Accidental Acquisition

by Evangeline Anderson

  “But…but…” Jillian shook her head frantically.

  “I need you to be brave,” Kalis told her. “And remember, my Ursus feels the same way about you that I do—he loves you! And he will never, ever hurt you.”

  Then he lowered her gently to the floor, took a step back, and began to change.

  49

  As he began to give his body over to his other side, Kalis sent frantic thoughts to the Ursus who shared his being.

  She’s frightened! You must be gentle! But don’t let her get away—heal her quickly—she’s badly wounded.

  This changing process—which lasted only a split second in most cases—was the only time he had direct communication with the beast inside him. He could sense it at other times, moving on the other side of his psyche, but this was the only time they could actually talk.

  As the fur sprouted from his skin and his face elongated into a blunt muzzle, he heard back from his other half.

  Understand. Gentle…careful…frightened.

  The Ursus didn’t speak in words often—it mostly communicated via emotions. From it, Kalis felt his own feelings for Jillian echoed back at him. Love… protectiveness… caring… the desperate desire to heal and guard and shelter from harm…

  He was right—the massive beast inside him loved the curvy little Earth female as much as he did. The Ursus only wanted to heal and protect her.

  He only hoped that Jillian would allow herself to be healed.

  50

  Earlier, Jillian had been feeling faint and weak from blood-loss but she’d been fighting to stay awake. Now she wished she could lose consciousness. She didn’t want to see Kalis change—didn’t want to watch as the massive predator took over the man she loved.

  But though she wished she could faint, the opposite happened—she seemed to have become hyper-aware of the enormous Ursus as it emerged.

  It filled up most of the room when it was done and she could faintly hear Brad screaming for help and shifting around in the metal folding chair he was tied to as he tried to get away from its huge, hairy bulk.

  But all that seemed unimportant—the only thing that mattered now was that the massive predator had dropped its snout to her side and was snuffling at the knife wound, which was still pumping blood onto the dirty concrete floor.

  “No,” Jillian whispered hoarsely, as it opened its mouth, revealing jaws that would have put any Great White shark to shame. “Oh God, no please—please, don’t bite me!”

  She wanted badly to scramble up and run away, through the small metal door that led to the much larger interior of the warehouse. But she was so weak by this time all she could do was scoot a bit on the blood-slick floor. To her left, the body of Jimmy Moreno still stared sightlessly at the ceiling. And looming over her was the Ursus, its massive, powerful bulk seeming to suck all the oxygen out of the small room.

  Suddenly, it snaked out a surprisingly long, pink tongue and lapped at her wounded side.

  “Please!” Jillian begged again—this time it was almost a scream—would have been a scream if she could have gotten enough air in her lungs.

  She knew what was going to happen once it got a taste of her blood—it was going to decide it wanted a bite of her flesh. And then it would sink those horribly long, steak-knife teeth into her body and bite right through! She was sure that would make the knife wound Jimmy Moreno had given her seem like no more than a paper cut.

  The vision of what was to come was so incredibly sharp and vivid in her mind, that she was absolutely certain when the Ursus opened its mouth wider, it would be to bite.

  So she was greatly surprised when, instead of taking a bloody mouthful out of her side, the enormous beast instead took her sodden chef’s smock between its front teeth and tugged it delicately away from her wounded side.

  Jillian had been trying to keep her right hand—the un-mutilated one—clamped over the wound. But the Ursus nudged it gently but firmly aside, baring the place the knife had punctured her abdomen.

  By now, she was frozen in fright. It was the same way she had felt when the Ursus was fighting the Trolloxes—she was completely unable to move—paralyzed with fear. But she was so weak with blood-loss, she couldn’t have run even if she’d been able to make her frozen legs move. She just lay there in a pool of her own blood, feeling like the shadow of death was moving over her and there wasn’t a thing she could do about it…

  The long pink tongue snaked out again, sliding over her wounded side with surprising delicacy. Jillian gave a hoarse little yelp and squeezed her eyes shut.

  This is it—this is how I die. Now that it’s got a taste of my blood, it’s going to want more. It’s going to eat me alive—rip into me just like the dog ripped into Lucy. I’m dead…I’m dead!

  Only…the Ursus didn’t sink its teeth into her. She kept expecting it to—kept expecting it to bite down and rip into her with its massive jaws. Its head was bigger than her torso, after all—it could bite her in two without a second thought.

  But instead of biting, the huge beast just kept on licking her. Licking and licking the place where Moreno’s knife had exited her body. And everywhere it licked, Jillian felt a kind of healing warmth. It almost felt like someone was pouring warm, soothing water over her injured flesh and not just over her flesh but into it as well. With some surprise, she realized that—as the Ursus delicately probed the wound with his tongue—she felt the warmth seeping inside her.

  “What…what are you doing?” she whispered, opening her eyes and looking down at herself.

  The Ursus had pulled back for a moment and was considering her wounded flank. He tilted his head from side to side as he examined her, looking for all the world like a worried doctor, wondering if his patient was going to make it.

  To Jillian’s surprise, the knife wound was no longer pumping blood. In fact, it was barely visible at all. Instead of a bloody gash, there was only a small pinkish line, like a newly healed scar.

  “Oh…” she whispered, staring down at herself. “Oh my God—how did you do that?”

  Of course, the Ursus didn’t answer. Instead, he put out one shovel-sized paw and very gently inserted it under Jillian’s shoulder. Then he gave her a little push. After a moment, she realized he was trying to get her to roll over.

  “Do…do you want to lick my back, too?” she asked the massive beast. Then she berated herself—how stupid was she, talking to it like it could understand her?

  But to her surprise, the Ursus looked directly at her and nodded its huge head up and down once, very decidedly.

  Maybe he does understand me, Jillian thought, feeling dazed. And maybe he really did heal me—how else could the wound close like that?

  Slowly, her terror of the big beast began to slip away. It stood to reason that if the Ursus wanted to eat her, he already would have. Instead of biting her and mauling her as she had feared, he appeared to be focused on healing her—just like Kalis had promised. And also, she was thinking of him as a “He,” not an “it” anymore, she realized. When had that happened?

  Maybe I should just let him heal me.

  The thought slipped into her mind as naturally as water flows downhill. Maybe it was the fact that the huge beast hadn’t hurt her and didn’t show any kind of aggression towards her. Or maybe it was because his dense, silver-green fur gave off the same spicy, warm, comforting scent she smelled on Kalis when she cuddled close to the big Kindred. But for whatever reason, she found that her abject terror had almost completely leaked away.

  “Okay,” she told the Ursus, who was pawing at her again and trying to turn her over. “I’ll try and roll over for you. I’m still kind of weak—give me a minute.”

  She rolled on her left side—very, very carefully, since that was the side with the maimed hand—and did her best to tug her soaked chef’s whites (more like chef’s reds now, whispered a little voice in her head) above the place where the knife had entered.

  The Ursus lowered his massive head and sniffed delicately at th
e knife’s entry point. Then he began licking again, spreading that healing warmth over her skin and inside her as well.

  Jillian sighed softly and found herself relaxing as the soothing sensation penetrated her flesh. For a moment, her eyelids fluttered closed and she drifted between darkness and light. Then the Ursus was turning her over again, so that she was looking at its enormous face looming over her.

  What’s wrong with me—I should be scared silly. Why aren’t I afraid of him anymore?

  But somehow, she just wasn’t. It was almost as though, along with the healing warmth, the Ursus had imparted some kind of emotion to her. It was a feeling of protectiveness—of caring and concern. The giant predator cared for her—as crazy as it sounded, she could feel it.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, as she looked up at him. The pain in her side was gone—gone completely—and she somehow knew that she was healed inside and out. “Thank you for healing me,” she told the Ursus again.

  He made a soft sound in his throat and ducked his head as though in acknowledgement. Then he sniffed very carefully at her maimed left hand.

  Jillian winced as she followed his gaze. She had been so consumed with the burning, stabbing pain in her side, she’d barely thought of her three severed fingers. Now she could barely stand to look at the bleeding stumps where they used to be.

  “Well, I still have my pointer and my thumb at least,” she croaked, talking to herself as well as the Ursus. “And at least it’s not my right hand—that’s my knife hand.”

  She looked around the dirty floor, searching for her missing fingers. Maybe they could still be reattached somehow? But she didn’t see them anywhere. Either they had gotten crushed and lost in the scuffle, or maybe they were under Jimmy Moreno’s body and she wasn’t about to go digging under his corpse to try and find them. Just the thought made her shiver with revulsion.

  Then the Ursus made that soft, rumbling sound in the back of his throat again and carefully touched the tip of his black nose to the wrist of her injured hand. Then he opened his mouth just a little and looked at her expectantly.

  Jillian’s heart began to beat faster. Was he asking her to do what she thought he was asking her to do? Did he actually want her to put her hand in his mouth?

  The minute the thought entered her brain, she tried to push it away. It was one thing to let the massive predator lick her—it was quite another to literally stick her hand in his mouth full of razor-sharp teeth. After all, she could probably still manage in the kitchen with just one finger and her thumb. It would be a lot harder to cook with only one hand, if the Ursus bit her other one off.

  The huge creature seemed to understand her fear, because he made that soft rumbling sound—it was almost like a very deep purring, Jillian thought—and nudged her healed side with his nose. Then he nudged her left wrist again. After that, he looked at her expectantly.

  “Are you saying that you already healed my side and now you want to heal my hand?” Jillian asked hesitantly.

  The Ursus nodded his massive head again—very decisively. Then he parted his lips and gave her that same expectant look.

  Jillian took a deep breath. Was it worth the risk? She didn’t know, but the enormous creature had been incredibly gentle and tender with her so far—treating her much like Kalis himself would have, she was sure. Thinking of the big Kindred made her remember his words.

  My Ursus loves you—he would never hurt you!

  “Well, he’s been right so far,” she muttered to herself. “Let’s hope he’s right again.”

  She winced as she levered herself up into a sitting position, using only her right arm as a prop. The Ursus waited patiently as she performed this operation, which was more difficult than expected since she was weak with blood loss. He kept his mouth open—just a little, not enough to show his teeth—and just looked at Jillian.

  Jillian looked back at him. Was she really going to do this?

  It appeared that she was.

  “Okay,” she said. “I can’t believe I’m doing this but…here goes.”

  Then, slowly, she slipped her wounded left hand between the black lips and into the enormous creature’s mouth.

  It was like slipping her hand into a warm, wet cavern. The Ursus’s tongue was soft and it curled up around the edges to engulf her entire hand and draw her even further in. Jillian bit her lip, wondering if those massive jaws were going to close over her arm and bite it off at the elbow. But she never even felt a single tooth—only the soft, warm tongue like a gentle cloud enfolding her.

  “Well,” she said, after a long moment. “I’m not sure how long this is supposed to take but—”

  Then she gasped, because a deep tingling had started in the stumps of her three missing fingers. What was happening? Was he just healing the wounds and sealing them over to stop the blood loss? Or was something else going on?

  Her eyes flew up to meet those of the Ursus and she saw that he was watching her with that same, almost human-like look of concern in his deep, silver-green eyes. He was also holding perfectly still, as though he didn’t want to frighten her even as the tingling continued and grew.

  “What…what are you doing to me?” Jillian asked him, still staring deep into his eyes. “Are you just healing the stumps—making them scar over? Or are you doing…something else?”

  To her utter shock, the Ursus answered.

  Not in spoken words—which would have been impossible, since he literally had his mouth full—but as she looked into his eyes, she could hear a deep, wild voice talking in her mind.

  “Healing…you,” the voice said. “Hold still. Regrowth…hard. Takes…time.”

  The voice didn’t seem to be used to speaking because the words were halting and hesitant, as though he was trying to translate his thoughts from another language—a more primitive speech that was felt more than heard.

  “Thank you,” Jillian whispered to him. Tentatively, she reached up to stroke his enormous head with her right hand. “Thank you for healing me, Ursus.”

  “I am…Brun,” she heard the Ursus say. “You are…Jillian. Also Mistress. Also sweetheart. We…belong…together.”

  And then he followed up the words with a rush of emotion—an outpouring of concern and protectiveness and love that felt like a warm quilt being wrapped around her shoulders.

  Jillian didn’t know what to say—she was overwhelmed by the sudden emotions she could feel pouring into her as Brun held her hand in his mouth and healed her. The last vestiges of fear, that had still clung like cobwebs to the corners of her mind, were brushed aside and melted away like ice in the warm sunshine.

  “Oh,” she whispered. “Oh, Brun…you love me. You really do!”

  “Love…want…need…care for…heal,” he assured her in that deep, wild mental voice of his. “You are…mine. I am…yours.”

  “Yes.” Jillian stroked his thick fur—which was much softer than it looked—as she gazed into those wild eyes. “Yes, we belong together. You’re right—I don’t know why I couldn’t see it before.”

  “Frightened,” Brun suggested. “Not frightened…now.”

  “No, I’m not scared of you anymore,” Jillian told him. She felt her heart swell as they held each other’s eyes. “You’re amazing,” she whispered.

  “Love…you, too. Healed now,” Brun informed her. “All…new.”

  “New?” Jillian slowly pulled her hand from between his massive jaws and examined the fingers.

  To her surprise and joy, she had five of them again!

  “How? Oh my God, how did you do that?” she exclaimed, turning her hand from side to side and looking at it from every angle. Sure enough, she had three new fingers on her hand to replace the ones she’d lost. They were a little bit paler than the original ones, but they still bent and moved normally and when she touched the tip of each new finger to her thumb, the nerve endings were as sensitive as ever.

  “All healed,” Brun told her again, making that soft, rumbling purr in the back of his
throat. “Kalis now.”

  Jillian dragged her eyes from her new, perfect fingers to the huge Ursus’s face.

  “Wait, you’re going now? Going to turn back into Kalis?”

  It was exactly what she would have wanted half an hour ago. But now, she was sorry to be losing the enormous beast.

  “But will I see you again?” she asked anxiously.

  He nodded his head in that decisive way of his.

  “Soon.”

  “Good.” Impulsively, Jillian reached for him and threw her arms as far as she could around the enormous, furry neck. “Thank you, Brun,” she whispered in one tufted ear as she snuggled close to the huge Ursus. “Thank you so much for healing me. I’m so sorry I didn’t give you a chance before.”

  Brun nuzzled her very, very gently and she heard him say, “Love you, Jillian.”

  Then he began to shrink in her arms and his fur grew shorter and shorter until, at last, it wasn’t fur but smooth, warm, naked skin.

  And then, instead of Brun, she found she was holding Kalis in her arms and the big Kindred was holding her back.

  51

  “Jillian? Sweetheart?” Kalis looked down at her anxiously. She still looked pale and drawn, but it was clear that his other half had healed her completely. Also, there was a happy look in her lovely eyes that warmed his heart.

  “You tamed him,” he murmured, and felt assent from his other form as well as a warm feeling of contentment and love. “You tamed my Ursus.”

  “His name is Brun,” Jillian said, smiling up at him. “And he’s wonderful. I don’t know why I was ever afraid of him!”

  Kalis felt as though his heart might overflow with joy.

  “He told you his name?” he exclaimed, looking down at her. “He really gave you his true name?”

  “Well, yes…” She shrugged and he realized she didn’t understand the significance. “Why—shouldn’t he have told me?” she asked anxiously.