Prologue

Brooks

 

“Pussy, of course. What the fuck sort of answer were you expecting?” Tanner laughs as he unrolls the bloody skin on the wooden surface of our dining table. My lips twitch in annoyance, but where else is he supposed to do his work?

Going outside at night is a death sentence.

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“That’s what you miss the most about home?” I repeat, trying not to let my judgment show in my words. Tanner will notice, and it’ll start a fight. I’ve got better things to do than put the other two men in my coven in their places. “Sex?”

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Tanner flicks his tongue against the corner of his mouth, lifting blue-gray eyes to mine. He isn’t smiling anymore; I never smile. We’re on the same page then.

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“That’s not what you asked, Brooks.” He grabs his fleshing knife with both hands, putting the silver blade against the meaty hide in front of him. “And that’s not what I meant. You asked us what was the hardest thing to give up. I answered honestly. Didn’t say I was proud of it.” He pauses, and that easy smile of his clicks back on. “I’ve done my fair share of whoring around. All I want now is a woman to call my own.”

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The scrape of his metal blade is loud in the quiet of the cottage.

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Outside, something screams. Not unusual. These woods are always screaming.

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“Would you shut the hell up?” Marlowe doesn’t look up from his task, grinding the bone of some nightwalking monster against a stone. His leather-clad knees are splayed around it, the black, pointed hat on his head dripping with wooden charms, tiny potion bottles, and teeth. Glowing mushrooms sprout from the brim, causing the hat to sag on one side. “I don’t want to hear your fairy-tale shit tonight.”

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Tanner shoves the knife ruthlessly against the hide, spattering blood on his face. He smirks with scarred lips as he slides his gaze over to Marlowe, and I narrow my eyes at them both. Better things to do, remember?

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“I’ll give her everything I have. My heart, my soul, my body.” He pauses, releasing the fleshing knife with one hand to squeeze the front of his leather pants. “My dick. It’s all hers, this future woman of mine.” The wolf ears on Tanner’s hat prick up in challenge. “I'll find myself a wife. Most difficult game I’ve ever stalked, but I haven’t failed a hunt yet.”

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Marlowe sneers in disgust.

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I’m even less amused.

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“You’ll never find love in these tainted woods.” It’s a statement of fact, but it comes out sounding like a command. I wasn’t such a hard-edged dick before I came here, swear to God. I worked two jobs. Drove a blue Chevy pickup. Played baseball.

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A scoff slips past my lips as I rub a hand over my mouth.

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I stand up from the overstuffed armchair by the fire, casting a horrible shadow on the ceiling. My dark silhouette has antlers that stretch across the curved walls of the room like an unwanted embrace.

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“How the fuck do you know that?” Tanner responds with a quirk of his lips. The rhythmic scrape of his fleshing knife resumes as he cleans the hide of an animal that doesn’t exist outside of this place. “The next person we run into will be the love of my life. That, or I’ll let 'im go. I can promise you that.”

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I step closer to the fire, using a wooden spoon to check the mixture that’s bubbling in the cauldron. The lid of another pot clatters as the stew inside overheats and boils over. With a flick of my fingers, I calm the flame underneath it.

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“The love of your life? There’s not even anybody around to fuck.” Marlowe—Lo—examines the bone shard, testing the sharpness by pressing it against a finger and drawing blood.

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“Aww, look at that,” Tanner teases, snorting and startling the six-eyed crow that he keeps as a pet. “Loverboy over here pretending like he knows anything at all about casual sex.”

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Marlowe’s jaw clenches and violence bubbles in time with the liquid in the cauldron

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“That’s enough.” This time, my words are most definitely a command. I use the knife from my belt to slit my palm. No hesitation. No flinching. Holding my hand over the cauldron, I squeeze it into a tight fist, dribbling blood into the mixture. “Get over here. This spell won’t cast itself.”

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I clean the wound with a cloth and then smear a minty salve across the angry red line as the boys join me around the cauldron. They cut their own palms, add their own blood. We stare at each other in silence, hat brims low, fire crackling in the hearth. I’m not the only one who hates this shit. Tanner’s right: if we had a woman as our North, life would be so much easier.

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In unison, we spit in our palms, shove our pants down and grip our cocks.

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Three straight male witches jerking off in a fairy-tale cottage.

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A woman really would change my world for the better. My gaze drops to the cauldron as that horrible idea sticks in my skull like cobwebs. Damn Tanner for putting that in my head. I graze a thumb across my pierced crown, smearing pre-ejac over my achy skin. A shiver pricks my spine, like claws.

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Oh yes, I’m thinking about it now. Really thinking about it.

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Strong, sure jerks of my fist. Up and down. Fantasizing about a possible, future her.

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My cock twitches in my hand, and I finish inside the cauldron. My teeth are clenched tight, a muscle in my jaw ticking. Tanner is already done, but Marlowe takes his sweet time like he always does.

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Our combined cum changes the brew from purple to red. I watch it roil as a bead of sweat slides down my nose and hits my lips.

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I lick it off with a cranky swirl of tongue. We’re not lucky enough to snag a North and a wife in the same person. It’ll never happen. Those are fetishes not worth entertaining. Useless distractions. A waste of time.

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“You don’t give a shit who our North is, do you?” Lo growls at me, like he’d enjoy taking the arrowhead he just made to Tanner’s throat. But he can’t. Whether he likes us or not—and he doesn’t—we’re stuck with each other.

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“Of course not,” I lie, shrugging and pulling my pants back up. I do care. I’m just not willing to suffer in these woods for want of a better opportunity.

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“The next person who sticks their hand in that godforsaken tree better be a woman of marriageable age,” Tanner says, like a threat. He prowls back to the table. Stares at the now meatless hide. Tosses it over his shoulder like the barbarian that he is. He runs bloodied fingers through his hair. “Doesn’t matter to me who she is, I’m all in.”

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“How romantic.” Marlowe reaches up to adjust his hat, scowling as Tanner only just then remembers to fix his pants. A bat-winged shadow curls in on itself on the wall behind Lo, like a bitchy gargoyle. “Why don’t you tell her that she’s your woman by virtue of having a pussy? I’m sure that’ll charm her pants right off.”

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“You think there’s something wrong with that?” Tanner asks finally, putting both palms on the surface of the wooden table and leaning down. Bloody face dark but eyes bright. His shadow splits in half on the wall behind him, a tail on either side of his silhouette. “Committing myself to a woman after we make vows to one another?”

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“We made vows to one another, and I don’t see you romancing me.” Marlowe grabs his iron mask from the counter while Tanner laughs. Guarantee that Lo finds nothing funny about any of this. “Fuck off, Tanner. If I see a North wandering around, I’ll bind him. Whatever it takes. Whoever it is.”

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His eyes meet mine as he slips the mask over his nose and mouth, using the chains around his ears to keep it in place. Before putting his gloves on, he uses sign language to communicate with me. It’s essential here, the ability to talk without speaking a single word aloud.

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“Whoever it is,” Marlowe repeats with hard, rough movements of his inked hands.

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Liar.

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He heads up the stairs and disappears out the front door.

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“With our luck, I bet the next North that comes around is an old man who pisses his pants during his first Hag sighting.” Tanner lifts the corner of his lip, a single white fang catching the light from the fire. His crow flutters down from its perch on a boar head that’s mounted to the wall, landing on the back of his chair. “I’m warning you, Brooks: I’d rather stay here than compromise.”

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I swirl my hand over the liquid in the cauldron, and the steam dances with the motion. I coax the red miasma into a shape, building a rose, watching it die, letting it turn to ash. With another flick of my fingers, it sucks back into the cauldron and joins the brew.

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“If our North is an elderly man,” I begin, thinking over the spell options in the grimoires that line our shelves, “then it’ll take weeks to get out of here.”

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Weeks in the Witchwoods means years back home.

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It doesn’t matter to me—I’ve been trapped here for so long that everyone I know and love is dead. For me, it’s been just over two years. For the family and friends I left behind, it’s been seventy.

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Tanner’s boots are loud as he moves into the foyer, snagging his own iron mask from an ivory hook. The hide is still on his right shoulder; his crow settles faithfully on his left.

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“If I see a man of any age walking these woods, I’m going to stitch his lips shut and send him home to California.” Tanner cocks an eyebrow as he fixes his mask in place. I believe the bastard when he says that. “I’m finding us a wife,” he signs to me, just before he follows the wooden steps to ground level and slips into the wicked woods beyond the door.

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I take a sip of broth from the stew—game meat, purple yams, foraged mushrooms, and wild basil (for luck). I lick my lips as I turn and catch another glimpse of my shadow, wearing the antlers of a forest beast.

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No, I don’t care who our North is, but if getting out of the Witchwoods requires dragging a fourth person into this nightmare with us, then I’ll do it regardless of who they are. I’ve done it before.

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North. South. East. West.

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A smile crooks my lips, and the shadow on the wall opens its mouth to reveal sharp teeth.

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“Whatever it takes. Whoever it is.”

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I grab another bite of the stew, drop the lid in place, and put my own mask on before venturing out with the rest of my coven. Never leave home without it.

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I’ve seen more than one person torn apart by the Hag Wytch, and I’m not keen to be the next one that she eats—while they’re still alive and screaming.