Charmed I'm Sure Read Online Free PDF Page A

really?” she insisted.
    â€œI am a man,” I answered, then shivered. It was the cold of the water, of course. Something, not her, compelled me to add an honest: “I think.”
    â€œBack in the clearing, you burned as brightly as a wolf walker.” The voice came from a different part of the woods now. “But I never dreamed of your coming, not once, and my voice does not call you. Those are the hallmarks of a knight.”
    It was true. The geas that compels knights of my old order to hunt creatures of shadow also prevents any other mind magic from taking root in the soil of our psyches. Seers cannot see us. Enthrallers cannot compel us. Cursers cannot curse us.
    â€œAnd that knife you are holding,” the voice continued. “It is silver steel, is it not? A knight’s weapon.”
    Silver steel is an alloy with a silver quotient just high enough to affect creatures who are susceptible to such things. Fae and their brood are not among them.
    â€œPerhaps I am your sins come calling,” I said.
    A sigh. “It was Dustin who brought you here, wasn’t it? I knew I should have killed him. But he was such a wonderful lover for so long. And it amused me to think of him bumbling his way back into his former life, the old dear, haunted by half-remembered dreams, never fully alive again.”
    Eric chose that moment to fire his Thompson at the direction of the voice. He did an impressive job of raking the area considering how badly his hands were shaking, but then, it was a weapon, and he was a Marine.
    When he was done, the voice continued from another section of wood as if nothing had happened. “If I have violated your territory, I apologize. You did not mark your surroundings, and I meant no disrespect by hunting here.”
    â€œThis is not a matter for wolves,” I answered. “I am a knight.”
    â€œWha…whu…whuh you talkin’…about?” Eric managed.
    We both ignored him.
    â€œIf you are a knight, your geas will keep you from harming me.” The voice betrayed a hint of impatience. “You are only allowed to hunt those of us who violate the Pax, and I am removing all evidence of my existence. Dustin was an indulgence, I admit, but he won’t be able to tell anyone anything, and I am disposing of all other witnesses.”
    â€œThis is not a matter for knights,” I said. “I am a wolf.”
    There was silence then. “What is this really about?”
    â€œThis is about a man’s torn feet,” I said. “This is about a boy hanging on a tree.”
    â€œI don’t believe you.” The voice held absolute conviction.
    â€œOr perhaps this is about the fact that my name is John Charming,” I told her. “Perhaps my family has protected humanity from things such as you for more than a thousand years. Perhaps, sometimes, on nights like this, I remember who I really am.”
    The voice began to thicken, to deepen. I could not see her, but I had a sense of shadows growing larger. There was something in the voice that could have been laughter, or disbelief, or fear. “You are telling me that a Charming still lives, and he is a werewolf?”
    â€œI did say perhaps,” I reminded her.
    She came charging out of the woods in the form of a bear. I threw the knife at her just to get it out of my hands, and she didn’t even pause or bother to roar as it sank into her flank. My foot released the hawthorn pike, and when the wood bobbed to the surface, I stuck the top of my foot under it and kicked it up out of the water. We were both moving faster than humanly possible, and I snatched the branch out of the air and whirled it, planting one sharpened end into the river mud and the other upward as she was throwing her weight down upon me.
    The pike entered under her breastbone but missed her heart. For a moment, a precious moment, the branch held her suspended there—not piercing all the way through