They all froze at the disembodied chuckling coming from the trees around them. It wasn’t movie-villain cackling, more like an old lady laughing at children’s antics, kindly and indulgent, but ready to scold or spank if things got out of hand.
It chilled Rafe’s blood and warmed it at the same time. The disembodiedness was unnerving—a couple of lifetimes in Elissa and Jude’s world might be enough to get used to that kind of thing, though he doubted it—but the sound itself was sweet.
It evoked memories that couldn’t be his own, memories of a grandmother cuddling his infant self. Not his adoptive mother’s mother, who’d died before he was born, or his adoptive dad’s mom, who’d come out from Cape Cod to visit a few times a year, driving her sunflower yellow convertible, always smelling like oil paint and ocean, a baseball cap on her cropped iron gray head. This memory involved his baby hand grabbing a long, white braid. This memory smelled of woodsmoke and pine and sage and…something like Elissa, only more so.
Like magic.
Smells and sounds and colors all grew clearer.
Words in a language he didn’t understand filled his head, words he knew were names of what he saw around him. White pine. Cedar. Maple. Sky. Snow. Deer. Lovers. Family.
Something shattered inside him, but in a good way. It reminded him of going off Drozz, but with the suppressed senses hitting all at once instead of gradually. A door in his head, previously shut and locked, blew open—a strong gust of wind, clearing out cobwebs and rickety old barriers.
He knew what people meant when they talked about the sixth sense. He’d always had keen intuition, even on Drozz, and it had been stronger since he’d stopped taking it. But when Elissa talked about a seventh sense, about what she called witch-sight, he’d been confused. Her explanations had made it worse.
Now he got it, only he couldn’t make his mouth work to say he got it. He wanted to take her hand and let her feel it, but he couldn’t move. He wanted to holster his gun, but the signal wasn’t transmitting from his brain to his hand.
Everything in the universe was connected. Everything had magical energy. Everything spiraled back to the Powers. If he squinted just right, he could see it all.
Which would probably make his head explode.
Once, he’d had to deal with a kid they’d all thought was tripping on something. Turned out he was a genetic-sport witch in a normy family. One day his witch-sight turned on without warning.
They’d pulled him off the ledge before he’d jumped. Barely. For the first time, Rafe understood the poor bastard.
Rafe focused his new weird sense on the speaker, or rather on the fact he couldn’t see her. Someone or something moved among the trees. Rafe couldn’t make out the shape, but it was there, in a blurry not-
there way that suggested it would be invisible to anyone else. It felt strong and ancient, yet fresh as a sunny spring day.
“I can’t draw power here.” Elissa spoke quietly, but her voice cut through the silence. “Something’s blocking me. It’s not unfriendly, just protective. This land’s loved, and it loves back. It doesn’t want to give me any power until it’s sure I’m not dangerous.”
Rafe nodded. He sensed what she was talking about: a cool wall, and behind it, warmth and affection and the power of wilderness.
“Stand down,” she said to Rafe. Putting her hand on Jude’s back, she repeated her words, stroking the fur as if she hoped the touch would calm the lion-brain even if her words weren’t sinking in.
Rafe lowered his gun. Should holster it, he thought, but that was as far as he got. His brain was overwhelmed, all the circuits scrambled.
The figure in the trees stepped forward into sharp focus. Extremely sharp focus, like some kind of movie special effect, and the forest seemed to tilt toward it.
Not it. Her. Standing before them was an old woman dressed in what looked, to Rafe’s untutored eyes, to be traditional Native American clothes: a deerskin dress, leggings, white hair in long braids wrapped with leather strips on the end. She was tiny, not just wizened with age, although she was that as well, but an actual little person, a midget.
No, not that either. She might be tall for whatever she was, because she wasn’t human. Her features were subtly off, her eyes a solid brown like bark. She was alien, and yet, to Rafe’s heart, familiar.
To his new witch-sight, she glowed with power.
“Manitou,” Elissa breathed.
Glad she knew.
“Not precisely, but close enough.” The implied “for a white human” was strong, but not unkind. “Welcome to Canada, Dr. Donovan, Mr. Duclos. We’ve been expecting you.”
Elissa punched the lion’s shoulder until he transformed to his other shape.
The manitou shook her head and exclaimed with the unabashed glee of a woman old enough to be beyond shame, “You are a magnificent beast. I envy you, girl. The two-natured ones are awful on clothes, though, aren’t they? Here.”
She waved a hand idly and Jude was dressed in a male equivalent of her own outfit, deerskin trousers and shirt, soft boots. “I had a lot of practice with that spell, once upon a time,” she said, her voice softening.
She turned to Rafe. “And look at you, all grown up and so handsome and strong,” she said, her voice quavering like any old woman’s in the grip of strong emotion.
Her face turned misty, as if that was her equivalent for unshed tears.
Something clenched inside him then melted.
Once again, memories flooded him, only they couldn’t possibly be his. A grandmother. Parents. A home entirely different than the ordinary suburban Syracuse ranch house in which he’d grown up: a rustic log home scented by forests and sage and magic.
And then violence, the copper smell of blood and darkness.
He couldn’t possibly remember anything like that. He’d been adopted at six months.
But he did.
The old woman took a few steps toward him. “We’ve sought you for so long, but there was no way to reach you until your loves helped you find who you are.”
Rafe gaped. It almost made sense, but he still couldn’t believe it.
She turned back briefly to Jude and Elissa and smiled like a ray of sunlight through mist. “Thank you. You would be sheltered here in any case—my trees like you—but now you will be as family.”
Elissa reached out, found Jude’s hand. Jude tried to reach for Rafe, but Rafe still couldn’t unclench his fingers from his useless gun.
Rain began to fall, but only around them.
Warm rain. The nature-spirit’s tears.
His grandmother walked over to Rafe. She didn’t leave any footprints, not in the mud, not in the wet snow. She beamed at him.
Rafe thought he knew about love. His adoptive parents and sister loved him enough to accept he wasn’t even the same species they were. He loved them back and regretted he couldn’t figure out how to let them know all the wild stories about Rafe Benedict, rogue cop, weren’t true. He loved Elissa and Jude more than he’d ever known it was possible to love someone, let alone two people.
But he’d never seen love like what he saw in her face.
She smelled like home, even more than Elissa and Jude did.
His grandmother touched his hand and his gun dropped from his nerveless fingers into a puddle. She took his hand between her two smaller ones.
Rafe looked down at their intertwined fingers. Her hand was tiny and wrinkled, but the skin color and even the shape were similar.
Then he looked in her eyes. His brain reeled.
Before he could force the witch-sight shut, he saw a cougar wearing a necklace of shells and bear claws, decidedly a dual in animal form. An achingly young, tiny woman with a cougar’s eyes and a not-quite-human face. A handsome man, scarcely more than a boy, with Native American features similar to his own and a glow that reminded him of Elissa’s. Saw something that—Elissa would know better than he—might have been the double helix of shared DNA.
He knew what the old wo
man would say before she did. He still couldn’t quite believe it, but he knew.
“Raphael Abooksigun Three-Bloods. Welcome home, grandson.”
Three-Bloods.
So many things that hadn’t made sense did now. He wasn’t dual, or not entirely. He certainly wasn’t human, but he had human blood. Witch or shaman blood, he’d guess. He was…whatever his grandmother was. A nature being of some kind.
He was different even by Different standards. But looking into eyes that shifted from bark to spring leaf and glancing over at his lovers—Elissa wept openly and Jude was doing the manly stoic thing but he was close to losing it, too—Rafe knew that was fine.
He folded his grandmother into his arms.
The rain fell harder as they both cried.
But not for long. His grandmother patted him on the back, then pulled away to glance at Elissa and Jude, and then at him. “This is so exciting. As if having you come home at last isn’t enough, it’s been forever since we’ve had a three-way wedding.”
“We’re… Elissa and I are already married, ma’am,” Jude said in a painfully polite voice.
“You love my grandson, don’t you?”
She looked from one to the other and it was obvious she didn’t need their spoken yeses to know the truth. “I already know he loves you both. So you should all be married. Plain as mud. Complicating important things like love is for humans, not people like us.”
Rafe nodded slowly and let his newfound grandmother shunt him into his partners’ waiting arms. Not that he didn’t want to be there, but he’d have been too stunned to object in any case. Whatever his grandmother was, she was a force to be reckoned with.
They took him in, and he could feel their joy, their confusion and most of all the love radiating from them. He saw, for the first time, the cords connecting their spirits, the ones Elissa talked about.
A three-way wedding? In a heartbeat, if they’d have him.
“Let’s get you back to the longhouse. We’ve family for you to meet and a wedding to plan.” Grandmother started leading the way, then turned and grinned at them. “And a cradle to build, if I don’t miss my guess, though we won’t need that for…” She squinted at Elissa’s flat belly. “Probably eight months, although it depends on what species the baby is, and even I can’t see that yet. Might be something new altogether—you probably have some fae blood with that fiery hair, and who knows what that’ll do to the mix.”
Three voices spoke as one: “What?”
“It seems pretty simple. You’re having a baby, dear.”
“How? I’m human and they’re duals.” Elissa’s voice wavered.
Grandmother put a hand on Elissa’s head. Short though Elissa was, she had to stretch to do it. “I guess it’s complicated after all. Raphael is my grandson and the grandson of a two-natured cougar and the son of a shaman of the Algonquin nation. He’s three-bloods, able to give you children because I’m an earth spirit and we’re all about fertility. Now you do want this baby, the three of you, right?”
One by one, they nodded.
Grandmother grinned. “Wonderful! Come along, my dears. Must get you settled. No time to waste!”
About the Author
Teresa Noelle Roberts started writing stories in kindergarten and she hasn’t stopped yet. A prolific author of short erotica, she’s also a published poet and fantasy writer—but hot paranormals are her favorite.
When she’s not writing, Teresa enjoys belly dance, yoga, playing in the ocean, cooking, and growing more vegetables than she and her husband can possibly eat. She shares her home in southern Massachusetts with a handsome Leo who works in law enforcement and three immense housecats. In terms of pounds of meat purchased and volume of fur vacuumed up, it’s practically the same as living with a lion.
To learn more about Teresa Noelle Roberts, please visit www.teresanoelleroberts.com.
Giving in to the lure of passion could lead to disaster.
Lycan Tides
© 2009 Renee Wildes
Guardians of the Light, Book 3
Selkie princess Finora is all too familiar with betrayal. Betrayed by her curiosity, which led her from the sea. By her body, which yielded to a handsome human under the full moon. By the human, who hid her skin and took its location with him to his grave. After seven years of searching, she no longer believes in miracles.
Trystan is a werewolf on a mission to find and return dragons to his homeland. He follows a slim lead westward across an unfamiliar sea. Gravely wounded in a pirate attack, his ship foundered in a storm and sinking fast, he comes face to face with the most unexpected rescuers—Finora and her two half-human children.
Selkie and werewolf. Both creatures ruled by the moon. The attraction is instant, mutual, undeniable…and impossible. Trystan is destined to return to the mountains and Finora can’t leave the sea. Their only gift to each other is one night of searing passion—which could lead to the greatest betrayal of all…
Enjoy the following excerpt for Lycan Tides:
What had she gotten herself into? Finora crossed her arms to hide her shaking hands and watched Trystan’s broad back lead the way into The Mermaid Pub. The tightness in her womb, the wet heat betwixt her thighs, shocked her. The full moon was last night. The burning need should have been over. She wasn’t supposed to respond to a male out of time. Of course, four years was a long time to go without. ’Twas the selkie way to indulge that part of their natures. ’Twas the easiest way to trap them, as she’d learned to her sorrow.
Why now? Why him?
Her lips still tingled from his kiss. She quivered at the thought of sharing her bed tonight, of limbs entwined and hot skin sliding against hot skin. What was it about Trystan that made him impossible to resist? She should have put her foot down and left him in town to find his own way. Was it because he wasn’t human, either, but a fellow creature of the moon?
He was safer with her, away from eyes and questions. But was she safer with him? Ioain wasn’t the only one at risk for a broken heart. He’s not staying long. He has a mission to complete, then a family and home of his own to get back to. A family of his own… “I made a promise t’ someone back home, a promise t’ keep,” he’d stated.
“Trystan, wait.”
He turned at the doorway, a question in those piercing blue eyes.
Stars, those eyes…
“The someone back home whom you promised. Is it a woman? Are you married?”
“A woman? Aye. But a wife?” He shook his head and smiled. “Nay, lass. Were I bound t’ another, I’d no’ be stayin’ with ye an’ the littles. ’Tis no’ me way. Me folk back home have but one mate. There’s no one awaitin’ me return.”
One mate per male? In her world the strongest bulls got the most cows. A bull could have many cows in his household, but each cow answered to but one bull. A pang struck her. Acourse being stuck on land, with Bran gone, she’d had an uncommon spell of freedom. None to answer to, making her own decisions. A small rebellious part of her—the part that had caused her to disregard her sire’s warnings so long ago—reveled in that freedom. Even as she yearned for the sea itself, she dreaded going back to the harem, to being just one of many in her sire’s household, until he shipped her off to some other bull.
Why her heart flipped at Trystan’s unbound status she didn’t know. ’Twas of no consequence to her. “You’ve never taken a wife?”
His eyes twinkled. “I’ve been asked. But I’ve ne’er been tempted t’ say aye.”
Stop talking now. You’re making a fool of your— “What? You mean to tell me your women do the choosing? And they ask?” Finora knew her jaw was surely hanging down around her knees, but she couldn’t seem to close her mouth.
“The clans are each ruled by a headwoman. The women govern an’ each decides who they wish t’ take as a mate an’ father their bairns. Doth a mon piss her off enough, a lass is free t’ release him an’ choose another.”
“What do the men do?”
He
shrugged. “Whate’er we’re good at. We hunt, scout, craft, defend. Those o’ us that be guardians, though,” a shadow crossed his face, “are sworn t’ the clans as a whole. That be above any bond t’ one woman. There’s no’ many women who relish the thought o’ a mon that oft disappears for days, weeks or months at a time on clan business, or can be slain in battle.”
“Is that what this is?” Finora asked. “This quest of yours? Clan business?”
His eyes sobered. “Nay, lass. ’Twas a promise t’ a guardian queen, who wished t’ know if she be the last o’ her kind.”
She sensed a holding back in those words, like there was something he could have added but didn’t. One thing was clear to her, however: Trystan was an honorable man, with his own ironclad code of conduct. She could trust him. She moved around him, brushed against his arm as she opened the Mermaid’s door and went back inside.
The children sat at the table with Giles and Jan, Niadh and Storm sprawled at their feet. Ealga perched on the back of Braeca’s chair. Giles handed Trystan the half-finished whiskey Trystan had set down when he’d stepped outside for their talk. “Would you like something?” Giles asked Finora.
The whiskey was too tempting. She needed a clear head. “Just cider,” she replied. Tess unloaded her tray at the next table.
Giles waved Tess over and gave her Finora’s request.
Finora sat down in the empty chair betwixt her two children. “Were the scones good?”
Ioain nodded. “Can we bwing some home?”
“Please, Mama?” Braeca added, pleading in her big brown eyes.
Finora laughed. “Very well. Enough with those cow eyes, poppet!” When the other woman brought her the cider, she said, “Tess, I think I’ll need a dozen of those cranberry scones to take home with us.”
“I’ll wrap them now,” Tess replied.
Trystan held out a hand and Ealga returned to his shoulder. He slouched against the wall, savoring his drink. “They make this back home. Me uncle Cormag’s a master. His has a unique nutty flavor an’ his barrels’re stamped with an acorn.”
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