Shifter Magnetism by Stormie Kent Page B

still her racing heart. She reached up to clear her face and winced at the pain in her shoulder. She clutched the thin sticks covering her and pulled them away. She opened her eyes. Hay. She’d fallen into a big pile of hay.
    Old, moldy, stinky, and lifesaving hay.
    She sat up and immediately collapsed into the dried grass. Her head pounded, and her back didn’t feel much better. Trying again, but more slowly, she managed to sit upright. She looked around and gasped. She was in a gigantic cage. Scrambling to her feet, she stumbled to the bars. Fearing a shock, she tentatively touched the metal. Nothing happened. She grabbed the poles and shook them frantically. They didn’t budge. She moved around the enclosure, shaking the bars. Only the door jiggled, and it was locked.
    She rested her forehead on the cool metal she still clutched with both hands. There wasn’t any time to feel sorry for herself. Nic needed her. She had to get out of there.
    She took a deep breath and looked outside the cage. And froze. It felt as if her heart stopped, then began thudding again almost painfully. She blinked. The walls were covered with words. Words formed into enchantments that gave off a neon orange-red glow. She averted her eyes so she wouldn’t accidentally read anything more. The entire room was cursed and protected by dark magic.
    She whimpered, then searched the rest of the room, avoiding the walls, for something to help her. She could call objects to her, though the process depleted much of her strength, and she wasn’t sure her magic wouldn’t backfire with all the dark wardings. She recoiled at her first sight of the altar in the corner. Human and animal skulls were prominent. There were small burlap bundles scattered on the floor before the velvet-draped altar. Something red was splattered over all the items. She forced herself not to speculate on the origins of the substance.
    In the center of the floor sat a steel table and, underneath the table, a drain. She shuddered. A stand next to the table held an ax, a mace, a saw, and several ornamental daggers. The smell made much more sense now. The choking odor of sulphur, the tinny scent of old blood, and the rancid tang of a charnel house filled the room.
    Her knees gave out, and she slid to the floor of the cage, frightened to search its contents.
    She was trapped in Radkin Lewis’s torture chamber.
    * * * *
    Nic snatched his hand back as the trapdoor closed on his mate. He jumped to his feet and began to stomp on the seam. Dust and dirt billowed along the cracks in the floor. Nothing happened.
    “Open the door!”
    The sorcerer laughed. He initiated a chant. Nic shot him in the arm. The sorcerer howled in pain.
    Nic partially shifted and leaped toward the old man. Lewis held his injured arm and hunched over. His fear rolled off him in waves. A wolf shifter partially shifted had inspired the human’s werewolf legends. His muzzle full of fangs and hands of claws descended on the other man.
    “I’ll pull a limb off at a time until you take me to my mate!” His speech was more growls than syllables, but the sorcerer nodded anyway.
    Nic grabbed Lewis by the nape of the neck and hauled him upright. He ignored the man’s whimpers.
    He shook Lewis. “Where is she?”
    He needed to find her now. She could be lying broken and hurt anywhere in the house, and he had to get to her. Lewis slowly shuffled toward the door. Nic used his grip on the man’s neck to shove him. The man needed to go faster. His mate needed him.
    “Take me to her now, or your right arm is the first thing I pull off.” His beast was riding him, forcing him to do or say anything to get to its mate.
    His wolf didn’t care about his human job as a policeman. In hybrid shift, with his mate in danger, the wolf was stronger. His claws dug into Lewis’s flesh. Blood dripped down the sorcerer’s neck. They moved forward at a pace too slow for Nic. “Tell me which way!”
    Lewis whimpered. “Third door…on