by Viola Rivard
“Aren't we only a couple of days away?” she asked.
“Yes, but we won't be returning yet.”
Harper drew her legs up onto the chair and tucked them beneath the pelt. “Where are we going?”
Shan flicked his wrist, as though brushing off her question.
“Did you eat your breakfast?” he asked.
“Not yet,” she grudgingly replied.
He instructed one of the females to get her something to eat, and then said, “Eat your breakfast and then have your measurements taken. We'll leave once you're ready.”
Shan settled down in the chair across from her, his gaze remote and fixed on the hearth. Insecurity pricked at Harper, like a thousand tiny needles. He had touched her face, carried her, and allowed her to cover herself with his pelt, but there was still a palpable distance between them.
She had breached his trust, and she had no idea how to fix things. In the past, whenever she'd fucked up this badly in a relationship, she'd just ended things and cut contact. With Shan, that wasn't going to be an option. She couldn't leave things as they were and she wasn't even sure she could leave Shan, period. She didn’t know what was happening between them, but it was something serious, something that couldn't be ended by a falling out. At least, she didn't think so.
Once her measurements had been taken and she'd forced down a passable amount of food, Harper saw the resident healer a final time. The bandages on her arm were changed and she was instructed to stay off her ankle for at least a week. Harper knew from experience that shifters tended to overestimate the amount of time it took humans to heal, so she mentally gave herself two days before she was back up and fully mobile.
Their departure was slow. As they were on their way out, the den's inhabitants were returning from a hunt and Shan stopped to talked to every single one of them. There were at least two dozen wolves and he seemed to know all of their names, as well as minor details about their lives. He introduced her to each of them, not as his mate-to-be, but simply as Harper. She told herself that this was a good thing, but each time she could feel the needles being driven deeper into her skin.
It was late morning when they arrived outside and Harper got her first look at the den. The entrance was situated at the base of a tall rock formation the shape of which reminded her of a lighthouse. Long fir trees with drooping branches were clustered in the immediate vicinity, blocking her view of what lay beyond the small clearing.
Several of the wolves had followed them outside and had gathered by the entrance to watch Shan take his wolf form. He set Harper down near to the others and then unwrapped his pelt from around her. Once he'd moved some distance away, the pelt fused to his skin and his body began to expand.
In the span of a minute, his body filled nearly the entire clearing. The completion of his shift was met with applause and cheers from the onlooking crowd. Harper felt just as excited, though not just from seeing a man take the form of a colossal wolf. As soon as he came fully into himself, the wolf's attention was fixed solely on Harper. He took a step towards her and lowered his head, at first sniffing her and then rubbing the side of his snout against her. Gentle though he was, he nearly knocked her over. After a moment of reacquainting himself with her, the wolf opened his mouth and closed it around her body.
Harper experienced a moment of panic that didn't quite subside when she realized that the wolf wasn't trying to eat her. With all the finesse and care of a mother alligator carrying her babies in her mouth, the wolf lifted Harper up and deposited her onto his back. She came down in his soft mane of fur and to the sound of more cheering. The wolf took another minute to make sure that she was secure and to lick her, and then they were departing.
As they traveled, the trees gave way to rolling fields for a time, and when they entered the forest again, the trees were mostly deciduous. The cold nights had turned the leaves to shades of red, orange, yellow, and gold, and Harper enjoyed taking it all in just as much as she enjoyed riding on Shan's back.
She had officially come to the conclusion that his wolf had a mind of its own, and it was a mind that seemed to hold Harper in pretty high regard. He made frequent stops to check on her and was prompt in helping her down when she told him she had to pee. At one point, he stopped just so that he could twist his big head around and nuzzle her. When he looked at her, there was no wall between them. It was the same raw affection Shan had held for her, before he'd found out she'd been deceiving him.
When they stopped, Harper half hoped that he would remain in his wolf form. It was late afternoon and she could easily picture herself cuddling up in the space between the wolf's legs and falling asleep swathed in his warmth and tenderness.
As soon as she was placed on the ground, he began to shift. With her back to him, she listened to the sounds of joints and bones popping as they reconfigured themselves into Shan's human form.
While he shifted, she looked around at the area where they'd stopped. She could see the opening of a rock shelter in the craggy hill in front of her, and beyond the trees to her left, sunlight reflecting off a large body of water.
She felt Shan behind her a moment before he lifted her up into his arms. The expression he regarded her with was neither affectionate nor hostile, but cool and bordering on indifference. She'd much rather he be angry.
“Are we staying here for the night?” she asked as he carried her towards the shelter.
It seemed a little strange that they were stopping so soon. It was getting late, but they'd only been traveling for a few hours and she doubted he was already tired enough to sleep.
“We're staying here for however long it takes for you to shift.”
Harper looked around again, her face scrunching. “You can't be serious. We don't even know if I can shift, and you want to waste days out here, away from your pack?”
His lips curved into a humorless smile. “We are going to stay here all winter, if that's what it takes.”