by Amelia Jade
Allix slowed as they neared the more manicured section of the park, cautioned by Luther’s hand coming up, telling her to stop.
Please be clear. Please be clear. Please be clear.
She just wanted to be safe.
Her hopes vanished as she heard Luther utter one word.
“Shit.”
“What is it?” she asked as quietly as she could, but he held up a hand sharply to silence her.
Allix flushed at the abrupt treatment, but fell silent. Now was not the time to tell him his manners could use some work. He was, after all, in the middle of trying to break her out of enemy territory. She could probably be talked into ignoring any little idiosyncrasies for the next little while. But when they got to safety, she would have a chat with him about expressing himself, and how to do so properly.
Like not shoving a stack of bills at a woman just after another man had done so? Allix stifled a giggle as she realized now that it all came down to him not being able to properly express himself. He didn’t necessarily pick up on some of the social queues that others did.
Her mind strayed back to the first time she’d walked up to the table, and the way he’d simply stared at her. Maybe he hadn’t been trying to be rude then either…
“Back,” he hissed at her, reaching behind him and pushing her back down the path they’d just come, until they could duck behind some thick pine trees that would obscure them.
“How bad?” she asked, rooting herself back in the present as she looked up at him, noting the concern he was trying not to show.
“It’s not good,” he admitted, his eyes focused elsewhere. “I count at least three. If Andrew was there, I wouldn’t hesitate, but I don’t know if he is.”
Allix wasn’t sure who Andrew was, but she assumed he was a friend.
“What do we do?”
Luther glanced away. “We set a rendezvous for the edge of the city if this is unworkable.”
“So we have to go all the way to the far side of the city?” she asked in disbelief. “We’ll never make it!”
“I know,” he agreed bitterly. “Which is why I’m trying to figure out a way to make this work. We moved quickly enough. I doubt they’ve thought to move reinforcements here just yet.”
“Why are they even there in the first place?” she asked, not understanding. “Seems like a strange place to just hang out.”
“Shifters enjoy forests,” he said. “If any holdouts from Cadia escaped, a place like this is where they would go if they couldn’t make it out of the city.”
Oh. Well that made more sense she supposed.
“So what now?” she asked again.
Luther’s eyes hardened as his head swiveled to look out into the park. “Now I do something stupid and hope like hell our ticket out of here is on the same page. Wait for my signal,” he told her.
“What? No!” she protested quietly, her fingers wrapping around his forearm and pulling on him. “You are not leaving me here!”
He paused, looking back at her. “I came here to get you to safety. And that’s what I’m going to do.”
“And you’re going to get yourself killed doing it!” she told him vehemently. “This is not the way to do things.”
The big shifter sighed, his jaw working as he clearly searched for words.
She glared up at him, reaching a hand up to touch his jaw, her skin dragging gently over the slight stubble there, as she forced him to keep meeting her eyes.
He stiffened at the contact, but didn’t break away.
“You don’t have to do this,” she said firmly. “We can find another way without always fighting.”
Luther shook his head. “That’s not how it works with my kind, Allix.” He squared up to her as she looked at him sourly. “I don’t like the killing either. It’s senseless and stupid. Shifters are already low in numbers. We shouldn’t be killing each other off—”
“Exactly!” she said, interrupting him. “So let’s find another way to do it.”
The big shifter placed a hand on top of hers, holding it to his face as he stared into her eyes. Looking up into his green orbs, Allix saw some of his walls drop away, revealing a hurt, and a disgust, that she hadn’t previously been allowed to see.
“There is no other way,” he said with a sad smile. “These shifters from Fenris, they’re not like most of we Cadians, Allix. They’re bad people.” He sighed. “How to explain this to you… it’s like, it’s like they’re from the slums, I guess. They’ve never known a better way of life, and if I were to try and show it to them, they’d think it was all a lie, a trap of some sort to screw them over.”
He shook his head, eyes flashing bright. “That’s a terrible analogy, and really insults some good people I’m sure. But hopefully it gets the point across. Fenris, it’s not a nice place. Not a good place. These people won’t listen.”
“I don’t like it,” she said bluntly.
“Neither do I,” he agreed, the sad smile returning.
“What if you get hurt?”
“I’ll heal.”
“What if I lose you?” She felt her eyes widen at the choice of words. “I mean, what if you get killed? What do I do?”
He flashed a smile at her, and his eyes bounced with delight. “I have no intentions of that.”
She rolled her eyes. “Of course not, you big dummy. But that doesn’t mean it won’t happen.”
“Listen, Allix. This is what I do, what I’m trained for. I’m better than these guys. Trust me.”
With that, he gave her hand a squeeze and pulled it from his face. Then, before she could resist, he kissed the back of it gently and then let go.
Allix opened her mouth to protest, but Luther was already moving away, his speed increasing with every stride as he broke out into a run.
You come back in one piece! She almost shouted the words after him, instead of sending them out in a mental burst, but any noise louder than their whispers threatened to alert his foes, and she didn’t want to do that.
Instead, she crept through the brush as silently as she could.
She needed to see this.
Chapter Eight
Luther
Stupid. Idiot. Moron.
He’d talked things up with Allix like he was some sort of badass. Which he was. After all, not everyone became a Green Bearet, and even fewer became Guardians.
But these shifters were just as highly trained. All of them were likely Wards of Fenris, their equivalent to Guardians. Luther might have had better training, but he was willing to bet at least one of them had a lot of experience on him.
Three versus one.
Unless Andrew was nearby. If his gryphon ride hadn’t abandoned him, the fight would work easily in their favor. If the other man decided that he was done helping out, then Luther was going to be in a world of hurt.
And so was Allix.
His bear surged to the surface at the thought of her being captured—or worse—by someone from Fenris. Luther allowed it, harnessing the rage and protective instinct, using it to hone his senses, to pump his system full of superhuman strength. He would resist shifting if he could.
The first shifter heard him coming a step too late. Luther was already in mid-air, fist cocked and aimed at the shifter’s head when he turned.
The enemy went down in a heap, but rolled to his feet almost immediately, coming up into a ready stance before Luther could take full advantage of his surprise.
Damn, he’s good.
“Over here boys!” the man shouted.
Really good.
Luther had hoped the other shifter might forget to alert his friends, or that he could knock him out of the fight with the first blow.
Come on, Andrew. Take notice. Get in here.
He had no idea if the gryphon had shifted and concealed himself somewhere in the park, or was still circling high overhead.
Shouts from the park told him the other two shifters were on their way. Luther needed to deal with this one, and
fast.
He waded in, blocking a left, but taking a right to the ribs as the first strike turned out to be a feint. The blow rocked him back, and the other shifter swept his feet out from under him, dumping Luther in the snow.
“Fuck this,” he muttered.
“You’re dead,” the other shifter said with a grin and closed in.
“There’s snow way,” Luther replied and hurled a handful of snow into the face of his opponent.
The shifter threw up his hands, turning his head instinctively. Luther’s foot shot out, connecting with the right kneecap. The leg held for a split second, but the force of his kick was too great. The man screamed as the knee bent backward, the joint reversing itself thanks to Luther.
Rising to his feet, Luther loomed over his wounded foe, who was hopping backward on one foot.
It was too easy. He tackled the man and they went down, with Luther on top. He grabbed the shifter’s left arm, ignoring the blows raining down on him from the right, and with both hands wrenched the hand back at the wrist.
Ligaments and tendons ripped, and the hand suddenly went limp. Another scream tore from the Fenris shifter’s mouth, but it was silenced as Luther drove an elbow into his temple. The other shifter was down and out, and it was a simple case after that to snap his neck.
Rising to his feet, Luther spun, looking for the other two shifters he knew to be coming at him.
He saw the first, a shorter blond-haired shifter in a bright red jacket. The shifter was slowing down though, an evil grin on his face.
Luther frowned. Why would he be slowing down…
The other shifter glanced past Luther.
Oh fuck…
Spinning, Luther’s eyes went wide as he saw a gigantic polar bear charging across the snow at him.
Not good. Not good at all. Polar bears were nasty customers, and the only shifters bigger than his mountain grizzly.
Luther snarled and charged. He wouldn’t have time to reorient himself if he shifted, so he had to put some space between him and the hard-charging beast. Three steps. Two. He leapt—
And fell into the snow.
“What the hell?” he asked, spinning around as he heard a pained noise echo through the park.
The polar bear, once so intent on ripping him limb from limb, was now engaged in a vicious battle for its life with a massive gryphon. And it was losing. Badly.
Andrew had come.
Luther growled and leapt to his feet, not wasting any time as he charged after the last shifter. The smaller blond man turned and began to run as he realized the odds had abruptly turned against him.
Feeling pain in his ribs, Luther pulled up short, letting the last shifter get away.
He motioned to where he knew Allix was hiding. “Come on!” he shouted, just as the gryphon’s razor-sharp beak darted in and ripped the throat from the polar bear in a shower of blood.
Luther hated for her to see all this, but they needed to go, and now. Others would be coming, and it was likely that Fenris had sent more than just bears to Cloud Lake by now. If they had a gryphon of their own—or worse, a dragon—things were about to get very hairy indeed.
Allix came charging from the bush, and he intercepted her halfway to Andrew.
They heard shouts from the street that bordered the park on the far side, followed by the angry roar of more bears as the rules for shifting in human territory were ignored yet again.
Luther firmly ignored the fact that Andrew was here in his gryphon form.
“Can you take both of us?” he asked the gryphon as he hoisted Allix up onto the big animal’s back.
Andrew just looked at him with his beady eyes and shook his wings, settling any ruffled feathers.
“Okay, I’ll take that as I shouldn’t have even asked.”
The gryphon tossed its head, as if to say “Exactly.”
Luther climbed on behind Allix and held her tight.
“Go!” he shouted, and they were off, leaving the ground seconds before the first angry bear reached them, growling and roaring at them as they soared into the sky.
He’d done it. Allix was safe.
***
When they arrived back at Base Camp, he thanked Andrew profusely. The gryphon had shrugged it off. The opportunity to beat up on some other shifters was always welcome, he’d said. Luther wasn’t sure how to interpret that, so he’d just nodded and escorted Allix to his room.
The colonel had been busy, and said he would summon him when he had a moment. For now, he got Allix inside and fed. After that, the two of them had collapsed into the chairs in his room and waited.
“So what happens to me now?” Allix asked abruptly, breaking the silence that had descended over them.
“What do you mean?” he asked, unsure of her meaning. Did she think that they were going to do something to her?
“Well, I mean, I can’t go back to Cloud Lake. I’m here now at a secret shifter training base. Are you really going to let me go?”
Luther rocked back slightly. “I hadn’t thought about it.”
Allix frowned. “That’s not very reassuring to me,” she said, her eyes darting from him to the door.
“I don’t understand,” he said, noting the look but unsure what was going through her mind.
“Luther,” she said slowly. “Am I a prisoner now?”
His eyebrows rose in shock. “Absolutely not!” he said, hurt by the accusation.
“So I’m free to go?”
“After we talk to the colonel. He will want to talk about what happened. But after that, of course. I can’t return you to Cloud Lake, of course. But you’ll be free to go wherever you like.”
Luther carefully did not say his true feelings, that he wished she would stay there, with him. That he didn’t want her to leave his side.
It made no sense, even now as they sat together in his quarters. But the pull that he felt to this woman was so strong it defied belief.
“Okay,” she said in relief, sitting back into the chair, visibly relaxing. “So, what is this place?”
“This is Base Camp,” he said, hesitating, unsure of how much to reveal. “This is my home.”
Was it still his home? It had been, but that was before he’d been kicked out. The colonel had reactivated him, but Luther wasn’t completely sure if he felt at home here or not. There was a lot to process there.
“This is where bears from Cadia are trained.”
Allix nodded. “I see. So, you, um, train here?”
He considered just saying yes, but then shrugged. To hell with it. After all she’d been through, Allix deserved some modicum of truth.
“I trained here, yes. I graduated from the program. Now I train others.”
“Is that why you’re a captain?”
“Yes,” he said, meeting her hazel eyes. That caused her to smile at him. He returned the look, forcing down the butterflies in his stomach. She was so beautiful!
“So, Captain Luther Klein,” she said, standing up from the chair and looking around his admittedly sparse quarters. “Not much in here to tell me about you.”
He looked around. There was a picture of him at his graduation ceremony on the nightstand next to the expertly made bed. On the wall was a plaque, a gold-embossed bear with the words Analyze Twice, Fight Once, the motto of the Green Bearets.
Other than that, he had very little in the way of personal effects. It begged the question: who was he?
“What would you like to know?” he asked instead, his eyes traveling down her body as she bent over to examine his picture.
“Who are you? What’s your story?”
Well that was easy enough.
“My name is Luther Klein. I’m a bear shifter, born to two bear shifters thirty-three odd years ago. Ever since I was little, I knew I wanted to be a Guardian, to protect my homeland. Neither of my parents were, but they approved of my desires, and helped me along the path. I trained all my life to be invited to Base Camp. Then I trained here for six years, until
finally six months ago I was appointed a Guardian. Then less than a month ago I was tossed from the service because the politicians decided we had too many Guardians.”
He heard the bitterness in his voice as he finished telling his tale.
“Well, that’s pretty succinct,” Allix replied.
He rose from his seat and joined her, where she was still looking at the picture of him. Luther eyed it, the big, happy grin on his face. Those had been different times. Simpler times. He’d known back then what was going to become of him, though he hadn’t expected it to take four more years before he achieved his dream.
“I guess I’m still looking for that one big tale to tell,” he said, surprising himself at the words and the depth of emotion contained within them.
Allix looked at him inquisitively, and he tried not to stare at her. Her hair looked more red than brown in the light of his room as it fell down in front of her shoulders, curling around the base of her neck, covering the tantalizing bits of smooth skin he’d seen there.
Her ears were pierced, he noticed. Gleaming little diamond studs sparkled. Her little upturned nose and easily dimpled cheeks were still a little flushed from the ride back to Base Camp, but her lips, thick, plump and pink were what was really calling him.
No. Behave yourself. Yes, she’s extremely attractive. But you can’t. You don’t even know her.
“Well, sometimes those stories sneak up on you,” Allix said at last, licking her lips as she continued to meet his gaze.
“So I’ve been told. They happen at the most random, and sometimes inopportune times.”
She nodded jerkily, and he felt his heart thud, threatening to explode as his nerves got the best of him. He was rarely flustered in battle, but this human woman, with her long legs and thick thighs, was leaving him rattled simply by being close to him.
The distance between them had closed, he noted, as they swayed back and forth.
“What about you?” he asked, his voice dropping an octave even as it lowered in volume as well. “Who are you?”
“My name is Allix Rose and I’m a nomad.”