Heart of the wolf, p.36
Heart of the Wolf, page 36
She set her hand on his, squeezing hard. “An accident?”
“A werecat slipped on a mossy rock and landed in the river. He couldn’t swim worth a damn. I shifted to human and dove off my rock. Pulled him close to the bank and grabbed a low tree branch. But he panicked. Climbed me, leaped off my shoulder, and knocked me loose and into the current.” Gods, he’d been powerless against the rushing water. “I went over the falls.”
“Mother of all.” Her grip on his hand was painful. “Madoc.”
“Rocks banged me up good. A shifter couple was fishing and dragged me out, mostly drowned. Trouble was I’d cracked my head on the rocks. Everything else healed, but my brain… It left me clumsy and barely able to talk.”
She closed her eyes for a moment as if in pain. “I’m guessing your girlfriend couldn’t deal with it?”
“Tossed me away faster than a dwarf finding coal in his pile of gold.” He gave her a pained smile. “She was with someone else two days later. Joined the others in making fun of me.”
Heather’s dark growl made Madoc blink. “Point her out to me. And the others. I’ll—”
“You’re a vicious little wolf.” His laugh was unexpected, especially with the thickness in his throat. “It was years ago, aye? As it happens, André and Niall took care of them.”
Niall told him later that in protecting Madoc, he’d learned he wanted—needed—to be a cahir.
“Didn’t this happen during your fostering years? Your brothers shouldn’t have been there.”
For teens after First Shift, most littermates were separated and sent to distant relatives to give each cub a chance to grow in independence.
“Apparently, my pain—and misery—came through our littermate bond. André ran away from our uncle, detoured to BC to fetch Niall, and they covered over a thousand kilometers to get to me. Their guardians were more than pissed-off.”
“I bet. Good for André and Niall.” She was blinking hard, and he saw wetness on her cheeks. “You must have been hurting so bad for them to feel it.”
“Mmmhmm.” Was she crying? Over him?
She turned away and wiped her cheeks. “So…are you still longing after your girlfriend?”
“Not even.” He smiled slightly. “She’s still in the Yukon, and according to my uncle, latches onto a new male every year.”
“Oh. Well.” Heather released his hand, leaving dents behind. “But you got better. I mean, you’re certainly not clumsy or inarticulate.”
“It just took a long time to heal. If I’d been older, I might have been out of luck.”
“Cubs are resilient, thank the Gods.” She was silent for a while. “But, Madoc, avoiding all females simply because of a bad one seems…”
She bit her lip and looked away. “Sorry. I was being judgmental.”
But truthful. It was one of the things he liked—her blunt honesty. “Well, she did break my tender, young heart.”
His words came out lightly, but he was also being truthful. The pain of her betrayal had been far worse than the blinding headaches he’d suffered from. “When Herne made Niall a cahir, I saw how females chased him for his genes or status. So many times, a female would lead him on; he’d fall hard for her, then get chucked like two-day-old garbage when she moved on to the next status symbol. He’d be fucking miserable for months.”
Heather winced. “Poor Niall.”
“So yeah, I stay away from females outside of Gatherings. I only wish I could completely avoid the ones chasing after Niall…and now André.”
“Wait, what?” Heather snorted. “Dude, seriously? The only females you talk with are the ones chasing the Gods-called?”
He shrugged. “Yeah.”
“Madoc, you do realize not all females are like those? That’s like deciding all birds are predators after watching only the hawks.”
Could she be right? By Herne’s hairy hocks. “I, ah, might not have realized I was judging females based on a sub-group.”
Her expression…
“Yeah, go ahead, call me a gnome-brain.”
Her lips twitched. “Didn’t you meet nice females at the restaurants where you worked?”
He shrugged. “The places were human-run.” To avoid shifter females.
“Oh honestly.” She shook her head, then laughed. “I’m afraid your time of avoiding my gender is over, what with owning a restaurant and having to help the Cosantir.”
“So it seems.” The thought wasn’t particularly appealing. Especially if one shifter female wasn’t going to be around.
Gods, he didn’t want her to leave.
Time to try again. He took her hand again. “Maybe I was wary of you at first, but that hasn’t been the case for a while.”
She blinked and pulled her hand away.
You can’t stop me from making my point, little wolf. “How many hours have we spent together, working on the restaurant? Or this afternoon in bed?” Keeping his arm around her shoulders so she couldn’t move away, he stroked the sweetly curved legs lying across his thighs.
He really did like touching her.
“Madoc.”
“Heather. I don’t want you to leave. You can mark it off as a reason.”
She huffed at him like a bear might. Fucking lovable. “Your aunt wants me gone, and I’m not going to cause a fight within your family.”
Because she was a peacemaker—and how rare was that?
“Bron doesn’t know you yet, Heather.” He sighed. “Between the females chasing after Niall and the ones harassing her cahir friends, she has as warped an opinion as mine. As mine was.”
Heather narrowed her eyes. “Even without her beliefs, I doubt we’d get along.”
“She won’t stay in our house long. In the past, any visit lasting over three days made us as irritable as if we’d rolled in grit. Her, too. She prefers to live alone.”
“Oh. Well…”
He gave her another verbal nudge. “André told you to stay. Do you really want to upset a brand-new Cosantir?”
“Now you’re playing dirty.”
Laughing, he pulled her closer, then fully into his lap. “You want to play dirty, little wolf?” Tangling his fingers in her hair, he pulled her head down so he could kiss her.
And wasn’t it an amazing feeling when, after the smallest of hesitations, she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back.
When his hand closed on her breast, he could feel the full-body shiver she gave.
And then he had the joy of mating with her under the stars. Of taking all the time he wanted, of hearing her throaty cries of satisfaction.
It was a long, long time before they returned to the house.
Talam felt something grab his arm; the hellhound charged out of the mist, and somehow, it was already biting him. He screamed and hit and hit.
“Ow!” The voice was Sky’s.
Did the monster have Sky?
“Wake up, ninnyhammer.”
Ninnyhammer. That was what Mama called them when they were stupid. Why did—
The hellhound shook Talam like he was a rat.
“Wake up.”
Jerking awake, Talam sat up real fast. Everything was dark, only no, there was a light down low. An owl was flying in front of the moon. Why was the moon by the ground?
It was the nightlight. He was in bed. At the Cosantir’s house.
Next to him, Sky dug his fingernails into Talam’s shoulder.
“Ow.” Talam scowled. “Did you shake me?”
“Uh—maybe?”
There was a tap on the door. “Cubs, are you all right? May I come in?” It was Heather.
“Yeah.” Talam’s voice was hoarse, and he swallowed hard. He really, really wanted her to come and be with them. He swung his legs out of the bed.
Sky had already jumped up and let her in. “Hey.”
Walking in, almost as quiet as André and Niall, she patted Sky’s arm. Then she looked at Talam, and her smile went away. “Oh baby, did you have a nightmare?”
Talam bit his lip. “Did I wake you up?” He kinda thought he might have screamed out loud, like a scaredy-mouse.
“No, I read for a while after my walk and was getting ready for bed when I heard you.”
Scat, had everybody heard him? “Did I wake up anyone else?”
She shook her head. “I think your bed is above my guest room. I doubt the brothers heard you.” Still in jeans and shirt, she sat on the bed and put an arm around him, pulling him close. Kinda like Mom used to do.
Sky took her other side, and she hugged him too. “You know, nightmares happen after scary things. Shifters recover better than humans and usually the dreams and jittery feelings go away. But if not, we have soulweavers and shepherds to help us. Our big, bad cahirs use them too.”
“I bet cahirs get really bad nightmares.” Sky shook his head. “I mean, they look for hellhounds. Not me, nope, never.”
“I guess.” And… Talam frowned. If he and Sky hadn’t made the hellhound chase them, then people would’ve died. Niall and André almost did and so did Madoc and Heather’s brother. They’d been safe, because of what he ‘n’ Sky had done.
He’d protected the clan almost like a cahir.
He snuggled closer to Heather and wondered if grown-up cahirs got hugs too.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
The next morning, in the warehouse behind the Shamrock restaurant, André finished talking to the carpenters about sectioning off the back for a half-court for basketball.
As he crossed the huge building, sunlight from the big windows brightened the freshly painted walls and gleamed on the refinished hardwood floor. Freestanding room dividers created smaller spaces.
Progress. The building was now functional, although rather bland. This winter, he’d have the clan’s artists paint murals on the walls.
But, despite the construction noise, shifters were already using some of the sectioned-off spaces. In one, a couple of Daonain were using the computers Niall had bought.
A craft corner with comfortable chairs held three females and two males knitting as they talked.
It was a start.
A good start.
On the other side of the building, Niall entered, followed by Madoc with a carryout tote in his hand.
“Brawd, come and eat breakfast with us,” Madoc called.
A meal with his brothers. He could think of nothing he’d like better.
Or maybe there was one possible “better.” As he bumped shoulders in greeting, he asked, “Is Heather joining us?”
Madoc’s jaw tightened as he shook his head. “Should we walk down to the park?”
Noting the interested gazes from the shifters in the building, André nodded. The park was much more private.
As they crossed the square, the brisk wind held a decidedly autumnal chill. In the creek, undines were riding the crests of the small whitecaps.
“Here’s a good spot.” André took a seat on a picnic table behind a windbreak of bushes.
His brothers joined him, and Madoc started unpacking the tote.
Stomach rumbling, André devoured the first sausage biscuit. “Thanks for this. I didn’t realize how hungry I was.”
“You must have left at dawn this morning.” Madoc’s heavy brows pulled together with his disapproval.
“Aye. I slept too much yesterday and last night.”
“You’re an unnatural cat.” Niall smirked. “I can always sleep late. Or nap.”
“Only because you’re lazy.” André helped himself to a coffee thermos. “Was there something we need to discuss, or did you just miss me?”
Madoc grinned and made kissy noises until Niall thumped him.
At Madoc’s grunt, Niall made a satisfied chuff, then turned to André. “We always miss you, brawd, but we wanted to catch you up when the cubs were absent.”
André stiffened. “What’s wrong with the cubs?”
Madoc set a hand on his arm. “Merely a concern, nothing major.”
Niall nodded. “After Madoc took the cubs to school, Heather said Talam had a screaming nightmare last night. Sky’s unsettled too.”
André relaxed. But…the poor younglings. “I’m not surprised.”
“I didn’t hear any screaming.” Madoc frowned.
“Healing sleep is deeper than normal,” Niall muttered. The cahir would know.
Madoc frowned. “It’s a shame there are no soulweavers or shepherds in Rainier Territory.”
“There are none in the North Cascades, either.” It was why last summer at the festival here in Washington, they’d encouraged a shifter suffering from PTSD to move to Canada where he could get help. Tilting his head back, André inhaled the cold, moist air. There was so much to do yet. “We’ll have to work on attracting one to this area.”
Madoc huffed agreement. “The clan’s had rough times. A soulweaver would have plenty of work.”
“I’m not sure hearing about work is an enticement.” Niall’s voice was dry. “Here, shepherd, let me share my worst nightmares with you.”
Sipping the hot coffee, André considered his brother.
Niall had suffered ugly nightmares in his early years as a cahir, especially after the first time he sent a feral back to the Mother. All too often, a shifter who lost all bonds to others would disappear into their animal, savagely attacking and killing other shifters. There was no cure but death, ordered by the Cosantir, carried out by a cahir. The feral could be someone the cahir knew, even loved.
Cahirs might be the supreme predators, but their spirits could still be damaged. André bumped Niall’s shoulder. “You’ve picked up some coping techniques over the years. Can you take Talam and Sky on a few hikes and do some sharing?”
“I don’t have…” Niall stopped, then half-smiled. “I guess I do have ways to bounce back. Mostly ones I learned from old Bram up in the Kwadacha Territory Elder Village. He’d draft me for his carpentry projects and entertain me with advice hidden inside his stories.”
Back when Niall had only been a cahir for a couple of years, they’d met the retired cahir when visiting a great-uncle who was nearing the total of his days.
“All right.” Niall scrubbed his hands over his face. “I’ll talk with the younglings. Put them to work maybe.”
“Got a project you can use.” Leaning back against the top of the picnic table, Madoc stretched out his legs. “Down the lake trail, there’s a beautiful old log bench crying out for refinishing.”
“Sounds like a perfect cub-sized job,” Niall agreed and told André, “I got this.”
“Thank you, brawd.” André turned his regard to the bear who had followed Heather out last night. “You found a lake, a bench, and…perhaps a beautiful female?”
“Maybe.” Madoc scowled. “So what?”
Niall groaned. “Bear, you’re killing me.”
It appeared Madoc and Heather had talked, at least. Last night, seeing him go after her, André had hoped the two would connect. His brother had a tender heart for wounded souls.
André had hoped for more than talk, but there was time.
“You two.” Madoc shook his head, his expression hard as mountain rock…and then burst out laughing.
“What the…” Niall stared.
Thumping his palm on the picnic table, Madoc grinned. “So I love that female. When are we going to lifemate her?”
André choked on his coffee.
Niall’s biscuit dropped onto the table. “Say again?”
“What? You’re telling me you don’t want her for our own?” Madoc smirked.
“I…fuck, yes, I want her for ours.” Niall shook his head like a half-drowned cat. “I never thought you’d take a female seriously.”
“Yeah, well”—Madoc pushed his hair back—“it’s time to move past old shit.”
André managed to clear his throat. “From back when you were hurt?”
“Aye. It warped my feelings about females.” He bumped Niall with his shoulder. “And the incredibly pushy females after you—how they didn’t want you for yourself.”
Niall’s eyes narrowed. “And you were thinking all females were like them?”
“I’ve met a few good females. None who were single. So…yeah.”
Niall sighed. “Sorry, brawd.”
“Dirt under our paws.” Madoc held up his hand, and Niall slapped it.
They turned to look at André.
“You in?” Madoc asked.
“I’ve simply been waiting for my slug-witted littermates to catch up.” André raised an eyebrow. “They’re, perhaps, a few leaves short of a bush.”
“Flea-ridden feline.” Niall smacked the back of André’s head.
André grinned…because all three of them loved Heather.
The future seemed to be filled with light.
“So how do we handle this?” Niall asked.
“Slowly, I would think.” André pinched the bridge of his nose as he considered. “She fears being hurt again. We might simply live together for a time until she learns to trust the way we feel about her.”
“Sounds like a good plan except for one problem.” Madoc picked up his coffee. “Last night, she was planning to move to Cold Creek.”
“Because of Bron?” When Madoc nodded, Niall scowled. “By the Gods, she was way out of line.”
“Our aunt also has…issues.” André didn’t know how much his cahir aunt had shared with his brothers. “And she’s still very protective of us, especially Niall.”
Niall set his size fourteen foot on the bench and braced a forearm on his huge thigh. “It’s because I have delicate feelings,” he told them earnestly.
With a snort, Madoc back-armed Niall and his delicate feelings off the bench.
Trying not to laugh, André cleared his throat. “We will move slowly, but be prepared.”
“Prepared?” Madoc asked.
“Aye. Did you know there’s a blademage in Cold Creek?”
Grins met his hint. Then three fists thumped the table in unanimous agreement.
At a desk in the dusty bar office, Heather rubbed her burning eyes. Nikolaou’s writing was so pinched as to be nearly unreadable, and the lighting in the room was abysmal. Next time, she’d bring in her own desk light.
