Promise Forever: Fairy Tales with a Modern Twist

by Pauline Creeden

  She kissed his chest. “I know. Change is normal, even inevitable, but the unknown scares the shit out of most people.” She settled against his side. “I’m almost as scared of doing nothing as I am of doing something.”

  “An endless solar eclipse, huh?”

  “Not a perfect analogy, but yes.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “You married me. What does that make you?”

  Marrok’s rumble had her smiling. “A lovestruck werewolf who’d do anything for his crazy witch.”

  “Blasphemy.” Oriana pulled Marrok on top of her, opening her legs and body to him again. “Mmmm, yes, no more talking.”

  Lights turned on, and a familiar voice screamed.

  Oriana swore.

  Marrok bolted out of bed, strategically covering himself with a pillow.

  “Oriana,” her mother and consort yelled at the same time.

  Cringing, she reached for her Whisper of Echoes magic and jumped them out of Kalinda’s bedroom. First thing tomorrow, she’d buy her mother a new bed.

  December 31, 2240

  Steelcross Realm

  Steelrise

  With a swipe to the left, Marrok turned the page on his handheld Mage tablet, continuing to read Matriarch Helen’s diary entries. Not even Oriana had read these historic documents, although only she and Kalinda were privy to the matriarchal archives. His mother-in-law didn’t strike him as the kind of person to care about the past. In fact, in the months he and Oriana have been married, he’d read nothing in the archives that led him to believe that Kalinda was any different from past Matriarchs—present and future focused, the past inconsequential except for the power granted to witches and the threat of werewolves.

  It’s taken years to build Bronze Ward. Tuncay and I worked hard to turn our dream into a reality. Few thought we could do it. Even less believe it will be a success. But Bronze Ward is just brick and mortar. Its physical construction is only the first step in a much bigger dream of ours. The opening of Bronze Ward tomorrow won’t be true success but a critical first step along what will be a lengthy journey.

  I must admit, I’m frightened of what will come next. While I am responsible for every life on this planet, I feel a greater responsibility to the new residents of Bronze Ward. Friends have taken to calling the project a “grand experiment.” I dislike the skepticism in the name, but my feelings don’t make the not-so-subtle judgment any less true. Bronze Ward is an experiment, and there’s nothing inherently wrong with experiments. Except this one involves people’s lives. If I’m wrong, witches and werewolves could die.

  I don’t share my fears with Tuncay, of course. As Matriarch I must know. I must have the right answers, even when I have no idea. Rulership is a weighty burden. Too heavy, some days. I’m grateful for Tuncay but even he cannot help me carry the load of being a Matriarch. He battles his own demons. Our mutual burdens are why we’ve decided to postpone having children. For now, Bronze Ward is our newborn we must raise and nurture into a well-adjusted, fully-functioning adult. For that to happen, we need to survive its infancy and toddler years.

  Fireworks blasted. Marrok smiled, turning away from the tablet to the windows across from his bed. A rainbow of color lit up the night sky and his bedroom. Sparkling lights and loud revelers on the street below heralded in the New Year.

  “So loud,” Oriana complained from beside him, covering her sleepy head with a pillow. “Why must they be so loud? Until werewolves migrated here, Steelcross was a quiet city.”

  “Steelcross hasn’t been a quiet city since you became its Matriarch.”

  Oriana grumbled something he couldn’t hear, likely a curse.

  He slid down the bed, curling himself around his grumpy witch. “How are you feeling?”

  “Tired. A little nauseous.”

  “So basically the same as when you crashed, face-down, two hours ago.”

  “It’s all your fault.”

  “I know. All my fault.” Marrok snatched the pillow off Oriana’s head. This time, there was no doubt his witch cursed him—in two languages, no less.

  “You and your damn sperm.”

  Marrok laughed. “The morning sickness will pass. You could always take something or use magic to alleviate your discomfort.”

  “No magic. Blunt force weapons. That’s all witches are.”

  Marrok wouldn’t argue with her. He never did when she got like this. Until living with Oriana, he’d never known how much witches struggled with controlling their powers, even after having gone through the Rite of Endometal Fusion. Daily, he witnessed the physical and emotional toil on his wife. Carrying their child added to the demand for self-control.

  “What can I do to help?”

  Shifting in his embrace, she faced him. The red streaks in her hair seemed even brighter every time a firework crackled outside of their bedroom windows.

  “Have you learned anything new from the archives?”

  “Not much. There’s a lot to go through.”

  “I know. We need to devise a plan of attack. Twelve years, remember?”

  “Don’t put a ticking time bomb on our child?”

  “I don’t mean to, but that’s how I feel.”

  “If you think like that, it’s going to take all of the joy out of becoming and being a mother.”

  Burrowing into his bare chest, she didn’t speak, so he didn’t either. His father hadn’t prepared him for this kind of life, for living with a witch who, most days glowed like the sun, but other days was quiet and pensive. He was learning her, as much as she was learning how to live with him.

  Marrok inhaled her scent. Always lemon, even after she showered.

  “When are you leaving?”

  “In two days.”

  Blindly, she reached for his collar, finding it easily. “I hate it.”

  “So do I. You know I don’t want to leave, especially when you’re expecting. But we agreed. Short breaks from each other, the way Matriarch Helen suggested.”

  “Screw my grandparents and their short breaks. That is not a good long-term solution.”

  “It’s all we have. You smell too good, Oriana. I’m drawn to you more and more.”

  “It’s the sex.”

  He swatted her ass, and she smiled up at him. “I won’t lie, sex is part of it. Alarick warned me.”

  He’d told her his brother’s story, which she waved away with, “He was a boy just coming into his full werewolf powers. Between a fifteen-year-old Alarick and the eleven-year-old girl, she was the more dangerous of the two. We aren’t prey but predators. He’s lucky she didn’t kill him.”

  “The temptation is greatest when we make love. There’s more than sexual hunger inside me.”

  “Does your hunger make you want to kill me?”

  “How can you say that without any fear, as if my confession isn’t like that ticking time bomb we just talked about?”

  Rising onto her knees, she shoved his right shoulder. Obligingly, he moved onto his back, watching as she straddled his waist, as naked as him. For a minute, he only noticed the gorgeous breasts that led to the beginning of a small baby bump. Despite the twelve-year countdown clock in his own head, the one he worked damn hard to ignore, he couldn’t wait to become a father.

  Lita had told him to love “fully and fairly.” It hadn’t been fair of Io to only give Lita werewolves. Until their talk, Marrok hadn’t considered how selfish his father had been. He’d viewed Lita’s leaving their family from a narrow perspective, one born of limited knowledge and unconscious bias.

  “Now that I’m pregnant, you can have sex with me in your Bleddyn form, if you want.”

  His witch had a frightening knack for seeing into his mind. Not that he’d been expressly thinking about them having sex in his in-between form, but that his parents either only had sex while Io was in his Bleddyn form or his father made damn certain to use a contraceptive when in human form.

  “We’ve never done it like that before. It’s a New Year. I t
hink we should.” She sat more firmly on him. “At least one part of you is interested, so stop looking at me as if I suggested we have public sex. Sometimes, I think you’re a prude.”

  “You say shit like that to get under my skin. You know I’m not a prude, and you damn well know you’d never have sex in public. We’re supposed to be outside celebrating the New Year with residents of Steelrise, which you’ve seemed to have forgotten. You must’ve also forgotten that you’re the one who organized the party you complained is too loud.”

  “Yes, so we could have a party of two in here. No one wants anything from their Matriarch when music, food, and alcohol are free and plentiful distractors. Besides,” she licked her lips, “I want to see your Bleddyn.”

  “See or feel?”

  “Both.”

  He laughed at the lust in her eyes then moaned at the hand stroking him. Marrok could shift right there in their marital bed, giving them both what they wanted. But the energy Oriana displayed came from her exhausted reserve not from hours of rejuvenated rest.

  “Another time.”

  “Are you sure?”

  The fact that she wasn’t using flirtations or jokes to get her way was proof enough he’d made the right decision. Bleddyns were demanding lovers. Much more than having sex in human form and far less than mating with a fully shifted werewolf, which no sane female willingly did. Witches weren’t animals, although their bodies were structured to mate with a half-human, half-werewolf Bleddyn.

  The first trimester of his wife’s pregnancy wasn’t an ideal time to have that kind of sex because Bleddyns didn’t make love they screwed—hard and with the intent of getting his mate with a Channon, a werewolf baby.

  Oriana may have been too fatigued to engage in her own challenge but Marrok wasn’t fooled.

  Sitting up, he adjusted her on his lap, giving her a taste of what she wanted.

  Eyes closed, her forehead fell against his as she rode him.

  “I’m bigger.” He pushed into her. “Longer.” Another deep thrust. “Thicker.”

  Oriana’s eyes popped open, and he thrust into her again.

  “No matter my form, I can make you scream and come for me. But yeah, my Bleddyn will more than feed your witch hunger.”

  Oriana’s magic sparked to life, small sizzles from her hands onto the shoulders she gripped.

  He winced in pain, the shock a burn to his senses and skin.

  She stopped. “Shit. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s fine. It’s nothing.”

  “It’s not nothing. I burned you again.”

  “It was a mistake, and I’ll heal. Ignore it, Oriana, and make love to me.”

  “I can’t ignore—”

  Marrok kissed her, silencing her fears and building tension. He kept kissing her, unwilling to release his witch until she understood he’d take a hundred magic burns from her, if she found pleasure in his arms.

  He had a theory, though, because he didn’t think her burns were simply a byproduct of her strong sun magic. He kept hoping to find evidence to support his theory in the matriarchal archives. To date, he hadn’t.

  Marrok wanted to try something with Oriana but now wasn’t the time for experiments, not when she was pregnant, tired, and emotional. Not that Oriana would agree to a half-baked scheme that could leave him hurt or dead.

  More fireworks exploded, and so did Marrok.

  “Happy New Year, Oriana, I love you.”

  Aftermath

  April 30, 2243

  Irongarde Realm

  City of Wild Moor

  He trudged through the downtown streets of Wild Moor or what used to be the downtown area. Everything was gone, blasted to rumble, turned to dust. He hadn’t seen the sun in six days. Even his beloved moon had abandoned him, the grimy, black aftermath of Stormbringer explosive magic too dense for the glow of the moon to penetrate.

  In the depths of the war zone, ground zero of the goddamn Matriarchs’ assault, he’d survived. They thought they could kill him? He would show them. He’d brought war to them once, he’d do it again.

  He’d rebuild his army of Muraco from the ash of destruction the witches had wrought.

  “Where to?” Phelan asked, the first escaped Muraco to accept him as the white werewolves’ leader. “Storm Irongarde City and Iron Spire?”

  He coughed. The tainted air burned his lungs. The effect didn’t hurt nearly as much when in werewolf form, but communication was more effective as a human.

  “How many do we have?”

  He and Phelan stopped walking, both looking behind them at the bedraggled group of full-humans and chained black werewolves.

  “A couple dozen. Most people left during the first and second evac wave. These are the ones too stupid or slow to catch a Magerun transporter out of Wild Moor. What do you want to do about the black werewolves? Change them? Kill them?”

  “Kill them.”

  “The werewolves?”

  “All of them. The full-humans are sniveling dead weight who’ll slow us down. The black werewolves are useless, if they aren’t willing to fight against the matriarchy.”

  He also didn’t know how sane or persuadable freshly turned Muracos would be. The Muracos who still followed him may have been bloodthirsty killers, but they weren’t lunatics incapable of rational thought.

  “We aren’t traitors,” one of the black werewolves yelled. “What happened here is your fault, you pathetic piece of shit.”

  He removed the handgun from his waistband, pointed it at the mouthy black werewolf, and shot him. It wasn’t a kill shot, so he charged forward, releasing a volley of rounds into the asshole’s chest and stomach, dropping him to his knees and shutting him up.

  “Got anything else to say?”

  The werewolf fell forward, a pool of blood seeping under him onto the charred ground.

  Full-humans screamed and wept.

  Black werewolves fought against the chains around their wrists and ankles, trying to shift but the silver he’d forced down their throats made it impossible. Witches knew what in the hell they were doing when they’d put werewolves in Silver Snares and merged their magic with metal. Werewolves were allergic to most metals, especially silver. Not so much in human form but certainly when they shifted into werewolves.

  He nodded to Phelan and his cadre of Muraco. Like him, they’d survived the Matriarchs’ attack, retreating to a boarded-up and forgotten about underground Crimson Guard bunker when the coast had cleared. They had enough supplies to last them weeks, including a small arsenal of traditional weapons and liquid silver.

  The spray of gunfire quieted the screams, tears, and growls, leaving blessed silence and the metallic smell of fresh blood.

  “We need to hunt for other Muraco survivors. First in Wild Moor then in other cities of Janus Nether.”

  “What about Crimson Hunter?” Adolfus asked, a fifty-year-old Muraco with a scar that ran from chin to left eyebrow. He didn’t want to know what kind of weapon could leave a permanent scar on a werewolf with accelerated and advanced healing. “She’ll come after us.”

  “It’s been three days. Oriana and Kalinda think we’re dead. If they didn’t, Oriana would’ve returned by now.”

  That arrogant assumption would give him and his Muracos the time they needed to prepare their counterattack.

  He refused to call her Matriarch Oriana or Crimson Hunter. Those days of subservience were over. The reign of witches was at an end. It was time for werewolves to stand as men, reclaiming Earth Rift as their stolen birthright. The witches had left a ready-made army for him. He wouldn’t squander his good fortune.

  “We need to check the Muraco prisons in Wild Moor for survivors. That’s where we’ll find our new army. After that, we’ll move to the next city. Once we’re done, we’ll be strong enough to take the fight to the gates of Irongarde City. We’ll be unstoppable, and I’ll personally devour Kalinda’s heart before slitting Oriana’s throat and drinking the bitch dry.

  “Let’s move out.
First stop Moonblight Penitentiary then Dogscar Correctional Facility.”

  “How are we going to get in and get them out?” Phelan asked.

  He had no idea, but Moonblight was miles away, and Magerun had been shut down. They’d have to hoof it, leaving him time to devise a plan.

  “I’ll tell you when we get there. Let’s go.”

  His clan howled their assent.

  July 15, 2240

  Irongarde Realm

  City of Wild Moor

  “I can’t believe he married her and moved all the way to Steelcross.”

  Alarick downed the rest of his beer, like a goddamn werewolf this time. “Shut up about it already. I’m tired of hearing you whine about Marrok and Matriarch Oriana. It’s done. He’s happy, and so are Dad and Mom.”

  Snatching up his own mug of beer, Zev coated his mouth with the bitter taste, swishing it around before swallowing. “Lita isn’t our mother. She’s the incubator who gave us birth.”

  “Watch your mouth, or so help me Zev, I’m going to hurt you.”

  “What? Since when have you taken her side over mine?”

  “You’ve always talked a lot of shit, especially about witches. I don’t know what you’re deal is, and I’ve never cared enough to think too hard on it. But I won’t sit here and say nothing while you talk shit about Mom. If Dad were here, he’d knock your teeth down your mouth.”

  “Because he’s as witch-whipped as Marrok. And you, from the way you’re acting. Calm down and order another drink.”

  “No, I’m done.”

  “Come on. What’s your deal?” Zev raised his fist to punch his brother in the arm, but Alarick slapped his hand away with such force Zev’s instinct was to strike back.

  He felt it, the Silver Snare materializing around his neck, followed by a hiss of magic from his reformed collar, dulling his anger, his urge to lash out in violence. Unballing his fist, Zev tried to fight against the magic seeping into his body, but it was a fight he couldn’t win. No werewolf, no matter how strong, could counteract a Silver Snare, not as long as the damn Rage Disrupter injection was functional.