Awakening: Dream Prophet, #1

By Colleen Tews

Two millennia of civil war between witches and werewolves has taken a serious turn. The Alpha, leader to the world's strongest lycanthropy pack, died, leaving a hole in the chain of command. A battle royale narrows down the list of those fit to take on the role. What the shifters don't know is one of the wolves in the fight is also a witch.

Rhianne Leto is that a witch. She's also a werewolf and a werewolf hunter. Since the Alpha's death Rhianne has been having odd dreams. She headed into the arena to gather information and came out with more questions.

As the mystical puzzle pieces from her dreams come together so, too, does a forbidden romance between Rhianne and the new Alpha. Could these new feelings and insights lead to peace in her time or a hidden doom exacerbating the current state of affairs?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Colleen Tews
• Release date: May 7, 2019
• ISBN: 9781386531791

Colleen Tews

Colleen Tews is a quirky, shy nerd who is so introverted she is extraverted at times. She is a happily married woman with four beautiful children and two grandchildren. When Colleen isn't writing you can catch her reading at a dog park with her beloved mutt, River or in a movie theater crying over the latest Marvel movie.

Book preview

To Ellen

The Hunt

MORNING DEW CAPTURED the fresh scent of moss-covered rocks, scattered under the sycamore and oak umbrella branches. I stalked werewolves, taking each muddy step quick and meticulous. Hiking the Laguna Mountain, which lay about thirty-five miles north of California’s Southern Border Wall, with my Steyr AUG A1 in hand, was riskier hunting ground than I imagined.

The witch counsel’s seers foresaw this particular uppity pack of pups running a human trafficking circuit under the tunnel between San Diego and Tijuana. They sent my partner, Oscar Nodin and I to exterminate the problem. I guess the furballs figured if humans traded dogs, they could trade humans.

Oscar, who was the size of a linebacker, crept from tree to tree about three yards to my right. His black trench coat draped behind him, weighted down by his gear. The bottom hem skimmed the tops of twigs and small patches of grass. He wore a black skull cap. I assumed it locked his thick, black braid in place. His hair was longer than mine. He held his Steyr AUG A3 with Steyr GL 40 under barrel grenade launcher. At every tree he planted his feet and surveyed the area down the length of the barrel.

He knelt next to an oak and held his fist up. Pointing his rifle skyward, he kept his focus on the pack of lycanthropes around the bend. I leaned against a sycamore.

I touched the green and black spotted kambaba jasper and goldstone leather bound collar wrapped loose around my neck. A nervous habit brought on from younger days. It provided me with the extra patience and courage to balance my fears. An added bonus was the sound proofing spell. Werewolves heard damn near everything. This protected my cover in the woods. It was a present from my best friend, Meredith. With a deep breathe I recited in my head, This was not my first hunt. With years of training under my belt and a great partner at my side, it won’t be my last.

Three of the werewolves were in wolf form. They created an adorable doggy pile by the roaring bonfire. A lieutenant sat in a folding chair by a utility van, arms folded, ankles crossed. He looked half-asleep. He pulled his aged baseball hat down over his face.

Oscar pointed to himself, held up one finger, shook his gun followed by a sleeping gesture. He was going after the man by the van. That left the peripheral to me. Ever the feminist.

I smiled and nodded. He loved playing hero. In truth he wanted to save the people in the van. Be the big macho superhero. This was fine with me. I liked a good tousle.

He ticked down on his fingers. 3, 2, Oscar spun off the oak to double back on his target.

My jaw dropped. I mouthed, Son of a... Not only was I on peripheral I was distraction. And he had the grenade launcher. I’d have to do this old school.

One last grasp of the collar centered me. Deep breathe in and out. I charged the camp.

The wolves stirred as I reached the tree line. I slammed my shoulder against a tree and took aim. There was no need for headshots. Slow breathe, get their body in the circle.

Pop. Pop. Pop.

They scattered. I hit two. One took a silver bullet in the chest. Its brown fur matted as it fought the pain. The large black took one in the shoulder. It limped behind the fire. I couldn’t see what I was shooting. That didn’t stop me. I knew where the big fella was standing. The third was a beautiful grey and white. She ran into the woods. I was no longer safe where I hid.

Rifle cocked against my shoulder. I stepped into the open. My muddy boots left tracks on the dry campgrounds. I scanned behind me. There was a growl from the injured on by the fire. Stay boy. I’ll deal with you in a second.

The clash of metal hitting metal made every nerve in my body jump. I spun on my heels, white-knuckling the barrel of the AUG. Oscar was pummeling the crap out of the lazy guard dog with his own folding chair. That must have been what Barky was growling about. How sweet?

I took watch again. Oscar had his job down pat. I scanned the north side where she ran. For all I knew she bolted. But one could never be too careful. My father, Alessandro, used to say, Always be on guard. It doesn’t matter if you’re on the hunt or in your own home, Rhianne. One never knows when the next blow will come and there is always another strike coming. He was right; then and now.

Jumped from behind the AUG pinned my fingers to the ground. My face bounced off the dirt. Blood spilled from my nose like a sieve. I spit out a tooth. I felt a giant paw dislocate my left knee. It slammed back into place upon contact with the earth. There was no way to move it. The bitch fractured it. There was only way I was going to heal it and survive.

You got this! Oscar shouted. I heard bullets fire. Ever the cheerleader. His chiefs would be proud of him.

Deep within my gut a felt all the rage I bottled from years of self-loathing and shame. It mixed with the same part of me that saw the beauty of this human trafficking psycho, who was ripping my enchanted leather jacket to shreds in an attempt to get to my spine, when she fled into the woods. I summoned the darkest part of me, my wolf.

A scream of raw pain tore reverberated as my ribs cracked. Vertebrae snapped. Joints repositioned themselves, healing my knee. Thumbs shot up my forearms. Long strands of black hair fell out in clumps. My tan skin ripped apart, splitting and shredding as black fur with tan highlights erupted everywhere. Cheekbones broke, elongated, and reshaped the skull as a bloody muzzle shoved through my human face. I was grateful my eyes did not pop out like the movies suggested. Instead, my natural green eyes grew. The only thing I wore that survived the morph was the collar.

The bitch jumped off me. I smelled her confusion like fresh crushed coffee beans. I shook off the remaining bits of goo. Once the transformation was completed, I howled. Between her and I it meant, Yeah, you’re fucked.

We circled each other, gnarling and growling. When I realized she was getting to close to Oscar and the fearful women exiting the van I snipped at her feet. She leapt sideways. The moment she was off-balanced I attacked.

I lounged under her front legs to hug her underbelly. I twisted my neck to get the right angle. Every time I nicked her throat she scrapped me with the four claws on her hind paw. This was going nowhere fast.

The van door clicked shut. Oscar ordered the captives to run. I heard them clash through the brush. I bit the bitch’s thick coat. She fell on top of me. We wrestled around the ground. It took everything I had not to let go. I had to buy Oscar as much time as I could.

I scratched her eye. She bit a chip out of my ear. We rolled. She slashed a couple nipples off. I tore into her back. A copper liquid loosened my bite. I wasn’t sure if the blood came from her or me. Either way, it was time to end this game. But how? We were in a stalemate.

I felt the heat of the bonfire behind me.

I sank my teeth higher in her chest. Pinning her front legs to her body, I gave her one last quick shake. Her back paws slipped off me. This gave me the advantage to hold up her underbelly with my hind paws. Like a potato bug I rolled. Working every supernaturally imbued abdominal muscle I sat up, still holding her chest, then rocked back, and launched that bitch into the bonfire.

Oscar came running out of the woods. You good?

I sat on my hind legs, tilted my head at him; then at the fire. Burnt fur was rank. I huffed. Suddenly a horrible itch screamed at me from my good ear. I scratched it with my right hind paw.

Burnt fur, really Rhianne? There was no other way? You know that smell is going to hang around here for days. There are worse smells though. He picked up the dead bodies, now in human form, and put them in the fire as he spoke. Don’t know about you, but the smell of wet werewolf is enough to shoot them with a silver bullet. No offense.

I sashayed to my AUG. I retrieved it with my mouth. The scent of the people we freed was fresh. 

What are you doing?

I gave him my back, flipped my tail up, and kicked dirt backwards in his general direction. I headed into the woods.

He laughed hard enough to choke.

THE WAYBACK

CURLED UP IN THE PASSENGER seat, using Oscar’s trench coat as a blanket, and chilling to 90’s grunge music while I licked my wounds was not how I planned on our trip to the local reservation. At least I had air conditioning.

Oscar escorted the weary ladies we saved from the traffickers to Southern Indian Health Council. The Campo Kumeyaay Nation knows what it’s like to have loved ones taken away and they are open to helping others find their way home. In the 1950’s the United States wanted to rid itself of Indians. So it told these great nations they had to send their children to public schools and never returned the kids. Most of the Campo didn’t speak English, and didn’t understand what was happening. The county chalked it up to