Wolf Song (Wolf Singer Prophecies Book 1)

with the other.
I would have to ask her how she did that, if that was a native gift of hers. Hiding things.
~Make invisible. It's an easy solution.~
~Of course. An easy solution using a rare gift.~
~You know what they would do if they ever got their hands on her.~
I swallowed again so I wouldn't growl.
"Look, I know you're not planning on killing me or even hurting me, but I don't think I'll be able to sleep well knowing that you're awake or that others are out there. So, could you just promise me that you guys are going to be okay? Then I'll be able to sleep soundly?"
Her eyes were rimmed red. She was tired. I should have seen it. The rush of being outside and possibly needing to fight and then trying to figure out the cipher—all the adrenaline that she must have been running on had finally worked its way out of her body.
Poor thing, I would carry her upstairs if I knew she would let me. Instead, I stayed out of her way. "I promise we will be okay, and that we will safeguard your house." We knew her dad’s rule. Do not open that front door while it was dark. Though there were a lot of protectors around, we were not going to mess with the juju that made up the spell. Maybe if it was disobeyed, other spells and wards would break.
I wasn't going to be the one that broke that spell.
~No one will touch that door, Boss.~
She nodded wearily. Her head seemed like it was getting too heavy for her neck and my arms itched to wrap around her and take her upstairs. To sleep. And nothing more.
I ignored the snickers from the others. After all, I was the one inside of her house, not them.
~Aw, that's just mean.~
~Yeah, we're all here, all four of us, same as you. We all crossed the barrier.~
That they had, and I needed to acknowledge that.
~True. You're inside the barrier.~
All the same, I felt like I'd won something by being here with her, observing her body up close as she climbed up the stairs to rest.
I planned on counting to one hundred and then following after her.
Soleil
I couldn't handle the idea of people pacing outside, even though I knew they had been there before. The difference was the fact that I hadn't known they were there, at least not in the real sense that I did now. Every now and again, there was a slight creak on the porch, a bit of pressure like the wind changed.
I was suddenly tired.
I'd washed up, ignoring the fact that there was some guy on the first level. It didn't do to be that self-conscious. He wasn't going to do anything.
And I told myself that I didn’t want him to do anything.
I still changed my clothes in the bathroom. I wasn't so carefree that I felt safe enough to wear an actual nightgown. I wore linen clothes that were still able to move with me in my sleep but durable enough if I needed to run from my house. A pair of boots rested beside my bed, socks tucked inside.
I was under no illusion: if there was something strong enough to break the wards and make it into the house, I was surely done for. No amount of clothes or running would help. But there was always that chance and it was for that chance that I wanted to run.
Once I was in my room with the door closed, I peered out of my window. I saw nothing out there, but just knowing Creed’s men were out there made me feel like I was on display somehow. At least I didn't have to be worried about a raven pecking at my window all night.
I still drew the curtain down. I didn't like to do that because I preferred being up at the first sign of daylight, but it was the compromise I made to myself so I might sleep.
Of course, I probably wouldn't sleep, considering that my dad likely wrote a message I could never decipher and now he was in some kind of coma because he had braved only god knew what to get something to me. So why the hell did he use some kind of crazy message? Something that would be impossible to decipher without finding his friend and his friend's book?
It was like a chance in a million. Made no sense given all he taught me.
I sat up in bed, opened to the first page the book fell to, and stared at the drawings. I traced them with my finger and felt a kinship with my parents even though I was suddenly alone without them.
There was one herb that I thought looked really funny and whimsical, something that I'd never been able to find, which was only frustrating because my mother did such a great job identifying all the various kinds of flora. Yeah, she was an herb witch, but she was also a botanist, certified in all manner of plant information.
She even helped to write a book about plants, she loved them so much. She could have been teaching at the fanciest universities, but she didn't want to move away from the place she called home, so she used her gifts to teach at the local college.
Good thing, too, since that was how she met my dad.
Then, as if some kind of light bulb finally burst inside of my head, I realized something. My dad would never give me an impossible riddle. At least not for anything important. Sure, he'd do it just to see me try to wrestle through the problem, but he'd be here to see me struggle and laugh with me when he pulled the joke.
But he wouldn't do anything like that for real.
That meant...my mother's book.
I whipped out of bed and bounded out of the room. I nearly tripped over Creed, who sprang up off the floor as if he had been