Promised to the Pride: A Shifter Romance

by Candace Wondrak

  It wasn’t too hard to be comfortable in their arms. They seemed nice, and besides, I had the feeling they were the polar opposite of Jonas, anyway. I couldn’t waste my apprehension on these guys when Jonas was still an unknown entity.

  Once Aster let go, I felt even colder than I did before, mostly because I missed their body heat. They both ran warm, and I felt like I needed to crawl under a thousand blankets and cocoon myself away from the world. As it turned out, leaving your family and marching yourself all alone to your destiny was hard.

  I gave them each smiles before they went, thankful that neither of them tried anything. I knew I would have to let them have me whenever they wanted, but that didn’t stop me from being upset about it. Just because it was my reality didn’t mean I didn’t have the right to be upset.

  I had every right to be.

  The cabin felt extremely cold and lonely after they left, even with the heat turned up. I collapsed on the sofa, letting out a loud sigh. My luggage would get unpacked later. Right now I was just tired.

  So, so tired.

  After texting my parents that I made it—and trying to send Lumi a picture of the cabin—I closed my eyes and went to sleep.

  Little did I know the craziness was only getting started in Fairbanks.

  Chapter Six – Holly

  I couldn’t sleep, which didn’t come as a shock to me, considering how my day went. Left my family before the sun had even risen, flew on a plane that I was honestly worried about falling apart mid-flight, and met two of my three mates. The third seemed to be an antisocial recluse who I was anxious about meeting, but it wasn’t something I could change. Because of that, I knew I should stop worrying about it.

  Did I, though? Did I stop worrying about it?

  Being a female shifter, and a rare one at that—special not only in the fact that I was female but also that I was of a rare shifter breed—I had lived my whole life worrying what my future held. I knew it was up to chance, and to luck, as to what type of mate or mates I would end up with. Mom had done her best to warn me about the harsh realities shifter women sometimes faced, even in today’s day and age, so I’d prepared myself for the worst.

  An awful thing for a child to grow up worrying about, but I was, and I did. While my human classmates gossiped and started dating each other, I kept to myself, the shy and quiet girl in class. I’d gotten asked out a few times, even been asked to a few dances, but I never went, never accepted any boy’s offer. They just weren’t my type. Mom said I could date if I wanted to, but the idea never felt like a good one.

  I mean, what if I dated one and I started to like them a lot? The Pride wouldn’t let me stay with them, and if they did, they’d just make the same offer to me that they did to my mom. I’d have to give birth to kids until I birthed a shifter cub. That didn’t sound particularly appealing to me, so I steered clear of it.

  I lay in bed, in sheets that smelled only a little stale, for hours. I kept the blinds open, gazing up at the sky from my pillow. The sky had cleared up, no longer cloudy and overcast. Stars littered the space above the world like an ethereal blanket, and for a moment, I couldn’t help but wonder if there was another planet out there with someone like me, caught in the same situation. Other shifter females on earth surely were, or they were caught in worse ones.

  I was lucky, I supposed, that Nikolas and Aster hadn’t mated me right then and there. They genuinely seemed kind, which I hadn’t allowed myself to hope for. It seemed a terrible thing, to hope and be crushed; I’d much rather never hope and have the slight, miniscule chance that I’d be pleasantly surprised.

  Jonas…he was the one I was nervous about. Whether or not he would hurt me, be rough with me, wasn’t something I could change. Why bother worrying about it if I couldn’t change it? That was what the logical part of my brain said, but the illogical part couldn’t help but be fretful over it.

  Getting hurt, having a mate who saw me only as a womb and not a person…it wasn’t something I wanted. Could anyone blame me? I’d grown up around humans, and even though humans didn’t respect each other all the time, women and men were a bit more equal. Well, depending on what human you were talking about, I supposed. There were still humans that viewed women as lesser, inferior and stupid. Because we were not physically strong, because we bled every month and gave birth, we were seen as lesser creatures.

  Forgive my language, but fuck that.

  If we did not exist, the species would not exist. Without us, there would be no haughty pricks to hold such opinions. Without us, shifters like Jonas never would’ve been born. Women should not be viewed as lesser or just wombs to impregnate. We should be ruling the world.

  Dawn began to rise, and I’d put money on me not having slept a wink. Not that I had money to bet, hence the whole reason I was here, but you know what I mean. I was tired, and yet, even when I buried myself under the blankets, I couldn’t sleep. So I got up.

  I got up, checked my phone for messages. I’d texted Lumi for a few hours last night, until nine, when it became her bedtime. Dad a bit, and Mom a bit more. They missed me, of course, and they hoped my mates were treating me well. I’d told them I hadn’t met all three yet, to which Mom had simply replied: It’ll be fine.

  Would it, though? Would it be fine? The more I thought about it, the less sure I became.

  There were no new messages, since it was so early. Even with the time difference, I was pretty sure my parents were still sleeping. Lumi still had an hour or two before school. I set my phone down, glancing around the cabin. What the hell was I supposed to do by myself all day? No TV, no internet…I had some games and music on my phone, but even that stuff could only entertain me for so long.

  I meandered into the kitchen, peeking in the fridge. It wasn’t even a full-sized refrigerator, and…absolutely nothing was in it. Okay, what was I supposed to eat? I couldn’t live on snow. I mean, the body could go longer without food than it could water, so I supposed as a last resort I could live on snow for a little bit, but it didn’t sound appealing to me in the slightest.

  My mates would have to take me shopping, or go shopping for me. At this point, I didn’t care—although I would take any reason to leave this cabin.

  Any reason, like an early morning walk. Yes, get some fresh air, study the surrounding area—Jonas had miles of land, I think. Once I shifted, we could go running.

  I was allowed to leave the cabin, wasn’t I? No one had told me otherwise. I assumed if I wasn’t allowed, they would’ve forbidden me to do it, or had a lock put in on the outside of the cabin.

  Wait. Was there a lock?

  I went to check the front door, and after I unlocked the deadbolt, the door swung open easily.

  Nope. No lock.

  Well, then, I guess it was time for an early morning walk after all. It was literally the only thing I had to do. The only thing I could think of to occupy my time without going bonkers.

  And I would, I would go bonkers stuck in that tiny cabin all by myself.

  Nikolas and Aster hadn’t said when they’d be back, so I didn’t know when to expect them. Since the sun hadn’t risen yet, I figured I still had some time, so I yanked on my pathetic excuse for boots and a jacket and went outside. I still wore the same clothes as yesterday, and I hadn’t showered. These guys would need to take me shopping for food and for clothes. I brought some, but not much.

  The moment I stepped outside, a chilly breeze blew past me, almost making me reconsider the whole thing and turn around. At least the cabin had heat, which I blasted all night. Icicles had formed on the cabin’s gutters, and I stood there for a bit, my arms crossed, gazing at the house a good ways away.

  Jonas’s cabin was far larger than mine. It had its own smokestack, along with a garage and a hell of a lot more square footage.

  I stared at it for a bit too long, deep down worried that he’d pop out of the house, beyond furious that I dared to leave my cabin. But my third mate didn’t make an appearance. I was alone. Cold and alone
in this wild, freezing, snowy world.

  This was my world now. No more tanning. No more hot, sweaty summers. I didn’t know how warm this place got in the summer, but I could imagine sleeves and pants were still necessary. No more shorts and tank tops. I let out the world’s biggest sigh. I’d grown used to the human world.

  I started walking, heading in the opposite direction of the main house and the road. Deeper into the tundra. I supposed I could encounter some nasty wildlife, but…well, I was going to take my chances.

  The land around the cabin was woodsy, the snow lining the branches of the trees. They were like skeletons of their former selves, leafless and covered in ice. The sky was oddly clear, and the sun had just started to rise in the distance, a beautiful pink color. Every time the wind blew, snow whipped around me, twirling in my hair.

  So cold, and yet I knew I’d get used to it. Eventually. This was my home now, and I had to learn to love its stark beauty.

  I walked for a while, aimlessly going in a straight direction, knowing I’d have to find my way back. I wasn’t counting on tracing my footsteps back, not with the wind. The snow out here was still dusty, not packed down too much, so I knew by the time I decided to turn around, my trail would be filled in.

  After a while, I came across a lake. Its water was frozen, an icy blue color. With the sun rising in the distance, the color pink reflected on its surface, and I stood there for the longest time, losing myself in the scenery.

  Okay, this was picture-perfect. This was postcard-worthy. This little lake in the middle of nowhere was like heaven frozen over. I didn’t think a more perfect place could exist, honestly. It was too beautiful, with the ice and the rising sun.

  I smiled to myself. When I breathed, my air exhaled in a puff of white. I closed my eyes, reveling in it. When I opened them, I saw that I wasn’t alone.

  A bear stood, not thirty feet from me, all brown and hairy, its eyes squarely on me. It wasn’t a fully grown one, but it still looked fierce all the same. Fierce and angry, as if I hedged in on its territory.

  Were you supposed to run from bears, or were you supposed to back away from them slowly? If I made a lot of noise, would I scare it off? I’d never had to deal with a bear before; what if it charged me?

  While I was lost in indecision, the bear must’ve made up its mind.

  It started to come closer, letting out a grunt and a deep growl as it pawed at the snow between us. And then—then the hairy bastard started charging. He was much faster than he looked, and I was frozen, a deer in headlights.

  I had one thought: Oh, crap. This morning walk was a bad idea.

  Chapter Seven – Jonas

  I was up early. I couldn’t sleep, not whilst knowing she was here. All this time, and I finally had a mate, yet I didn’t want to see her. Once I saw her, I knew, things would change. I wasn’t ready for things to change yet. I liked how things were. Keeping to myself, hardly going into town unless I needed something; it was how I liked to live. Having a mate, sharing a mate with the other two local leopards, wasn’t something I’d wrapped my mind around yet.

  It shouldn’t be something I should have difficulty with. The goal of every living species was simply to procreate, and shifters were no different. We were closer to our animal sides than humans were, more linked to nature.

  Her name was Holly. That’s all I knew about her. The Pride didn’t have pictures of her or even a description of what she looked like. I knew she was young, though. Nineteen. Eleven years younger than me—an age difference that would startle some humans.

  But we weren’t human, and our species was damned near close to extinct. Things were different with us, they had to be if us leopard shifters had any hope in the long-term survival of our race.

  Nikolas and Aster had met her, spent time with her, but I couldn’t. Not yet. I needed to make sure the animal inside was controlled, so I spent most of the night working out. I might’ve gotten a few hours of sleep, but not much. I needed air. I needed to clear my head, go for a run, make sure that I wouldn’t break her the first moment I saw her.

  The urge was…let’s just say it had gotten stronger the older I became. The more I didn’t have a mate, the more I didn’t claim a female as my own, the more urgently I wanted to do just that. My inner animal was a wild one; I couldn’t let him take control and hurt the mate I needed so desperately.

  I left the house, the early hours of dawn meeting me with a slap of cold air. The cold didn’t bother me. My house was so far removed from the road that I felt comfortable stripping outside in plain sight, and then shifting.

  My human form morphed, and within a matter of seconds, I was on all fours, my thick-padded paws in the snow. I lifted my head, about to run, but something in the air stopped me. A new scent.

  Her.

  I smelled her.

  I moved around my house, spotting her cabin with my expert eyesight. The door was closed, but her scent was too strong. She’d been outside. I went towards the cabin, my paws digging through the snow, but I didn’t make it far. Footprints lined the snow just outside her cabin, heading off behind it.

  Did my mate try to run? My mouth parted, my sharp teeth visible. A low rumble escaped me, and I could feel my self-control waning. If she tried to run, I would make her regret it. My mate had no right to try to run from me.

  My paws took off, my long tail raising as I darted through the snow, following her scent and her footsteps. I wanted to tear her apart, to teach her a lesson, but I knew that whatever I did, I had to do my best to hold the inner beast back. He was too ugly to let out, too vicious for the first encounter with my mate.

  Although, perhaps she deserved it, trying to run.

  I ran for a while, and her scent drew me to the lake. Instantly I spotted that she wasn’t alone. A grizzly—a young one, but much older than a cub—was charging her, and she was motionless, a look of pure fright on her face.

  Snow leopards couldn’t roar, but we could damn well growl. I let out my loudest growl, alerting the bear to my presence. Though the bear was charging her, I sprinted faster. I could move faster. As my mate stumbled back and tripped herself on something under the snow, I collided with the grizzly, swinging myself onto its back and digging my claws into its thick hide.

  The bear let out a grunt of pain, and I buried my teeth into the back of its neck, riding it as it tried to buck me off. Between the coarse fur, I tasted blood, and I sank my teeth down harder, my nails digging in deeper.

  It was too young of a bear to kill, yet I wanted to. I wanted to rip his throat out and splatter his blood upon the snow.

  It was insanely difficult to hold back, to stop myself from doing it—and I honestly think the only reason I was able to pull myself off the bear was because of my rage toward my mate. I leaped off the bear, the fur on my body puffing up. I was a larger than average leopard when it came to my kind, and I knew even to a bear I looked intimidating.

  Plus, this wasn’t my first grizzly. I’d taken down a much larger one before, but that was a day I didn’t want to repeat. I’d barely survived.

  This particular bear just needed a lesson in what was prey and what wasn’t.

  A loud growl rumbled from my throat, and I bared my teeth at the injured bear. Blood dripped off my muzzle, and I stared down the bear with my vibrant blue eyes. Normally they were a bright green, but when I shifted, they morphed into a crystal-like blue.

  The bear stared at me for a bit, decided the fight wasn’t worth it, and sauntered off, its back sagging a bit due to the injuries there. I watched it go, refusing to turn to my mate until I was certain the bear wouldn’t charge again. Sometimes you never knew. When you thought something was done, it turned right back around and showed you it wasn’t.

  The bear was nothing but a dot on the snowy horizon now, the yellow sun steadily rising in the sky. I breathed hard, slowly swinging my head around to glare at Holly. She’d fallen, and she hadn’t gotten back up. She sat on the snow, her sapphire eyes wide, her hands splayed
out behind her.

  I breathed in through my nose, practically tasting her scent. It was powerful, and from what I understood, she hadn’t awoken her inner animal yet. She wasn’t a full shifter yet, but she would be soon.

  She would be mine.

  I let out a growl, my claws digging into the snow. It took everything in me to not go after her, to not lunge for her. She met my stare, and I knew her blood pumped a bit faster, the adrenaline in her veins from the bear attack shifting into something else.

  Oh, she knew she was in trouble now. She knew she fucked up royally and pissed off the one person she should never piss off. Holly fucked up, and now she had to deal with the consequences.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, her voice soft and feathery, trembling slightly. Holly sounded afraid, terrified—though whether it was of me or the bear, I didn’t know. I didn’t care. If she was afraid of me, good. She should be, because I wanted to tear her apart for what she just did, for what she had almost put me through.

  I nearly lost her. I almost lost her before I even had her. The idiot.

  At her words, at her useless apology, I prowled closer, my head hanging low. She sat up in the snow, and I moved beside her, leaning my open, bloody muzzle against her cheek, smearing some of the bear’s blood onto her. My chest rumbled, but no longer with a growl. It was…something else.

  Though it was perhaps a bad idea, I couldn’t stop myself. I shifted back into my human form, my bloody cheek grazing hers still. In a flash I had her by the throat, pinning her down into the snow below.

  I brought my lips to her ear, knowing I looking sufficiently terrifying, and whispered, “If you run again, Mate, I just might let the bear get you next time.” My fingers curled around her throat easily, and I knew I could strangle her with little effort. She was so small beneath me, young and tender in a way that drove me mad.

  This was my mate? How the hell was she supposed to last? She smelled good, and she was easy on the eyes, but I would break her even when holding back.