Callie's Guardian: White Tigers of Brigantia (Book 1)

by Lisa Daniels

  Something about Milev indeed just clicked for her.

  She still had a long way to go. She still needed to find a place for all her thoughts, but part of her worries could be laid to rest at Milev's feet. The werewolf illuminated the dark, sordid parts of her mangled soul, letting her breathe freely, without stress or panic or hatred for the first time.

  Wherever she went next in her life, where the carousel of her thoughts and emotions took her, she knew she wanted to share the ride with Milev.

  Maybe then, staying with someone with a light heart, boundless affection and a fresh perspective on life would finally lay her demons to rest.

  He added laughter to her soul that had never been there, formerly sucked dry by years of anger.

  He was the smile she was missing.

  The love she needed.

  The truth she never saw.

  She fell into a dreamless, content sleep, safe in his arms, and in the knowledge of a brighter, positive future.

  The End

  Ordri’s Mate

  Shifters of the Bulgarian Bloodline

  Book 7

  Prologue:

  When the white wolf came, death followed. His footprints sunk into the wet, rain-sloshed earth. Pink, blooded eyes gleamed in the darkness, under the light of a full moon, which hung huge, as if someone had roped it in closer to the earth.

  The darkness in his expression made her shudder and think of the oozing advance of lava, creeping over the land and tainting it with its smoldering touch. In his full glory, a white, muzzled snout and white-furred body pacing closer without any clothes to confine the hulking muscles that ripped out of him, he stopped in front of Ordri.

  His lips twitched upwards in a vicious, needle-toothed smile. His eyes dilated in lust, and his nostrils flared. Ordri shivered, feeling alone and vulnerable, even though she knew her alpha was nearby. The alpha she didn’t care about. The alpha she wanted to die.

  The scent of the newcomer sent the others from the house outside. In the biting wind, under a cold moon and the jagged sway of leaves, life stood still.

  Her alpha, her husband, still in his human clothes, pea-green eyes cautious, twitched in anger.

  “You have no right to look at my wife like that,” Timaeus snarled, already morphing as he spoke, russet fur popping out of his human chest. The snout formed with a crunch of bone.

  The newcomer paid Timaeus barely any attention at all. His eyes stayed on Ordri, taking in her dark hair, her pale, alabaster skin, the hint of freckles that covered her nose and cheeks. It was as if he was already undressing her with his gaze, capturing her naked and exposed under the weight of his desire, leaving her unsure whether to feel frightened or aroused.

  Something about those eyes suggested a superiority, a sublime confidence that he could do what he wanted, act how he pleased. Could this be the one? The challenger that would kill her husband?

  The strange desire made her guilty. It might be the werewolf’s way to crush the weak and claim the allegiance of others through force, but she still knew there was a terrible wrongness about the way she disregarded her husband, even though he had disregarded her years back, practically on their wedding night.

  The white wolf turned his gaze onto Timaeus, and those lips bristled with derision and scorn. “A weakling like you does not deserve a wolf like her. She is like a jewel, but she does not smell like freedom. She smells like she is kept indoors, saturated with the filth of your ugly stench. She smells of misery.”

  He faced Ordri once more. “I will free you from him.”

  Ordri’s heart hammered faster. Her husband wasn't perfect, and he got insanely jealous and paranoid over any attention to her. Funny he did that, when they never did anything together. When he chose to make his bed with other women, and keep her for the strength of her family name only. She was just as bad, really. She kept him for the convenience his wealth gave her.

  “Leave, or die.” Timaeus, fully morphed, stood protectively in front of Ordri. His two betas joined him, flanking, knowing they had the numbers to challenge the impudent wanderer who dropped into their midst.

  The wanderer, however, gave a dangerous smile and a low, rumbling chuckle. “I challenge you for her hand. To the death.”

  Ordri Gregorovitch shivered. The last challenge rite in western Bulgaria had been thirty years before.

  “You challenge for her hand? You plan to usurp my clan?” Timaeus shivered in rage, the whites of his eyes showing. “Die!”

  Timaeus fell upon the wanderer, and his two betas sought to join the fight.

  Ordri expected the foolish wanderer to lose. One against one was even, but scary odds. Three against one, with nothing but bare teeth and claws? He may as well have buried himself alive. Her husband planned to cheat – not that she could blame him. The white wolf was built like a demigod, taller than all the rest, with muscles screaming their power.

  She crouched by the porch where she had been seated, admiring the evening and the ponderous moon that hung so low in the sky. She had seen the white wolf, like an omen of death, hailing from the distant hills.

  The wanderer shrugged off the odds. He ripped and tore at his foes, moving with blinding ferocity, rippling with unbridled power, an aura of destruction around him. Ordri stared in horror as what should have been a rout by her dishonorable mate turned instead into a slaughter of said mate. Lloyd and Gary, his faithful henchmen, had no idea how to handle such explosive strength.

  The white wolf lunged at the throat of Lloyd, and in a fountain of hissing blood, tore out his throat with enormous jaws and startling power. He took advantage of Gary's hesitation to pounce on him, and in a brief tussle, clawed at Gary's face, slashing his throat in a red smile.

  Timaeus was left alone to deal with the threat, his advantage whittled down to nothing. Fear emanated from his craven skin, and the wanderer gave a loud, exhilarating laugh. He danced around Timaeus with mocking amusement, lunging in to nip him and duck back out, leaving the befuddled and enraged alpha unable to react in time, to do anything to the white wolf’s skill.

  “Put up a fight,” the wanderer said, dancing out of a swipe, a desperate lunge at his elusive, phantom foe. “Pretend like you actually give a damn and fight for your honor.”

  “Fuck... you,” Timaeus spat, before grabbing the white wolf in a headlock. The white wolf simply twisted out of the lock and latched his jaws onto Timaeus's stomach, snapping and snapping his teeth, digging into bubbling red innards.

  The alpha gave a distraught and agonized scream, and frantically scrabbled at the wanderer, who took advantage of the distraction to lock his jaws onto the alpha's throat and yank.

  In an explosion of gore, bone and mess, Timaeus flopped to the ground with his betas, body twitching before it fell still.

  The wanderer smiled with crimson smeared lips, and flecks of blood on his formerly pristine white fur.

  Under his scrutiny, Ordri gritted her teeth. Her alpha had been defeated. Annihilated. By all rights, this wolf could take her. He could claim her as mate, as per the custom of the rite of challenge.

  He strode up to Ordri, sniffing at her appreciatively. Pink eyes glimmered, and his clawed fingers brushed over her jacket.

  “You're mine,” he growled.

  Fear lanced Ordri's heart, along with a slither of grief and guilt. Grief for her dead husband, guilt that she had never loved him. Now he lay dead and bleeding upon the ground.

  All because this wanderer desired her. Because she desired her mate’s demise.

  “Mine,” he repeated softly. His fingers became tight and painful.

  Chapter One

  Hostile takeover. That was the best way to describe what the wanderer had done. Using the ancient rite of challenge, he'd infiltrated a minor clan at the base of the Bulgarian mountains, and used freakish strength and ferocity to decimate said members of that clan.

  Ordri felt little grief for her husband – he had been a fool, a nuisance that simply held onto her out of a sens
e of obligation to his family, though he likely would have divorced her two years before, if he didn't value her family name above all else. She'd accepted him because he wasn't bad-looking, and he at least left her alone when she wanted, though he also spent most of his spare time screwing human girls in the local brothel.

  So, no. She didn't miss him very much at all.

  This newcomer, however, added a huge wrench into the natural order of things.

  He examined his prize with the lazy glare of a predator, perfectly content with staying in his feral form.

  “Do you want to, you know, shift out of that form now?” she asked, folding her arms as she regarded the bloodied werewolf, who still hadn't bothered to wash himself down from the fight.

  “No.” He prowled towards her, white fur bristling, dark pink eyes glimmering. “I will claim my prize now.”

  Without any ceremony whatsoever, he spun her around, and tore at her clothes.

  What the actual fuck? She let out a dreadful snarl, fangs sprouting out of her mouth, hands lengthening into claws. “No. Fuck you.”

  The albino wolf growled in surprise when she turned on him and slashed at his face. He dodged the blow, bewilderment written over his wolfish features. “I won you. Why are you attacking me?”

  “Are you –” Ordri attempted to control her rising temper. “Are you stupid? Why the hell would I want to have sex with you like this?”

  The albino werewolf appeared massively baffled by her resistance. “I won you in combat. Isn’t this what is supposed to happen? You should be happy to have such a strong werewolf wanting to mate with you.” He stepped forwards again, and Ordri snapped at him, her mouth finally formed into a snout. Through her werewolf eyes, she saw colors in bright hues, and patterns of heat and aroma forming as shimmers at the edges of any living target she saw.

  “Fuck off! What century do you come from? This isn't the 1700s anymore.” She nipped at his hand. With an irritated exclamation, he lunged at her and pinned her against the living room wall of the former alpha's house. His teeth dripped blood on her neck as he placed his muzzle near her ear.

  “You shouldn’t be resisting so much.”

  At this, Ordri let out a derisive laugh, and brought her knee up to hit him directly between the legs. He let out a choking squeak of shock and pain, before collapsing to his knees.

  “First, you stink. You have blood all over you. If you want me to actually have sex with you, that's not the way to do it.” Ordri stood above him as he wheezed, clutching his exposed parts as he glared up at her. “Second, I'm not a fan of being fucked with in feral form. We don't have the human orgasm parts, so it's boring as shit. Third, you just killed my mate. Can you imagine I might be a little hostile towards you?” Yes, she didn't particularly care much for her dead mate, but it made a good point nonetheless.

  The wanderer examined her for a long moment, roping in the rage that had been building up behind his muzzle. “I don’t understand. You're mine by rights, now. Why do you resist? I can smell that you desire this.”

  Ordri flushed. Yes, his display of power did some interesting things to her blood, but that didn’t change the fact that he was being pushy and dumb. “I might be yours by right. Yes, my body might like you. Doesn't mean I'm yours by heart.” Ordri snapped her fingers, lamenting at the albino's woeful ignorance. “You have to earn that respect and love.”

  Slight desperation crossed his face, as he scrabbled for a point to make. “I’m fairly sure that if I want, I can take you right now and there's not a thing you can do about it. And you would enjoy it. Why bother putting up such a defense?”

  Ordri sighed in exasperation. She'd been impressed by the wanderer's strength and virility, less so by his backward attitude. “Perhaps there’s nothing I can do. Or perhaps there is. If you take me right now, you will make an enemy of me. And if you make an enemy of me, you make an enemy of my family, and their allies.”

  “I am a great warrior. Your threats mean nothing.”

  Oh, dear God. It's like talking to a retarded puppy.

  “Listen, jackass. I'm a Gregorovitch. If you threaten me, half of Bulgaria's werewolves will be on you and rip you apart before you can say 'oops.' So I suggest if you want to own this little part of the world, you learn to make nice with me and the people I associate with. Understand?”

  The werewolf stared blankly at her. Whatever he'd anticipated, or expected, he obviously never imagined that his so-called prize would bite back. Also, he seemed rather dazed by the name drop.

  “You're a Gregorovitch?”

  Now it was Ordri's turn to stare blankly at him. “You didn't know who I was before you attacked?”

  The wanderer shook his head, consternation now alight in his eyes. “No. I had intended to pick a small clan to take over. Not one affiliated with the noble families.”

  “Tough luck. You just fucked with them.” Ordri raised one eyebrow, finding secret amusement in his sudden panic. “Guess you bit off more than you could chew.”

  The werewolf sighed, now running his claws over his chest in agitation. “Well, fuck. That didn't quite work out as intended.”

  “Have you been living under a rock or something the past few years?”

  The wanderer ignored her, instead getting up and striding into the kitchen. “I'm going to have to go. I didn't intend for this to happen.”

  “What? You can't just come in here and kill everyone, then leave me to pick up the pieces. Are you stupid? Take responsibility.” Ordri followed him into the kitchen, just as he began pacing up and down.

  “What should I do then?” His panic seemed sincere. Behind that menace, that overwhelming power that emanated from his body, lingered a mind that seemed oddly... innocent. And possibly a bit delusional. What kind of rational mind would complete the ancient rite of challenge, claim his new female, only to realize that, oops, maybe it was a bad idea, sorry, goodbye?

  If this guy ends up having children, they better pray they get his body and not his brains.

  She repressed a wild instinct to laugh, controlling herself in the wake of his bafflement. “Look. I'll help with the whole Gregorovitch thing. Since you are now claiming territory, you need to go around to the adjacent clans to this one and, uh, explain things at some point. And we'll need dinner with my family and their closest allies to introduce you. It's been a while since anyone's killed someone around here for small territorial gain, so I bet my grandfather's gonna love you.”

  The albino continued to stare at her with that edge of panic, now that the impact of his casual choice to take over a Gregorovitch subsidiary clan had kicked in.

  “Might help if I know your name, too. I'm Ordri Gregorovitch.” Ordri melted back into her human form, revealing glimmering light brown hair, olive-toned skin, and a casual black top and jeans. She was showing off now – partly elated by the growing fact that she was free of her former marriage, free to pursue personal interests on a broader scale.

  Maybe she could work on wrapping this chunk of rock around her finger.

  The albino blinked. “Oh. Um. I'm Bronislaw. No last name.”

  No last name? Exiled from his last clan, it seems. Now Bronislaw, whom Ordri had already started addressing as Bron in her mind, finally began shifting out of his werewolf form.

  Into a handsome and alarmingly naked male with bright pink eyes. Silvery hair curled from his head in soft tufts, giving him a roguish appearance with features that looked as if they had been sculpted out of marble. Despite her opinion on his intellect, and his rather abrasive and befuddled attitude towards her, a further nugget of arousal deposited itself into her system. Damn, that was one good-looking man. Really packing something down there.

  Not that she was looking or anything.

  “Oh,” Ordri said, finally forming one syllable out of the many whirling through her mind. She should have expected that extreme nakedness, really, given that he was walking around with full fur and nothing over it, like some Jungle Book or Tarzan kid. Maybe
he really was some hippy wanderer from the edges of some unknown forest in God knows where. Who had, in a clueless manner, come blundering into a world he hadn't done much research on, pushing into Ordri's sphere of influence like a car crash. A naked and handsome hippy with certain parts that seemed larger than life dangling between his thighs. She tried hard not to stare at that for too long, or she'd be going nowhere fast.

  Down, girl.

  “My last clothes got torn up,” he said. “I had an altercation with a bear.”

  “Seriously?” Ordri this time couldn't control her laughter. Bron flinched at her amusement, unsure if she mocked him or found some other idea unbelievably hilarious.

  A slight pang of guilt stopped her mirth. She should be grieving for her husband, even if she didn't care for him or his betas. Any nodes of affection had long since dried up, leaving her bereft of anything warm or positive regarding Timaeus. It was like drifting in a cold tide. Her head might be above the water, she might be living and have nice and pretty things surrounding her, but that was it. Nothing else blessed her. If he died, as she'd suspected for a while, she just wouldn't care.

  Now that the event came to pass, the reality of her emotions and mindset became true. It made her wonder if there was something fundamentally wrong inside that inhibited her from feeling the emotions she expected she was meant to feel, other than lust and physical attraction.

  In all those years she'd been with him, she'd never said the words I love you once. Timaeus never said them either, never showed any hint he cared for her beyond making sure her needs were accommodated, in a bid to stop her complaining to her family about him. Sure, he'd been wealthy, living in a big house in the middle of nowhere, and she had the freedom of the forests, to visit her family at any time and tell them things were going okay. She was just alone most of the time. Alone in what should have been her own home.

  She believed her grandfather wouldn't understand why she'd refuse such a mutually beneficial marriage, even if Timaeus did have that small flaw of sleeping around with anything that breathed.