My gaze drifted across to where they were watching me. “You two are famous amongst the packs now. Everyone wants a connection to Shadow. No matter how many times I explained that I’m just as terrified of the beast as the rest of them, they thought I was the key.”
Shadow smiled, as if pleased by this, but there was fire burning deep in his eyes.
I continued, grateful that no one had interrupted. “Alpha Lorenze brought me back to the pack after that, told me my history, and the moment I felt Tabitha’s energy I knew the truth. He kept her close enough that I didn’t forget her again, and I did everything in my power to get her back. The only reason I’m not mated and popping out shifter pups now is his son was too young and hadn’t shifted yet. But today… today was the day, and somehow Shadow and Mera showed up at the right moment to give me and Tabby a chance at a real life.”
Simone reached out behind Tabitha’s chair and grasped my arm. “Why didn’t you tell us?” she rasped, her eyes glassy as she swallowed hard. “You lost years of time with your daughter. Years being part of this pack. We could have prevented so much heartache.”
Swallowing roughly myself, I shook my head. “I didn’t know that Shadow could read minds. The alpha told me only he knew how to keep Tabitha alive, and I mean… look at her. She’s ten years old and barely looks six months. Most people can’t feel her energy, but I can. And at times she was so weak. Which I now know the alpha did deliberately. That bastard.”
Len let out a growl, and fuck if everyone didn’t still at the sound. “Fae children require massive influxes of energy in their early years,” he rumbled, voice scary deep. “The crystal mat would have kept her alive, but she couldn’t thrive. Not on Earth, with its lack of power.”
Panic choked me for a second before I swallowed it down. “Is it too late now to help her?” I managed to ask.
“No,” he said immediately, as if knowing I was about to burst at the seams. “You can think of it as her being in stasis, but as you can see, already in a world of strong magic and power, she’s blooming. Once we’re back in Faerie, it will only be days before she’s much bigger than Aurora and Damon. There’s no fast tracking her growth—she will not look ten for quite a long time, but she will still develop just as she always would have. No permanent damage.”
Relief had me sagging into my chair. “Thank the gods.”
This was the point that the servers returned for us to order. I just went with a sandwich; not sure my stomach could handle anything heavier.
Angel, who had clearly been processing everything in that ancient brain of hers, was the first to speak after the servers left. “The fact that you don’t remember anything from being with Len, or the pregnancy and birth, leads me to believe the spell over you has something to do with the ancient faerie magic that controls true mate bonds.”
True mate bonds.It had been such a negative phrase for me over the last few years, but Angel was talking about fae bonds. Not shifters. I knew next to nothing about the world of Faerie. Hell, it hadn’t been that long ago that I was completely unaware ofany worldoutside of Earth.
Were their bonds different to shifters?
“Fae go on magical walks to find their mates,” Len said, answering the confusion on my face. “We’re put into a trance-like state, infused with the fertility energy, and when we leave we’re drawn to our mates. We can find them anywhere across Faerie, or I guess technically, across the worlds.”
“Not that it’s ever happened between worlds,” Shadow added. “Fae stick with fae. It’s a known fact.”
Len nodded. “This is true. Our magics and energy are generally not compatible with other races. And as far back in history that I know, there’s never been a true mate pairing from outside of Faerie.”
“How do the walks work?” Mera asked, before I could delve into what he’d just said.
Len answered her, even as his gaze remained on me, taking in my reaction to everything. “When we go into the trance, we don’t remember anything that happens during that time. It’s only when we return and wake, if we found our true mate, they will be there with you and the memories return. If you didn’t find your mate, you will wake alone and with no memories. Until your mate is found, the walks remain a mystery.”
I was just about fucking done with these mystical bonds that appeared to remove free will.
Len’s eyes narrowed and I realized in my shock that I must have blurted that out. “There’s still free will,” he told me. “Anyone with a mate can choose to reject them. As you and Mera know, it’s not even that rare, but most of the time those of us who have walked this world for millennia understand that your true mate is the only being who will truly complete you.”
I’d insulted him, and that hadn’t been my intention. But after everything I’d been put through from my true mate and his family, the bitterness was somewhat ingrained.
Or maybe there was a touch of unhappiness from another factor…
“If we don’t remember, that must mean we aren’t true mates, right?” I’d drawn the logical conclusion, and it fucking bothered me. Even though the fae and I were strangers.
Yeah, I might have lost my damn mind.
16
SAMANTHA
Everyone remained silent after my last statement.
A statement that hadn’t given any indication if I was happy or not by the fact that we weren’t mates. Maybe because I didn’t even know how I truly felt about it. Today had already been the longest, strangest day in existence. My emotions and thoughts were messy, and it’d take days—and probably therapy—to truly figure out my feelings on this whole Len situation.
“I don’t think we can assume that yet,” Angel said suddenly. “Firstly, the spell could be masking a lot. And secondly, if you can produce a child, there must be a deeper bond. Not to mention some fae in Samantha’s heritage.”
“I was thinking the same,” Mera piped up. “I mean, the first time I saw her I thought she was more gorgeous than any shifter had the right to be. She held a littleextra.”
