1 Chapter 1

1

Summer 1647

His hair was ash blond, like spun silver. The long ends swung over me, tickling my bare skin as he wound a thin, silver chain round my wrists. I focussed on my hands held in front of me, my claw-tipped fingers curled inward, as he carefully wrapped the length of chain around my wrists. The chain was cool, its power potent and binding. A shiver passed over me, a ripple of magic, but I couldn’t change form. I was trapped in this almost human shell, trapped by his magic. He pulled my bound hands up then, securing them above my head. I writhed, and a growl rumbled from deep within my chest. “Release me.”

He gazed down at me with pale grey eyes tinged with violet—the eyes of a witch. “No,” he answered softly. “Not yet.”

* * * *

The memory faded, and I forced myself awake. Amused snickers greeted me. A familiar voice asked, “Good dream was it, Wulf?”

“Shh!” a second voice hissed in reply. “He might still be in shock.”

“Hah!” the first voice scoffed. “Not much shocks our Wulf.”

I opened my eyes and looked about in panic. Selby and Quiller gazed down at me, their long, dark hair framing their faces, their mouths quirked with smiles that they didn’t bother to hide. The sky above them was dark, and the spindly tree tops loomed over their heads. I realised I was lying on my back. “What happened?” I tried to sit up, and met with a swirl of dizziness. My body felt woozy, strange.

Selby pushed me back down none too gently. “Just be quiet, baby brother. We had to come all this way to rescue you.”

“What?” I murmured, blinking my eyes to focus. I was flat on my back again, on some kind of cloth. My brothers dragged me across the forest floor, small rocks scraping my backbone. “Ow!” I complained. “What in the Goddess’ name are you doing? Ow!”

“This would be a lot easier—ugh!” Quiller grunted as they hauled me along. “If you changed into something smaller, Wulf.”

“Not yet.” Selby shook his head. The trinkets woven into his hair faintly chimed. “The state he’s in, he might get it wrong.”

They both tugged and heaved together. Quiller snorted a laugh. “Hah! Knowing him, he’d get it wrong anyway.”

“You’re one to talk,” I muttered, rubbing my hands across my face. Why did I feel so strange, so weak?

“Day-break’s near,” Quiller piped up.

“Then we shall have to stop,” Selby replied.

Another snort from Quiller. He shook his head from side to side, showing his irritation. His long hair and the rook’s feathers poked into it ruffled with the movement.

“Oh, stop griping,” Selby told him. “If you hadn’t stopped on the way here to chat to those imps…”

They bickered as they pulled me along. I put my fingers in my ears in an attempt to get some peace. Being the youngest of seven, living amongst incessant, pointless squabbling was my lot. That was why I took to marauding through the forest on my own as often as time allowed. Sometimes I was with Garnet, my older brother and fifth eldest. What had I been doing anyway? Had I gotten lost? And who was that humanin my dream? The memory was hazy.

“This shall do!” Selby declared, halting suddenly. Quiller was caught off guard and, without Selby’s greater strength to help pull me, he slipped over with a yelp. I sat up carefully. We were at the foot of an old yew tree, its trunk dry and hollow. “Get up, Quill,” Selby scolded, as Quiller glared at him.

“We need to change,” Selby said.

“I thought you—”

“We’ll help him change.” Selby turned to me and offered his hand. “Ready, Wulf?”

“I can manage, thank you.” I swept my arm out, swinging it over my head with a quick changing spell. Selby and Quiller squinted as my spell popped and fizzled, flashing brightly. It didn’t work. I was lying on my back as before, with sparks in my eyes, wondering what had happened. Or hadn’thappened.

Quiller chuckled. Selby rolled his eyes. “Hold his hand,” he muttered to Quiller. They yanked me upright and took a hold of my hands, then each other’s. “Small,” Selby commanded aloud, as his spell pulsed through us. I gasped as our forms changed, superbly executed. We barely disturbed the air as we shrank into our smaller size; the forest grew taller, and the trees became giants.

Quiller shook himself down, the feathers in his hair ruffling with magic. “That’s better. I don’t like being big for so long. It feels like being spread thin.”

“It gets easier if you practice more,” Selby said, pompous as ever.

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