Page 6 of Omega Haunting (Starscale Mates #8)

Marsin

Astral’s family was chaos. I’d grown accustomed to a certain level of noise and activity since Fred’s arrival. He brought the whole crew with him and then along came Minter. While I didn’t live with them, we visited each other often and I made room in my life for the noise that came along with Minter and then their next hatchlings too.

The kitchen of Astral’s family home was full to the brim with hatchlings (puplings?) of various ages. Full enough that if they all didn’t smell related I’d ask if they were running a daycare or if one of the kids had hosted a sleep over the night before.

“They’re a lot,” Astral whispered, smelling apologetic about his family.

“They’re fine,” I shook my head. “Kids make noise. Kids make messes. They run around and do all the stuff.”

“All the stuff,” Astral laughed and the sound wrapped around me like a warm blanket. I almost kissed him again but a small boy ran by and nearly ran headfirst into him. I scooped Astral up and spun out of the way.

“All the stuff,” I nodded.

As much as she had watched out the window I expected his sire to interrogate me. Fred and the other Moonys often talked about how some parents reacted to their children dating or meeting their true-mates but she and her mate had already disappeared from the kitchen. I glanced around as Astral made our plates. We were the only adults around.

“The kids hang out in here until it’s time for school or daycare. Pups eat a lot in our family. It’s all that magic pumping through our veins.”

“The moonshine!” I said and almost slapped the table as the memory from the night before came back to me. “That’s how I found you. I hadn’t told Elio or anyone else about the voice and needed a reason to come here.”

“It’s a little early in the day to start drinking the stuff but you can try some tonight if you’re up for it,” Astral offered. “Tastes horrible but gets most people drunk quickly enough. We mostly use it for magic.”

Astral swore under his breath as he set our plates out on the table.

“What’s wrong?” I glanced at the food. “Is it cold?”

“Hot food never gets cold in this house. My parents would sooner cut off their own tails than serve a guest cold food. I was supposed to swing by Morgi’s today and put up more deer wards.”

“Deer wards?” I arched a brow as my mate handed me a fork.

“Yeah. He has a bit of an orchard. The deer eat his stuff if there’s nothing to keep them out. We put wards up that keep them away without hurting them. The deer are food too but future food. If Morgi ate every deer that annoyed him he’d be as big as a house and the rest of us would go hungry.”

“What is this white sauce on everything?” I whispered.

“Oh! Gravy,” Astral laughed. “Mom makes it up really good. It’s an Appalachian specialty. That’s deer gravy too.”

I tried it and it wasn’t bad. It was creamier than I expected and saturated with deer fat, but we had our own gravy recipes back on 1. We just didn’t cover most of our breakfast with it. Though, by the end of the meal I’d grown fond of it.

“I’ll see if someone else can take Morgi’s wards today. He prefers when I do it, but he can deal,” Astral said as he rinsed our plates at the sink.

“I’ll go with you if you need to go to work. I understand that currency is a major part of life on your planet. Currency is used for everything and not merely measuring how much food to produce for any given year,” I said.

“You guys don’t have money?” Astral blinked at me. “How do you get anything?”

“Points or barter but even if you’re out of points you eat. It’s a measurement for the councils,” I shrugged.

“Morgi pays for the year upfront. Mostly in barter because food in the fridge is worth a lot more than money in the bank. I’m torn, though. I don’t want anyone else messing with my magical setup, but I don’t want to go,” he sighed, drying the dishes and putting them away.

Slowly one by one and then in pairs and small groups the children had disappeared from the kitchen to be dispatched to wherever their young lives were directed.

“Do you not like Morgi?” I asked.

A sudden need to protect Astral from anyone who might annoy him filled the atoms between my scales. The magic tugged and pulled on me until I found myself standing with him in front of the sink.

“Morgi and I are close. Well, as close as I am to anyone outside my family. I don’t dislike him. I just like you more than him which sounds outrageous when I say it aloud. We just met.”

“This time,” I pointed out. “We’ve known each other before and I’d love to know how those lives played out. How did you go from being a dragon to being a wolf? Perhaps there were more furry shifters in our flight than the councils and leaders want us to know. I know some flight members remained behind because their mates couldn’t handle flying through space.”

“Maybe you were a wolf in one lifetime,” Astral smirked.

I clenched my jaw. This wolf was going to be the death of me. Alone in the kitchen with him, I was already hard again. My dick throbbed for attention. Lifting him up and carrying him out of the kitchen would’ve been easy. Too easy. I could take him to one of the many caves in the surrounding area and make love to him again and again until neither of us could cum anymore. I could coax the pleasure out of his lean, muscular body until he couldn’t stop writhing and had an egg….

“That’s exactly why I don’t want to go to Morgi’s,” Astral whispered, snapping my attention back to the present but the fantasy still lingered in the back of my mind.

I glanced down. My mate was hard too, and I knew if I took a deep breath, I’d smell how slick he was. Astral ran his hands up and down my arms before finally entwining his fingers with mine. I tried to imagine standing like this with him for the first time in the Other World and smiled despite how many brain cells we both lost since meeting an hour ago. Brain cells usually returned to their full functioning by the time newly met mates had been together for a few years. We were all made of magic after all.

“What about your family? Your flight? Are they worried?” Astral asked.

I cocked my head to the side homing in on my brother over the flight link. He and his family were still on Earthside helping clean up after the wedding. For a microsecond I felt guilty but that’s why we’re a flight. Not everyone could function at one hundred percent all the time. Sometimes you had to drop out of being a functional member of society so that you could function even better later.

“Have fun. I wish you would’ve told us you were leaving but I get it. I mean, I dragged Fred across the universe just to have him by my side. Let us know if you need anything and I mean ANYTHING,” Elio sounded off in my thoughts over the family link.

“Thanks, Elio. I can’t wait for you all to meet him. Only, I can wait because even sharing him with his own family and pack is torture.”

“That gets easier. Mostly easier anyway,” Elio chuckled.

“They’re okay,” I told Astral a second later. “I think our flight link reaches further than some links here. Our scientists and psychologists believe that’s because the ancestors had to hone the skill while they were traveling through space. Being able to communicate over long distances accurately allowed them to scout larger swatches of space at once without losing each other in the dark, cold void.”

“I’ve always said I’m more of a magic than science guy, but I think I could listen to you talk about anything for the rest of my life,” Astral said, locking his gaze to mine.

“Magic and science are lovers. One doesn’t function without the other,” I said and cupped his chin because I couldn’t resist touching more of him. Then, remembering that most furry shifters loved to scent mark, I ran my fingers over his cheek and he nuzzled into my hand. Phantom fur brushed against my skin and my dragon sat up. He wouldn’t officially meet Astral’s wolf in the place our inner sanctums merged into one until after our claiming vows but that didn’t stop him from pining away.

“Sorry to interrupt,” Dern said, walking into the kitchen.

Astral startled away from me like we were teenagers caught in some forbidden embrace, but Dern pretended not to notice.

“I was on my way out and wanted to let you guys know that if you stopped by I’d lend you some of Ormund’s old clothes. I don’t think anyone else around here has anything that will fit you and I don’t think you want to spend the rest of your time here running around in a suit.”

“Was Ormund a dragon too?” I asked, taking Astral’s hand in mine.

Dern chuckled and glanced to the empty space on his left. Was that where Ormund would’ve walked by his side if he was still on this side of the door of life and death?

“My Ormund’s a lot of things but he’s not a dragon,” Dern said. “His clothes should fit you, though. He had a lot of torso like you do.”

“Thanks, I think.”

“It’s not a bad thing. More torso meant more happy trail,” Dern shrugged and Astral made a face.

“You wouldn’t be making that face if you saw him,” Dern laughed. “Stop by when you get a chance. If I don’t see you by the morning, I’ll try to drag some over here. That is unless you’re going somewhere else.”

“We haven’t decided yet,” Astral said. “We haven’t decided much yet. Have you seen something else we should know about?”

“I’m always seeing. That’s what fortune tellers do,” he shrugged. “Nothing important, though. Not today anyway. I’ll see you guys in a bit.”

Astral and Dern said their goodbyes, but I didn’t say anything else until he was long gone. I watched him out of the kitchen window for as long as I could. Something was strange about him. Something was off. All seers were a bit eccentric. Everyone who worked at the Star Room was a bit off too but he was off in a different way.

“He’s a widower but no one knows how his mate died. When I was a kid there was a rumor that he murdered Ormund. They were true-mates, though. So we know that didn’t happen. I think it’s mostly he knows too much about the world from experience and bullshit.”

“Picking up things over the flight link already?” I asked, squeezing Astral’s hand.

“Nope. Reading your expression. Plus, everyone thinks Dern’s a little strange,” he shrugged. “Though, I summon ancestors, talk to apples, and use moonshine like some people use sage in their magic. I don’t think I have much room to speak. I think we’ll stop by Morgi’s if you don’t mind. We should probably drop in on Dern later and pick up those clothes. I know how to sew clothes in a pinch but right now I’d probably sew myself to the machine. I’m having trouble finding two unoccupied brain cells to rub together.”

“Will I be a distraction?” I asked him.

“Yes, but there’s nothing we can do about that. If I can’t do the wards, Morgi will have to either wait until things below the belt calm down or settle for someone else in my family putting them up.”

“What if I went to Dern’s to grab the clothes and you went to work? I could meet you at Morgi’s.”

“You’re not going to do anything weird to Dern, right?” he narrowed his eyes on me. “I know he’s strange and that leads people to act weird around him but he’s not a bad wolf. He’s annoying sometimes and being old makes him think he knows everything but he’s a good guy. He helped bring us together.”

“I wouldn’t harm your pack,” I said. “I do want to speak to him a bit more. I have a feeling.” I rubbed over the star-shaped scale on my chest. “I’m not psychic or anything but I’d like to speak to him more.”

“He could use more friends,” Astral said, letting out a long sigh of relief.

It wasn’t the whole truth. Something was off about Dern, and I didn’t want my mate hanging around him until I figured out what it was. If that made me a cave-dragon, then I was a cave-dragon. That was something I could live with but I’d never be able to live with myself if I let it go and something happened to Astral.

“I’ll put their addresses into your phone so that you can find your way around,” Astral offered.

“No need. I can use the flight link and that means I know how to get around as well as you do. Can I take your short cuts or would I get shot for it?”

“Eh, the word’s gotten around about our true-mate response by now,” Astral said, flashing me a sheepish smile that made me want to hold onto his hand forever. “So you should be good. If anyone gives you trouble just remind them that you’re with a Warden now and I’ll hex their balls to get sucked up inside them anytime they see anyone naked. I’m not playing around with your safety.”

I kissed him again, because how could I not?

***

Dern must’ve expected that we’d show up earlier than he made it sound like back in the kitchen. He sat on his porch with a travel sized suitcase next to his chair. Somewhere nearby a fire burnt, and glimpses of a fire pit played through my memory. Only they weren’t my memories but Astral’s.

Two empty chairs sat on either side of Dern. The one on his left rocked in the breeze as if some ghostly inhabitant lounged next to him.

“Stop thinking like that,” my dragon cut into my thoughts. “Just because someone helped you meet your true-mate doesn’t mean they’re packing big magic. The true-mate magic is everywhere and it wants to help mates find each other. Something’s off about him but I don’t know that it’s dead people. Besides, our Astral keeps talking about summoning ancestors and there’s nothing wrong with him.”

“Thought you’d show up alone,” Dern said in lieu of a greeting. “Everyone usually does. You can sit there.” The old wolf pointed a wrinkled hand at the chair that didn’t rock.

I made myself comfortable and for a long moment neither of us spoke. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to ask Dern and maybe I should just thank him and move on with my life but unless I whisked Astral away from his family their friendship wasn’t going anywhere.

“Not everyone can sense it,” Dern said.

“Sense what?” I asked.

“That I’ve done magic that would make most people’s skin crawl. I won’t explain myself. I won’t lay it all out. Not now. Not yet. Some day I will and it will be on my terms. All I can say is that it’s been some years and it’s never been against this pack. You’ve met your omega now. You’d do anything to keep him safe, right?”

“Yeah, of course,” I nodded, my brows knitting together.

“That wasn’t a threat. It was a genuine question. Astral deserves an alpha who will. It also means you know where I’m coming from. If a threat was bigger and physically stronger than you and the only way you could save him was to do dark magic, you’d do it too. Almost anyone would. I’d do it again too if it meant I was back with Ormund again. I’d do anything to be back with him.”

“I’m sorry that you two are separated,” I said, skirting around the subject of dark magic. Everyone had their own definition of what qualified as dark and I didn’t want to know what the old wolf had been forced to do.

“Me too. It’s not forever, though. It’s not for long. Time is relative, I guess. The suitcase is all packed up for you. I’ve seen a couple futures for you two. Your matingmoon anyway. Going away is more romantic but sticking around here pays off more in the end. Besides, if you like breakfast gravy as much as you do in my visions, you’ll like it if you stick around. She cooks it with almost every meal.”

“It must be hard seeing so much all the time.”

“Not really,” Dern shook his head. “I only pay attention if it helps me. I told your omega the same thing about the spell I cast on the apple and I meant it. I don’t think he believed me. I think he will before everything’s said and done. You two being together is good for me.”

“Do you think we’re going to have your Ormund as our son or something?” I asked, trying not to sound as bemused as I was.

“I love dragons. You’re always looking for the logical answers. Trying to parse out the puzzles. No, my Ormund will not be your child or descendant as far as I know but it’s good for me that you two are together. Keep wondering about me. It’s fun, isn’t it? Just know, I’ll never hurt anyone unless they stand between me and Ormund.”

“Good to know,” I nodded but didn’t find any reassurance in his words.

“Okay. The old wolf is up to something, and that chair is definitely rocking faster than before,” my dragon chimed into my thoughts.

We’d have to talk this out later, but I didn’t want to spend anymore time away from Astral than I absolutely had to. Besides, with me by his side no dark magic wolf would ever hurt him.