Savage Magic

Title Page

Dedication

Copyright

Series

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

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by

Judy Teel

To my readers and fans and to my husband, Kelly — you all share many of the same stellar traits, not the least of which is patience and generosity of spirit.
 

This book's for you.

Acknowledgments

As always, my heartfelt thanks goes to all my beta readers: Rebecca (a fab editor in her own right), Jana G., Angie W.,
T. Hammond
, daughter Zoe and my wonderful sis-in-law, Joyce. Also a special thanks to all the amazing and supportive ladies of Magical Shifters who are the best readers, fans, and street team that any author could ask for.
 

And special thanks to my editor,
Christie Stratos
for her kindness, insight and unprecedented professional skills.

Published by Judy P. Mills

Copyright © June 2015 by Judy P. Mills

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the author, Judy P. Mills.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual business establishments, inventions, items, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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Cover by
For the Love of Reading Cover Design

Shifty Magic Series:

Shifty Magic

Undercover Magic

Savage Magic

Blue Ridge Mountains, NC — 2033

Being a Were who wasn't allowed to shift was hell. For one thing, you had to climb trees.

I was a city girl. Trees weren't really my thing. Unfortunately, I was in the middle of the woods in the mountains of North Carolina, and after sneaking off with Cooper to have a little Adam and Eve fun, he decided that I needed to work on my wilderness skills.
 

He went one way and I went the other. Whoever could successfully sneak up on the other had to do the dishes after dinner. Agent Luke Miller wasn't known for neatness in his cooking; I was very motivated.
 

Taking a deeper breath, I watched the thin ribbon of trail below me and noted the sharp tang of earth and musk that marked werewolves with regular access to hundreds of acres of wild forest. In particular, the scent Cooper and I'd picked up not long after Cooper, Miller and I had left Lake Lure and the coven of practitioners who lived there.
 

I pulled in a second breath of fresh air and caught the hint of blood on the breeze...Cooper's blood. Whoever was following us had apparently decided to step up their game. I clenched my teeth, getting my urge to fight under control and focusing it on dealing with whatever was about to come down the path.
 

So glad to be invited to play.
 

I reached for the modified Browning BuckMark that was usually strapped snugly against my jeans-clad thigh and remembered that Cooper had made me leave it back at camp. He didn't want me too dependent on my go-to defense move, and I wasn't too happy about being without it.

I also knew he was right. We'd been working on strengthening my Were abilities in ways that still kept them hidden, so I pushed down my feeling of vulnerability and focused on regulating my breathing the way he'd taught me...in through the nose nice and slow, out through the mouth.
Control your Were nature, don't let it control you.

Easy for him to say. He wasn't brand new to the whole "you're not human" gig like I was. He also wasn't some kind of freaky monster who was supposed to be extinct — one of the many unanswered questions I had about myself. That's how life rolls when you're abandoned as an infant on the steps of a church in Charlotte, North Carolina.
 

For most of my life, I thought I was like any other foster kid in the city. Until nine years ago when paranormal terrorists attacked major cities around the world and almost brought human civilization to its knees. That's when things we thought only existed in books, movies and stories around the campfire stories turned out to be real. When the terrorists hit Charlotte, my foster family panicked and fled the city, forgetting to take me with them. That's when I learned to survive.

The strange Weres' scent caught my attention again, and I ducked farther back into the leafy cover, tightening my grip on the branch above me. I wasn't sure who or what I was going to see coming down the trail, but I doubted it would be friendly.
 

There were plenty of both kinds of paranormals in the world now; those who saw humans as food or at best slaves, and those who wanted an inclusive society and lived under the new laws. It was the last kind that had swung the war our way, coming out of hiding to help what was left of the human population beat back the bad guys.
 

Still, things would never be the same again, and for the most part I was okay with that. Once the schools reopened, I graduated high school and then started my own business as a private investigator with a knack for fighting monsters. That led to a couple of jobs with the paranormal division of the FBI, and it wasn't long before Cooper and I were an item, albeit a secret one thanks to old prejudices and laws that frowned on interspecies relationships.

Then about three months ago, I discovered that I wasn't human and my life took on a whole new level of complexity. The biggest being that Cooper and I became what Weres called bonded. According to Were legends and customs, that meant we were fated to be together or something. We could even feel each other's feelings if they were intense enough, which most of the time I considered a bonus. Not being able to let anyone know what I really was...that was just a pain in my ass.
 

The scent of blood got stronger, pulling my thoughts back and making my heart pound a little harder against my chest. Slipping a knife from the sheath inside my right boot, I watched the flutter of shadows on the path below where it turned and disappeared behind a thick wall of laurels. Slow breath in...Silent breath out...

Deeper shadows emerged and took shape — a man and a woman, both dressed for living outdoors and blending in. And there was Cooper, complacently allowing them to roughly pull him along between them, his nose and a cut on his cheek seeping blood. Weird. Cooper was built like an early twenty-first century Olympic gymnast and I'd seen him take out opponents in less than ten seconds without a single blow landing on him. How had they managed to subdue him?

I watched them come closer and pass below me. The woman on one side of Cooper was medium height with light skin and dark red hair that she'd pulled back into a short ponytail with a strip of leather. The man on the other side was tall and muscular with tanned skin, his bright red hair in a military cut.

Cooper had spent the last two days of our trek into the mountains telling me about the two werewolf Clans that shared the land that had once been a national park. Weres tended to keep similar coloring when they were humans as when they were in animal form, and red wolves equaled Blood Clan. Along with the other two werewolf Clans in Virginia, they shared a comprehensive treaty that had been unbroken for over twenty-five years.
 

Was that why he hadn't fought back? Because of the treaty? Then why had they attacked him? A chill slid across the back of my neck. Were they rogues?
 

In my experience, paras outside of their species' laws were the most dangerous creatures on the planet. Whatever they had planned for Cooper, it wasn't going to be pleasant.
 

I adjusted the soles of my logger boots against the branch under me to give myself a more solid launch, judged the distance — and jumped.

"Travis, look out!" the woman shouted, leaping back and drawing a pistol from the shoulder holster underneath her camo jacket.

I landed on her just as she got off a shot, the bullet buzzing past my ear like a giant hornet. We went down, my knee on her chest, my left hand wrapped around her wrist. I squeezed down on the bone while her free hand went for my right wrist in an attempt to keep my knife off her throat.

Behind me, a grunt and then silence. I didn't know if Cooper was up or down and I didn't have time to check on him. Reversing the downward pressure I'd put on my knife hand, I pulled up, letting the force the woman was exerting work for me. Her arm shot up with the grip she had on me, unbalancing her as her shoulder went with it.
 

Using her half-second of surprise, I slammed my forehead into the socket of the vulnerable shoulder. The joint dislocated with a muffled
pop
.

She gave a startled yelp and her grip on my wrist gave out, gifting me with another second to drop my knife and bear down with both hands on her gun. I broke her hold on the weapon and tore it from her fingers.

Grabbing my knife, I leaped off of her and aimed her Glock at her head. "Who are you?"

Her gaze skated past a spot over my left shoulder, and the back of my neck tingled. I focused my attention just enough to open my senses the way Cooper had taught me and heard a quiet hiss of breath about five yards back, overlaid by the scent of anger, but not fear. That told me that her friend, Travis, was about to use some kind of Were bulldozing attack designed to awe and frighten the poor little human.
 

I did a quick tune-in on Cooper, noting that he might look knocked out where he sprawled in the leaves, but he was feeling ridiculously pleased with himself. I relaxed my stance, bending my knees slightly in preparation for the next attack. "Who are you?" I repeated.

The Were on the ground met my gaze and tried to hold it but couldn't. "Go to hell." She kept her gaze clamped on the ground at my feet as the feeling of hostile, predatory eyes boring into a spot between my shoulder blades amped up.