Page 14 of His Unicorn Alpha (Shifters Sanctuary #3)

M om’s squeal could be heard all the way from California, I was certain of it. I had asked to Facetime with her and Dad, and it was surprisingly easy to tell them that I was mated —no longer a beta, but an alpha— and that they were going to have grandchildren. Sitting on Brandt’s couch, with my phone propped on the coffee table in front of us, we watched my dad wince as my mom shot out of her seat, still squealing at a pitch which I feared would damage all shifter and animal hearing within a hundred-mile radius of both her house and Brandt’s.

“Mom,” I laughed, “stop. You’re hurting my ears.” I jutted my chin at my screen. “I think you made Dad deaf.”

“I’m sorry,” she apologized, sitting back down so we could see her in the frame of the screen again. Her blue eyes were shiny with happy tears, and she clutched her hands to her chest, “I just never dreamed this day would actually happen. The universe told me it would, but—”

That was the perfect opening for my main reason for calling, and I leapt on it. “Actually, Mom, the universe thing…can we, uh, talk about that?”

“You want to talk about the voices in your mother’s head and not about the fact that you’re suddenly an alpha?” Dad asked with a hint of bewilderment. “Mike, really?”

My parents, for all that they were a pair of aging naturalists, were like apples and oranges sometimes. Mom was an eternal optimist who just expected that fate and karma would do their thing, but Dad could sometimes get hung up on concepts that threw him for a loop, even if he was easy going most of the time.

It was funny how I seemed to be a mix of the two of them, and not just physically. I didn’t really look like either of my parents, even if I had inherited Mom’s facial structure and a similar color of hair to Dad’s, but personality-wise, I was a blend of the two of them. I went with the flow…until something came along for me to hyperfixate on.

I shifted in my seat. “Well, it’s just that—”

“This is kind of a big deal,” he continued. “I know your friend, Brett?”

“Beckett.”

“Beckett, right,” he nodded. “I know he was the first alpha known to exist in hundreds of years, but I remember you saying he was practically human before he met his omega. You are — were — a beta. You already had a designation. Does it feel different to be an alpha now?”

I considered the question seriously. It had only been a day since I had first popped a knot and bitten down on Brandt’s neck, and I really hadn’t felt any different outside of the bond itself, and the physical changes during sex.

“Not…really,” I admitted slowly as I really thought about it.

“But changes could develop over time,” Brandt cut in gently. He had been nervous to meet my parents, even if he had tried to hide his anxiety. Even now, he was sitting stiffly at my side, and only speaking if he absolutely had to. Of course, that could have also been because he could barely get a word in edgewise with my mother on the call. “The three other alphas all reported their shifter senses developing over time, though they were, as you said, starting from a human baseline. Still, I suspect we may see changes to Micah’s senses and abilities over the coming days, perhaps even weeks.”

“Oh, Mikey, he sounds so exotic,” my mother told me, making me facepalm.

“Mom,” I groaned, “that’s not the compliment you think it is. It’s actually offensive.”

Her eyes widened and suddenly the tears didn’t seem as happy anymore. I immediately felt guilty. “I’m sorry,” she said, “I didn’t mean—”

“I know,” I told her softly. “It’s just that it’s kind of dehumanizing and also fetishizing and—”

“And I was not offended,” Brandt placed his hand on my knee and squeezed. Under his voice he added, “But thank you for defending my honor, my alpha.”

I stifled a groan of an entirely different kind. “Behave,” I murmured back at him, enjoying the deep, dark chuckle my plea elicited.

Then he turned his attention back to the screen and said, “Thank you for the compliment, Mrs. Hawthorne.”

Mom recovered from her own guilt at rapid speed and…was that a blush ? Oh, God, did my mother think my bondmate was hot?

While I was grappling with those disturbing thoughts, she giggled, “Oh, no, sweetie, call me Hannah.” After half a breath, she asked, “Where are you from originally, Brandt?”

“My clan traveled around Europa —what we now call Europe— quite a lot before we eventually settled in the New World, that is, America. I believe I spent most of my formative years in what you would now call Eastern Europe; Hungary, Ukraine, Romania...” He aimed a crooked smile at the screen which made my stomach flip with instant arousal. “I am aware my accent is somewhat mottled between that and spending a couple of hundred years here…”

“It’s lovely,” Mom assured him. She nudged Dad with her elbow. “Isn’t it, Jeff?”

Dad nodded. “Sure is.” Then he looked into the camera. “Do you have any theories on why your designation changed?”

While Mom was more of a hippy than Dad, it was a little out of character for him to ask about ‘theories’.

“Not really.” I narrowed my gaze and leaned forward, feeling mildly suspicious of the question. “Do you have any theories? Because, honestly, I didn’t think there was anything that really set me apart from other betas at all. Aside from…y’know.”

Dad winced and nodded, while Mom rolled her eyes the way she always did when I so much as alluded to my smaller-than-average size.

“I hardly think your body issues —which are so unfounded, baby; you’re perfect as you are— anyway, I doubt they would have anything to do with being an alpha.” She bobbed her head as if punctuating the statement.

Dad’s expression twisted. It was hard to really read him through my phone screen, but I knew him well enough to tell that he disagreed with her.

“Dad?” I prompted, an irrational sensation of dread welling up inside me.

The sensation increased when he sighed heavily and gave the camera a baleful, apologetic look. He opened his mouth, but Mom interrupted him, pleading, “Jeff, no. Please.”

He physically turned sideways in his seat on the patchwork couch inside their shabby-chic cabin and threw his hands into the air, “We should have told him years ago, Hannah. He’s in his thirties now. Almost forty. Hell, he’s an alpha . He can handle it.”

“Handle what?” I leaned in closer to the phone, feeling Brandt’s large, warm palm land on my back in a bracing, comforting gesture. “Should have told me what?”

“Mikey,” Dad began, raising his voice over the top of Mom’s protested “Jeff, don’t!”

“Mikey,” he repeated in the tone that told me I was not going to like his next words, “there’s a chance —a strong chance— you’re not my son.”

I…what?!

I slumped back against the couch, feeling like the world was spinning.

There were so many certainties in my world. Things that kept me grounded. Truths I could rely on to maintain the chill outlook I was proud to possess. Things like ‘grass is green’, and ‘the sun rises in the east and sets in the west’, and ‘Hannah and Jeff Hawthorne are ridiculously, stupidly in love with each other’.

Mom would never, ever cheat. Even if they were all about free love or whatever…their relationship was solid. And Dad…Dad was my dad. He had raised me from birth. He’d taken me for my first shift. He…he…

“What?” I heard my own voice croak while thoughts and emotions spiraled in my brain. “How is that…I mean…were you, like…swingers, or…?” Because that I could potentially stomach. If they’d participated consensually together and… ugh. I didn’t want to think of my parents that way.

“Oh, no, baby,” my mother’s answer was firm and sweet all at once. “No, nothing like that. I…well, you know we tried for years to have a baby, don’t you?”

Brandt rubbed my back as I nodded.

Mom smiled sadly at me from the phone screen. I didn’t know whether I wanted to hug her, or throw the phone at the wall. “Well, we… I …got desperate after my third miscarriage. I…the universe directed me to a Shaman…”

At my side, Brandt straightened, but he didn’t stop rubbing my back. “Okay…?” I prompted.

Mom’s expression shuttered. “He gave us —Jeff and me both— some potions and tonics. Rituals to perform at certain phases of the moon…” Licking her lips, she exhaled. “Then, after the final new moon in the cycle, we had to return to him. We…don’t remember a lot from that night, but six weeks later, my pregnancy was confirmed. And it was perfect; I didn’t even have morning sickness. Then you were here, and you were perfect. But…well.” Her face fell. “You didn’t really look anything like Jeff. Didn’t scent like him, either.”

“It didn’t matter to us. You were ours, one hundred percent, even if you might not have been mine genetically,” Dad took over. “But…with the tonics and potions and moon-magic rituals…I think you’ve always been different from the rest of the pack, Mike. And I think—”

“That that’s why I’m an alpha,” I finished for him. “ That’s the difference.”

I had always felt like an outsider in my pack, after all. Maybe there was something different inside me. Something at a molecular level. Something influenced by magic.

“I’m so sorry, baby,” Mom sniffled. When I blinked and focused back on the screen, she appeared distraught. My heart panged. “It…we didn’t see it as any different to using a sperm donor or having a mix up with IVF or something. You were our baby. Are still our baby, regardless of how you came to be.”

My thoughts shifted to my own children — the trio of embryos I hadn’t actually been involved in creating, unless masturbating into a cup counted as participation. I didn’t feel like I would love them any less for not having come about the traditional way, and I certainly didn’t resent Brandt for his desperation to bring them into the world, either.

“I’m not gonna freak out, Mom. A little shellshocked,” I admitted, “but…you’re right. You both raised me. You both loved me. I’m not…I mean, I am a little upset that you didn’t tell me, but…it doesn’t change who I am. And I am who I am because of you two.”

It might explain why I didn’t look anything like Dad, though. But I still took after him in personality. There was something to be said about nature vs nurture, or whatever.

“This Shaman,” Brandt spoke into the awkward silence descending over the call, “do you recall anything else about him? His species? Whether he remained in the area? Anything?”

Mom shook her head. “No…he was only passing through. He just seemed to be in the right place when I was at my lowest point.” Her lips quirked. “A gift from the universe. From fate.”

“And his scent? His species?”

“I…he wore scent blockers,” she answered, frowning. “I remember finding that odd and asking him about it, and he said it helped keep his clients calm if he maintained a neutral scent, so we couldn’t see him as predator or prey. I thought that was a bit funny, because we’re horses — we don’t prey on anything, except maybe the occasional apple tree.”

Whipping my head around to look at Brandt, I blurted, “You’re thinking he was a dragon, aren’t you? But then…” I frowned. “He’d have to have been an alpha.”

“Yes,” he agreed solemnly. “However, as far as we are aware, the last known dragon alpha was—”

“Your father.” I felt supremely uncomfortable at what that might mean.

“Fate wouldn’t do that to you,” Mom’s voice filtered towards us from the phone as we stared at each other in dawning horror. “To either of you. Besides,” she sniffed, “Brandt, you said you ran tests on all the samples in your lab. That would have shown a DNA match between you, wouldn’t it?”

Relief washed over Brandt’s handsome face. “Yes,” he breathed the word out and nodded at my phone. “Yes, of course. And it did not.”

“So…” I locked eyes with Brandt again, unsure how to describe the maelstrom of feelings inside me. Shock, trepidation, hope, awe, sadness…they were all there. “That must mean there’s another dragon alpha out there somewhere. Or, at least, there was thirty-seven years ago.”

“And he is old,” Brandt added, his dark eyebrows furrowing together. “Old enough to practice magic long-thought forgotten.”

That…was an intimidating thought indeed.

“Speaking of,” Dad spoke up again, and I didn’t like the uncertain look on his face. Even though I had just told him that I didn’t see him any differently, that he was still my dad, I guessed that he was still unsure that I really meant it. “Your lifespans are drastically different. How will being bonded affect that?”

“We are not sure,” Brandt answered for me. “We are the first alpha-omega pairing of different species. I would like to take samples of Micah’s blood and compare them to my own, and, yes,” he added, directing the next words my way, “it would be helpful to locate someone well versed in the magic and history of the old ways. They might have the answers which we have not been able to find during our research.”

My parents nodded, and the silence that fell between us, sitting on Brandt’s comfy leather couch, and them on the other side of the call was awkward and strained.

Brandt cleared his throat, “Similarly,” he admitted, sounding apologetic, “we’re unsure which species of shifter our children will be. It does not matter to either of us, obviously, but there are many unknown variables in our situation.”

He’s a smart, smart dragon, I mused as Mom brightened at the reminder of her grandchildren. He had known exactly what he was doing by bringing the conversation back around to them.

I squeezed his thigh in gratitude.

He squeezed my knee right back.

Nothing more needed to be said.

“I still can’t believe we’re getting three grandbabies,” Mom cooed. “Tell me, have you started thinking about names? Oh, and what about clothes? Toys? Oh, boys, I hope you’ll allow us to come visit. We’d love to help you in those early days. Babies are hard work, you know.”

And maybe my gratitude was too pre-emptive.

“We should shift,” Brandt told me a few days after the call with my parents. I wasn’t sure if it was a suggestion borne of scientific curiosity, or if he was attempting to distract me from the funk I’d fallen into.

Because, as much as I had told everyone that the bomb my parents had dropped on me didn’t bother me…it kind of did.

I had spent my entire life feeling like an outsider in an otherwise accepting, supportive pack. For years, I had thought there was something wrong with me. They were nice people, good people, and I still hadn’t felt right with them.

Was it because some part of me had always known I was different?

I understood why my parents hadn’t told me. They didn’t want to hurt or confuse me, and I appreciated that. But when I had packed up to leave —when I had explicitly told them it was because I knew I didn’t belong— they should have said something.

No matter what happened with my kids, I vowed that I would always be honest and upfront with them.

And, Gods, I was having kids of my own.

I had no idea what I really was, genetically speaking, and I was having kids with a stranger.

Well, no. He wasn’t really a stranger anymore. Brandt and I had spent days exploring our bond, and getting to know each other properly. From favorite foods and movies to our deepest dreams and wishes, we had been sharing as much information with each other as possible. And, thanks to the bond we shared, he felt like he was a part of me already.

So, I suspected Brandt’s suggestion to shift was probably less about science and more about drawing me out of my mood.

It worked.

“You mean I finally get to see a real dragon?” I leapt from the couch and grinned, probably confusing him with my sudden enthusiasm.

He chuckled. “Yes. And I get to meet your horse.”

“That seems a bit anti-climactic next to a fire-breathing dragon,” I replied, then shrugged, “but you do you, sugar.”

“Come on,” he reached for my hand and tugged me towards the front door. “This is long overdue. You are my bondmate, and you deserve to be acquainted with every part of me, and I with you.”

He made valid points, I had to give him that.

Brandt drove us to the clinic and parked in the parking lot in front of the building. “We will walk from here. I need space to shift.”

“Just how big is your dragon?” I asked with awe as I followed him around the cottage which housed his lab.

“Well,” he responded contemplatively, “when I am shifted, my claws are large enough to hold grown humans easily. And I could eat a fully grown human in a single bite, too.”

My eyes widened. “Wow.”

“However,” he continued, “like all shifters, I am completely cognizant of my actions when I am in shifted form. You have no reason to fear me.”

“Aww,” I couldn’t hold back the amused, fond sound. “That’s really sweet, but I’m not going to be afraid of you. You’re my mate. My omega. The only way you’re going to eat me is if you eat my—”

“ Whoa , little ears present,” Rex’s southern drawl cut me off with a laugh as we rounded the corner behind the cottage, heading towards the fields at the back of the property. The puma shifter smirked at me as I snapped my mouth shut. “Hi there, boys.” He lifted the toddler on his hip. “Say hi to Uncle Bran, Cam.”

“Ban!” the little guy said, and I watched my mate turn to mush.

Gasping, Brandt reached out to pluck the toddler from Rex’s grasp. “Very good, little one!” he declared, then looked at Rex. “When did he learn my name?”

“Maybe yesterday? The day before? He’s been saying Pa and Da for a while now, but Day’s been tryin’ to get more out of him. You’re his fourth word.” As an aside to me, Rex added, “His third was ‘no’.”

I snorted. I hadn’t known Damon and Rex long, nor had I spent much time with them, but it wasn’t a surprise that their son was learning to be stubborn and argumentative early on.

“Such a clever boy,” Brandt fussed at the kid in his arms. He was beaming at him, and the smile made him look so much younger and lighter. Not that I didn’t think he was super hot with the brooding smolder, mind you. “Can you say it again? Say Uncle Brandt?”

Cam giggled and nodded. “No!”

Inside me, my alpha radiated warmth and pride as I watched my mate continue to play with the toddler. It took me a long moment to understand that he —that I — was imagining the omega with our children.

Holy shit, we were going to have this for ourselves before too long.

Only, for us, there would be three of them.

“Ah, I know that feelin’,” Rex patted my shoulder and gave me a knowing smile. “Is reality finally hitting you?”

It was one thing to know that my mate was pregnant, but something entirely different to witness him interacting with a baby. He was glowing with happiness as he continued to chatter with the boy, tickling the kid and making him squeal. It definitely reinforced my belief that I would never have refused him the chance to have kids of his own, but it also made my heart rate increase with mild panic.

Because —and I might not have mentioned this yet— we were having three of them.

Soon .

“You’re okay,” Rex patted my back. “They start off pretty small and helpless, and that makes it easier in a lot of ways.”

“I’m not freaking out,” I lied a little, then I sighed. “I mean, I am, but not because I don’t want this. It’s just…it’s so soon, you know? And what if I’m not as good with kids as he is? Because look at him.” I gestured towards Brandt, who was now laughing as he tossed Cam into the air and caught him again, much to the toddler’s raucous delight. “He’s a natural.”

“He is, yeah,” Rex agreed. “But Beck and Ollie both say you’re awesome with the twins. And, really, it is easier when they’re your own, too. You’re the one setting the boundaries on how to interact with them, and your instincts kick in and you just know what’s best for them. Or, at least, you want to do what’s best for them.” He shrugged. “Sometimes it doesn’t always work out.”

“That’s ominous.”

“That’s parenthood.”

Before I could respond, Brandt brought Cam back to his father. “I wish to continue playing, however Micah and I have plans to shift and meet each other in our shifted forms for the first time.”

Rex grinned. “How’d you get that past Eric? He’d want to observe something that huge, wouldn’t he?”

“He would,” Eric himself appeared behind us and Brandt stifled a groan as his brother approached. “Especially because you’re the first mixed-breed alpha-omega pairing. It only makes sense for someone to be there to document the occasion so we have a record of it.”

“And on that note,” Rex propped Cam on his hip and dipped his Stetson, “I’m out. I think this little guy’s ready for a bath and a nap anyway. Say bye-bye to Uncle Brandt and Micah and Eric, sweetheart.”

Cam waved and smiled. “No!”

Brandt chuckled.

“Seriously, though,” Eric arched an eyebrow as he looked between us, “you weren’t really planning on doing this without asking someone to take notes, were you?”

“I can take my own notes,” Brandt responded almost petulantly.

Having grown up as an only child, I’d never experienced what it was like to have a sibling, and it was amusing to watch Brandt interact with his youngest brother. Even though they were hundreds of years old, they really did seem to behave like pre-teens when they were together.

Will our three be the same?

The thought reminded me that I hadn’t even had a chance to see what adding the middle brother, Sage, into the mix did for their dynamic.

“Well, I’m coming with you,” Eric declared in the same sort of tone. “You’re too close to the situation to present an unbiased account.”

Brandt scowled, but I placed a placating hand on his shoulder. “Just let him, sugar. I want to see you shift.”

“Besides,” Eric added cheerfully, “it will be interesting to see if you feel the same sort of lethargy in shifted form that the other omegas reported during their shifts. Of course, you’re only just in the early stages of your second trimester, so we should definitely get you to shift at least once a week to monitor your energy levels across the rest of your pregnancy.”

Brandt gave me a baleful look. “He never switches off.”

“Maybe he needs an alpha of his own.”

“ Gah ,” Eric shook his head, and if I wasn’t mistaken, his already pale tone seemed to turn a little whiter. “No. Nope. Not for me. I’d rather just observe and record data. I don’t need the lived experience.”

Interesting.

I shared a glance with Brandt who winked back, then teased, “Are you afraid of mating, little brother?”

“Of course not,” Eric turned his nose up, his mop of blonde hair flopping backwards with the movement. “But not every omega wants the whole ‘picket fence with an alpha and two point three pups’ lifestyle. They shouldn’t have to want it to be taken seriously, either.”

I felt a little guilty for being so amused at his refusal of a mate. “That’s fair,” I told him, nodding. “Your designation shouldn’t determine your life goals or your dreams. If you don’t want an alpha and kids, that’s not a bad thing.”

“But it is not wrong to want them, either,” Brandt defended his own feelings, and I took his hand, bringing it to my lips so I could brush a soft kiss over the backs of his knuckles.

“Not at all, sugar.”

“Anyway,” Eric shook out his shoulders. “Are we doing this thing or not? I have appointments in an hour.”

Brandt was magnificent. His dragon form was huge . At least the size of a small building, when you included his thick, scaled legs and his massive, spiked tail, not to mention his enormous head.

He had made me stand half a field away from him as he shifted, but as soon as his transformation was complete, I hurried towards him. The closer I got, the bigger he loomed.

His scales were a dark, blood red color. I had seen them before, of course, when they had framed his face during our mating, but to see the effect on the entire, massive dragon was something else. They glinted red in the sunlight, but would probably appear black at night time. His face was adorned with pearly-white spikes, running along his snout and in the space I would call his eyebrows. Larger versions of the same spikes traveled in parallel lines down his back, trailing into a singular line down his tail and clustering near the tip. His tail alone would be a deadly weapon.

As I approached, I noticed that his eyes were just giant versions of the eyes I was becoming so familiar with: deep, soulful brown orbs that I could drown in if I let myself. And then there were his wings, which he extended, presumably for me to properly see them.

The backs of his wings were scaled, but underneath was almost leathery. I wanted to run my hands over the smooth, inviting surface, but with his height and mass, I was way too short to reach.

One day, I told myself, running my palms over the scales I could reach on his arm.

When he dipped his head, bringing his eye down to my level, I realized that the diameter of his eyeball was only a little smaller than I was tall. I grinned at him and patted his muzzle.

“You are gorgeous, Bran,” I murmured in awe, and I’m almost certain he purred. Then shifted his head and nudged me with his nose, pushing me backwards.

“What?” I asked him, even though he couldn’t answer.

He snorted, and warm air blew up dust from the ground at my feet. Lifting his claw, Brandt pointed at his chest, then ran the same talon from the top of my head to my feet.

It still took me a moment to understand. “Oh! My turn to shift. Got it.”

He snorted again and nodded.

“I’m telling you, my horse form is way less impressive.” I repeated my earlier argument. “I probably should have gone first.”

The dragon in front of me let out a grumbly, growly sound which I read as irritation. Some people might have thought it was scary, but I just thought it was adorable.

“Okay, okay,” I whipped my shirt off, “I’m doing it.”

I turned my back on Eric and removed the rest of my clothes, then forced my shift as quickly as possible.

It felt…strange.

When Brandt had shifted, I had focused on the sensations through the bond in awe. His form was so different to mine, and so feeling him grow and contort and sprout wings had been something completely new to me.

But my own shift, which I thought I knew better than the back of my hand, felt somewhat new, too. Not completely. My shape was still fundamentally the same. But…it kept going, tugging and contorting my back and, strangely, my forehead in ways that felt kind of reminiscent of Brandt’s shift.

Through our bond, I felt a jolt of deep, intense shock, and it made me look up at my mate. His dragon eyes were wide with human levels of wonder, and he let out another huff of warm air as he took a couple of lumbering steps backward.

I brayed at him, wishing I could demand an answer for his intense surprise —surely he had seen a simple horse before— and I stomped my front hooves in the dirt, kicking up another cloud of dust.

“Holy shit,” I turned at the sound of Eric’s awed declaration. “Micah…do you feel anything different?”

I rolled my eyes as best I could and whinnied, because how the hell did he expect me to answer? Then I remembered I could still nod and if I’d been in my human form, I would have facepalmed. Chuffing, I nodded at him.

He grinned at me, and it seemed almost manic. “You’re…actually, no, hang on.” He pulled out his phone and took a photo of me, then hurried forward, tilting the screen so I could see it.

What the actual fuck?

I let out a startled squeal and reeled backwards, suddenly feeling uncoordinated in a way that I hadn’t since my first childhood shifts. My long legs felt gangly as if I was a foal, and I stumbled away from the strange thing I had just seen.

“Whoa,” Eric shoved his phone back into his pocket and held both hands up to placate me as I reared back onto my hindquarters, kicking at the air with my front legs. “Calm down. It’s okay. Really. It’s okay.”

How? I wanted to demand, but I didn’t have the ability to speak, what with being shifted and all. How is it okay?

Because the photo he had shown me hadn’t been of my usual horse form. No: the creature in the photo had wings and a horn.

A unicorn.

What the hell was happening to me?