked to the right and she slowly lifted her arm, pointing to the glistening black wolf that burst from the night.

“Ella,” he whispered.