Wolf Born

by Linda Thomas-Sundstrom

  She stood proudly before his scrutiny, comfortable with her nakedness, as all Weres were, but trembling from the circumstances they found themselves in. Rosalind didn’t fear vampires, and maybe not even demons, but she wanted nothing to do with the Miami PD.

  Colton wanted to feed her, fatten her up, pacify her fears. He wanted to keep her within the circle of his arms and assure her that nothing outside their relationship mattered. But he saw, as she moved with the grace of a panther beside him, that her waist-length hair, salt-and-pepper-colored moments before, was now completely white. No black remained, and therefore no evidence of the Night Wulf.

  This was the result of a kiss, and of holding her in his arms so briefly.

  “Ghost,” he said softly, tenderly, as the uniforms on the other side of the fence fumbled with the lock in the gate.

  “Landau’s is the safest place now. Are you good with that? Will you trust me?” he said to Rosalind. “They will help. I’ll be there with you, and it will be all right.”

  She nodded.

  “Promise you’ll follow me there,” Colton said. “Promise now.”

  “I promise,” Rosalind said, reaching for the pile of clothes on the steps.

  Having gained that assurance, Colton leaped through the open window of his parents’ house with Rosalind in his wake just as the backyard gate finally swung open behind them.

  “Wait. Stop!” both officers directed.

  “Sorry, boys,” Colton tossed back.

  Seconds later he and Rosalind were out the front door and sprinting with a speed that matched the sound of the wind in Colton’s ears.

  * * *

  They moved in tandem, side by side, in a rhythm that made Rosalind’s heart pound. They were leaving the human neighborhood behind, but the imprint of the demon’s silent message stayed with her.

  It hadn’t wanted her.

  It wanted Colton.

  She was afraid to slow down, afraid the demon’s evil intentions would make her turn around and hunt for it, so that she could wring answers from its scrawny neck.

  The hellish monster hadn’t had a mouth, or eyes. It was composed of mounds of tight skin stretched over an otherwise humanlike form, with exceptionally long arms. It had communicated through vibrations in its body, by rubbing bone against bone.

  It had followed her, but didn’t intend to harm her.

  It had wanted Colton, but hadn’t stuck around.

  The thought made her ill and threatened to topple every theory they had pieced together so far. Things were quite the opposite, in fact. For whatever reason, that demon had used her to get to her mate. She had led it to him.

  Her thoughts reformed as she ran beside Colton, with terrible results.

  If that monster hadn’t wanted her, was there a chance the vampires hadn’t wanted her, either? Could they also have been after her lover? But...why?

  There had to be more to this story than met the eye. The pairing between Colton, specifically, and herself was what her father had actually been afraid to let happen.

  She and Colton. Two entities able to shift shape at will, unlike other Weres. Special beings. Wulf. Now, one of them was a night creature and the other an entity out of Were legend.

  She didn’t like this terrible line of thought. Now that the floodgates of thought had opened, though, her ideas took on a life of their own. What-ifs became directions.

  If a demon wanted to find Colton, and that applied also to the vampires, there might be a possibility that the bloodsuckers that had murdered Colton’s family had done so in order to call him out, knowing he would follow them with a Were’s need for vengeance. They hadn’t gone away, but had been waiting in the park.

  “Colton!” she exclaimed between breaths, her body again filled with dread. “Colton. No!”

  If any of those thoughts proved true, Colton was in the dark about what was happening, and was in real danger. He was the one who had to be careful. She had a Death-caller inside her, and yet her lover might be the entity in trouble.

  “Colton,” she said again, softer this time, almost pleading.

  How had all this started, she wanted to ask him, if not by her coming to his aid in the park? If not imprinting with him immediately, with the first glance in his direction, before fighting off the vampires?

  What had made her want to belong to him, and him to her, in a relationship with a supersonic ascent?

  His wail of agony.

  Not hers.

  Rosalind focused on that memory and dug in with her razor-sharp claws.

  The sound Colton had made, exemplifying his grief, and in this very neighborhood, is what had chased away her anger over his early rejection. His wail of unimaginable pain had to have been what succeeded in sealing her soul to his.

  His wail. His call. The pain and death in that heartrending sound he had made after finding the remains of his loved ones was the language that a Banshee, whose deal was to announce those same things, would recognize and identify with.

  She had been drawn to his pain. It had been love at first sight. Like calling to like. She had accepted this, confronted it, reveled in it. Did that make her a cohort of the monsters in the area? Had her need kept Colton from seeing the possibility of his own peril?

  She, usually so fleet on her feet, stumbled.

  The data seemed flawed, the gaps insurmountable. Colton had been right. Judge Landau and the elders were their only option for finding the truth.

  Perhaps sensing her distress, Colton slowed. In the heat of the balmy night, chills covered his naked body, mimicking hers. Having told him something of the demon’s desire, his mind would be as active as hers in attempting to process that information. There was so much going on in her mind, she couldn’t enter his.

  Rosalind shook her head hard to clear it.

  There was someone up ahead.

  A silver-haired man was headed their way beneath the lights of the tall Landau gates. Backed by the two big Weres that had stood guard at the gate, the silver-haired Lycan tossed some clothes to Colton and gestured for the gates to be closed after them.

  Colton’s sigh of relief when the sound of iron hitting iron resonated in the night moved through Rosalind as if she’d made it.

  Chapter 26

  There were more Weres on the front lawn than Colton had ever seen. Young Weres and old. Landau, his wife, his son Dylan and Dana Delmonico were the recognizable few. Beyond their somber presence stood the rest of the Weres Colton had met in this same area the last time he’d faced a welcoming party.

  Had that only been two nights ago?

  The difference was that he felt almost glad to see them this time.

  “I’m truly sorry about that,” the judge said as the gates closed. “I couldn’t get rid of those officers in the park. They wanted to drive me home. Then they waited here for a while. Is everything all right?”

  “Not unless you can discount the presence of a demon in Miami,” Colton replied.

  “A—”

  “Demon,” Colton repeated. “An eyeless, mouthless bastard that Rosalind says was looking for me.”

  He turned to Rosalind, who was inches from him and staring nervously at the reception line. “Do you want to go inside? Your father is probably waiting to see you.”

  When she shook her white-haired head, a rustle of murmurs went through the gathered crowd. Colton had forgotten how her appearance had to have surprised them. The younger Weres, Dylan and his pack, had never seen Rosalind. They hadn’t been allowed to see her.

  Here she stood. A creature possessed by a spirit that none of them understood, although it would have been easy for them, as Weres, to pick up on the subtle Otherworldly aspect of her aura. It was all there in her scent, along with that seductive fragrance of flowers.

 
Rosalind, just inside the walls, had donned a blue long-sleeved sweatshirt and a pair of jeans. Her feet were bare. Her hair was tangled and she was covered in blood. Looking battle-scarred, she faced them all defiantly. Truly special. One of a kind.

  He knew she was shaking inside.

  Colton stepped in front of her possessively to ward off the stares. To the judge, he said, “Do you have any idea why a demon might want to find a wulf?”

  Landau frowned. “I’ve never heard of a demon actually existing, not to mention showing itself in public.”

  “I have,” a woman said, stepping forward and into the light of the porch.

  All eyes turned to the auburn-haired beauty who was flanked by Matt Wilson, the Were detective Colton had met the other night.

  “I run a facility not far out of the city center,” she said. “A psychiatric hospital. A few days ago I felt a presence hanging around outside and went out for a look. I saw what I now presume might have been your demon skirting the perimeter of the fence. When I turned on the lights, it slunk away.”

  “Then there’s a chance it wasn’t after me,” Colton said, turning to Rosalind. “I’ve never seen that place.”

  “It was looking for you,” Rosalind confirmed.

  “Why?”

  “Black heart,” a deep voice said from behind them, and everyone in that yard spun to find Jared Kirk, standing in the house’s open doorway.

  “What’s that?” Judge Landau barked.

  To the judge Rosalind’s father asked, “Do we want to talk about this here or in private?”

  “I think it’s gone too far to be considered private,” Colton replied in Landau’s place.

  Judge Landau glanced to his son, and to his pack of gathered Weres. Dylan spoke up. “I think we need to know what’s going on. We’re the peacekeepers here. How can we do our jobs if there are secrets we aren’t privy to, or if some of this missing information can put not only innocent bystanders, but those we love in jeopardy?”

  Kirk stiffly took a seat on a bench. He gathered his thoughts before speaking again.

  “My daughter,” he said, “is not just Lycan. She is part Death-caller, a Celtic spirit who deals with death. Not handing it out, not walking hand in hand with Death. A Banshee, as some call them, merely acknowledges the coming of Death, and warns humans of its approach.”

  His voice had dulled, but he continued. “The spirit in Rosalind is a messenger from the Otherworld, and something we know little about. Hence the need for protection and seclusion.”

  “That doesn’t mean she’s a danger to others,” Colton said, realizing how rude it was for them to be speaking of Rosalind’s secrets, and about her, as if she wasn’t there.

  “I believe that she’s no danger if the spirit is contained,” Kirk said.

  Colton was of a mind to pick Rosalind up and take her away from this. But she needed these explanations as much as any of them did. Probably so much more.

  “I didn’t guard her for other people’s safety, really. I guarded her for her own welfare,” Kirk said. “Telling myself otherwise, and allowing myself to believe it was for the sake of others that she had to be hidden away, was perhaps my best way, my only way, of finding justice in keeping her apart from all of you.”

  Dylan Landau spoke up. “You said black heart as if that’s something significant. What does it mean?”

  More murmurings went through the crowd.

  “Rosalind will become something else if she...”

  “What will she become?” the judge asked when Kirk let the explanation die.

  “Night Wulf.”

  Colton heard Rosalind’s soft, lamenting whine before her father’s explanation had concluded. It drove him forward so fast, he shocked Jared Kirk into silence when he faced the elder Were from a closeness of less than three feet.

  “Maybe I spoke too soon and she has heard enough for now,” he said.

  “Yes.” Kirk nodded sympathetically. “But this affects you, Colton, if you’re the demon’s target.”

  Colton nodded for him to go on.

  “I had to accept that you had mated, and along with that the possibility, the hope that you would adhere to my request never to touch her again until we knew what the situation was. In ignoring my request, you’ve placed her and yourself in danger. The others who come after her will want to be rid of you. You now stand in their way. As her mate, they need your removal in order to make Rosalind realize her full potential.”

  Light-headed from the strain of standing up to this after all that had gone on before, Colton raised a hand to stop the Were. Rosalind had other ideas. She appeared beside him to stare at her father.

  “Black heart,” she said. “What is that?”

  Kirk looked pained by the smooth deception of his daughter’s calm expression. Though his reluctance showed, he met her gaze.

  “A Night Wulf is created if you, Rosalind, were to mate with a species in whose chest rests a black heart. An evil heart. Rogue vampires, demons and fallen angels will all fight for the right to turn you, to possess you, in order to bring this thing into being.”

  “I thought that’s what I am already,” Rosalind said weakly.

  “No. Not yet. Not ever, hopefully. Because that creature would, I believe, have the potential to rule any species she chose.”

  Colton put his arm around Rosalind’s waist, able to feel her tremors roll through him.

  Her father spoke again. “Keeping you from actualizing such an inheritance has always been my goal. Keeping you hidden from those kinds of beasts was all I ever wanted.”

  Colton staggered forward. “You thought I’d have such a heart? Because I’m what you’ve called a ghost?”

  Kirk’s patience was worn, his face haggard. “I didn’t know what the vampires had done to you. I thought you might be the key to a Night Wulf’s conception. I was wrong.”

  “Who killed my mother?” Rosalind asked. Colton thought her voice sounded sad.

  “Something other than demon. Something worse.” Kirk’s wide shoulders sagged. “They all came eventually, after so much time without a sighting or hint of their presence. And they came at once. I didn’t know until it was too late. Your mother slipped out to meet them without my knowledge, and while you and I slept. She sacrificed herself for you and for me, knowing we would go through it all again when you were old enough, but wanting to give us some time.”

  There were tears on Rosalind’s face when Colton pulled her closer. The tears streamed down. With gentle fingers he stroked her face, wiping away the dampness. “You are blameless, innocent and vulnerable,” he said to her. “I don’t care who is after you or me. We can beat this and find the truth.”

  She looked up at him with pale gray eyes. “They nearly killed you the first time I followed you. Your parents dying was bad enough, but that didn’t have to be connected to me, to what I am.”

  Then she stiffened and looked to her father. “I didn’t know Colton until the night the vampires attacked his family. Those monsters couldn’t have been trying to take him from me.”

  Leaning over, she spoke to her father clearly. “Secrets. There are more. I can taste them.”

  Kirk shook his head as if some parts of this mystery were too hard to comprehend.

  “The ridiculous part of all this,” Judge Landau chimed in, “is how they can think they can tackle a werewolf pack to get what they want, when what they want is for the most part Lycan.”

  The judge approached Rosalind cautiously, not afraid, Colton sensed, but taking care not to alarm her. “What else can you tell us about this, Rosalind? You must know something.”

  “Colton and I were meant to be mated,” she replied without hesitation. “I don’t see how vampires could have predicted that ahead of time and gone after his family.”

 
Landau appeared to consider her statement. His gaze fixed thoughtfully on Jared Kirk.

  “Do you understand that, and what might cause her to believe she’s right?” he asked.

  In the lull of silence following Landau’s inquiry, Rosalind repeated her tiny sound of distress. Whether or not her father fully comprehended what was going on, Rosalind had forged some sort of link to the truth, and knew it.

  “What is it?” Colton asked her.

  She turned her luminous eyes to him. “Memories.”

  “Tell me about them.”

  “I have to speak with my father alone first.”

  “Use the house,” Landau said.

  Reluctantly, Colton stood aside so that Rosalind could see the doorway. “I’ll hate every minute you’re in there, and out of my sight,” he confessed. “I won’t leave the porch until you come out, or call.”

  Kirk looked pretty much like a doomed man, Colton thought, as the elder Were, with hunched shoulders and a solemn expression, followed his daughter inside.

  Colton placed his back to the doorjamb and stared out at the gathering of Weres. “Any problems with this?” he asked them. “Or with hosting us here until we figure out what to do next? Because if there are, we’ll honor that, and go.”

  “No problems,” Judge Landau replied, as spokesman and Alpha of his pack. “None whatsoever.”

  The rest of Landau’s pack hadn’t moved a muscle.

  Chapter 27

  Rosalind preceded her father into the Landaus’ living room, feeling trapped there. Feeling wild, and way too feral to make use of a chair.

  She began to pace.

  “The last time I was here,” she said, “I eagerly waited for Colton to heal, naively believing that everything might be okay once he did. It was you who frightened me with hints of the secrets you were keeping. Maybe things would have been easier if you had shared those secrets with me.”

  “You have matured,” her father said in response. “Quickly. I’m not sure you would have listened or understood just days ago.”