Perform, Monkey!

As we bring Aspen up to speed on what happened with us last night, Levi drives us back out toward the werewolf compound.

Leaving behind the heart of Silver Hollow takes no time, the paved road transitioning back into dirt, and the dense forest closing in once more. It's a stark separation between the werewolves who founded the small town and the others who came after.

I lean forward in Haut's lap, his arms around my waist stabilizing me. "How come Silver Hollow grew up around the coven and not the pack compound?"

Levi's eyes flick to me in the rearview mirror. "Despite the barrier, werewolves still have a bad rap, though it's gotten better with the younger paranormal generation."

"But you guys still stay separate." I nibble on my bottom lip. "Doesn't that make it harder for them to accept you?"

"It does." He rests an elbow on the window ledge as we bump down the road. "But young werewolves are a bit much. Not sure seeing that would help our case, even with the barrier's effect in place, giving them more control."

"What do you mean?" Tris's eyebrows pinch together.

"When they're young, they're pretty rowdy, as you saw last night, but when puberty hits?" Levi shakes his head. "That's when the dominance acts start up. Kids who thought they'd be alphas suddenly realize that the scrawny pups they picked on when they were kids can turn them belly up, baring their throat once they reach puberty. Add in the human side of things, and it's just better to keep a little distance for everyone's sake."

His eyes flick to the rearview mirror again. "It's not like that with wolf shifters?"

"In the packs that choose to roam, it is." Haut tugs me so that my back rests against his chest. "But in Hartford Cove, choosing to stay pretty much means accepting the current Alpha, which had become a hereditary position until recently. The position is back with the founding family now, so everything is as it should be."

Haut lost his position as Alpha because of me, and I squeeze his arm in comfort.

Confusion fills Levi's voice. "And no one challenges it?"

"Sometimes, but so far, no one has won." Haut rubs his cheek against mine. "For the most part, no one in Hartford Cove really wants the responsibility of being Alpha. They're happy to let someone else deal with the headache."

"But surely some of the pups, when they grow up, want to cut their teeth on a challenge?" Levi's bewildered tone makes it clear that a pack without challengers is a foreign concept to him.

"We don't have many pups." Haut's hand absently strokes my stomach before I slap it away. "That's part of what the yearly festival is about. Anyone lucky enough to have their womb quicken usually stays in Hartford Cove until the pregnancy comes to term. It's the Alpha's duty to keep them calm and not change form during that time."

"Huh." Levi drums his thumbs on the steering wheel. "Maybe werewolves and wolf shifters are more different than I thought. We don't have any in Silver Hollow."

"Why not?" Tris asks.

"Cats and dogs don't get along." Levi chuckles. "We discourage it as best we can, but any time a wolf shifter visits, the cats and crows make sure they move along."

Aspen turns his head to look at Levi. "But they're okay with the werewolves?"

"We're human, most of the time," Levi says. "And there's a curfew during the full moon."

"When you're forced to shift?" I wait for Levi's nod. "But then, how do you have so many pups? Do they all have human mothers?"

"Most do." Sadness tinges his voice, and I remember how Levi said the human moms ditch their babies at the compound. "And we have the necklaces for when a female werewolf gets pregnant, though it's rarer."

"For good reason." Aspen looks out his window. "The curse isn't meant to spread through procreation."

"Well, now, that's just rude," Levi drawls, a growl of warning underscoring the words.

"My apologies," Aspen says to the passing trees.

Tris reaches over the seat to clasp our mentor's shoulder. "Aspen's got his wand up his ass about these things, but we're working on it."

He lets out a long sigh. "Yes, werewolves are on the council watch list, for a reason."

"The maiming and killing." I nod along like a good pupil. "Which has proven now to be circumvented with very little effort, should any witch choose to do it."

Aspen turns in his seat to glare at me. "That is an untested theory at best."

"Only because we didn't have anyone else to test it on." I spread my hands to encompass the woods we drive through. "But hello town of test subjects!"

"What are you two talking about?" Levi interrupts.

"Rowe injected her blood into Owen, and it suppressed his curse long enough for him to reason with it," Tris eagerly explains. "Which is how Owen now has control over his werewolf."

"Owen already shared a mate bond with Rowe," Aspen says in exasperation. "His werewolf was predisposed to not want to hurt her."

I lift my chin. "It worked with Deputy Arden, too."

"Who is part of your pack." Aspen pinches the bridge of his nose. "You can't cure curses simply by opening a vein."

I cross my arms over my chest. "It works for Ros every time he feeds."

"He's a vampire. That's the natural order of things." Aspen leans against the headrest. "Mucking about in magic is how we get creatures like vampires and werewolves in the first place."

Haut stiffens with surprise. "Are you saying vampires started out as a curse?"

"It's a theory." Aspen rolls his head from side to side. "Dark magic, power stealing, and a backlash resulting in a being who can no longer survive without stealing power."

Ros had said that people could be cursed to become vampires, but now I wonder if he's heard this theory before. It makes my fingers itch to call him up and ask, but I don't know where my phone is.

Hopefully, it's back at the compound and not lost somewhere in the woods.

As we pass the turnoff for the werewolf compound, I straighten in Haut's lap. "Aren't we dropping Aspen off?"

My mentor snorts. "Like I'd let you go poking at the barrier unsupervised."

"I figured you'd all want to take a better look at it before meeting with the local coven." Levi brings the Jeep to a halt, alerted by something I can't see that we've arrived at our destination.

We climb out, Aspen wincing as he puts weight on his injured leg.

"Need me to carry you?" Levi offers, coming around to his side.

Aspen shakes his head. "Thanks, but I'll manage."

"Stay right there." Levi trots off into the woods, leaving us alone on the road.

As we wait, I turn to Aspen. "Did you get a look at whatever attacked you?"

He shakes his head. "No, it happened too fast. All I could do was cast a circle to keep it from getting me again. I wasn't its primary target, though, and as soon as you guys left me behind, it chased after you."

My shoulders hunch with guilt. "Sorry about that."

He studies me with curiosity. "What did you do to fight it off? I felt a surge of power rush through me, similar to when you draw on the barrier in Hartford Cove."

"Oh, I was…uh…trying to be one with the ether." I dig the toe of my shoe into the dirt path, feeling a little sheepish. "But I accidentally made contact with the barrier around Silver Hollow. I'm pretty sure I could have drawn on it the same way I do in Hartford Cove, but it would have damaged it more."

"Did you make it to town before you were attacked?" Aspen asks.

"No, we only made it a few yards from where you went down before the monster was on us." Haut looks toward the woods as he remembers the night before. "We were still about a half a mile from Silver Hollow."

"Interesting." Aspen's head tips back, studying the sky, where gray clouds promise rain. "It's possible an ethereal witch set up the barrier and linked it to the forest. Whatever is hurting the barrier may be causing the magic to spill over into the trees, which is why it's losing power."

"Great!" I brighten. "So all we have to do is find the leak and plug it."

"Let's hope it's that easy." Aspen chuckles weakly, leaning against the Jeep for support.

A rustle in the nearby bushes signals Levi's return, and he emerges with a thick branch in hand, which he offers as a makeshift walking stick to Aspen. "Here, to help keep the weight off your leg."

"Thank you." Aspen grips the branch, and the tension in his face eases. "We came up with a theory while you were gone."

My eyebrows shoot up. "We did?"

"We did." Aspen gestures to the road ahead of us. "Try to connect to the magic the same way you did last night."

I shift from foot to foot, self-conscious under everyone's attention. "I'm not a performing monkey."

"I've seen you climb enough cabinets to know that's not true." Aspen gets that stubborn set to his jaw that says he's not going to be swayed on this. "It's the same people who were with you last night. No one is grading you."

"Except for you," I mutter under my breath, but he either doesn't hear me or chooses to ignore it.

Aspen painfully lowers himself to the ground, his injured leg stretched out in front of him, and rests his back against the wheel of the Jeep, closing his eyes.

"What are you doing?" Concerned, Tris steps toward our mentor. "Are you feeling lightheaded?"

He cracks one eye open. "No, I'm waiting for Rowe to get over her performance anxiety and get on with it before I expire from hunger."

With a groan, I stomp around in a circle, trying to shake off my nerves before squatting next to Aspen and pressing my hand to the ground.

When nothing happens, I frown. "I don't feel anything."

"Actually try," Aspen snaps, his patience wearing thin.

"The wand is way up there today." When he ignores me again, I close my eyes, concentrating hard on generating that prickly sensation I felt before.

Still, nothing happens.

Frustrated, I throw my hands up. "I can't do it on command!"

"Then we'll sit here until you can." He opens his eyes, pain swimming in their icy depths. "You're a witch who relies too much on instinct, and one of these days, instinct won't save you. So, figure it out."

"She's doing her best," Tris protests, his hands settling on my shoulders.

As soon as he does, energy jumps to my hand, and the world washes out in lines of silver and black. Bright blips of light interrupt some of the lines, and I recognize them as the people here and those back in town.

Looking down the road toward the forest, I find a sheet of pure silver, the barrier I saw last night, surrounding Silver Hollow in a bubble.

"Whoa," Levi breathes. "You and Tris are glowing again."

I look toward his voice, his form rippling with silver waves in the rough shape of a wolf surrounding a man. It's been a while since my mind showed me the monsters behind the human masks, and now that I understand, I find beauty in them instead of horror.

When I look at Haut, I marvel at the beautiful silver outline of his wolf, rising around his shoulders.

"Tris must be the extra boost you need to connect with this barrier, since it's not synched to your family line."

Aspen's voice draws my attention to him, and I squint at how brightly he shines. The glowing pillar reaches out, his hand settling on my knee.

I barely have time to register the contact before his magic jolts through me with the same force I'd experience if I stuck a fork in a power outlet.

Shocked, I lose my balance and fall flat on my ass, breaking the connection between us.

The silver glow vanishes, returning the world to normal.

"Don't do that without warning." I glare at Aspen as I rub my sore backside.

"I didn't think my power would affect you like that," he huffs. "You've wielded lighting."

"Yeah, but that was intentional." I scoot away from him. "The lightning didn't just randomly slap me on the head."

"I'd like to slap you on the head." He massages his injured leg. "Might get you to focus faster."

"Did you get what you wanted?" Tris asks Aspen.

"Just a headache." With a grimace, he rubs his temples. "All I saw was power."

"You didn't see the lines?" I ask, confused.

"No lines." Aspen rests his head back against the tire. "It was too much to process anything."

When I glance at Tris for confirmation, he shakes his head, too. "For me, it was more like feeling the pulse of life around us."

"Last night, for me, it was like my senses opened up, and I could feel the shifts in the world around us," Haut offers.

"All right." Aspen shakes out his hand before settling it in his lap, not trying to connect with me this time. "Try again, Rowe, but without Tris touching you."

I do as he says, pressing my hand against the dirt once more.

This time, the energy surges up into my palm, like greeting an old friend, though with less intensity than before.

I can't see Levi or Haut's other forms when I look at them, and Aspen's pillar of light is dimmer, with more of a man shape to him. When I look at the barrier, instead of a sheet of silver, I pick out individual threads, the magic spilling out beneath us, leading toward the werewolf compound. More magic spreads outward into the forest past the barrier, just as Aspen suspected.

Not all of the lines look solid, though, and I squint, but can't pull them into focus. Awkwardly, I take off my shoes and socks with one hand, struggling to maintain my connection to the ground.

As soon as my bare feet touch the earth, the magic surges through me, bright enough that I practically float to my feet, feeling like a balloon barely tethered.

I drift toward the barrier, and as I near, I spot pinpricks of darkness where silver lines are broken. When I reach out to touch one, a silver spark drifts into the air. I catch it and return the magic to the barrier, tracing the break down to where it should connect.

The thread brightens, and I stare at the ground, watching as a slender line of spillover pulls back into the barrier, like I fixed a leaky faucet.

"Ha!" I fix another of the broken threads. "Take that, you stupid magical… hole thing!"

But when I move to the next break, this one higher, I look up at the sky and reality comes crashing back down on me. There are hundreds more black spots just within my view, rising toward the sky, far past where I can reach. A glance to the left and right reveals even more, slipping into the distance.

My shoulders slump as I realize just how bad the leakage is.

"Guys…" I call over my shoulder, my voice wavering. "We have a big problem here."

"Can you fix it?" Aspen asks.

"Yes…" Then I shake my head, because…so many holes… But I can, so I nod, before shaking my head again. "Sort of?"

"Which is it?" Levi demands.

"I can fix it." I repair another thread, bringing a little more magic back to the barrier. "But there's so much damage. Even if I had wings or something to get to it all, it would take a while."

"How long?" Resignation fills Levi's voice, as if he already knows the answer.

"More than we have right now."