The whole world shrank to the task: yank away the carts and other items meant to keep his family in the smoke-filled croft. He had to save them before the roof completely caved in. The men set to the barricade with axes, stones, and bare hands, bellowing with the effort.
Each blow sent splinters flying and rattled the frame, but the fire was quicker than they were, and the smoke burned their eyes and lungs. He felt the hours of his childhood, his father’s hands, his mother’s gentle admonishments, burning away with every moment of delay.
His mother screamed inside, high and desperate. For a heartbeat, everything stopped; even the fire seemed to hold its breath. Coinneach dropped his shoulder and rammed the door with all his weight. The first time, nothing.
The second, a groan of splintering wood. The third, the barricade shifted, and the men surged forward in a tangle oflimbs, finally toppling the beam. The door swung open, spewing fire and choking blackness.
Coinneach plunged in first, the heat singeing his eyebrows and beard. He groped for anything living, found his mother’s wrist, and yanked her toward the threshold. The others followed, dragging his father and his brother out of the building.
He heard, distantly, the voices of the men calling out to each other, and then the cool, sweet relief of the afternoon air as he fell backwards onto the grass, clutching his mother to his chest, and saw the rest emerge, coughing and weeping, alive.
Aisling saw Coinneach and ran to him, kneeling beside him. “You did it,” she gasped. “You got them out.”
Coinneach could only nod, his throat raw and useless. But as he looked up at the blazing ruin of his family’s home, he knew this was not the end. It was the beginning of a reckoning.
Then he saw Morag, her dress on fire as she tried to extinguish it. She screamed at Rupert to help her, but he saw Hamish and the others coming, and Rupert took off to leave her to her dilemma. Then they saw Osmond.
He had his hands on his head, staring at Morag as the flames took over. He finally realized Hamish and his men were coming, and he looked around, saw Rupert, and ran in a different direction. It appeared he was keen to save his own worthless hide.
Aisling immediately began to take care of Coinneach’s mother while Hamish and Aodhan saw to Magnus and Tamhas.
At the same time, Blair arrived, seated behind Tristan, looking a little green from the wild ride. She began helping Aisling with the care of the victims while the men put out the flames.
Hamish glanced at Morag, who had died. “She deserved what she got.”
“What about Osmond and Rupert?” Coinneach asked.
“We take them down. They get no more chances.”
Coinneach kissed his mother, put his hand on his da’s shoulder, and said to his brother, “Tamhas, didna you die on us.”
“I have…cough…no intention…cough, cough, of doing so. Where is Nelly?”
About that time, Nelly came riding behind Ruadh on his horse. She slipped off the horse and ran to Tamhas.
He would be in good hands.
Ruadh, Aodhan, and Tristan went with Coinneach to track down Osmond. As far as he was concerned, he was the biggest threat. Rupert was just spineless.
Hamish, Collum, and Fletcher chased down Rupert.
On horseback, Coinneach and his team had the advantage until they were deeper in the woods. Then Coinneach left his horse with Tristan, removed his clothes, and shifted. He could find Osmond more quickly as a wolf.
They were deeper in the woods. Roots and brambles tripped even the most sure-footed of their party, but Coinneach, with his keen sense of scent and direction, pressed on ahead. The chase had become a hunt, and the human mind in him yielded by degrees to the primal urge that simmered beneath.
The world brightened as his senses recalibrated. Smells billowed toward him—sap, rot, musk. The track was clear: this was not just a manhunt. This was a pursuit through every evolutionary shortcut his body had ever known.
He moved through the underbrush with all the fluidity of memory. The ground was damp, the air thick, and every sound was an invitation; every rustle a warning or a lure. Osmond's scent was easy to follow. Fear-sweat laced with wolf, a hybrid trail of desperation and cunning. Coinneach found him at last, huddled inside a shallow depression beneath a tangle of bracken and broken branches.
Osmond’s eyes, wide and shining, reflected every glint of sunlight that managed to sift through the canopy. He was trembling, but even before Coinneach could close the distance, Osmond pulled away from his hiding place and began to undress.
Omond’s movements were less the flailings of a desperate man than the precise, almost reverent gestures of someone who had repeated this act many times, each time expecting it might save him. He dropped his sword andsgian dubh, ditched his tunic, shirt, breeches, and boots. He stood naked for only a second before the transformation overtook him.
His wolf form was smaller than Coinneach’s, leaner, with a ruff of fur around the neck and an angular, almost foxlike head. His jaws were already agape, tongue lolling in anticipation. Coinneach had never seen him fight as a wolf. Had he ever fought wolves before? Like with any venture, they needed to practice to succeed.
Osmond looked more ill at ease than ever. Not waiting another second, Coinneach lunged first. He landed on Osmond’s back, snapping at the scruff, dragging him through wet leaves and upended loam. Osmond bucked, twisting his head to clamp down on Coinneach’s foreleg, but Coinneach barely felt the puncture; adrenaline overrode all but the deepest pain.
They tumbled together in a blur of fur and teeth, every bite and claw a message written in the oldest language of all. Osmond’s technique was extraordinary—he fought dirty, going for the soft underside of the throat, for the eyes, for the places that a wolf would usually never dare to attack. The rules of wolf etiquette did not bind him.
