Read Online Turned by Kessie Carroll - Free Book Online

forearm.
     
    He turned on her with a flash of white teeth,
like a dog whose tail had been pulled. She yelped and backed away.
He'd bitten her arm, and blood welled through her fur. "Bernard!
Why?"
     
    He gazed at her for a long moment with flat
yellow eyes. Then slowly his expression changed to one of remorse,
and his eyes deepened. "Oh Charlotte, I'm so sorry!" He stepped
forward and licked her wounded arm.
     
    She panted in fear, half-expecting him to
bite her again. "What is wrong with you?"
     
    "I think the Staff strengthened the curse.
The elixir is failing. I must give the formula to the mages
before--" he broke off and bathed her arm vigorously.
     
    "What about me? If you lose your mind, I--I
can't live without you." She meant to say that she would not
survive without him, but as she spoke the words, she realized their
truth. If he became a mindless beast and she somehow returned to
her human life, she'd return to her lonely, selfish ways--but
tormented by the memory of love.
     
    The bleeding stopped. Bernard clasped her paw
in both of his. "Forgive me, my lady. If I don't survive this, find
Kryn. He will understand the situation. Don't let Allard near you
with his staff."
     
    Charlotte gazed into his eyes and gripped his
hands. Her heart crept into her throat. "Bernard, I can't--"
     
    He licked her nose. "You can, my love. You
don't realize how strong you are. Whatever happens to me, you will
triumph. Even if I--" His voice broke and he lowered his head.
"--even if I lose my mind."
     
    She nuzzled his face, unable to speak. Death
and insanity had become stark realities, and in the next few hours,
she could very well encounter both. As they walked on, anguish
dragged at her muscles. She lagged behind Bernard, panting and
weeping inside.
     
    Long before she was ready, Bernard halted and
pointed with a claw. "There is the mage tower."
     
    A structure like a lighthouse stood in the
midst of a grassy field with a cobblestone road winding to its
foot. To Charlotte it looked foreboding, like a torturer's castle
from which no captive ever returned. She dropped to her belly and
whimpered.
     
    "I have to go," said Bernard.
     
    "I know," she whispered. He carried in his
head their only hope at regaining their human bodies, and only the
mages and alchemists could help them. But her heart cried a
warning.
     
    "Stay hidden," he whispered. "The brush here
is thick, and you can watch without revealing yourself. If Allard
is there and uses the Staff on me, remain hidden until you are
certain he's gone. Then you may try to speak to them. I can't bear
to think of you trying to live alone out here, and at the very
least they will shelter you, as long as they know you can speak."
His voice trembled, and he wrapped his arms around her and buried
his muzzle in her thick neck fur.
     
    Charlotte returned his embrace. Despite his
monstrous form and strength, his muscles trembled. Beneath the
wolf, he was still the small, scholarly man she had married, and he
had never before faced death.
     
    Finally he withdrew and gave her a last
tender lick on the cheek. Then he pushed out of the brush and
walked across the green toward the tower.
     
    Charlotte dug her claws into the forest floor
nervously. When Bernard was halfway to the tower, he rose and
walked on two legs. Perhaps he hoped to show his humanity by his
posture. At any rate, he reached the tower door unchallenged, and
rapped his claws three times on the wood.
     
    Charlotte's attention was diverted by voices
and footsteps behind her, drawing closer by the second. The onion
smell of humans flooded her nose, as well as ozone and gunpowder.
Hunters!
     
    She shrank down under the bushes and lay
still, hoping they would simply pass by. But one of them muttered,
"The trail is fresh. Look sharp, boys, they're probably in this
brush."
     
    Five pairs of booted feet picked their way
toward Charlotte, following the trail she and Bernard had left. Her
constant dread spiked into true