Blood Moon Harvest (Seasons of the Moon) Read online

  BLOOD MOON HARVEST

  The Cain Chronicles, Episode 2

  SM Reine

  Copyright © 2012 SM Reine

  Published by Red Iris Books

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Proposal

  Injured

  Questioning

  Reinforcements

  Rescued

  Abandon Ship

  A Promise

  Battlefield

  Lost Chapters

  An Answer

  ONE

  Proposal

  The longest journey was always the one going home. And it only seemed to take longer when Seth knew that his girlfriend was waiting for him… with his brother.

  His years studying pre-med seemed to take torturous decades. But even slow time marched forward, and his endless, aching days at the university did pass.

  July came, and Seth finally went home.

  He stood in the middle of the Gresham Ranch house’s living room, drinking in the sights, sounds, and smells he had been missing all semester.

  Aunt Gwyn’s furnishings were looking even more beat up than usual. After a few months of having werewolves play-fight, eat, and sleep on her couches, they were looking more like very sad piles of leather and wood than actual furniture.

  A vase of blossoms decorated the mantel. Dried scales, taken from shedding rattlesnakes, were hung by the door. Everything smelled a little bit like wet dog, even though Seth knew Gwyn was anal about cleanliness.

  But it was home. Home.

  Rylie’s jacket hung on a hook by the rattlesnake scales, nestled in Abel’s duster. Seth tried not to look at them as he stacked a pile of lumber from the shed by the windows.

  Preparing to fortify the ranch wasn’t enough to dampen his relief at being home; where werewolves were concerned, the threat of impending danger was pretty homey, too.

  Once he had everything set down, he pulled a hammer and nails out of the closet, set them on the coffee table, and considered the room’s entry points.

  The kitchen. The front windows. The hall. It wouldn’t be too hard to secure, if things got ugly.

  He was about to go looking for Rylie when he realized there was one entry point he hadn’t considered: the fireplace. Seth kneeled and glanced up the chimney. It was probably too narrow for a human to squeeze inside, but he wasn’t certain that they were dealing with humans. Better to board that up, too.

  As he straightened, the pictures on the mantel caught his eye. There was a picture of two wolves among the school headshots of Bekah and Levi, and the Gresham family photos. One of the wolves was slender and gold; the other was a hulking black beast. Seth would have recognized Rylie and Abel anywhere. He had spent more than enough nights running with them as a human.

  He picked up the picture of the two wolves. They were seated beside each other, shoulder-to-shoulder. They looked like yin and yang.

  Seth’s jaw clenched. He set the picture back down a little too hard.

  He unpacked his suitcase in Rylie’s bedroom. She always saved the bottom two drawers of her dresser for him, even though he never had enough to fill them, and their laundry would end up all mixed together by the end of the week anyway.

  Seth put his guns in the safe under Rylie’s bed, but left it unlocked. And then he pulled the last item out of his bag—a small jewelry box.

  There was a gold ring inside, which he had bought at a shop in the town where he attended college. He hadn’t been planning to buy a ring for Rylie that day. He just happened to be passing the window when it caught his eye.

  Rylie wasn’t the kind of girl who would be impressed by a diamond ring, but what he saw was something different, something special—a milky white rock that Seth had instantly recognized as a moonstone. It was bordered by clusters of tiny, sparkling diamonds. It looked like the full moon and the stars in the sky.

  Perfect for Rylie.

  Seth had found himself going into the shop, and a few minutes later, he had walked out with a lighter wallet and the ring in his pocket.

  That had been over a month ago, and he had been thinking about the ring ever since. He spent a lot of time just opening the box to stare at it and contemplate what it meant.

  He closed the box again, put it in his pocket, and went looking for Rylie.

  Abel was sitting on the back patio, sharpening a hunting knife.

  “How’s it going?” Seth asked, pausing at his side.

  His brother glanced at him. “Fine.” That one word spoke volumes—resentful volumes.

  “I put lumber by the front door. We should probably prepare to guard our rooms, too. Do you want me to put some by your bedroom window?”

  Abel grunted.

  “I can get Levi to do it if you’re busy,” Seth ventured.

  “Yeah. Fine. That works.”

  Aunt Gwyneth stepped out the back door, brushing out one of her thick gray braids. “Have either of you seen Rylie since dinner?”

  Adrenaline rushed through Seth. “No. Why?”

  “She’s not inside. I thought she might be with you boys.”

  Abel stood, clenching the knife. “I’ll look for her.”

  But Seth was already backing down the hill. “I’ve got it. She probably just went for a walk. It’s almost the new moon—she always gets restless about now.”

  He jogged into the night, stretching out his senses for the tickle at the back of his neck that would tell him werewolves were nearby. He could always feel plenty of them around the ranch, but Rylie’s energy resonated with him in a different way. Seth wasn’t sure if it was the Alpha thing or if he just loved her so much that he couldn’t keep away.

  Seth found her pale form by the highway. She climbed over the fence onto their property again when she saw him approach.

  Every time he went away to college, he started to forget just how beautiful Rylie was. He always knew she was pretty—just thinking about her made him feel warm and possessive. But the reality of her beauty never failed to shock him.

  She looked surprised to see him approach, but she extended her hands toward him anyway, and Seth caught her in an embrace.

  “What are you doing out here alone?” he asked, scanning the fields without releasing her. Rylie fit under his arm perfectly.

  She leaned her head on his chest. “Look at this.” She pointed to tracks in the mud on the other side of the fence. “I smell Pagan. She was here this afternoon.”

  A surge of protectiveness rocked through Seth, so sudden and strong that it was hard to breathe. “She’s checking us out. You shouldn’t be out here.”

  “I couldn’t sleep. I’ve been worrying.”

  “Nothing’s going to hurt you,” he said. “I promise. I won’t let it happen.”

  She shuddered against his chest. “But it’s already July. You’ll go back to school next month—and then what? I mean… it’s fine. But it’s easy for you to tell me not to worry when it’s not going to be your problem soon.”

  Seth pressed her hand against his heart and took a long look at her.

  He hadn’t told Rylie yet, but he wasn’t going back to college that fall. He had rushed through the last few semesters with almost double the normal credit load. Between his crazy schedule and the summer and winter terms, he had already completed his undergraduate degree.

  He was taking the year off before entering medical school, which gave him a lot of time to be with her. There would be plenty of time to explain that later, when she wasn’t trembling with fear.

  “Your safety is always my problem,” he said firmly. “You fill my mind and heart. I’m not going anywhere until I know you’re safe.”

  It didn’t seem to soothe her at all. She
remained tense. “We should go inside.”

  The hint of sadness in her voice was just too much for Seth to bear. He felt the weight of the ring box in his pocket.

  He gave her a weak smile. “Wait a second. You never asked about the surprise I have for you.”

  She blinked. “Oh—what is it?”

  “Well, I wanted to wait until we could go somewhere special or something, but since it sounds like things might be getting crazy soon…” Seth blew a breath out of his lips. “I’ve been thinking a lot lately. About our relationship.”

  She pulled away from him and hung her head. “Yeah. Me too.”

  “I want to be with you more, and I just worry we don’t have enough time. You know?” he asked.

  Rylie didn’t seem to know. She gave him a blank look.

  Was he speaking in a foreign language? Everything was coming out in a jumble. He was trying to tell her that he had already gotten through pre-med, just for her, but it got lost somewhere between his brain and lips.

  Seth took a deep breath to try a different angle.

  “And with everything happening now—this Cain thing and missing werewolves and silver bullets…”

  She gave a little gasp. “You’re not breaking up with me, are you?”

  He had to laugh. “Are you serious? I would never let you go, Rylie. I’d have to be stupid.”

  “Then what?”

  He braced himself, dropped to one knee, and pulled out the ring box.

  He watched the emotions flash over Rylie’s heart-shaped face. Confusion turned to surprise in a flash. Was that a good thing, or a bad thing?

  Rylie’s white-blond hair fluttered around her face in the midsummer breeze. Her golden eyes flashed. She bit her bottom lip.

  God, she was so beautiful.

  He swallowed hard. He had to ask now, before he lost his nerve.

  “Rylie… will you marry me?”

  Her mouth moved soundlessly.

  Then her eyes flicked over his shoulder, and that shock turned to fear.

  “Abel!” she cried. Not exactly the response he had been hoping for.

  A shot whip-cracked through the air.

  Seth had heard enough guns firing to recognize it instantly.

  He twisted to see what had gone wrong. Abel stood on the hill. A woman was behind him, gun drawn—Pagan.

  His brother put a hand to his side and tumbled to his knees.

  He had been shot.

  Seth’s gun was drawn and aimed in an instant. He fired off one shot, and then another; Pagan fled down the hill, leaving Abel bleeding on the grass.

  “Save him,” Rylie said with a growl, her spine hunched.

  “Wait—”

  But she was already gone. With a cry, her human form erupted.

  Blood sprayed. Blond hair puddled on the ground. Her clothes shredded, bones popped, and she fell to all fours.

  Within moments, the girl he had just asked to marry him was a sleek, golden wolf, almost more catlike than canine.

  Rylie looked at him for a moment as if to say, Don’t let him die.

  And then she vanished into the night, chasing Pagan.

  TWO

  Injured

  Seth was fast, but not fast enough to keep up with a werewolf on the hunt. Save him, she had said. Of course she thought about Abel’s safety first.

  He ran up the hill to find his brother groaning and sweaty. His shirt was stained with blood.

  It looked bad. Really bad.

  He kept his tone light and teasing to hide his worry. “Were you spying on us?” Seth asked, lifting the hem to glance at the injury underneath. It was too dark to tell if the bullet had made it all the way through, but touching the area made his fingers sticky.

  Abel glared at him, lips drawn back in a grimace. “Proposing marriage in some muddy field? God, you’re such a tool.” That was a good sign. If he was being insulting, he probably wasn’t on the brink of death.

  Seth crouched and pulled Abel’s arm over his shoulders, helping him stand.

  They limped to the house together. Every step ripped a sound of pain from Abel’s throat, and by the time they reached the back door, he wasn’t walking for himself at all. He stumbled on the threshold.

  Seth dropped him on the kitchen floor.

  “Jesus,” Gwyn said, stepping in from the living room wearing her nightgown with a hammer in hand. Several of the werewolves from the barn were behind her, trying to see over her shoulder. “What happened?”

  Seth barked out one word: “Hunter.”

  Rylie’s aunt pointed at two of the wolves—Levi and Sora. “You two, come with me.”

  Then she stepped into the living room long enough to grab her shotgun and headed out the back door.

  “Turn on the lights,” Seth ordered, and Bekah hurried to obey.

  The fluorescents flared on, and he inspected his brother’s injuries. There was both an entry and an exit wound, and it was shallow. If Pagan had been using normal bullets, it wouldn’t have fazed Abel.

  But she had been using silver bullets.

  The skin was inflamed and red. Blood puddled underneath him.

  Everything Seth knew about safe handling of wounds didn’t apply to werewolves—Abel didn’t have any diseases to protect against, aside from the kind transferred by a bite, and Seth didn’t have to worry about contaminating the injury. Werewolves were immune to infection.

  All that left for him to do was remove the fragments of metal at any cost. The alloy hunters used was soft and tended to spread inside the body. Silver poisoning was an ugly thing to witness. If Abel didn’t die, he would go crazy.

  Seth had watched it happen to Rylie before. He didn’t want to see it happen again.

  “Sorry,” he muttered, plunging his fingers into the wound. Abel shouted and arched his back. His fists flailed. He almost hit Seth. “Someone hold him!”

  Bekah helped pin him down as Seth removed two large bullet fragments. She was strong, despite her size, but it took all of her weight to keep Abel’s shoulders flat on the linoleum.

  Seth dug out the biggest pieces of silver and dropped them on the counter. He wiped his hands on a dishrag.

  Abel sagged, panting and weak. “You are a shitty doctor, bro.”

  “You’re welcome,” Seth said. He would have to explore the injury further, and quickly.

  Rylie dragged Pagan into the kitchen. She almost wasn’t recognizable as the attempted assassin Seth had been hunting in North Harbor. Her arm was a mangled mess of blood, and her pale face was covered in dirt. She sagged in the jaws of the werewolf like a rag doll.

  “Holy crap. Is she alive?” Bekah asked, hovering nearby with her hands held out, as if she wanted to help Rylie but wasn’t sure how.

  Gwyn entered next, tracking muddy boot prints on the linoleum. “She’s alive, but I think something’s wrong with that woman,” she said, nodding at Pagan. “Rylie took it easy on her. It’s like her skin is tissue paper.”

  “Throw her in the cellar,” Seth said. “Padlock the door. I’ll look at her when I’m done with Abel.”

  Bekah threw Pagan over her shoulder and took her out the back door again.

  Rylie’s bones popped and crunched. The shift back from wolf was smoother, but it took a few minutes longer than her last transition.

  Gwyn draped a blanket over her niece’s bare body. “I’m going to make sure that Pagan doesn’t wake up and hurt Bekah.”

  Rylie didn’t respond. She only had eyes for Abel.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, gripping one of his hands in both of hers. Her mouth was still stained with Pagan’s blood. A streak ran from the corner of her lips to her right ear.

  Abel responded by lifting a hand to Rylie’s cheek. She closed her eyes and tilted her face into his palm.

  Nauseating venom surged through Seth. He took Rylie’s hand to distract her. “I need to finish extracting the silver,” he said as calmly as he could manage. “Can you help me move Abel?”

  She coul
d have lifted the weight of three people at once if she wanted to, but Abel was tall and unwieldy. They had to work together to drag him down the hall to his bedroom.

  He gave a low groan as he settled into the mattress.

  Seth ducked into the bedroom he shared with Rylie to find tweezers and gauze. When he returned, she was kneeling beside Abel, and they spoke in low voices.

  “Pagan won’t be firing another gun anytime soon,” Rylie said, eyes burning and cheeks flushed. Seth hadn’t seen her that angry in a long time. “I ate her arm.”

  Abel didn’t seem to care about the implications of a werewolf bite that didn’t kill. He gave a faint smile. “That’s my girl.”

  Seth sat down on the side of the bed, shoulder muscles tensed into knots. “This is going to hurt,” he said, and without further warning, he began to operate on his brother.

  Rylie couldn’t watch Seth work on Abel. It made her nerves tie into knots. So instead, she got dressed and paced outside the cellar door.

  It was almost an hour before Bekah and Gwyn came out again. They wrapped a chain around the handles and padlocked it.

  “Is Pagan going to survive?” Rylie asked, gnawing on her thumbnail.

  “I don’t know,” Gwyn said, checking the safety on Pagan’s pistol and stuffing it in her belt. Her eyes roved over the darkened hills as she guided her niece toward the back porch. “She’s bleeding a lot.”

  Guilt twisted in Rylie’s stomach. “I was angry.”

  “You’re a force to be reckoned with, babe. For now, that woman’s not going anywhere. What did you call her? Pagan? What kind of name is that?”

  “You would have to ask her parents,” Rylie said, echoing what the assassin had told her the first time they met. The joke fell just as flat the second time.

  Gwyn faced Bekah. “Start boarding the living room windows.” She waited until the Riese girl went inside before speaking again. “Rylie, there’s something not right about that woman down there. It’s not just the severity of the injury. Her skin—I could see through it to her bones.”

  Rylie blinked. “What?”

  “I know it sounds crazy, but… I don’t think she’s human.”

  “Then what is she?”