“Are you happy?” I asked Enid, a strangely intimate question.
Enid turned and gave me a contemplative look. “I’m busy and sometimes stressed, but yes, I’m happy.”
“That’s wonderful,” I said with more than a little longing and some envy too.
“It is wonderful. I’m lucky to have the right mates. Choosing the right person, or people, makes all the difference.” She handed me a steaming cup of tea. “You know, Skylar, my brother fancies you a great deal.”
I let the fragrant steam waft over me and chose my next words with care, “I fancy him too.”
“But?” she asked, perhaps sensing there was one without me having to say it.
“I’m just getting out of a bad breakup, and I’m a bit of a mess. We’re… figuring things out.” She didn’t need to know my biggest fear, one that I didn’t even like to face myself, that maybe I just wasn’t worthy of love.
“The important thing is that you communicate, something I tell my mates all the time,” Enid said.
“How do you keep up with two men?” I asked. One man was more than enough for me.
She smiled and said haughtily, “More like, how do they keep up with me?”
I blushed at her insinuation. No wonder they had six pups already. “I’m surprised he doesn’t have a partner,” I said, shifting the conversation back to Hiero. “Is there something I should know? Any secrets you’d like to share?”
She laughed heartily. “If you’re not of shifter blood, the Dragonback Mountains can be a hard adjustment for an outsider. We’re a tight-knit community but we are pretty isolated out here. We don’t have a lot of the diversions of theother realms, but if you like being outdoors and you can make your own fun, then this could be the right place for you.”
“You all certainly seem to be good at that.”
“We try. You don’t know how many times I’ve had to stitch up Hiero or one of my other kin on account of their shenanigans. Falling off a dirtbike or out of a tree or starting trouble with a rival pack.”
I recalled the scars on Hiero’s stomach.
“Hiero said he’d been a bit of a brawler in his younger years.”
“He was, but he’s settled down some. Now you’ll only see it on occasion when he’s provoked. He’s a protector, which comes in handy around here.”
I nodded. It was something I’d admired about him as well. While we sipped our tea, I asked a few questions about their clan customs. Enid said they shifted pretty regularly but a full moon was when the urge was strongest, a time when the packs ran together.
“Many a pup has been conceived under the light of a full moon,” she said with a wink.
After finishing, we went back outside, and I caught sight of Hiero across the yard throwing axes with a few of the younger shifters. Something about a man with a tool in his hand really turned me on, and when he smiled at me, my heart surely skipped a beat. Was it strange to see a future path laid out so plainly before me? A simple life with the sexy minotaur, raising pups if the Goddess blessed us, having outdoor adventures andgreat sex. Being the boy of a strong, caring Daddy. Was there really anything more to life than that?
After the sun had set and the moon had risen, one of Enid’s mates whistled to get everyone’s attention. As the Wolfsbane alpha, Enid started baying and the rest of the pack soon joined in until it was a crescendo of howling voices. Their non-shifter wolf brethren joined the call from the mountains so that it became a cannon echoing all the way down to the valley below. I wondered if Monica was listening. I couldn’t wait to tell her what I’d witnessed, especially when the shifters started stripping off their clothing.
“Looks like we’re on clean-up duty,” Hiero said to me good-naturedly.
All around us, bodies started transforming: limbs bent, skin sprouted hair, noses became muzzles, ears grew pointed and long, spines bowed, and muscles quivered from the shift. A few minutes later, we were surrounded by three dozen wolves, sniffing the ground or each other in preparation for their run. Enid, now with a brassy red coat and pointed ears, lifted her head and howled at the moon. The others soon followed. Then their sleek bodies bounded off into the night, joining the chorus in the distance until it was just Hiero and me and a few other non-shifter relations, some of whom went inside to tend to the little ones like Caris who were too young to shift. We drank a little more and snacked on the trays of food before storing it away for when they returned in the morning, hungry and exhausted.
“So, this was your life growing up?” I asked, fascinated by it all.
“Pretty much. One minute we’d be having a conversation. The next minute they’d be off chasing a rabbit through the forest.”
“Frito told me about the time you tried to join them,” I said. It had been a few nights ago during closing when Frito had regaled me with that story. “How you got lost in the woods.”
“I was terrified, wolves all around me, and I couldn’t tell which were my kin and which were wild animals. Thankfully, I spotted Enid in the mix, and she led me home. They made so much fun of me for months after.” Hiero shook his head and beneath his humor, I could see why he felt slightly separate from the pack–excluded, even if it wasn’t intentional. Perhaps that was something we recognized in each other, that loneliness and longing.
“How do the shifters get along with the wild wolves?” I asked.
“Wolves by nature are territorial, but the Wolfsbane Clan respects the wild ones as their ancestors and offers them the leavings of their hunts. The wolves, in turn, offer their protection. Once you’ve lived here for a while, they’ll pick up your scent and recognize you as one of their own, which also helps when defending our territory against intruders.”
“Helps when you get lost in the woods too,” I teased.
