Wrong. Morgan’s scent was wrong. What had seemed a pure, sweet melody was tainted. Mingled with Morgan’s scent was another she knew as well as her own, and a third she recognized and feared above all others.
Niall had been here, or very close. And either he, or Morgan, had shed blood.
Not even the pain in her legs could slow her now. She forced her muscles to obey and leaped up, broke the surface of snow in her descent and leaped again. The edge of the meadow loomed ahead. She clawed her way onto a jutting boulder and entered the cover of the trees.
The smell of blood grew thicker, Morgan’s scent stronger as Niall’s faded. Athena’s paws hardly touched the ground. In a small clearing, protected from the worst of the storm, she found him.
He lay on his. back in snow melted by his own blood, limbs twisted and dark hair thick across his face. The ground all around him had been trampled by booted feet. Niall’s boots.
Niall had been here. The sharp tang of metal and gunpowder played counterpoint to the stench of blood. No mist of breath rose from Morgan’s parted lips.
Athena covered the remaining distance in a single jump. She lost her balance, fell to her side, and scrambled the last few feet on shaking legs.
Morgan lay unmoving. Athena nudged his chin with her muzzle and snarled in his face. His skin was cold. She clawed at him frantically, heedless of the scratches she left on his bare skin. His chest didn’t move. She grabbed his arm between her teeth and tugged him this way and that with small, despairing whimpers.
Only then, when every attempt had failed, did she sit back on her haunches and howl. Wolves could not weep. But she was also human, and humans possessed a strange and foolish quality called hope.
Hope gave her the strength to Change. Hope kept her heart beating as she lay atop him, spreading her arms and legs over him like a living blanket. Hope warmed her breath as she kissed his unyielding lips.
“Be alive,” she whispered. “Damn you, Morgan, be alive.” She pushed her fingers into his hair and lifted his head as if he could see the determination in her eyes. “Are you going to give up, after fighting the world with every breath? Is this how it ends? Well, you’ve underestimated me for the last time, Morgan Holt.”
She kissed him again, bruisingly, biting into his lower lip until she tasted blood. Hating him, and loving him more than life itself.
He gasped. His chest arched up as if pulled by invisible cords, and he sucked in a lungful of air. Bright, fresh blood welled from the wounds in his side and temple.
“Morgan!” she cried, searching for something to stanch the flow. But he didn’t hear her. His eyes remained closed. Dark mist formed over his body, the telltale sign of impending Change.
She slid away from him just as the transformation began. It was neither swift nor smooth; midway through the Change, he hovered between wolf and man just as he had in her bedroom at Long Park. Only this time it was not by choice. His body could not complete the Change in its weakened state, so near to death. Blood continued to stain the snow.
Athena caught at his fur-mantled shoulders and shook him. “Decide, Morgan!” she shouted. “Live or die. Wolf or man. But if you choose death, I’ll know you were a coward!”
His eyelids fluttered, revealing the alien yellow of a wolf’s eyes. He shuddered violently, and the mist became like a choking cloud. The shape under Athena’s hands finished its transition. The black wolf lay on its side, barely breathing.
She buried her hands in Morgan’s fur, feeling for the wounds. Her fingers came away dry. No more blood. Bone and muscle felt firm and whole. His heart beat strongly under his ribs.
Without questioning the miracle, Athena let herself go limp and rested her head on his flank. She knew she had slept when she felt hands—human hands—in her hair, stroking it away from her face.
She blinked and sat up. Morgan lay beside her, his bare skin unmarked and his eyes free of pain. He let his hand fall and gazed up at her, waiting for her questions.