‘I hope you don’t mind,’ she said from the doorway, gesturing to her outfit – a pair of his boxer shorts and one of his white t shirts. ‘I didn’t bring a change of clothes.’
He put his book aside and came over to her. He wrapped his arms around her waist and lifted her clean off the floor. She giggled and looked down at him, hair falling around her face.
‘I think you look spectacular,’ he said and kissed her.
‘I sure don’t feel it,’ she said, down on the floor once more. ‘I must have caught a cold. Which means you’ll have it now, too. Sorry!’
‘Not me. I never get sick. It’s another one of the perks.’
‘Really? No stomach flu? No winter colds? Are you sure you want to end this so-called “curse”?’
She sank into one of the couches and he sat down next to her, chuckling.
‘Dinner will be ready in forty-five minutes,’ he said. ‘Roast chicken, roast potatoes, gravy… hopefully that’ll make you feel better.’
‘Now you’re talking.’
He pulled her close and they quietly cuddled for a few minutes. It was still raining outside and there was a chill in the air that suggested autumn was closer than they thought. Van took a blanket from the back of the couch and wrapped it around them.
‘I was joking just now about whether you really wanted to end your curse,’ she said after a while. ‘But I’ve been thinking about it seriously, too.’ She looked up at him. ‘Last night was absolutely incredible. I can’t even describe how amazing it was to run through the woods with you like that. What about that bear?! And the view over the lakes, the feeling of being all alone, like it was only the two of us in the world… all of it. You have this monthly access to a whole other existence. A world of freedom, beauty, the wild. People would kill for a chance to live like that. Are you really sure you want to leave it all behind?’
He considered this for a moment. ‘Like any situation, there are good and bad parts. Yes, it’s incredible to run and smell and hunt like a wolf, and in a way I feel blessed that I’ve had the chance to experience it. I don’t know if you’ve ever been on vacation alone, but if you have, you’ll know that it’s never as good as if you had gone with someone else. Now that I’ve found you, I can’t bear to do anything but grow old with you. Last night was beautiful because we shared it. Now I never want to be alone again. I’d rather live only a few more years with you than forever alone. Imagine if we could have forty or fifty years together. That’d be all I ever dreamed for.’
Sophia’s heart melted with his tender words.
‘Wolves are pack animals,’ he continued. ‘Perhaps if I lived within a group it’d be different. It feels wrong to be alone. As a man as well as a wolf.’
‘Have you ever found any others like you?’
‘Not around these parts. But there’s another place I go sometimes where werewolves are more common than men. They’ve travelled there from all over the world, often because they feel that urge to be part of the group structure. Once they’re there, they don’t tend to leave. Vampires, too. But it’s difficult; you can’t just wander in and join a pack. There are hierarchies, rules. It’s an unusual situation; usually in a wolf pack, there is a dominant male and a dominant female, but in a werewolf pack, it’s typically only males. This only makes all the fighting even more aggressive. Some wolves fight to the death in order to settle a dispute about pack position. I guess it goes back to that same old loathing I have of conflict. I’ve chosen the solitary life instead.’
Sophia shivered. ‘Did you just say there were vampires there? Are you serious?’
He nodded. ‘Deadly.’
She shook her head. ‘Sorry, but I’m trying to process the idea of a forest filled with werewolves as well as vampires. I’d only just gotten my head around the werewolf thing. Now you’re telling me that vampires exist, too. It’s a lot to take in. Where is this place?’
‘I’ll take you there next full moon. I have a feeling that’s where we need to go to unlock the secrets of the Pure Soul and find out what needs to be done to reverse the werewolf curse. We have to take a journey to get there. A long journey, but a short one at the same time.’
Sophia frowned. How mysterious.
He kissed her forehead tenderly.
‘I can’t quite believe I’ve actually found you,’ he said. Sophia couldn’t tell if he was changing the subject on purpose or not. ‘You know everything about me, and yet here you are, still here in my arms. I was terrified you would run away. I’d be devastated. I’ve also heard there are terrible repercussions if a werewolf finds his Pure Soul and then loses her again.’
Sophia wanted to ask what kind of terrible repercussions, but she held her question back. She’d already decided that she wasn’t running away from this adventure, so there was no point in knowing. Some people might feel motivated by the threat of something terrible, but she preferred to decide on a plan and go with it rather than dwell on “what-ifs”. She was convinced that she was Van’s Pure Soul, and now they needed to figure out what she had to do in order to save him.
She nestled her head into the nook underneath his chin and sighed with pleasure at the feeling of his warm chest on her cheek, and his arms around her.
‘You’re a gorgeous man,’ she thought aloud. ‘And you make a damn fine looking wolf, too. I just wanted to run my hands through your fur all night. And your eyes! They’re spectacular when you’re a man, but when you’re a wolf, it’s like they’re less guarded somehow. I felt like I could see straight through to your soul. It was that connection that woke up the adventurous spirit inside of me, and made me want to dive into this journey one hundred-percent.’
He squeezed her.
‘I’m so glad. Something changed in me last night, too. I felt calmer, less chaotic. When we made love, I wasn’t fearful of my desires taking over. It’s like you’re balancing me.’
‘I’m the one whose desires were taking over last night,’ Sophia said, blushing a little. ‘It was like my body took charge and I had no control over it anymore.’
‘It was beautiful,’ he said. ‘You’re beautiful.’
Sophia grinned into his shirt. She sniffed the air. ‘I hate to change the subject, but that chicken smells beautiful, too. Shall we eat?’
Chapter 15
Over the coming weeks, Sophia spent a lot of time with Van at Fir Lodge. She began to work from there, too, feeling a sense of calm and peace in the surroundings and with Van, one that she had never known before. Her writing flourished and she made regular trips to the office to update her editors with progress on her latest series, and review the illustrations of the last books prior to the print run. Everything ticked along smoothly, and during these weeks of the waxing, new, and waning moon, it was easy to imagine that they were just a regular couple enjoying the highs of a new relationship.
Except for one thing. Like any couple in the throes of new love, their bedroom sessions were frequent and passionate. But it wasn’t long before Sophia began to notice a pattern. The extreme lethargy she experienced after their first time happened again after the second time, and again each time after that. It was debilitating and worrying, and made her think twice about engaging in a bedroom tryst at all. She approached Van with her concerns one afternoon.
‘Have you noticed that I’m completely whacked out after we sleep together?’ she mused as they sat on the front steps on a sunny afternoon. Sophia was cautious with her tone – she suspected what was happening, but was conscious of how it would make Van feel. How was a guy supposed to react to the notion that he’s sucking the life out of his new lover? She’d finished work for the day, and Van was taking a break from a new painting he was working on in his garage studio. She wasn’t allowed to see it yet.
‘Sometimes it’s worse than others,’ she continued. ‘Sometimes I feel better after only a few hours, but then last week I slept through a whole day again.’
‘I had noticed, and you’re right, it’s strange,’ he a
dmitted. ‘At the same time as you’re experiencing your low, I feel totally invigorated. Do you think it’s connected? Am I somehow stealing your energy each time?’
She nodded. ‘That’s what I’ve been wondering. But is that even possible?’
‘At one time – a hundred and sixty years ago – I would’ve said no. But now I think nothing is impossible. Do you feel like you recover after you’ve rested, or are you getting progressively weaker?’
Sophia frowned. ‘I think I do, but I can’t be sure. What shall we do about it?’
‘The next full moon is in a week’s time. I think we should take that journey I was telling you about. We need to get some answers about how this Pure Soul thing works, and whether this phenomenon is part of it.’
Sophia felt excited and nervous at the same time. She’d wanted to ask about the forest that was filled with vampires and werewolves, but sensed that Van would tell her everything when the time was right.
‘How will we get there?’ she asked. ‘Shall we book some flights?’
He chuckled. ‘Not quite.’ He looked at her intently. ‘Remember Trinity Rock?’
‘Of course.’ Aside from their first visit in the moonlight, Sophia and Van had visited Trinity Rock twice more during day walks in the woods. Each time, Sophia felt in awe of it and certain that there was more to the rock than met the eye.
‘Well, as I think you’ve guessed, Trinity Rock is more than just a lump of stone. So much more. For a start, it’s a site of ancient significance to the Native American people. Many believe that human sacrifices were carried out there.’
The hairs on the back of Sophia’s neck stood on end. ‘Human sacrifice? I didn’t even know that happened in America.’
He nodded, apparently unperturbed by the notion. ‘A pit was found near Trinity Rock in the 1940s that contained twenty-three bodies, neatly arranged with their arms linked. All of them were decapitated.’
Sophia shuddered. ‘So what does this have to do with the werewolf forest?’ A thought suddenly occurred to her, one she wasn’t particularly fond of. ‘Are we in werewolf forest right now?’
‘No,’ he replied, smiling at her relieved face. ‘I’ll explain. Trinity Rock was important to the Native American tribes, but it’s hugely important to me, too. I discovered something quite incredible a few years back. I was at the rock one night during a full moon, when I was in wolf form. Something compelled me to climb to the top, something I’d never done because the surface is so smooth and not at all easy to climb. I scrabbled about for a bit before taking a run up and making it to the top. Up there, I found a deep indentation in the stone, large enough for a man to stand in up to his shins, or a wolf to sit in. Still following my instincts, I sat inside. Straight away, the trees began to blur and I knew something strange was happening. I was afraid, but at the same time I didn’t want to stop it. Everything went dark and there was this mind-blowing roaring in my ears. Then I passed out.’
‘Then what happened?’ Sophia asked, hanging off each word.
‘When I came to, I was lying at the foot of an enormous oak tree in a place I’d never been before. It was a forest, but I could tell by the trees and the lay of the land that I was a long way from home.’
‘So, Trinity Rock is some kind of portal into another forest?’
‘That’s right. Time isn’t altered through the portal, just place.’
‘Do you go to the same place each time?’
‘Yes. On that first time, I cautiously explored the area; then each month I’d go back and widen my explorations. It seemed like I was alone those first few visits, but now I know I was most certainly being watched. Apparently, the oak tree portal is linked to numerous sites all over the world. That’s why there are so many werewolves and vampires in that forest; they’re the ones who’ve decided to stay rather than return home. So far, I’ve only traveled between my forest and the oak tree forest; I don’t know if it’s possible to access other locations.’
‘Where in the world is the forest?’
‘It took me a while to figure that out. The oak tree is deep in the forest, and the distance I can travel each time I visit is limited. If I want to get home, I need to travel while the moon is still full; that’s the only time the portal is open. That gives me only a couple of days to explore – one day out and one day back, and that’s only if I don’t run into trouble. One month, I pushed hard, and right before I needed to turn back, I found a tiny village. The next month, I knew exactly where to go, so I made it there with time to look around and figure out where I was. It wasn’t easy to do that, mind you. There was only one store and I knew the attendant wouldn’t exactly be thrilled if a werewolf came through the door, looking to buy a newspaper or ask for directions. In the end, I scavenged an addressed letter and then looked up the name of the town when I got home. I was in a village in central Romania, the only civilization for miles, deep within an ancient, largely unexplored forest.’
‘Wow,’ Sophia said, truly stunned. ‘So once you knew where you were each month, how did you find out about the vampires and other werewolves?’
‘If I’d known how many pairs of eyes were probably on me during those first few explorations, I’d have been more cautious. But then I would never have found the village. On around the fourth or fifth month, I set out as usual, when all of a sudden a pack of wolves appeared. It was strange, because usually I’d smell another animal from a mile away, but for some reason my sense of smell is affected by travelling through the portal. It’s a major obstacle because so much of your perception as a wolf is based on scent. I’ve encountered other wolves before, here around the lodge, and I immediately presumed these were also regular wolves, albeit large ones. Then I locked eyes with the wolf at the front of the pack, and all of a sudden it was like someone was talking to me from right inside my head.’
‘Telepathy?’
‘That’s right. I learned that night that werewolves can communicate with other werewolves through their minds; provided eye contact is established, we can carry out whole conversations without making a sound. It’s quite remarkable. Anyway, I hadn’t been talking to the lead wolf long when we were ambushed by a group of vampires. Some old dispute I got caught up in. It was my first experience fighting a vampire; not my last, but I was a whole lot more careful after that.’
Sophia could tell that he was sparing her the details of that fight and others he’d been involved in to avoid frightening her. She appreciated that he already knew her well enough to do this.
She briskly changed the subject. ‘What’s the plan when we go through the rock?’
‘First we have to establish that you can go through,’ Van replied. ‘Then we’ve got someone to find; a werewolf known simply as The Pack Leader. I’m confident that he’ll be able to help us.’
‘Sounds simple enough,’ said Sophia hopefully.
Van looked a little less optimistic. ‘There’s plenty of ways it can go wrong. For a start, we’ll only be able to find him if he wants to be found. It may take more than one trip.’ He took her hands, suddenly serious. ‘I’m not going to lie; it’s going to be dangerous. I know firsthand how brutal fights between werewolves can be; let alone when vampires get involved. I’m protected by my resistance to injury, but you’re not. It worries me, leading you into danger like this.’ He sat up, suddenly decisive. ‘No, it’s too dangerous. I’ve made a decision, just now. I’ll go alone this month. I’ll come straight back and tell you everything I’ve found out.’
‘No!’ Sophia said loudly. ‘No,’ she repeated more softly. ‘I want to come with you, if the portal will let me. I don’t know why, but I’ve just got this feeling that we’ll both need to be there when we find the Pack Leader, like it’ll be a wasted trip if you go alone. Wouldn’t it be amazing if I was able to reverse the curse straight away? Also, what if we didn’t have forever to use the power of the Pure Soul? What if it was a limited time thing?’
‘I hadn’t thought of there being a time limit on it
. Even so, I wouldn’t forgive myself if anything happened to you.’
‘I want to go,’ Sophia said firmly. ‘I’m going.’
He looked at her with a hint of amusement on his face.
‘I didn’t know you were so strong willed and stubborn.’
She laughed.
‘Neither did I.’
Chapter 16
Despite her insistence, over the coming week Sophia felt almost sick with nerves. An old friend was in town and she’d planned to see a show with Jane and Willow, so she spent the first three nights of the week at her neglected apartment. It felt strange to be apart from Van as such a momentous occasion drew near. It was also weird to field her friends’ questions about her new man without telling the full truth. She’d always been transparent with her sister, in particular, and didn’t like keeping something as huge as this from her. But as it turned out, they were so busy with dinner and at the show that the moment didn’t arise to drop the bombshell that her boyfriend was actually a werewolf, and that in a couple of day’s time they’d be travelling through an ancient portal to a forest on the other side of the world. When she practiced the conversation in her head, she realized that it was so outrageous Jane would be just as likely to have her committed as wish her well on her journey. She decided to wait until there was more time and much more wine before sharing this story.
Curves & Alphas: A Paranormal Box Set: (BBW Paranormal Shape Shifter Romance) Page 21