Legacy (Blackwater Pack Book 3)

by Hannah McBride

  That analogy was completely lost on me, and it must have shown.

  “My magic is linked to the earth,” Lulu said. “Romani, my people, are able to siphon the magic that already exists in nature and manipulate it, but there are limits. It’s not a free for all.”

  “Limits to your magic,” Tate emphasized.

  Another giggle bubbled past Lulu’s full mouth. The sound was sweet and airy. “Sure.”

  As fun as all the magic talk was, my mind was still caught up in the bomb Elias had dropped in my lap. And since the idea of going to Dimitri or Nikolai was less than ideal, maybe Lulu was my answer.

  “Is there a drug store or something around here?” I asked hesitantly, my eyes sliding back to the window and the small town.

  Tate’s astonishment over actual freaking magic vanished as she realized what I was talking about.

  Lulu frowned, her nose wrinkling. “There’s a pharmacy in town, yes, but odds are we have whatever you need on hand here.”

  “What if I didn’t want to ask anyone here for what I need?” I hedged, shifting nervously on my feet.

  Lulu’s head tilted to one side, a wave of glossy black curls spilling over her shoulder. “What’s going on?”

  I exchanged a look with Tate, who gave me a helpless, tiny shrug with a nod.

  “I need a pregnancy test,” I muttered, looking away. My eyes caught on the flames licking up the fireplace.

  Lulu stood up slowly, eyes wide. “Excuse me?”

  I exhaled hard, puffing my cheeks out. “I spoke with Elias, the doctor who used to visit Nikolai?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “I’m well aware of who that asshole is. He thinks it’s okay to fuck with the natural order of things to get his way. Also? He smells like bengay. It’s gross.”

  I blinked slowly. “Right. Well, he said something to me earlier, and … and I need to know if I’m pregnant.”

  Her lips thinned as she assessed me with almost clinical precision. “How far along do you think you are?”

  “Less than a week,” I replied, heat blooming on my cheeks as I remembered vividly all the ways and times I had been with Remy in such a small amount of time. Parts of me I had forgotten existed tingled to life at the memories of his hands and mouth on my skin.

  She shook her head with a small frown. “It’s too soon for a test, even by shifter standards. You’d need to wait at least two weeks and have a blood test to be sure.”

  Freaking awesome. A week of this hanging over my head.

  I didn’t hate the idea of a person that Remy and I created growing in me. I actually kind of loved the idea. Anything that came from the love we had for each other would be welcome, but I didn’t love the idea of bringing a baby into our current chaos.

  Plus, I selfishly wanted more time with just Remy before we had a family.

  “But, maybe I can help?” Lulu offered. She waved a hand at my stomach. “May I?”

  “Uh, sure,” I stammered, watching as she came closer.

  She stepped over to me with a small smile before reaching out and lifting up my shirt. I jumped at the contact when she splayed her hand flat against my lower stomach and closed her eyes.

  My wide eyes met Tate’s over her shoulder. This was beyond weird.

  “You’re not pregnant,” Lulu announced, opening her eyes and stepping back, her hand falling to her side.

  “I’m not?”

  “How can you be sure?” Tate chimed in.

  “I would be able to sense the soul of the baby even a few hours after conception,” she replied. “All I sense is you in there. No baby.”

  Relief hit me fast and hard, but there was the bitter taste of regret and disappointment mixed in as well.

  No, I didn’t want to have a baby right now, but it still made me sad for some inexplicable reason.

  “That’s a good thing, right, Skye?” Tate pressed, clearly reading the conflicted look I was giving.

  “Yeah,” I said quickly. Too quickly and too brightly. “It’s what I wanted to hear. Teenage pregnancy wasn’t high on my checklist of things to do before I went to college. It’s great news.”

  That sounded forced even to my own ears.

  Lulu frowned, the corners of her mouth tightening. “You’ll probably have another year before your first estrous cycle. If you want to get pregnant then, you probably will. Or, you know, use condoms if you don’t.”

  That caught my attention. My head swung around. “What did you say?”

  She gave me an encouraging smile. “Your body is about a year away from its first fertility cycle. Maybe a little less? It’s not an exact science.”

  “You can tell when that’s going to happen?” Tate whispered, a mixture of astonishment and horror on her face.

  Lulu looked mildly uncomfortable at the sudden attention. “Motherhood is the very essence of earth magic. It gives life. So, yes, I can tell when someone is pregnant or has the best chance to become so,” Lulu replied with a secret smile. “It’s a pretty nifty talent to have around this place.”

  “That’s still … wow,” I murmured, a hand laying over my flat stomach on instinct. There might not be a baby now but there could be a year from now.

  Holy crap, that was a dizzying thought.

  Why could I suddenly picture a little boy running around with Remy’s eyes and smile?

  I shook my head, trying to physically dislodge the illusion from my brain before it could take hold.

  “Ultimately, it’s your choice when you get pregnant,” Lulu added, going back and sitting down again. Her lips pressed together thoughtfully. “You're a second gen, right?”

  “A second what?” I asked, confused as hell.

  “Second generation bonded mate,” she spelled out with a quirky grin. “Your parents were bonded and your mate’s parents were bonded?”

  I nodded.

  “So, you’re a second generation bonded pair.” She said it like we should know what that meant. “You and your mate can always use protection so you don’t get pregnant. It’s not a once or twice shot like it is for most women. Bonded mates have a few more chances, but second gens have significantly more fertility cycles. I know a second gen pair that has eight kids.”

  “Eight?” Tate practically choked on the word. “That seems excessive.”

  Okay, a baby I could handle, but an entire soccer team of them? That was too much. Way too freaking much, and my sudden worry must have shown on my face.

  “Okay, it’s like this,” Lulu said with a chuckle as she leaned forward, “since each of you came from bonded parents, it means your bond is stronger. I’m guessing you guys have some extra bonus bonded perks? Like human telepathy or something? It varies from bond to bond.”

  “Memories,” I muttered. “We can see and feel each others’ memories.”

  But telepathy in human form sounded kind of cool, too.

  Lulu nodded. “Yup. That happens.”

  “And the aspects of our bond happened faster,” I commented, finally joining them in the sitting area. I toed off my shoes and pulled my legs up. “We were able to communicate immediately.”

  “Totally normal,” Lulu told me with another encouraging nod. “Your bodies already kind of having a mating blueprint from being born to bonded parents. Like a gene they pass on.”

  “Skye also could heal faster,” Tate mentioned. “She should have died last year from an accident, but she didn’t.”

  “Also normal.” Lulu grinned. “You’ll live longer, too. Most shifters live until they’re a hundred or so. Bonded pairs usually get an average of twenty years beyond that, but second generations last almost a hundred and fifty years, give or take a decade. They also have an average of ten to fifteen fertility cycles in their lifetime.”

  My jaw dropped open like it was on a hinge.

  “Also good news? Your aging rate is different, so you’ll look like you’re twenty when you’re sixty.” Lulu tossed a wink at me. “So you’ll be hot, like, forever. Also makes it easier when you
’re pushing out triplets when you’re fifty years old. That’s happened before.”

  “So, Remy and I are … normal?” I whispered the last word, ignoring the idea of having kids when I was fifty.

  Our bond had seemed abnormal to everyone else, especially Elias, who only seemed to want to study our connection.

  “Elias made it seem like you two were something totally new,” Tate said, voicing my thoughts.

  Lulu scoffed and rolled her eyes. “Like I said, that old man is clueless. Dimitri had a weird feeling about him from the start, so we kept things from him until we knew for sure. Guess Dima was right.”

  Her features twisted into a scowl suddenly. “Don’t tell him I ever said that.”

  “Elias was coming here to study Nikolai’s methods on helping shifters. Dimitri told me that you have a way to keep a shifter as a wolf for a month to help with that?” I asked her.

  “Whoa. A whole month as a wolf? Isn’t that extreme?” Tate gave me an incredulous look.

  “Kind of? Not really?” Lulu made a face and picked at a loose thread on her sweater. “I can give you the whole explanation, but honestly? Right now you both kind of look like I threw a toaster in your bathwater.” She made a face, scrunching up her nose in concern.

  “That actually sums up how I’m feeling,” Tate admitted, blinking fast.

  “Too much, too fast?” Lulu asked with a laugh, absently running a hand through her long hair. “Sorry. It’s just so normal for us. It’s been awhile since I had to explain this to anyone, and I forget that it can be overwhelming.”

  “It’s definitely a lot to take in,” I said slowly, willing my brain to finish processing all of that information she had just dumped on us.

  “I mean, I get it.” She made a face. “From what I’ve heard, American packs aren’t big on female empowerment or letting females set the tone, so it’s no wonder there’s barely any second gen pairs in your country.”

  I laughed woodenly. “Hell no. My last pack was proof of that. There wasn’t a single bonded couple in our pack. I didn’t even know what bonding was until I came to Blackwater. Everything in Long Mesa was forced.”

  “It’s hard to find a mate in those conditions,” Lulu commented. “Without those initial pairings, second gen bondings are a bit tougher since their mate is never in their pack. It took the pack here a long time to realize that.”

  My head snapped up. “What?”

  “Yeah, it’s this cosmic way of keeping packs from becoming too inbred or some shit. Nature keeps a balance.” Lulu explained, waving her hand. “First generation bonds usually happen within the same pack, but second gens almost always come from separate packs.”

  “Seriously?” Tate asked skeptically.

  “Yeah. I mean there’s always a few exceptions to the rule, but that’s not the norm,” she confirmed. “The first second gen pair came from this pack and one in Turkey a few hundred years ago. No one knew second gens were a thing until then.”

  “Remy and I are from different packs,” I murmured, absently rubbing my bottom lip. “The only reason we met was because I escaped my last pack.”

  “See? Here we’re used to it now that several times a year, packs will hold a Conclave. All unbonded second generation wolves in Europe, Asia, and Africa attend to see if they can find their mate.”

  “The Bachelor: Shifter Edition,” Tate remarked with a snort as she rolled her eyes.

  “Basically,” Lulu agreed with a grin. “There’s a giant gala before everyone shifts to see if they can find their mate. It’s actually kind of cool to watch them all interact, especially when they see their mate for the first time.”

  “And it happens that fast?” Tate’s eyebrows lifted.

  “Second gens are a love at first sight kind of deal,” Lulu answered, shrugging. “When you know, you know.”

  “We bonded the first night our wolves saw each other,” I said absently.

  “It’s why the annual Conclave is such a big deal.” Lulu gave me a warm smile that made her eyes sparkle. “Second gens find their mate immediately if there’s a match there. We’ve had less and less each year, but I wonder if that would change by adding American packs to the mix.”

  Tate’s head bobbed slowly in agreement. “Maybe.”

  “Remy and I have the same markings, but opposite,” I said suddenly, fixing my attention to Lulu, remembering the first moment I saw his wolf the night we bonded. “Is that normal?”

  “Not especially. But, I will say that a star or contrast marking on a solid colored wolf is usually indicative of the wolf’s standing in the pack. Alphas, in particular, have those kinds of markings.”

  “Stars,” I murmured. “We both have stars, but my coat is white with a black star and his is the opposite.”

  “You said he’s an Alpha, right?” Lulu waited for me to nod. “Then it makes sense you both have that kind of marking. Your father does. His coat is black with a white marking on the center of his chest.”

  “But I’m a girl,” I reminded her.

  Lulu’s brows rose dramatically. “And? The very first Alpha of this pack was a female. The Narodnaya pack has been led by more females than males. It’s why you’re so special, Skye. You're the first female born into the Dashkov line in over two hundred years. Two-hundred and twenty-six years, to be specific. By all accounts, you should be Alpha of this pack when the time comes. It’s your birthright.”

  My shoulders stiffened. “I have a pack already. I’m not looking to change that.”

  “Still, I would have loved to see the look on the faces of those ancient Council members when they found out you were an Alpha,” Tate added with a wicked grin that I couldn’t help but return.

  That quickly, the smile died on her lips and then mine.

  There was no Council because they were all dead in the same explosion that killed Luke.

  Tate looked away from me, her shoulders hunching slightly as she tried to protect herself from pain of the memory.

  Lulu watched us both before turning to me. “That’s your decision if you want to embrace your position here or walk away, but in this part of the world? We’re quite accustomed to female Alphas, bonded or not. Hell, most even come with their own harem if they aren’t bonded.”

  “Harem?” I repeated, my eyebrows shooting up.

  “A female will take multiple mates to essentially make up the perfect mate. Like if one guy is super strong, another is super smart, and another is good looking or something. They have a primal urge to take on as many people or souls as it will take to complete the mate they’re seeking. Kind of like a shifter buffet.”

  “But can a girl bond to more than one guy?” Tate asked quietly, her hazel eyes solemn as she rejoined the conversation. “Or would she only have one mate?”

  “No,” Lulu said quickly, shaking her head. “It happens often with twins since they share a soul. A female bonding with male twins, or triplets, isn’t uncommon. I’ve also seen a female bond to four unrelated males. That’s more rare, but it’s about the souls and the connection they form. Usually those bonds take years to develop. They’re trickier, and often people don’t want to put in the work that those bonds require, especially men.”

  “What do you mean?” I frowned.

  “Think of a bond as a circle,” Lulu said, dragging a finger through the air to make a circle. “Every person bonded has to be inside that circle. It can’t be a line where the female is in the middle with a male on either side. The males have to connect to form that circle. Meaning they have to have a connection with one another outside the one with the woman. That’s why it’s easier with twins since they already share a bond.”

  My mind turned that over. It made sense. It made a lot of sense.

  “Men can get territorial, especially over a woman. More times than not, they can’t get out of their own way to complete the circle so the bond never completes itself,” Lulu finished.

  Tate leaned back, silently contemplating that.

  �
�But you know that already,” Lulu added at the last minute, shrugging one shoulder as she watched Tate.

  “I do?” Tate asked, arching a brow.

  Lulu’s eyes narrowed and her head angled to the side as realization dawned. She winced. “You haven’t bonded to them yet.”

  Tate’s eyes went wide and round. I was pretty sure I was wearing the same expression.

  “I can sense it.” Lulu’s voice softened, almost apologetic. “The bond you share with … is it two men? It’s there. You’ll bond to them soon.”

  “How can you know that?” Tate whispered, her voice cracking with emotion.

  “I just can. It’s like an aura. Your soul is so deeply entwined with theirs, I can practically see it around you. They love each other as much as they love you?”

  Tate nodded, her throat working as she blinked back tears. “How soon is soon?”

  “I can’t say for sure when your bond will snap into place. It could be a few weeks or a couple of years, but you found your mates. There’s zero doubt in my mind from the waves you’re giving off,” Lulu told her, reaching out and squeezing her knee. “Hold onto that, Tate.”

  Tate blinked and tears fell, sliding down her cheeks as she swiped at them. Her eyes found mine. “I need a minute, okay?”

  I nodded as she got up and hurried across the room, through the joined bathroom. The door closed on her side a moment later.

  Lulu looked stricken. “Did I say something wrong?”

  “No,” I assured her quickly. “Tate’s just had a lot going on. I think this was news she needed to hear, but it’s also hard. Her dad just died, and … what you said would have made him really happy. He loved both of her boyfriends.”

  Her head dipped. “Shit. Talk about an emotional atomic bomb.”

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “Of course. Anything.” Lulu’s honesty was refreshing.

  “Does a female always bond to a male? Or multiple men?” I asked, thinking of Katy and Maren. Of the women Long Mesa had forced into hetero relationships.

  “No,” she replied swiftly. “Women are capable of bonding with other women, and men can bond to another man, or men. It’s not about gender; it’s about the soul connection.”