A wolverine with a painful past collides with an elf who glows like the full moon. Her rage meets his calm.
Sera has been trying to make ends meet since her family kicked her out. After years away from home in a fey menagerie, she had dreamed of being normal again. It wasn’t possible, and she lived a subsistence life until a strange woman named Pansy arrived in her field.
After negotiations, Sera is sent to the Crossroads where her term begins with a full body makeover that turns into an evening of dancing with a man who makes her heart light for the first time in years.
After the good night comes a night of flashbacks and she suddenly remembers what she is.
Atter has been warned that Serapha has her issues, but he doesn’t want to skirt around them, he wants to help her through her pain and to the other side, with him.
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Snarling at the Moon
Copyright © 2015 Zenina Masters
ISBN: 978-1-4874-0219-8
Cover art by Carmen Waters
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.
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Snarling at the Moon
Shifting Crossroads Book 25
By
Zenina Masters
Chapter One
Serapha glided through the snow on her skis, one step after another took her further and further from her home. When she had made her trail into the forest clearing that would glow with green during the summer, she removed her skis, stripped off her clothing, stood in the centre under the wide and all-encompassing moon and she screamed.
When her voice was raw, she transformed to her beast and snarled and thrashed her body in the snow.
The release of sound was all she was allowed since her return to her family, but since they chose to put her out because of her exposure to the enemy, she only had the wilderness to hide in.
All local predators were gone. She had scared them off weeks ago. With care, she marked the interior of the clearing with her claws and was getting ready to return to human when there was a blast of light in the centre of her territory.
Magic. It was strange, it tasted nearly fey, but it was also shifter. With a snarl, Serapha began to run toward the woman standing in the middle of the snowy glade.
“Holy shit!” The woman yelped and magic propelled her up and into a tree.
“Serapha Deemar? I am here with a message from the Crossroads, and it would be really great if I could talk to you, human to human.”
Serapha snorted and crouched for a moment before shifting into her normal form. She put her hands on her hips and cocked her head. “What is it?”
“Uh, aren’t you cold?”
Serapha chuckled. “No. You can come down now. Despite the teeth, I don’t bite.”
“Right. Well, my name is Pansy, and I have been sent with an invitation for you?”
Serapha headed to her neat pile of clothing and started getting dressed. “You seem unsure.”
“I am not sure that I have the right person. I mean, you have the marks of a bladed collar around your neck.”
“I was held in a menagerie, yes. Why, is that a problem?”
Pansy rubbed the back of her neck. “I was told you have been declared unmatchable by the Crossroads for a shifter mate.”
“Right. What other options are there?”
“That is where this gets a little weird. Certain fey who are amenable to a shifter mate have been invited to the Crossroads. We are inviting the males first...just in case.”
Serapha chuckled. “Interesting concept, but I have neither the funds nor the family resources to donate to a trip to the Crossroads. My clan has kicked me out for being weak enough to be captured and being stuck with my teeth pointed and visible in my human form.”
Pansy nodded and swallowed. “None of that is necessary. You have been called up because you have been deemed a good match for someone with non-human magic that isn’t a shifter.”
“So a fey.”
“Yes, do you hate the male fey very much for what they did to you?”
Serapha chuckled softly. “Not hardly. It was a male fey who leaked the information to the Guild that allowed us to be rescued. I was being held in the menagerie of one of their females.”
She finished putting on her clothes and turned to her ski boots. “Can you meet me at my cabin? It is five kilometres that way.” She pointed.
“Uh, I suppose. How are you getting there?”
“The same way I got out here. I am going to ski.” With a grimace, Sera snapped her skis into place, gripped her poles and glided silently into the forest.
She used the time to mull over the offer as she shifted her weight and propelled herself until the trees were a familiar blur. A fey. One of the fair folk. She remembered the woman with the scarlet hair and powder-blue skin with the dark blue eyes. That woman was very fair, and if Serapha ever saw her outside in the human world, she was going to pull her tongue out through her jaw. Lady Norviss escaped the raid that freed her menagerie but that wasn’t going to last for long.
There were hunters seeking out the cruel bitch, and when they found her, they were going to call Serapha, or she would know why. She needed to be there when they brought that bitch down.
A mate. Huh. She had given up on the idea of a mate when she hadn’t even been able to make an appointment for the Crossroads the first time. She hadn’t even had the fangs at that time. Her temperament had been enough to keep all thought of her being a good companion and proper partner from being considered a viable outcome. They had emotionally profiled her.
She couldn’t help her upbringing among the wolverine clan. They prided personal strength over every other personality trait aside from aggression. Serapha had always been fit, but never strong, though she was exceptionally aggressive when the moment called for it. Today, she was on her best behaviour and she had already completed her full moon ritual. She was calm and ready to hear what was about to be laid out before her.
It was a good thing she was calm. Pansy was a nervous wreck, but she did make a lovely pot of tea.
The cheery potbellied stove that provided the heat she needed required additional fuel, and as soon as she got into the interior of her space, she removed her ski boots and loaded the stove with chopped wood.
Pansy was perched on one of the counter stools and monitoring the teapot.
“Thank you for making tea. I forget about the niceties sometimes.”
Pansy nodded. “You are entitled. How long were you held?”
Serapha rubbed her exceptionally sharp teeth with her fingers. “I believe it was two years. Fortunately for me, most humans around here just think I
went through a gothic phase and got my teeth capped in the process. They are indulgent with a factor that makes me a sub-creature to my family.”
“I see. I really do. I was embedded with fey magic before I was born. Until this year, it meant a completely different response when I went anywhere in the shifter community. Now, I am sought out for my skills, but for you, well, I had to go to you.”
Serapha snorted. “I still don’t see why. I am not really fit for company, let alone a mate.”
“You are ideal for a member of the fey community then. They live so long that they enjoy being shaken out of their complacency now and then.”
“How does that work? Do they just remarry over and over?”
“No. For this to work, the binding has to be between a meeting of equals. They blend your magic with his, and his with yours. The result is something new. A shifting fey and a magic-using shifter. The idea is that a child with the blend of powers will be able to have more children than the fey can have on their own. They are fading from our world; their magic is going wild and trickling back into the earth with each death.”
“So, the fey are an endangered species?”
“Yes. If they died more frequently, it would be more apparent. There are less and less births each year and nowhere near enough to replenish the lost. They are indeed an endangered species.”
Serapha inhaled the wild berry smell of her tea. “How long do I have to consider it?”
“I was hoping that I could send you tonight?”
Serapha coughed. “Tonight? Why so soon?”
“Because the fey are using seers and the best candidates for you are being sent in the next three days.”
Serapha sat down and stared at the stranger in her tiny home. “Why?”
Pansy made a happy rumble as she nibbled at one of the cookies she had liberated while she was waiting.
“They are eager to get this project underway. There has been one excellent match and a few near hits. They didn’t manage a solid connection, so we are trying for the next most likely powerful female that their seers have seen.”
Serapha grabbed a cookie from the chipped plate. “So, a bitchy wolverine is the best you could do?”
Pansy coughed again. “They picked you, I just found you. My husband is a honey badger, so I know all about living around bitchy members of the weasel family.”
Serapha winced. “Ouch. Well, I commend you for your evident patience, but I am still not sure about this.”
Pansy looked around deliberately. “I don’t see anything here keeping you right now.”
“But if I go, when I come back, I will have to prime the water again. That is annoying.”
“Nice try, keep going.”
“Uh...I don’t have the money?”
“The fey are paying.”
“I don’t want to stay there indefinitely.”
“You can ask them for a four-week limit. Everything is paid for, from your purchases to your stay at one of the bed and breakfasts, as well as all your food. You don’t need to bring anything. Just you. Think of it as a winter vacation.”
Serapha wrinkled her nose and sighed. “Well, I was just howling for change, so it would be hypocritical of me to ignore your offer. One month?”
“Four weeks. Give it a chance. By the way, it smells good in here. That isn’t something I am used to with wolverines.”
Serapha took the dishes and washed them, drying them before she answered. “They pulled my scent glands. I go through the motions, but I am no longer one of my own kind. They can’t sense me, so to them, I don’t exist. The constant fangs are amusing; the lack of scent got me exiled.”
“Oh.” It was Pansy’s last word for a while.
When Serapha had cleared up and cold air was taking over the cabin—the fire was out and all was silent—she nodded to her ride. “I can go now.”
Pansy led her outside and watched her lock up. “It is safer out here. Trust me. The first time I went through the Crossroads portal, I blew the hell out of the building.”
Serapha smiled weakly. “Oh good. How many folks have you sent to the Crossroads since?”
“You will be the first, but I think I remember the way.” Pansy winked and lifted her hands as if there was rising music only she could hear.
Serapha felt the familiar wrap of shifter magic with the taste of something sweeter before the light wrapped around her and threw her away from the world and off to the Crossroads.
Chapter Two
Serapha staggered as she landed. Three elves turned to her with surprise in their gazes.
“Um, excuse me. Pansy sent me.” She flexed her hands and her claws thickened as no one spoke.
A woman with snow-white hair and an exasperated manner came to her. “I am sorry. We were not warned that you were arriving, and the fey take more briefing than the shifters do. They are not used to listening to instinct. It messes with their pretty faces.”
The woman’s tone was so low that only Serapha heard it.
She chuckled.
“My name is Teal and I am guessing you are Serapha?”
“I am.”
“Please, come this way and we will do all the necessary paperwork.”
Serapha chuckled and let the woman lead her by the arm. Based on scent, her guide was a swan. Her inner beast perked up. It liked to eat swan.
She throttled back her impulses and focused on being human for a while.
“Whatever you are thinking would be a very bad idea. We were not chosen for our charm. My mate, Tony, and myself were selected because we are the primes of our species. The avatars of the bird spirits. Ancient gods in living flesh.”
Serapha cleared her throat. “Was I drooling?”
“No, but from your file, you have been living wild. The more we let our beasts out, the harder it is to remember societal niceties.”
“Fine. You have a point. I will try and behave.”
Teal grinned, and they sat down to work on details of the agreement for the fey match. Serapha mentioned the four-week limit and Teal wrote it in.
When the contract was done, Serapha signed it, got her charm to pay for goods and services and Teal took her on a tour.
Serapha quirked her lips. “So, why is everyone staring?”
“You look a little wild. It is around your eyes and in your clothing. The fey insisted on a new spa being set up, and I think you are an ideal candidate for a full workup if you are willing.”
Serapha looked down at the smears of dirt on her hands from working with the stove before she left. “I think a mani-pedi is in order.”
Teal didn’t hesitate. She grabbed Serapha by the arm and hauled her bodily to the building that didn’t even have a sign up.
“Emmy, Stephan, head to toe and everything in between. She needs a heavy soak and I don’t know how much peeling. You are working with layers.”
Serapha scowled. “Hey!”
“It’s true.”
She sighed and grumbled as the two determined badgers approached her. She let them coax her into a back room, and once she was naked, she was bundled into a shower, a bath and a steam room with a speed that made her dizzy.
For the first few moments with Stephan, she had felt nervous, but as he simply looked at her skin and not her body, it made it easier.
Serapha finally sat still in the steam room and let the heat soak in. She moved her head and felt the scars of the bladed collar and the scent-gland removal tug with every motion. She was basically here for the free stuff. What fey in his right might would want an angry, scarred and fanged mate? They prided themselves on appearance and her appearance was definitely lacking.
* * * *
Atter watched the dust-ruffled woman being led away from their group, but he wanted to keep staring.
She held her head high, her hair needed a good scrubbing, but it was thick and lush with a white streak in it. The sharp teeth that she displayed when they
stared at her were a little surprising.
His lips quirked when a tiny movement drew his attention. Her hands had claws that were receding as she walked away with the female guardian.
His two companions dismissed her and turned to watch the approach of the male guardian.
Tony sorted their small medallions and marked them like pets.
Atter scowled and one of his companions commented.
“We are to be marked like animals?”
Tony paused and a wave of glittering darkness moved across him, more power than the fey had felt in decades.
“You are marked as fey courting shifters. The shifters that are amenable to your attentions are wearing bracelets with a matching stone. Their charms will glow when you get near them. It will help you identify when you get close. Everyone here who does not live at the Crossroads, wears a charm. It identifies you for purchases, opens your quarters and lets you buy anything here. It also shifts with you.”
Atter watched his companions perk up before watching the woman across the way settle with the other guardian. Despite the surface grime, she had a settled appearance, a calmness that he did not associate with the shifters he had met in his life.
Tony followed his gaze. “Don’t even think about it. We only brought her in because your seers pinpointed her as a potential for a match. I sincerely doubt that she will be receptive to you.”
“Why not?” Atter looked down at himself. He was pleasant, he was charming and his beauty was remarked on by both sexes.
“I will tell you when I show you to your guestrooms for the duration of your stay if you are still interested in knowing.”
Atter’s interest was aroused. “Please.”
With all the paperwork taken care of, they went on their tour of a place Atter had only dreamed about setting foot in. The power of the shifters was all around them, in the very ground the walked on. Threads of human and fey magic coursed along and made things tolerable.
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