Opposite Side Chapter 7

Chapter 7

She had gotten home. Her anger still riding high in the winds. She had come into her power late and unexpected and Rich and his master Jonathan had been there to show her what she was. They showed her a side she had never seen. Something exotic, different, tainted. At the time she had enjoyed it, deep down she knew it had been wrong. But her body loved the pleasure that they gave her. Rich had been her “soul mate” both blood witches in the same town, it had to mean something. Jonathan had been her lover. Human bodies weren’t meant to mate with wereanimals, even in human form they were rough. However, she was not a normal human, and she enjoyed the pain. Then there came the bloodletting, and the darker magic.

She grabbed Persuasion by Jane Austen off the bedside table, and after bunching her pillows around her, she started reading. Lately her only comfort was Miss. Austen. Persuasion was her favorite above Pride & Prejudice. Before her new life had started, she felt her life was exactly like Anne Elliot. She was no beauty and her family cared little for her. Except to help pay bills, they really had no use for her. She had always been the odd one out. So when Rich had introduced her to the Opposite Side she thought she had stepped into a fairy tale.

She was getting to the part when Anne finally left to Bath to be with her father and older sister when her phone rang.

Irritated she looked at the number, and noticed it didn’t have an ID. “Hello?”

“Leslie,” said a small-frightened voice. “Here in Snelling, is rogue werebear. Hurry, help.”

It sounded like a troll. “Where are you?” She jotted down the area.

She didn’t like to drive much, she liked being in the passenger seat, but driving made her nervous. The whole reason she learned is that she could stop relying on people to take her places. And right at the moment she was angry with Colin and Patrick. She arrived in Snelling forty-five minutes later, as the sun started to rise. She drove down the quiet main street passing the main store and the Freezie. And her GPS told her to take a right, and so she did. When she finally stopped she pulled up to the river. Frowning, she checked her gun before getting out of the car. Magic is good, but sometimes it still doesn’t stop certain things. Taking a deep breath, she got out of the car and started walking to the edge.

She looked around for a bit and finally found a trail down to the river. The trail seemed sort of rough, and sharp. She gave out a small prayer to the goddess and started down. Her feet slid out under her once, but she end up catching herself. The fact that she made it to the bottom alive seemed a huge miracle for her. She paused looking at the slow moving water. The river was high, but not as high as it would be in a month when the snow really started to melt.

She closed her eyes, and sniffed the air. She smelt, human sweat, river water, dead leaves, new growth, mud, a decomposing animal, and blood. She turned towards the smell, and started walking. She finally came to a small dilapidated shack after about half a mile. The brush and undergrowth seemed heavier here, and she had to cut through it quietly knowing she was probably doing a bad job at it. Rustling to her left made her pull her gun out. It got closer and she undid the safety. She smelt and felt power, and then those lively greenish gold eyes blinked at her over the muzzle of her gun.

“Nathan, what the hell are you doing here?” she whispered clicking on the safety and holstering the gun.

“I got a call that there was a rogue bear out here.”

“Funny that. I got a call that a rogue bear was out here too.”

“The shack reeks of decomposed animal and blood.”

“I know,” she said and put her hands out in front of her aiming them at the shack. She closed her eyes, and let out some energy. She opened her eyes, and looked at Nathan. “Nothing in there is alive.”

“Well let’s take a peek,” he said walking past her to the door. He pushed it open and walked in. She didn’t like this, something seemed off, but she followed after Nathan. Hand close to her gun. The old house wasn’t much of a shack; it had been a very nice two bedroom house once upon a time. Now the windows were missing glass, and boarded up, and the walls had last seen paint at least twenty years ago it seemed.

Nathan had a door open, as he waited for her. “It’s a sort of basement.”

“That’s what happened to the house. The river took it over,” she said finally noticing the water rot. She stopped next to him looking down in the darkness.

“I’ll go if you want to stay up here,” he said almost in a whisper.

She gave him a small frown. Sure she could think of better things to do then go into a stinky probably water filled basement, but this was part of her job as well. And she couldn’t let the Wolf King go down there by himself. She pulled out her mini flashlight, and flipped it on.

“I see, prepared for anything huh?” he asked his voice held an edge of tease.

“We work in the dark, flashlights are musts,” she said and started down the steps.

“What else do you have in your Batman pack?” he asked very close to her.

“The usual,” she said and made a small noise as she stepped down into water. She stopped.

“What?”

“Water.” She took two more steps before hitting the mushy ground. She stood knee deep. “You know for once I would really like to not get wet, covered in blood or dirty. Really is that too much to ask?” she said to herself mostly.

Nathan grabbed her arm, the one with the flashlight, and shown it around the very dark room. His touch startled her just a little, but what really startled her more was the person at the top of the stairs. They threw something in the water, and slammed the door. A thick gas started to rise from the water, a heavy fog.

Coughing, Leslie, grabbed her cell phone, and wrapped it in the plastic baggy she usually carried. Nathan didn’t let go of her arm, and dragged her up the stairs, he banged his shoulder into the door but it wouldn’t budge. The fog slowly filled the room; coughing Leslie had to sit down.

She could hear Nathan slamming his body into the door. “Nathan,” she said but the world went black. She woke up cold, wet, and in the dark. By the smell, she was sure she was in the same place. She opened her magic, and found the door they came through was heavily warded, and they were now not alone. Her magic found Nathan, to her right. Someone had come in after they were unconscious and moved them off the stairs.

“Nathan,” she whispered.

“Wha-,” he said. “Shit. Leslie don’t move.”

“There is a werebear in here with us isn’t there?” she asked.

He moved in the water towards her. She could feel him, and it gave her some comfort but not much. “It’s a cub, he’s going to change. The full moon is in a few days and there is fresh blood.”

She touched the cut on her cheek. “Uh-oh, um, that blood is me.”

“How bad?”

“It doesn’t hurt, so it had to have been a very nice sharp silver blade.”

A flood light came alive above them, probably on a timer, blinding them all briefly. They looked around, and saw the boy in the corner naked and scared. He seemed to be fighting off the change. But he would lose, they all do. Once the moon calls, the change happens, there is no fighting.

Nathan pulled off his shirt. He found a clean spot and wetting it he cleaned her cut. “It’s going to bleed for a while.”

“I think that’s the point.”

The boy let out a moan, and his body shuttered.

“Oh crap,” Leslie said and grabbed onto the Nathan’s arms.

That electricity zapped through them. They both sucked in air at the same time. But she did not let go. And he did something that should have unnerved her, but weirdly it didn’t. He leaned in as if he was going to kiss her, but then she felt his tongue moist and warm lick her cut. He looked at with those strange green eyes which were filled with curiosity.

The boy screamed behind them, the scream turned into a roar. Nathan crawled over to the boy, and using his own magic tried to sooth the cub. He couldn’t stop him from changing, but he could control it enough so that it could take longer.

Leslie got up and went to the door. She placed her hand against it and pushed some power into the ward. The ward didn’t like that at all; it shot back the power and some more. It hit at her in the chest pretty hard. She didn’t remember falling down the stairs, but she lay there in the cold water trying to breathe as Nathan talked above her.

She sat up. “Ouch,” she finally managed.

“Just an ouch. Leslie it looked like you got electrocuted, and whatever it was threw you down the stairs.”

“I’m going to find whoever did that ward and kick their ass?” She blinked at him. “Is that better?”

He gave her half a smile and turned back to the cub. The jolt had singed through the hoody, so she took it off, and it also singed some of her t-shirt. But she wasn’t about to go around shirtless. She was a tall Amazonian, as the guys liked to call her. And she might have been plain in most things, but she had been blessed with a double d cup size, so walking around shirtless was not a good thing. She really didn’t like to flaunt them.

The cub screamed and Leslie could see that his body was changing. “This is going to get dirty,” she said.

“Don’t panic.”

“Too late,” she said trying to calm her heart.

He came to her, and held her face in his big hands. The electricity flared. Her magic started to break through which happens even when she was scared. “Breath,” he said.

“I know what happens to the newly changed. They are hungry.”

He nodded, and leaned his forehead to hers. “I can’t stop it. This is going to be ugly just close your eyes.”

She did, but she could hear everything. All his bones were breaking, and reknitting themselves the sound sounded in-between a dog drinking water, and a messy eater eating something very gross. His screams turned to roars. Finally after all the bones we reknitted, it gave a roar that shook the small room they were trapped in. Nathan turned, keeping his back pressed to her, blocking her view. She did what she believed was the stupidest moves ever, but couldn’t help herself; she wrapped her arms around him. The flare of the electricity that entered her body, made her weak, and she leaned her head against the back of his neck.

The more skin that she pressed against him seemed to send more of the electrical feeling through them. But then something else happened. Her magic opened, but it didn’t go all scary. Instead it touched Nathan’s beast. His power flowed from him, mingling with hers. For a second they were nothing but magic. And then as one they looked at the cub, angry and hungry it slowly advanced on them. As one they willed it to sleep. And it did just that. It lay down and went to sleep, the bear body slowly turning back to human.

Nathan turned in her arms, and moved his face in close to hers. She thought he would like her cut again, but instead he pressed his lips against hers kissing her hard. Her arms moved up to circle around his broad neck, as she kissed him back with feverish wanting. Her hands had tangled themselves in his hair when he finally broke the kiss.

“What the hell was that?”

“A kiss,” she murmured.

“I know what that was, I mean that,” he said motioning to the boy.

“Magic,” she said.

“I’ve never fought the moon. But we did it. Your blood tastes bear and magic.”

The door above them exploded in, shaking the roof above them dangerously. “Never fear,” Colin said, “The Calvary is here.”

“Was that explosives?” Leslie said loudly barely able to hear over the loud ringing the explosion made.

“Sure was, hell with your magic. Give me enough boom, and I can get through anything,” Colin said. He turned. “Found your brother too.”

Nathan helped her up the stairs. She felt sad when he finally let go of her when he went back to get the cub. Outside the sun had set once again. She was sure they hadn’t been in there more than a day. But she couldn’t be sure by that gas that knocked them out. She grabbed a light and went back to the door. She wanted to see if there was enough wood left to see the ruins marked into the frame. She could maybe trace them back to whoever set the ward. As she looked she saw there was nothing left.

“Sorry,” Colin finally said as he watched her give up looking.

“It’s okay, at least you got us out. Very Rambo of you.”

“I was thinking more Die Hard.”

Patrick handed her a blanket. “I bet you can use some food, a shower and bed.”

She nodded, but looked at Nathan. He looked at her. She wondered if he felt the same, the need, want to touch. Her skin vibrated with this need. She finally looked at Patrick who seemed to be lecturing them about calling back up and letting people know where they were going. Lucky for her, they found out where her car was because the GPS.

“And mom had to call your work and say you were out sick. Your mother had to call in for you. So I hope you are ready to be teased at work.”

“Thank you Patrick,” he said. “This boy was turned against his will. So maybe you should be helping him.”

Colin and Patrick grabbed the boy and went and shoved him in Leslie’s car. Patrick would take him to HQ, Colin said he’d take Leslie home.

She had opened the passenger side door. Nathan stopped her before she could get in. “We have to talk about this.”

She nodded. “Drive safe.”

“I’ll be behind you all the way.” He started to turn away and stopped. “Do you still feel it?”

She rested her head against the glass. “I do.”

“Leslie, I found your phone. And I think it’s okay.”

“Hey, that’s always a plus.”

Nathan ran his fingers over her hand before leaving to his own car. She sat down, and laid her head back. “You going to tell me everything that happened down there?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Something happened between you two. I can see it by how you two look at each other.”

“I think I need to talk to Mr. Forever.”

“I am all up for a visit to the strip club.”

“I was thinking of waiting until full moon. He should be there, enjoying the festivities, like everyone.”

“Who warded the door?”

“There are only four people who can; me, Fred, Carlotta and Rich. The ruins were destroyed, but I’m sure its Rich. His wards are pretty damn tough. I am so going to kick his ass.”