The Look: Alpha Male, Feisty Female Romance (34 page)

He looked down at her, and stopped. “I saw.you.”

They both exited the building quickly and chased Elsa's form down the street. Elsa herself worried that Augustus might have gotten her hopes up needlessly, that maybe he had seen just someone who resembled Elsa's appearance. But when they caught up with the lady in the fur coat, Augustus pointed her out, and the real Elsa could see the woman's reflection in the mirror. It was Freja, they both knew it. Elsa tried to approach her, ready to bitch-slap the woman across the face. But Augustus grabbed her by the elbow. “Don't,” he said. “Remember, she's a witch and can kill you at any moment. It's a trap.” Elsa realized that, because her appearance was that of Freja's, Theo would probably do whatever he could to destroy her, thinking he was protecting the love of his life. Elsa continued to have thoughts of Zamir flash in and out of her consciousness, interrupting her conscious will. Her soul was divided. On the one hand, her love for Theo drove her all the way to hell and back, and she truly wanted to be with him. Sure, she also wanted revenge for what Freja did to her. She also wanted to win him back, and prove to herself that she could be a hero if she needed to be. On the other hand, a deeper, more primal aspect of her soul longed to get closer to Zamir, to fuse that shameful and violent part of herself with his own soul, and when they were one, she could somehow be true. Either way, she felt unfulfilled and continued to mull over how to deal with these conflicted feelings while she and Augustus continued with their plan. As they careened through the town, both Augustus and Elsa, but particularly Augustus found themselves awed by the lack of advancement the town endured since they had last seen it. Sure, the people were different, but the structure of the city was the same as it had been when Elsa was a part of it, and not much different than when Augustus was a part of it. The separation between the artificiality of the town and the authenticity of the forest struck a chord in both of them.

“Where do you think she's going?” Augustus asked her, as they watched Elsa's body dwindle in the distance. Elsa didn't initially know, but she stopped, when she saw Freja reach the cabin overlooking the entire town, near the cliff overlooking the ocean.

“I know,” she said. “Let's go, Augustus. We have a witch to kill.”

CHAPTER 48

Elsa's heart sank as they came near Theo's old cabin home, and it became clear to her that he still lived there. She wondered whether Theo would be an old man now, and she imagined all sorts of disturbing scenarios--Theo with kids and grandkids, Freja getting pregnant, watching them make love on the bed.

But as Augustus and Elsa approached the cabin, she could see a familiar blond man standing in the garden, and Elsa felt the overwhelming urge to run up behind the man and kiss him on the cheek. It was her Theo! Just as she last left him!

“It's him, Augustus,” she said, tears welling up in her eyes. Thankfully, she had Augustus to watch over her so that she didn't make any sudden moves. He made sure Elsa hid with him behind the same rock formation she hid that day when she first saw him. Once he was inside, Elsa was unable to control herself.

“Don't do it, Elsa,” Augustus said, but she broke free of his arm and kicked down the door, gripping the crystal in her pocket, the spell in her hand. She ran through the main hallway of Theo's cabin, making a bee line for the bedroom, just as Theo shut the door from behind. Elsa feared the worst. She kicked that door in as well, ready for the fight of her life. Once in the bedroom, Theo looked up from the bed, took one look at Elsa's appearance as Freja and look of horrified recognition spread across his face. His eyes immediately glowed yellow and he began shaking uncontrollably.

“I'll be damned if I let you destroy my happiness,” Theo said to Elsa, thinking she was Freja. “I'll do everything I can to destroy you if you don't leave my house at once. Never again, Freja.” He looked down on the bed, as a helpless and seemingly afraid “Elsa” shook with fear.

“You bitch,” the real Elsa said, “I'll kill you. You can't have him.”

As Augustus tried to calm Theo down, his eyes glowing a lion's orange, Elsa saw Freja pull out her want from under the covers, and Elsa immediately pulled out the red crystal, sitting it on the tabletop. She began reading out the spell Freja had given her. But the spell doesn't work, and there is nothing but silence between the four people, as Freja cackled and Theo got closer to morphing into his lion state. To protect her, Augustus also growled in his shifter voice, ready to attack Theo, although he was petrified.

Elsa stood there, unable to figure out why the spell wasn't working, holding the broken crystal, which now glowed red hot and angry. She stood there as Theo morphed into his lion state, fighting Augustus, clearly winning.

“Oh, Dear,” the real Freja said. “I knew you were coming. This was all part of the plan.” She raised her wand and a blue electric line slithered out of the tip, wrapping itself around Elsa. “You're so foolish for thinking my own spell would work on me.” Elsa screamed in pain and the other boys continued to fight. In this moment, all was lost, and Freja hissed a little to call her serpent forth. The white, two-headed snake emerged from under the door of the bedroom, ready to strike Elsa once and for all. Just as the snake was ready to strike, Freja cackling, Elsa making one last attempt to say the spell, Zamir appeared out of nowhere, taking Theo out in one fell swoop. The lion and black wolf fought to the death right then and there, and if Elsa didn't do something soon Zamir would kill him. Strong as Theo was, no one, not a single soul, could match the great black wolf, the once great warrior-general Zamir.

The crystal glowed hot at this point. “Please stop!” Elsa screamed at the top of her lungs, as Zamir's claw tore into Theo's flesh, sending blonde fur everywhere. “I can't take this anymore. I don't know what you want. I don't know what to do.”

“There's nothing to do, my dear,” Freja said. “Except die. You could do that favor for me.”

If Elsa didn't do something soon, she would witness the wild and crazy Zamir, in all his strength, tear apart the one person she ever truly loved. She watched his violent claw rip apart Theo's flesh and his angry teeth sink into his neck. After a few second, Theo's lion form lay there silent, lifeless. Zamir turned to Freja, ready to eat her now, and it was clear to Elsa that Freja was deathly afraid of Zamir. He lunched at her, and shaking, Freja held up her wand. “Not so fast, Dark Prince. If you touch me, she dies,” and Zamir looked over at her, his eyes almost busted with a radioactive green at this point. Zamir didn't want to hurt Elsa, and Freja could kill her in a single snap of the wrist, so fighting Freja meant killing Elsa.

The crystal continued to glow red and hot, burning through the table. Elsa tried to use the spell one more time. But she was losing energy fast. “Dark solitudes.awful wells.” Nothing happened, and Elsa sank further into a darkness in her mind, her eyelids getting heavy, losing focus. “Heavenly contemplation.dwells.” Again, nothing.

“My heart.the heat.leave me.” She trailed off, nearly unconsciousness. As she approached the breaking point in her journey, the point at which she truly had given up all hope, floating in mid-air by a magical blue wire, her true love dead at her feet, murdered by the shifter with whom she shared some mysterious, inexplicable great passion she would never fully understand, as he tried to save her, there was one thought that emerged from the depths of her grief. She spoke it aloud.

“Ok, you win, God. I love them both. I made a mistake. I don't have the answers. That's the truth.” And with that, she dropped her head, ready for anything, accepting her fate as it might come, given the circumstances. The crystal, as it lay on the wooden floor, suddenly glowed to life, brighter than anything, and a red and ruby light flooded the room. Far away in her mind, Elsa could hear Freja scream as the blue wire wrapped itself around her own neck, slicing off her head like an angry Medusa, sending it rolling across the floor. Elsa fell to the floor, her energy returning as the crystal's red hue brought Theo back to life. Elsa could see his chest, now in human form, move ever so slightly. She grabbed his hand and spoke the only words she could think to say.

“Theo,” she said, breathing heavily, “I'm back.”

CHAPTER 49

Elsa rushed outside to find Zamir, afraid something had happened to him. At the edge of the forest, she could see him standing there, the same mysterious expression on his face, simultaneously evil and passionate, even in his wolf form. He took one look at her before entering into the forest silently. Elsa wondered if she had broken his heart, or whether he cared at all. The emotions oscillated between anger and jealousy. She stood there with Theo and Augustus, feeling more alone than she ever had. But looking back at Theo, she realized she could finally form her relationship with him, however damaged it may be.

CHAPTER 50

The days and months after Theo's fight with Zamir were hard. He struggled to recover from his injuries, as he fought the only creature in existence who was stronger than he was. Elsa did everything she could to nurse him back to health, and after much apologizing on his part for trying to kill her, they started a new life together. Augustus watched over Elsa for a few days, but told her he needed to venture back into the forest, to find his brother and his friend. Elsa understood and wished him luck. Augustus, along with Elsa and Theo, was finally free of the Forbidden Forest, and he decided it was important for him to make peace with his past. He knew the Forest would let him be as long as he stayed honest, told the truth, and didn't try to be someone he wasn't. All these lessons he learned from Elsa's epiphany, and she knew he would be all right. He knew Dorien was out there, in the forest, and he wanted to make sure he had not captured Niklas and Kirbleitz. Augustus knew had an obligation to save them, find them, and show them the way out of the forest. He wanted to teach them what Elsa and all of them had learned.

Elsa and Theo continued to make a life together, in the aftermath of all that had happened. He loved her with all his heart, but he knew her situation--that the moment she tried to choose him over Zamir was the moment the forest would pull all of them back into its clutches. So Elsa remained faithful to Theo, but still occasionally wondered about Zamir and whether he would ever come back to her

Theo and Elsa finally would get the chance to consummate the love that burned between their hearts so long ago. Elsa could see through her own nature that Zamir was waiting for her, somewhere in the distance, and even though she tried to communicate with him during the day, she only managed to talk to him at night in her dreams. Maybe one day he would return to her, and when that day came, she would decide what to do about the two men whom she truly loved, the two men who completed each half of her divided soul. She laid the crystal on her nightstand, fearful but excited for the possibility that it would, in the not so distant future, come sparkling to life.

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Prologue

As a child growing up in a Bavarian village, Elsa Gutz learned about the area surrounding her home town through various paranormal myths her parents told her at night before bed. Her father, a stern man who showed his love the best he could, informed Elsa and her sister that their village was surrounded by a forest she must never enter, because the place was full of witches, warlocks, and werewolves. These magical creatures used to actually be normal people, with lives and families, he told her.

“Like with mommies and daddies?”

“Yes,” her father told her. “And brothers and sisters, too.” He plopped Elsa down onto her bed, covering her and her sister with a blanket.

“What happened to them?”

“They entered the Forbidden Forest, which their parents told them not to go into. Just like I'm telling you. The Forest lies far on the edge of town, where you must never go.”

The 6-year old Elsa grimaced, her toddler imagination painting tragic pictures of kids her age waddling into the forest, their parents chasing after them, crying and screaming.

“Did they ever come back?” Elsa asked, groping for some happy ending.

“No, never. The forest ate them, swallowed them up whole, like a hungry demon. But one local blacksmith, furious at his wife for allowing his children to even get close to the forest, vowed to get them back. He got a pick ax and ventured deep into the forest, and he didn't return for days.”

“Did he ever find his kids?”

“Oh, yes, he returned. The villagers asked him if he ever found his children, expecting to say they were gone forever. But to their surprise, he had found them, hidden in clearing between some trees, dancing and sinking naked around a fire pit, the moonlight shining through the trees. He tried bringing them back, but they told him they didn't want to go. His children's fate hurt the blacksmith worse than if they had died. They were lost, evil, gimps of the forest. The blacksmith could not make them normal children again. And he came back with a large bite out of his thigh--from a werewolf, who had driven him out of the forest, away from his children, who were now lost forever.”

Elsa squeezed her big sister's hand, as they listened to their father every night tell stories like this. Before falling asleep, in the space between her dreams and wake, she thought she could see some werewolves outside her window in the forest near her family's humble cabin home. She chalked up the faint images of green eyes staring at her from the recesses of the woods as her mind playing tricks on her.