Graham reached Oison. The Fae was tall, like Reid, with the same eyes that tried to bore into Graham’s skull. But Reid had proved to be smart, reasonable, and helpful, despite his Fae-ness, and he had a true fondness for Peigi and the cubs he’d helped rescue. Somewhere inside Reid was a heart, and feelings.

This Fae had used Misty to lure Graham to the desert, then tricked Misty into feeding Graham spelled water. Oison had caused Misty to be hurt, terrorized, and trapped. Therefore, he had to die.

Graham roared, shifting as he attacked. Who cared if it hurt like hell when his clothes fell from his bloody side? This was a dream.

Graham loved the look on the Fae’s face as two hundred and some pounds of snarling wolf landed on him. Eat this, shithead.

Oison went down, scrabbling to draw his sword as he fell, but Graham ripped into him with teeth and claws. He met the metal of the mail, but it peeled back like tinfoil, and Graham tasted blood.

Oison struggled, the sword falling to the obsidian floor with a clank. Graham opened his mouth wide, clamped his teeth around the Fae’s throat, and ripped. The Fae screamed, then the scream died to a gurgle in an eruption of gore.

Graham tasted lifeblood pouring into his mouth. He snarled his victory, raking open Oison’s skin to find bones. Oison’s coal black eyes fixed, then filmed over.

Graham scrambled off him. He sat back on his haunches, lifted his bloody muzzle, and howled. He’d defeated his enemy. He’d saved himself and Misty from the Fae’s clutches and the damned water spell.

Sudden pain cut off Graham’s breath. The echo of his wolf’s howl bounced from the cave’s high ceiling and evaporated.

Graham’s Collar had come alive. Dormant while Graham had attacked the Fae, the Collar was now a hot band of metal, shocks arcing around it and straight into Graham’s body.

He howled again, this time in pure agony. His body shifted of its own accord from wolf to his in-between beast, his strongest form.

The Collar’s shocks increased, blasting him with hot pain. Graham clawed at the Collar, desperately trying to make it stop.

He saw movement out of the corner of his eye. Through his blurring vision, he saw the Fae, bloody and torn up, rise and draw his sword.

Fae swords were works of art. They were fashioned of bronze or silver—iron and steel were poison to the Fae. This one looked silver. As well, Fae swords were almost always full of spells. The Swords of the Guardians had been made by a Shifter centuries ago, but woven with spells from that Shifter’s Fae mate.

Oison held his sword battle-ready as he made his way to where Graham fought his Collar. Graham reached his huge, clawed hands for Oison, ready to kill again—as many times as it took to put the ass**le down.

Oison swung his sword, stopping when the tip contacted the Collar. Graham’s agony increased. The Fae held the sword against the Collar, spells on the blade feeding into the Collar and then into Graham.

Graham was being baked alive. He roared, hands going for the Fae’s throat, which still ran with blood.

Oison shouted at him in a Fae language, but Graham somehow understood it. Monster, created of filth. I hold you. By sword and by Collar, you are mine. You will give them to me, the battle beasts, and Fae again will walk the earth.

Graham tried to jerk away from the sword but Oison was merciless. Graham saw runes shimmer across the sword’s blade, heard whispering: weakened, enslaved, obedient.

“That’s what the Collars are,” Oison said, his voice clear, no matter that his throat was a bloody mess. “Chains that will bring you back to us. You have enslaved yourselves.”

Graham used all his will to wrench himself sideways, finally breaking the contact with the sword. He fell down, down, and the flowering vines reached up to pull him to the slick floor.

He heard himself shout, Fuck you! then something started hammering on his chest, dozens of blows, full force.

Graham dragged in a breath to fight this new threat . . . and found himself lying flat on his back on Misty’s couch, the same stupid movie on her TV. Two little wolves were standing heavily on his chest, beating on him with their oversized paws.

 • • •

Misty emerged in the morning to find Graham at her kitchen table, red-eyed and irritable, his hands wrapped around a mug of coffee. Kyle and Matt, in their human form and dressed, their faces already dirty, bounced in chairs opposite him. Xavier stood at the stove, a towel over his shoulder, black T-shirt hugging his torso, as he cooked something that smelled wonderful.

Misty poured herself coffee. She enjoyed leaning back against the counter and taking a leisurely sip, happy to no longer crave liquid by the gallon.

Graham, on the other hand, was still under the spell. He lifted his coffee and took a sip, but his hands shook. He pulled the cup from his mouth after one taste, as though stopping himself from pouring the burning brew down his throat.

“You all right?” Misty asked him.

“Do I look all right?”

His voice was harsher than usual. His eyes were bloodshot, lips dry. This was Graham with a hangover, under a thirst spell, and by the looks of it, little sleep.

“No, you look like crap,” Misty said. “You need to drink something.”

Graham growled. “I need to go back to Shiftertown. Only reason I’m still here is to feed Kyle and Matt. And to make sure you’re all right for the day.”

“Xav’s making us chili killies,” one of the twins proclaimed.

“Chilaquiles,” Xav said good-naturedly from the stove. “Mama’s specialty. You’ll love this, Misty.”

Misty’s stomach growled. After the tequila shots, she should be as dry-voiced and red-eyed as Graham, but she felt pretty good. She’d had a dreamless sleep, waking when the sun rose to find the two wolves curled up on the bed next to her.

They’d leapt out as soon as she’d opened the door, and she’d hurried through her shower and dressed, concerned about Graham.

Xav brought two plates filled with eggs, fried tortillas, cheese, and tomatillo salsa to the table and put them in front of the cubs. He’d already laid out forks, and fortunately, the cubs decided to try to use them.

Graham had pushed aside his place setting, his elbows where his fork and knife would be. The flame tattoos climbed up his arms—red, orange, yellow, outlined in black.

“You need to eat something,” Misty said to him.

“No, I don’t. I need to go back to Shiftertown.”