Page 14

–Storm–

I CAN SAFELY say today was the most exhilarating day of my life and the most terrifying. One second, I was bonding with Callum in a whole new way during my True Moon Shift, turning into my wolf on the cliffs above a medieval Irish sea. Then, I was beneath the fiery waters of my mind and finally slipping my hand into his.

Finally letting him save me in all the ways fate wanted him to.

I couldn’t tell you why I put it like that, only it felt like all the hard years growing up in Southie had swirled away and led to what was always meant to be. My past had led me back to him in all the ways that would matter going forward.

Yet, at the height of so much uncertainty and the warmth that filled me when I slipped my hand into his beneath those waters, Tadc came screaming through, eager to harm everyone I cared about. Desperate to eat them alive as only evil could until they were dead or as rotten and corrupt as him.

That’s when I saw him clear as day, staring down at me, calling me to him as he had all along. Only this time, I didn’t feel a sense of acceptance but fire in my soul to match the water. Fire in my soul to not give in so easily but bide my time and save all I could.

“He’s out there,”

I gasped, jolted out of my shared trance with Callum's wolf because I knew my dream had been right. While it might not be daytime, the grey pup was out there somewhere alone and vulnerable.

When I pulled back and looked into Callum’s eyes, it was to find his wolf still caught in our fiery trance, which was probably for the best because he would likely try to stop me from going where I needed to go.

After all, it could very well land me in Tadc’s arms.

Fortunately, thanks to so many backing me up during my True Moon Shift, invoking more emotions than I could afford at the moment because it meant so much, things didn’t go as horribly wrong as I feared they would, but not as well as I would have hoped either. I might have been able to flee with the grey pup, scooping him up by the scruff of his neck because I knew I could move faster as a wolf, but only because so many were willing to put themselves in the line of fire.

I tried to push past my worry over the monumental risk Mave had taken because I knew she could have controlled the scent of going into heat longer due to her immense internal strength but had instead used it as bait. Herself as bait. While it might have cut Tadc’s battle numbers in half, it left her incredibly vulnerable and in terrible danger.

Everyone else, including Callum and Broderick, kept fighting while I fled to God knows where in the driving rain, splintered by lightning flashes. All I knew was to trust my wolf’s instincts and protect the half-pint with me because he mattered so much, just like his brother and sister.

Following a scent that felt right, I flew down an embankment, my agile, wolven body handling the slick mud underfoot well until I came to what appeared nothing more than drooping bushes over a large boulder and slipped between its branches. Making my way down into the dark underbelly of cold, hard rock, I slowed and inhaled deeply, overwhelmed by the delicious masculine scent of my mate.

Up to this point, I had felt nothing but a driving force to keep the pup safe, but now, cushioned between earth and rock with Callum filling my nostrils with every breath, I yet again felt a whole new strength. Better still, I felt Callum fill me in a way that went far beyond flesh to something entrenched deep in my soul. So deep that I lay down with the pup, glad when he cuddled close as I curled around him and kept an eye out, sure we were safe here.

Certain, wherever I had ended up was somehow with Callum.

“Don’t ever do that again,”

I grumbled, hoping the pup understood because I was frustrated that he had put himself in so much danger and terrified he might do it again. In response, he cuddled closer as if trying to tell me he was grateful I had saved him. Or maybe glad he was with me again, and I tended to agree because I’d taken to him and his siblings the moment I first met them in New Hampshire.

I was about to grumble more about how foolish he had been tonight just to drive my point home when I heard something outside, despite the torrential rain and thunder. Narrowing my eyes, I pushed the pup back further into the shadows and took a defensive position in front of him.

At first, I hoped it might be Callum or an ally, but regrettably, it was anything but. A sizeable, dusty brown male wolf, undoubtedly part of Tadc’s pack, shimmied down into the crawlspace-type cave, a dark gleam of anticipation in its wicked eyes when it homed in on me and the pup behind me.

When it bared its fangs, growled, and stalked closer, I bared my fangs in return, growled right back, and held my ground, feeling more empowered than ever. So empowered that instead of seeing through the prism of my green eyes, I saw through the fiery waters that had brought me and my mate together and met my enemy halfway when he lunged at me.

Unfortunately, despite how powerful I felt, I was still too new in my wolven form to understand how to fight well, so it was no surprise when I found myself locked down against the icy hard ground with his teeth clamped around my neck.

“No,”

I ground out when the pup growled and stalked our way, showing a great deal of courage. “Stay away.”

Seeming to understand the more he threatened me, the closer his future captive would come, the beast at my back dug his teeth in deeper, trying to instigate the little wolf, but only instigated another based on the low, deep growl that came instead.

“If you do not release my female now, stranger,”

Callum growled into the wolf’s mind, stalking so close he could lower his great head down beside my captor’s face. “I will shred your ballocks away before you see it coming and let your shame be well known as you bleed out on my territory, a reminder to all what I am capable of when it comes to my fated mate.”

For some reason, Callum saying those words in this place made clear what my wolf had already figured out.

We had completed our Fated Mate Cycle.

I was his eternally, and he was mine.

And that certain knowledge meant everything because where Callum wouldn’t yank the wolf away for fear it might shred my throat open, he didn’t need to because when I inhaled his scent again, a fresh growl bubbled up from deep inside me, followed by an enormous burst of strength.

A strength born of dragon fire.

When I’d had no control over my flames dying down earlier as I protected the pup from Tadc, I assumed my wolf didn’t want our enemy to know about them yet. Now, I had complete control over my flames, and they ignited. This time, they weren't cool and soothing to the touch like they were for my mate and me, but searing hot and deadly.

When the wolf over me ignited in flames and roared in anguish, Callum blocked the entrance so he couldn’t escape into the torrential rain. Meanwhile, not wanting the pup to see too much of this, I extinguished my flames, scooped him up by the scruff of his neck again, and flew deeper into the cave.

Understanding I was on Callum’s territory now, I followed his scent into another cave, set the pup down, kept him close, and waited. It wasn’t long before all grew silent, and I knew my enemy was finished. While a part of me felt uneasy because I’d never killed anyone before, a larger part felt relief that I had saved myself and the pup. Callum would have, but I sensed he was glad I’d taken the leap and defended myself.

Though Callum had fought valiantly against Tadc’s pack back there, I was still overwhelmed with relief at seeing him safe when he joined us. He rubbed his neck against mine before shifting to his human form and encouraging me to do the same.

“Shift and follow me, anamchara.”

He eyed my neck with concern after I shifted to make sure there were no puncture wounds, clearly relieved I was unharmed before gesturing that I follow him. “For now, we must get off my territory and onto Mave’s.”

“What about the pup?”

I scooped up the pup, who seemed just as comfortable in my human arms as he had been cuddling against my wolf. “Shouldn’t we get him back to Ceara?”

“Not quite yet.”

Callum gave me a grim look I didn’t understand before leading us deeper into the cave and veering right into a tunnel I hadn’t seen. “I will send word that he’s safe.”

Confused but trusting he knew what was best, I continued following him, acutely aware when his scent no longer surrounded me, signaling we were no longer on his territory. Eventually, we ended up in a larger cave at the center of numerous others.

“This is Mave’s Den of Dens, as she calls it.”

He chanted a fire to life in one of the pits toward the back. “’Tis full of other caves with no exits and will be a safe place to stay for the remainder of the night.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“The battle has ended, and Tadc will need the night to rally his men before pursuing us once more, given quite a few of them are distracted by Mave right now.”

He sighed and shook his head. “’Twas a brilliant but foolish move on her part.”

I felt not just his concern for her but his pride in her for protecting me and the pup. Something I hadn’t foreseen in my vision, but then my foresight wasn’t a perfect science, seen clearly with the time of day and weather.

“Tadc won’t waste much time once things are in order again,”

I murmured, certain of it because I was sure of something else. “He can’t because whatever bond he formed with us is coming untethered now you and I have completed our Cycle.”

“I know, and we will be ready for him.”

He chanted food onto several tables, anticipating the arrival of hungry wolves. “Everyone is meeting here because they all wish to be near you this night, so we will eat and do what we must to regain our strength.”

I didn’t have to ask what he meant by do what we must. I had felt my normal desire for him spiking through the roof since shifting back. Desire fueled by the adrenaline we’d felt during our run and then in battle. Wolves tended to need nourishment of two varieties afterward. Eating and rutting, as my cousins would put it in.

As if he, too, had run and battled, the pup pranced over to a tempting piece of meat Callum set down for him and dug right in.

“Wow,”

I murmured, smiling. “Look who’s losing his bashfulness.”

“’Tis to be expected.”

Callum pulled me onto his lap on a crude wooden bench where we could watch the pup and handed me an ale I was more than ready for. Big drinker or not, it had been one heck of a night.

“You understand why losing his bashfulness is to be expected, ta?”

he said softly, looking at me as I sipped.

“No.”

I cocked my head at him, wondering what I had missed. “Why?”

“The pup might not have run, battled, or even protected you this eve, but he meant to.”

He eyed the pup with unmistakable fondness mixed with worry. “’Twas that courageousness that brought him out on a stormy night, tracking you so he could help keep you safe, plus being part of your True Moon Shift, that made him as much your pack as the Rogues and Mave's pack who joined us. And that gives him a new sense of confidence indeed.”

“He’s part of my pack?”

I said softly, liking the idea but not sure how his mother, Ceara, might feel. “That’s why he couldn’t go back yet, isn’t it?”

“In part, ta.”

He wrapped his fingers with mine because he was as desperate to touch me as I was him. It didn’t matter if I was on his lap. We needed more.

“But also,”

he went on, explaining the pup’s predicament, “because he’s now been subjected to me in exile, he’s just as much at risk as everyone else. That's why ‘twas best to get you both off my territory. You might have been shunned just for stepping foot on land that was once mine.”

“Tréan would never exile the pup,”

I managed, hoping he was wrong about what he implied. Yet I could tell by his troubled expression as he stared into the flames that he wasn’t so sure. “Would he really? When the pup is so important?”

“I could not say what my alpha is capable of right now other than he tends to abide by pack rules.”

He brought our adjoined hands to his nose and inhaled the scent of my skin as if he couldn’t help himself. “As it should be.”

“I guess,”

I said, not sure if I agreed with that, but at the end of the day, Tréan had turned every last wolf in his pack, so the Wolves of Ossary were his to rule as he would. Which made me curious. I might be in Callum’s mind often now and catching more and more of his memories, but not the one about how he was made.

“How we were made,”

he corrected, catching my curiosity. He rested our adjoined hands on my lap and took a deep swig of ale as if he needed it more for this conversation than he did for all the hell we’d been through over the past few hours. “Mave and I were made at the same time as children.”

I hadn’t seen that coming. “Oh, wow.”

“Ta,”

he agreed. “Outside of turning Bain, who was the youngest he’s ever turned, ‘twas one of the worst days of Tréan’s life because there were two of us.”

I imagined it was and frowned. “What happened?”

“Nothing good.”

He sighed again. “And unfortunately, it was our first run-in with Tadc.”

“Oh, no.”

“Oh, yes.”

He took another swig of ale. “He was only a few years older than us when he was turned, and his wolf was trouble from nearly the beginning, whether Tréan is willing to admit it or not.”

“Because Tréan gives everyone the benefit of the doubt.”

“Ta.”

Callum continued staring into the flames and went on. “Despite his immense power, Tréan sometimes has a blind spot, as those of you from the future would call it, when it comes to his wolves. When it comes to any soul that had to become half beast because of the circumstances of his birth.”

“Ah, yes,”

I murmured, having heard the tale of how magic had been used to ensure Tréan’s survival, and he was turned half wolf only to end up mistakenly biting a farmer. When that happened, it blossomed into a curse, essentially making him patient zero for werewolves.

“Though we weren’t blood, Mave and I grew up in the same village and were good friends from the start,”

Callum went on gruffly. He fought emotion not just about that day but about the strides they had made today when Mave protected his mate and the pup and sacrificed herself to keep everyone safe. “We were as close as siblings even then.”

He took another sip before going on. “Although we were young and Mave a girl, we were born protectors, learning to wield a blade as children if it meant defending our village.”

The corner of his mouth quirked. “Granted, she was teased a fair bit because girls were supposed to tend the gardens and cook, but ‘twas never who Mave was.”

Thinking of the fierce wolf who had protected me and the pup tonight, I met his amusement. “I believe it.”

“We practiced fighting in the woodland where we were less likely to be seen in hopes of lessening the teasing,”

he went on. “Unable to get our hands on anything more than wooden swords, we mostly trained with daggers, but ‘twould not have mattered.”

A fond twinkle lit his eyes. “She was a natural.”

“Seen clearly tonight,”

I praised, squeezing his hand in support as he revisited a memory that greatly pained him.

“Even that fateful day, Mave was a warrior until the end,”

Callum went on softly, reverently yet bitterly, too. “The sun was just setting, ushering in a time between moons called—”

“The black moon,”

I murmured, getting chills at that.

“Ta, the black moon.”

He narrowed his eyes into the flames as he peered back at that day, letting me see and feel it with him. “The lighting was odd, caught as it was betwixt the last of the sinking sun and the rise of pure blackness, but Mave and I caught Tadc and his wolves skulking through the woodland toward the village, set to reap great harm.”

“Yet those wolves were just wolves,”

I said, surprised by that. “Wolves following a shifter into a situation full-blooded wolves would normally shy away from because it’s too dangerous.”

“Ta,”

Callum concurred. “But Tadc was stronger than most and able to control those wolves if it meant reaping havoc without Tréan knowing because even then, he craved death and destruction.”

“So you and Mave intercepted them,”

I managed, my chest tightening with the fear they must have felt. They had been incredibly brave confronting so many hungry wolves, not to mention Tadc, whether they knew what he was or not. My heart slammed into my throat as I experienced their fear yet unwavering courage when the pack turned their way, realizing they had isolated prey prime for the taking.

“I don’t think I was ever more proud of Mave than I was at that moment,”

Callum went on, nodding once just like he had when he and Mave’s gazes had locked because they realized what was about to happen. They would battle until the end, side by side, to their deaths if it meant protecting others. “And she fought well. Just as good as I did.”

His voice grew gruff with emotion again. “But there were too many.”

I bit back tears as I watched it unfold via his memories. It was no easy thing seeing two children fight a dozen or so wolves with nothing but small blades. They did well, though, working as a team, defending each other, and keeping the beasts at bay with several nicks and a few stabs before they ended up back-to-back beneath a black moon.

Seen only by the torchlit village beyond, their rapid breathing hit the cold air in foggy puffs as they fought their fear and kept their blades raised, ready for whatever wolf dared their way next. Little did they know, despite his smaller stature at the time, the worst wolf of them all was about to approach.

“He bit you both,”

I exclaimed, baffled by what I saw. Callum and Mave tried to fight him off, but it was too late against such a monster. Or should I say the monster Tadc became because I knew Tréan and most of those he had made would never have done what Tadc did that night.

“No, Tréan would not have done what Tadc did, and I know that firsthand,”

Callum said darkly, still entrenched in the memory of holding Mave in his arms on the woodland floor after Tadc attacked them. Interestingly, I felt not just his pain but hers.

“Making a habit of tracking all those he turned, Tréan came soon after,”

Callum continued. “Ironically, we had distracted a hunting party that had been after him the year before and, by doing so, allowed his wounded wolf to get away without having to bite anyone, so he was familiar with us.”

He flinched. “So finding us like that was excruciating for him. Naturally, after that night, he realized one wolf, above all, needed to be tracked more than most. The state we were in made that abundantly clear.”

“Tréan bit you again because he had no choice,”

I realized, saddened by the image of Tréan’s great white wolf keening in pain over the fallen children, only to bite them again to give them half a chance.

“In that bite, as our blood coursed through him, he knew how brave we had been,”

Callum confirmed. “How desperate to protect our village, which had, in the end, been saved when Tréan showed up and the wolves, including Tadc, dispersed.”

“His bite overrode Tadc’s,”

I exclaimed, learning something new about the curse into which I’d been thrust. A curse I had long been destined for. “If newly turned, a werewolf’s maker can become your maker.”

“If your maker is the first of his kind like Tréan, ta,”

Callum said softly. “So, you see, even though Tadc bit us first, Tréan will always be our alpha, and although this curse would not have been our preference, Mave and I will forever be grateful that Tréan, our rightful alpha, made us his in the end.”

He was about to go on when the pup, who had finished his meat and now sat in front of us as if protecting us, came to attention and perked his ears forward.

“They return,”

Callum said, relief in his voice as we stood. “Everyone has returned safely.”

Or so we thought until the pup took action once again and made clear on several fronts that nothing was how we hoped it would be, yet at the same time, other things were better than we could have possibly imagined.