Hunger Moon Rising Read online

  Ben, I sent to him again. I love you! Hurry, I need you. Finish this and claim me! The black wolf's head snapped up as though he'd heard me and I saw a new light enter his glowing eyes. He dodged forward as though going for Savage's throat again, and when the gray and brown wolf reared back to evade the hold, Ben ducked low and sank his fangs into one of Savage's forelegs instead. I heard a brittle snapping sound distinctly, like someone breaking a dry tree branch over their thigh, and my heart was filled with a fierce, primitive joy that I knew was Ben's.

  The gray and brown wolf howled in pain, and the pack echoed his cry. When Ben danced back again, he left the Lead Wolf limping on only three legs, the right foreleg dangling uselessly in front of him.

  Despite his distinct disadvantage, Savage still fought. In fact, if anything the injury seemed to make him more dangerous. He growled and snarled, ropes of saliva flying from his muzzle, and his fangs glistened in the moonlight. Ben approached him warily now, apparently aware that the Lead Wolf was more of a danger now that he was desperate.

  Suddenly a new howl sounded from somewhere in the forest. Startled, I looked away from the fight, and I saw the pack member's heads jerk in the direction of the strange howl too. None of the rest of the men had changed, so who was making the sound?

  Out into the moonlight ran a black wolf with gray streaks on its fur—a pattern that looked oddly familiar to me. It ran with a weird stagger, as though its body didn't quite want to work right, and its voice was cracked and strange. It had only been in the clearing an instant when another wolf burst out of the trees running close behind it—this one was platinum white with pale eyes—McKinsey! I realized with a start that the black wolf with gray stripes had to be Doctor Locke. But how had he turned himself into a wolf? I had been under the distinct impression that he wasn't a were, like Ben and Savage, so how had he managed to shift forms?

  My questions were driven out of my head when the black and gray wolf launched itself at the larger gray and brown one. The doctor was going after Savage! But he was no match for the enraged Lead Wolf. Even limping on three paws, Savage repelled the attack almost contemptuously, bowling the smaller wolf over with a head butt. Locke launched himself again, the moonlight gleaming on the gray stripes in his flanks, and Savage plucked him out of the air easily, his strong jaws closing on the smaller wolf's throat. I heard the distinct click of teeth meeting, and one agonized howl abruptly cut short as Savage crushed his attacker's windpipe.

  The white wolf threw back her head and howled mournfully as Savage shook the limp figure of the wolf that had dared to challenge him. The rest of the pack answered her howl. They were on the ragged edge of a change, but still they held back. Was it because they were waiting for an end to the conflict or because they were forbidden to change until the final kill had been made? But Ben, who had been hanging back as the other action took place, didn't howl with the others. Instead the compact black wolf that was the man I loved sprang into action.

  He rushed in before Savage could drop the body of the dead doctor/wolf to the ground, and his teeth closed on Savage's left foreleg. I heard the quick, painful snapping sound again, and when he danced back, Savage was truly crippled. The Lead Wolf howled and snapped angrily, but with no way to rest his weight on his two front legs, he had lost all the leverage he needed to fight. He was finished and everyone watching knew it.

  This time there was no holding the pack back. I saw them begin to twist and writhe, their forms changing from human to animal in a matter of about sixty seconds. They threw up their heads and bayed at the moon as one, before advancing on the figures in the center of the clearing. Clearly, they wanted Ben to finish what he had started, and just as clearly, he didn't want to.

  He backed away from the crippled Lead Wolf, his fur standing on end and a soft growl I felt rather than heard rumbling in his throat. Even in his purest, most animal form, Ben was not a killer, and part of me loved him for that.

  Seeing that he wasn't going to finish the job, the other wolves in the pack apparently decided to do it for him. As one, I saw them dive onto the wounded Lead Wolf and pull him to the ground. There was a jet of blood, black in the moonlight, and I turned my head, unable to watch anymore.

  “The Goddess is worshipped in blood!” Molly's voice startled me, and I looked down from my vantage on the flat stone altar to see that the women of the pack had retreated from the mass of writhing, furry backs, and circled around the priestess instead. The white wolf that was McKinsey was also there, crouched at the priestess's side, whining low in her throat. Both of the men that had cared for her were now gone, and the air of fear and loneliness she exuded was almost a palpable thing.

  “You know what is expected.” Molly looked at each woman in the loose circle around her and then up at me. “You know what you must do. Open yourselves to the Goddess! Her needs are only half met—let her fill you!”

  She raised her hands over her head in a welcoming gesture. “Oh, Goddess, we have met thy hunger for blood. Now fill us with yourself that we might meet thy need for flesh. We open ourselves and we call to you—do as you will with us. Use us, take us, make us what you will. We surrender to your hunger as we surrender to the hunger of our mates. Feed our desire that we might satiate yours.”

  A blast of wind came whipping through the trees and tousled Molly's salt and pepper curls as she spoke. I felt it winding around me almost like a large, cool hand tugging at the thin red robe I wore, trying to open it and bare my body. I resisted it at first, then something inside me seemed to break—some barrier that had been there since my time with Mitch. I realized I didn't want to resist. That I wanted to give in to the wind and the urging I felt all around me like a warm cloud of mist. I didn't know if it was actually the Goddess, or the form of mass hypnosis Ben and I had speculated about the night before. But whatever it was, I was willing to go with it.

  I spread my arms and let the wind tug open the red silk robe, leaving me bare from breasts to ankles. The breeze caressed my breasts like a thousand fingers, a thousand mouths, pulling my nipples into stiff, sensitive peaks. It played between my legs too, swirling around the soft, damp patch of curls that decorated my mound and urging me to spread my thighs so that it could lap at my swollen pussy lips, making me moan for more. Because more was what I needed. The wind, which seemed to have a mind of its own, felt wonderful but it was insubstantial. I needed real hands on me, a real mouth to suck my nipples, a real cock to fill me and fuck me until I came.

  “Dani.” The voice behind me was human, but only just. I whirled to see Ben standing in his human form on the rock beside me. He was naked and bloody and breathing hard, his broad chest heaving. His brown eyes were glowing as they had that night in the bar, and he smelled of sweat and grass with a coppery hint of blood, and under it all was a spicy musk—the scent of his masculine arousal.

  He towered over me—so much larger than I was and so much stronger too, and for a moment my courage faltered. There was so much strength in him, so much potential for violence. I took a step backward, biting my lip in sudden fear.

  “Dani, please,” he said again, and his voice was ragged with need, so ragged it hurt to listen to. This is Ben, I reminded myself. No matter what he is or what he turns into, he's still the man you trust most in the world. The man you love. Yes, but could I trust him enough to overcome those old, painful fears? Watching the fight from my vantage high on the rock, it had seemed so easy to give in to the desire I felt for him. But now, with him standing over me, crowding me with his naked, muscular body, I wasn't so sure.

  Help me, I thought, not sure if I was praying or who I was praying to. Help me do this—I love him. As I thought the words, I felt the wind again, swirling around me, touching me as gently as a lover. At the same time, the moonlight seemed to grow brighter and warmer, almost like the sun at noon beaming down to caress my skin. An inner peace filled me, and a voice which might have been the Goddess, if she really existed, sighed in my ears, Let the past go. And I found that