by Lisa Ladew
And the way Harlan looked at Eventine! Leilani felt like she would give away anything that was hers to give to have one man look at her in that way, just once. Not in the yucky “You’re hot and I want to control you,” way that she’d experienced a few times, but rather in an “I adore you,” way. An “I must love you or die,” kind of way, from a man that she felt the same way about. Leilani couldn’t imagine what that felt like. She could see the evidence of how good it must feel stamped all over Eventine’s face whenever she caught Harlan looking at her with worship in his eyes, but she couldn’t imagine it for herself.
Harlan moved in close to Eventine, repeating the steps of their dance, exactly the way Leilani had seen it so many times before. Harlan pressed up against his mate and grabbed her hips hard. His eyes were dark as he kneaded them, then ran both hands up her waist and sides, rubbing her shoulders for only a minute, pulling at her hair until her head fell back.
Her face was completely open, 100% trusting, and so relaxed and sensual that Leilani felt a moment’s jealousy rush through her. Eventine had everything. A strong body, a fierce mind, a devoted mate, a gorgeous face, and she was a wolf shifter. She fit in with all the rest of those wolves down there without trying. Following on the heels of the jealousy, thick guilt clogged Leilani’s throat. Eventine was also selfless and dedicated and thoughtful and had her own struggles and Leilani hated her thoughts.
Harlan yanked at the shirt Eventine was wearing, then ripped right through it with a claw that had extended straight out of his finger for a moment. The ruined halves of the shirt fell to the floor and Leilani looked away, but not before she saw Harlan press Evie into the counter, running one hand across her front so he could palm a breast. Evie sighed, a thick sigh that said she welcomed everything Harlan was doing.
Leilani sighed right along with her, wanting what Eventine had so fiercely it almost felt like jealousy again, but it wasn’t. It was just… desire. Leilani pulled back, trying to think where to look now to keep herself from noticing how dark it was becoming in the meadow, how dangerous it sounded, when Eventine spoke.
“Cool it for a second, cowboy,” Eventine said to Harlan. “I’m getting a report.”
“I’m no cowboy,” Harlan murmured into her neck. “But I know I’ve got a pony somewhere around here for you to ride.”
Leilani listened without watching, her eyes on the darkness next to her. Eventine spoke again, ignoring Harlan, but her voice was soft. “Report from Troy. Trent found the beast, but he won’t respond in ruhi. Trent thinks the beast is in complete control. He’s about to make contact.”
Leilani’s heart twinged in her chest at the news. She looked back. Harlan’s face had crumpled and his body sagged. Eventine turned around and pressed her naked body into her mate’s arms, giving only comfort. He crushed her to him, frown lines deep in his forehead, his eyes squeezed shut. They’d been waiting for any word on Jaggar and had sometimes whispered to each other that was what they were most afraid of, that Jaggar, once shifted into the beast, would not be able to shift out, ever. That the man would be locked inside the animal as surely as Trent was and Troy had been for so many years. They spoke about it in the hushed tones and couched words of people who are discussing a dangerous and vicious rumor that everyone hopes is not true.
“That’s why he hasn’t answered anyone,” Eventine said, her words muffled by Harlan’s chest. “He might not even be able to hear us. I haven’t tried because he still thinks I’m dead.”
Harlan seemed to choke on the word ‘dead’, and Evie moved to soothe him. Leilani pulled away, not wanting to invade their privacy anymore, shutting off the Ula, pulling herself completely back into the meadow, thinking hard about Jaggar.
Her mate.
7 – Get Your Ass Home
Jaggar stared at the dead body of the wild wolf the beast had killed, until the beast turned its head and body to go out the hole it had fallen in.
Another wolf leapt neatly into the cave through that entrance. A black wolf with a figure eight renqua on his shoulder, and a splash of white on the tip of his tail and his chest. Trent.
Trent, Jaggar said to him in ruhi. Leave us be. We aren’t going back.
But Trent didn’t act like he had heard at all. He stared at the beast, his head lowered. Trent was normal-sized for a wolfen, maybe two hundred pounds at the most, and the beast was easily twice that big. Trent didn’t seem to notice.
Jaggar, Trent said, his voice calm and low. I’m taking you home.
I can’t, Jaggar told him. I can’t go back.
Again, Trent did not act like he had heard him. Could Jaggar’s ruhi not breach the beast’s thick, malformed skull?
Trent, Jaggar said. I’m here.
Trent only stared. The beast growled low in the back of his throat, his eyes locked on Trent’s, then shooting past him up the sloped edge of the cave wall they’d tumbled down. The beast was going to try to get past Trent.
Trent saw it and moved his body in the way, blocking the beast’s exit. The beast growled and advanced on him. Trent watched him come, not showing his fangs until the beast was within striking distance, then he stalked forward, feinting at the beast, roaring in ruhi, his voice echoing strangely in the beast’s head, making the beast wince, but Jaggar could barely hear the words. He strained to figure them out.
Please, don’t make me laugh. You’re a baby. Sure, you’re big, and you’re confused, and you’re ugly, but ugly doesn’t win fights.
Trent came in fast at the end of that speech and bit the beast once behind the ear, not drawing blood, only giving him a warning. New pain sharpened old pain. Trent twisted around the beast, side-stepping him, then facing him from a few paces away.
You’ve never even been in a fight, have you? Except when you savaged Harlan. He lived, by the way. Which is the only reason I haven’t handed you your ass yet.
The beast growled and advanced on Trent. Jaggar sensed confusion from him. Confusion and rage, and he couldn’t get a handle on either.
Trent feinted in, heading for the beast’s right side, and the beast lunged for him, trying to catch him, but Trent was already moving to the other side. This time he did draw blood, then stood back just as quickly, pacing around the beast, making a show of turning his back, taunting the beast.
Jaggar was impressed. He’d always liked Trent, but rarely seen this side of him, and never from the vantage point of the one about to get his ass handed to him.
You’ve got a choice, Trent said, pacing, loping, head down, eyes seeming to glow dark with intensity. I can embarrass you now, or you can come back and see me in five years. Then it might be a fair fight. He snarled once, convincingly. For now, I am your alpha. Get home before I drag you home. Trent looked at the body of the wild wolf laying inert on the ground, then back to the beast. If you kill anything else I’ll be so far up your backtrail you’ll be asking my permission to take a shit. Got it? Snarl once if you understand.
Jaggar waited with held breath. What would the beast do? At least Jaggar didn’t have to worry about the beast killing Trent. Trent could handle him. But would the beast survive a fight between them? Maybe not. Did it matter? Maybe not. Was the beast anything more than a useless waste of space, a source of pain and embarrassment and shame? Maybe not. Jaggar knew he could put himself in the corner with the beast. It had been him who killed that orderly at the Roosevelt, not the beast, and he would do it again without hesitation.
That had been his one true mate in that bed, whether he wanted to admit it or not, dared to test it or not, he knew on some very deep level that it was true. That male had caused her pain, on purpose, more than once. Jaggar had been able to scent that fact on both of them, in the pain and shame and fear that poured from her and the misplaced predatorial urges that welled up in the orderly at the sight of Jaggar and Harlan in her room, about to take her away.
The thought of his one true mate helpless and abused sent Jaggar into a tailspin, stirring his brain, inducing that same sense
of rage he’d felt when he’d seen her in that hospital bed, beautiful, but so fragile, seeming to barely exist, her body weak and pale and limp. He snarled from inside the beast, urged him to lash out at anyone and anything within reach. The beast snarled once, with him, and Trent snarled back, then moved deeper into the cave, away from the exit.
Jaggar closed his eyes and let himself go. He was too tired, exhausted, and ashamed to do anything but let the beast do what the beast would do. The beast moved quickly, not at Trent, but up the side of the cave, claws struggling for purchase over loose rocks and earth.
Beast, one more thing you have to know. Trent said. Harlan didn’t—
Rocks shifted under the beast’s feet, tumbling it half way down the sloped wall. Jaggar and the beast both growled and fought to stay where they were, fought not to fall all the way down as earth shifted under their feet. Trent grunted in their head.
The beast found his footing, then whirled around to look behind him. Trent was on the ground, covered in rocks and dirt, shaking his head, blood flowing from a slice on the very top of his head, the fur there hanging in a flap. Trent fought to his feet, dirt flowing off of him to the ground, and shook his head, growling. Blood flew.
Trent stood where he was, head down. A pup yelped from deep in the cave. The female growled back at Trent. Stay away.
Trent didn’t stay away. He turned toward the female instead, bleeding freely.
The beast didn’t watch. He turned and continued the climb out, uninterested. When he got to the top, he turned away from home, finally.
Good, Jaggar thought. They couldn’t go home, no matter what Trent threatened them with. He was glad the beast saw it the same way.
8 – Leilani talks to Jaggar
Leilani sat in her “spot” at the entrance to the Path of the Catamount. The night had not progressed. It had sat at twilight for hours.
She was lonely, until the catamount came and sat next to her. A delicate pink butterfly fluttered too close and the catamount snatched it out of the air, crunching down on it, eating it with lots of mlem-mlem noises, as her tongue tried to work the small bug to the back of her throat.
Leilani looked away.
The catamount spoke, her clear, strong voice startling Leilani as it always did, still coming from everywhere. Why not ask for anything?
Leilani didn’t answer, not wanting to admit why she still hadn’t asked for books or food or a bed.
The catamount waited. Leilani shook her head, not knowing what to say.
Instead of making her answer, the catamount spoke again, another question. If you could have any one thing, what would you most want?
Leilani shifted her stance on the ground. That was even a harder question to answer.
There is no right answer, Lele. Tell me what wells up inside you when I ask you what you most want.
Ok then, she’d asked for it. Leilani told her, trying to keep herself under control as she did. “The impossible. I want it all. I want to be healthy, I want to be happy, I want to be able to see. I want to have the man and the good life, but I want to choose the man and the life. I want to have purpose, but not strife. I don’t want to have to fight the demon, but I don’t want him to win, either. I want to be powerful, but I don’t want to have this…” She held up her hands and looked at them, turning them over, searching for some sign of what she could do in or under her skin and the lines of her body. She knew what she was doing was impossible, traveling in time, changing the past and the future, and yet she’d done it so many times. “I don’t want to have this power. I want to be normal, I want to be ordinary. I want to know who I am and I want to be brave and sure, like Eventine.” She took a deep breath. “I want to be happy,” she said again. She’d had many hours to think about exactly what she wanted, although she’d never thought she would be breathing those words to a soul.
Leilani looked at the catamount, expecting her to be scowling. But she wasn’t, she was sitting next to Leilani on the end of the path, sleek tail curled around her haunches, nodding away. Yes, the catamount said. Life brings many wants, all of them good. Wants bring purpose and purpose played out brings wants. It is never-ending and always good.
Leilani could only stare for a few moments. Finally, when she spoke she could only say one word. “Purpose?”
The catamount had not stopped nodding, but then she did. She turned to face Leilani. Life gives up the opportunity for many things, some we want, some we need. So tell me, if you could have one thing, right now, what would it be?
Leilani couldn’t speak. She only stared. It made no sense to her. How could any of that possibly be assured for her?
The catamount lowered to her belly on the trail and surveyed her domain. I can’t wrap happiness up with a bow and give it to you, she said, her tone somber. What one thing do you think would make you the happiest right now?
Leilani couldn’t even believe this was a real question, but she knew the answer. “To be able to see,” she whispered, not daring to hope that her eyes could be fixed, knowing the catamount understood that she meant, “be able to see when I’m in my body.” Of course she could see in the meadow. It was heaven, right?
Not heaven, the catamount growled, then got to her feet and loped away without a good-bye, which was her way.
Leilani stared after her, wondering if she’d said the wrong thing. Perhaps she should have said something about Jaggar. Her mate. She thought about it for a long time, then decided to believe the catamount’s statement that there was no right answer.
Did she really believe in such things as mates? She imagined it was like a “soul mate”, but on a much more intense scale. If she said yes to her mate, she would be bitten and claimed by him. But would she be loved by him? Would she be adored? Would she want to be bitten, claimed, loved, and adored by him? She didn’t even know the guy, so how could she possibly know that?
She frowned, staring off over the edge, her mind whirring. Something Eventine had once said to her played through her mind. You can talk to him from up here, you know. He might not know it’s you, but you can soothe him, heal him, and even communicate a little in his dreams.
Did she want to? It would be an invitation to him, of sorts, and she wasn’t sure if she was ready for that. She wasn’t sure if she wanted that.
She didn’t think, didn’t let herself make a decision. She called up what she knew of him (Jaggar) in her mind, which wasn’t much. He was big, broad through the chest, with a hard face. The times she’d seen him in the Ula, her eyes and her mind hadn’t been working well and she hadn’t noticed much about him. From the meadow, however, she’d seen he had a military-short haircut and a neat, dark beard, and an obvious division down the center of him. His skin was light on one side and dark on the other, which she’d never seen before. He was handsome, but in a cruel way, because she’d only seen him scowl, never smile.
And she never would see his smile, not from the Ula.
Leilani gasped at the thought. It was so easy to forget reality from inside the meadow. But reality was that she was probably completely blind. The shifters have doctors, she thought. They have a dragen, too, and his blood has healing powers. That’s what saved Eventine. Maybe the blood would help Leilani, too. Maybe.
Desperate for something else to think about, she cast about for something, anything. Family? No, she hadn’t seen or wanted to see her mother for years, she had no siblings, she had nothing but the nurses at the Roosevelt, and her roommates over the years. What about… her mate?
Jaggar, she thought. I want to see Jaggar. She didn’t know where he was and her sightline in the Ula only wavered on the forest at VF, it didn’t actually go anywhere and she did not see him. She saw a male, tall and dark, with short wavy hair, up on a ladder installing cameras in trees at one corner of the forest though, and she looked closer for a moment, scared for her sisters. But she could tell right away that he was a wolfen. She wasn’t sure how she knew, except she’d absorbed some of Eventine’s knowing about s
uch things when they’d shared Leilani’s body. Leilani watched him for a second, then turned back to her own issues.
Eventine had said Leilani could talk to Jaggar. She wanted to talk to Jaggar. She wasn’t sure how, so she spoke out loud, like he was sitting right there next to her, hoping her words would carry to him. “Jaggar, um, hi. It’s me, Leilani. We ah, we haven’t met yet, not um, not formally.” She trailed off, her words fading, thinking she sounded like a complete idiot. It was all so awkward like this. Mates weren’t supposed to be hard. She’d definitely gotten that impression from Eventine that finding your mate, talking to your mate, being with your mate, and mating were the most natural things in the world, that the feelings came up from deep inside and there was nothing you could do to stop it and why would you want to stop it anyway?
But maybe that was Eventine’s experience. Maybe that wasn’t how it was for everyone. Leilani thought about her… her sisters. Ella. Cerise. Dahlia. Heather. Rogue. Willow. She’d only watched Ella, Cerise, Dahlia, and Heather for any length of time because Willow was out of the country with her mate, and Rogue was usually only around at night. Leilani could imagine for them it might have been different, but even if there was awkwardness at times, the desire to connect with their mate still led them to find ways around it. To keep trying.
But this wasn’t even awkward. This was hard. Halting. Rough. Maybe someone was wrong about her and Jaggar. Maybe she was too broken to be paired with him. Maybe he’d already decided he didn’t want her. The thought made her feel like crying, but she held it inside. She would try again.