A/N: This was originally called From the Depths and left unfinished in 2017. I'm excited to say that it's finally a finished story! Hope you enjoy!!!
They were called sea-wolves. It was a poor play of words, an attempt to reshape the common phrase she-wolf with what they did. For they were all female, and young, too, as diving into the cold waters off Mulgrew Bay and holding one's breath for minutes at a time to harvest shellfish and seaweed wasn't the work of old bones and worn hearts.
They all hunted bare-skinned, hair braided and pinned and a knife strapped at the waist. Whenever one popped back to the surface with her catch, she shook herself like the wolf she was, yellow eyes flashing while she swam for the rocky shore where the collecting baskets waited. As a group, they would rest, stretching out in the sun-warmed sand to doze or chatter, hand pies of smoked fish passed among them.
To anyone stepping away from the urbane heart of Crescent City, these creatures might have seemed more like spirits resting on the shore before slipping back into the rough waters of the bay. Certainly not wolves. Certainly not part of a pack and its rigid decadence.
But they were, indeedâa strange offshoot of the Upper Mulgrew Pack, left to themselves and yet jealously guarded. For these sea-wolves not only found delicacies for the royal family and their court, but also that one rare ingredient so vital to the antidote for silver poisoning: ambergris. It washed up on the shores of Mulgrew Bay and nowhere else for hundreds of miles, and these aloof, wild women were its collectors...
Joan's toes flexed against the damp sand while she picked her way along the shore. She was used to the prickle of salt-heavy air and wore nothing besides the net wrapped around her. A fishing spear hung easy in her hand, pointed toward the end of the shore. The cliffs there looked like a smudge of darkness in a land dimmed by the chilly, in-between minutes of twilight. Only the white castle perched on the ancient rock remained bright and polished as a pearl, but Joan gave it nothing more than a glance of contempt. The ones who lived there could hardly be called wolves, and she had nothing to do with them or their riches.
As she walked, she kept a sharp nose out for a particular smell. She didn't expect to find any ambergris along the shore that morning; the tides were all wrong. Even so, stumbling across one of those waxy lumps would mean a lot more than catching a rockfish for breakfast. Supplies were still low from what had happened the year before.
Yet the scent that blew in on the breeze had nothing to do with that precious gift from the sea. It was strong, equally distinctive in its own way. Worrying. It was the smell of rotting flesh, with that peculiar tang that came with a body brined in saltwater. Then she caught sight of gulls flapping against each other and squabbling at something trapped in seaweed just beyond the lap of the waves. Their cries were thin and harsh in the chilled air, their beaks vicious as they jerked bits of meat free.
Joan had discovered plenty of bodies along the shore. Seals bitten in half by sharks, pieces of whales that washed up with the tides. But this was something different. This was... she sniffed again and broke into a run.
The gulls shrieked and fled in an explosion of wings, a few stray feathers drifting back to the sand as she skidded to a stop and knocked away brown-shelled crabs with the side of the spear head. The smell was overwhelming, as powerful as the freshest ambergris, but she continued to stare at the greying flesh and dull bone.
Seaweed coiled over a cracked skull, the fractures too severe to be from a scavenger's hunger, and Joan sucked in a breath while scraping kelp from the rest of the remains. Then it hissed back out of her. The flared hips of a woman, the sharp fangs of a wolf... it had to be someone from the Mulgrew Pack.
Her voice rose with the sun, the howl piercing the line of cypresses that marked where the beach slid into proper Mulgrew territory. She called out again, heart thumping wildly in her chest even as she held the spear steady, ready to scare off any bird or crab that drew too close. It was only right to watch over her with the same care she'd give a fellow sea-sister until the city wolves responded to her howls.
When they came, guards in their uniforms of leather, wool, and shiny brass buttons and enchanters with their bandoliers heavy with tools, she knew enough to get out of their way. While she sat on a large piece of driftwood, waiting to be called over, a few of the younger guards kept glancing her way, gazes roaming over her bared breasts and tight belly. She didn't flush at their attention but didn't provoke it, either, thoughts hazy with worry instead of lust. A she-wolf washing up from a watery grave. Murdered, at that. What could it mean?
It wasn't the brisk wind that made her shudder, and she looked away from the city wolves and their castle far above. Instead, her gaze followed the ribbon of shore to distant, broken hills where the sea-wolves had carved their homes right into the cliffside. Her sisters were about to wake, and her absence was about to be discovered while the others ate cod-and-egg scramble and drank kelp tea.
Suddenly, she understood how remote they could seem to outsiders, how out of reachâsomething she'd never fully grasped while among the rest of her sea-sisters. She glanced around at the city wolves, taking in how their faces wrinkled in disgust at the sand pooling into their trouser cuffs and how their dagger hilts were encrusted with gems, and shivered again, wishing she'd waited for Nora or Izzie to wake up and hunt with her.
The murmurs of conversation that slid around her like sea foam suddenly hushed, warning her to pay attention. The wolves around the body had all turned toward the stairway that led from the cypresses to the shore, watching as three newcomers made their way down crooked wooden steps built right into the sand. Then the guards straightened their uniforms and the enchanters looked busy with their tools, a silent signal spreading among them all. The royal inspectors had appeared.
Even Joan knew that these wolves were some of the few to carry the ultimate authority of their queen, and she watched them with open curiosity. Two wore the black uniforms of their field, the gold and mother-of-pearl embellishments along their shoulders and lapels suggesting they were very high in rank. Well-fed, puffing from the slight exercise of walking through sand. She dismissed them without a second thought.
The third wolf was bare-headed and stripped down to his shirtsleeves and shoulder holsters, seemingly unaware of the sand clinging to his dark trousers while he approached the protective wards that the enchanters had drawn around the body. He had a badge clipped to his belt, a gold one engraved with the Upper Mulgrew insignia that revealed who he wasâthe chief royal inspector.
Joan blinked, taking in the shape of his forehead and nose, the dark color of his hair and the strong lines of his shoulders as he studied the remains. They were the only features she'd really been able to see, so many months ago in the hospital. If it was himâand she felt surer with each passing moment that it wasâthen from the cane he used, his right knee had never fully recovered from the silver bullet that had shattered it.
Even as the muscles in her body tightened into knots, one of the enchanters speaking with him pointed in her direction, and he turned to look. Meeting his eyes had the same effect of diving into the early-morning waters of the sea: a shock that froze the breath and then silence except for her heartbeat thrumming in her ears.
She knew the nearby guards watched her, not liking how she stared so boldly at what had to be one of the highest members of their pack. They could go to hell for all she cared; after a year of wondering whether he had survived, the answer stood right there in front of her.
When he approached, she raised her chin a little, daring him to take a tone with her that matched the disregard she saw in the other wolves' eyes. It was possible he wouldn't remember her, but she was still nothing to be sniffed at.
Instead, the remote expression on his face warmed into a faint smile. "You're real. It was hard to tell what was a hallucination much of the time."
He was better at hiding his shock than she, and her breath came out as a shudder. "They pulled a lot of silver out of you. It was a miracle you were clear-headed at all."
"Three bullets and a stab wound that nicked my liver, or so the doctors said."
She supposed it made sense that he would hold onto any details possible, even the morbid ones, if the silver poisoning had muddled his memories of that time.
When she said nothing, he tilted his head at her. "How are you mixed up in this?"
"I found the body."
His jaw tightened, and she wondered what he knew and she didn't. She looked toward the dead she-wolf before asking, "Did I get myself in trouble?"
"Maybe." His gaze remained on her faceâno small thing, with the amount of skin she showed. Even the other inspectors cast a glance or two over her body while listening to the enchanters, and not to add details to those little black notebooks they continually wrote in.
"What's your name?" he said, abruptly. "I never learned it in the hospital and you vanished afterward."
She wished a guard hadn't taken away her spear. It would have given her hands something to fiddle with. "There was no chance to say goodbye. One day, we were told that we weren't needed anymore and wouldn't be allowed to come back. Anyway, I never learned your name, either. You were just my surviving patient."
He nodded, unoffended. It seemed he still enjoyed her boldness. Something about the grip on his cane suggested that he would've liked to sit beside her, heedless of what the rough wood would do to his fine trousers. It also suggested that he couldn't rise again without an obvious struggle, a fact he didn't wish to show to others.
Joan read all of that in the tight knuckles of his hand and then stood up, ignoring how the nearest guards bristled. They didn't like a lack of fear or deference, and she showed neither while moving closer to him.
"My name is Joan," she said, voice dropping to a whisper. His eyes were just as she remembered, a dark amber that had always seemed so clear even when he'd been lost in the throes of delirium. The sound of her name brightened them into fire.
"Thomas," he murmured. "Thomas Etheridge."
"Etheridge?" Surprising, that. She knew the Upper Mulgrew Pack didn't let its wolves have different surnames.
"I was born in another pack, one that lived inland before it was wiped out by rivals." He answered without bitterness, studying her intently despite the approach of one of the wolves who had arrived with him.
This new wolf must have overheard Etheridge's answer, because he looked faintly surprised despite his slight bow. "I'm sorry, Inspector, but there's something I must urgently discuss with you."
The loud words sent Joan back a step, and something flickered in Etheridge's eyes, there and gone too fast for her to understand.
"It's become complicated," continued the other inspector, stopping beside him.
That convinced Etheridge to turn away, although not without a final glance in her direction. She watched them move closer to the shore so that the hiss of waves would mask their conversation from any prying ears. The other inspector rubbed at his eyes tiredly while he spoke. Etheridge just looked grim.
When they both glanced at her, Joan fixed her gaze on the sea, skin prickling like whenever she caught sight of a shark's fin. She began playing with her hair, making sure the movements of her fingers looked nervous instead of filled with purpose. As with all sea-sisters, she always braided beads made from driftwood or sea glass into her hair. To outsiders, they looked like pretty little baubles. In reality, they were charms, and right then her instincts warned her to use one.
A glass bead the color of seaweed slipped free of its strands and fell through her fingers, quickly swallowed by a sudden, strong wave that spread over more of the shore than before. She relaxed against the familiar brush of water even while the city wolves cursed and jumped away from the foam hissing over their shoes. The message was on its way, and if nothing else, she'd be the only one in danger.
It wasn't long before Etheridge and the other wolf returned to her, and when they did, the third inspector joined them. So did some of the guards. She blinked at them all, wondering if it would be better to change form and make a run for it. These city wolves couldn't handle sand like she could. Then Etheridge spoke, keeping her still for the moment.
"It's better if you return with the rest of us." His tone revealed nothing about what waited ahead.
"And stay where?" she said, gaze darting from face to face. The other two had gained a predatory hunch to their shoulders, and they were actually regarding her.
The inspector on Etheridge's left seemed a little surprised that her first question hadn't been "why," and his eyebrows were raised as he said, "I would think that you're in no position toâ"
"You'll be taken to my office," said Etheridge, a hint of a growl in his voice. Joan sensed that it was meant for the other inspector, not for her. "This case threatens the pack, and I need to know everything you do."
Silence fell as they all waited for her response.
What kind of waters had she fallen into? Deep ones, surely, and murky, too. She could balk. She could fight. Yet she sensed that the more she argued, the weaker Etheridge's decision would seem in the eyes of others. Could she trust him that much? Him, a wolf she barely knew?
She glanced toward the distant cliffs of her home, wishing she could be with her sisters. Their tiny figures could already be seen slipping into the sea.
"I'll make sure they know what happened," said Etheridge, his voice softening a little.
Joan nodded, surprised to find how readily she believed him. Surprised to find how her throat had gone too tight to speak. And once he gestured at the guards to stay back, she fell in step with him, keeping her head held high and her gaze fixed on the forest even as the wind carried distant shouts and howls of laughter to her.