Her Viking Wolves: 50 Loving States, Michigan (4 page)

“Yeah, I know what he said,” I answer. “But the engagement’s off.”

Aunt Wilma crooks her head like,
say what now?

“You trying to tell me Wilton let the North Dakota prince call off your wedding?”

Gotta love how Aunt Wilma went straight to assuming Kyle was the one who backed out of marrying me. And she sounds so insulted by the prospect, I half suspect she’s about ready to send Uncle Ford down to North Dakota to “talk” to the North Dakota royals on my behalf. You can take the thug princess out of Detroit and plant her in one of the most well-regarded and civilized wolf kingdoms in the North American territories, but…

“No…” I answer her. My eyes travel to their three-story, yellow cedar kingdom house with intricately carved totem poles on either side of the massive front door. A mountain looms behind the beautiful structure, with yellow cedar houses pebbling both sides of the main road leading up to it.

This is the total opposite of our kingdom house in Hidden Hills, where instead of going to a mountain on full moon nights, we lock the iron gates that lead into our gated community and run free. In fact, the shifter town of Wolf Lake is so pastoral, it feels like I’ve just stepped into a postcard.

Welcome to Alaska,
I think as I admit to Aunt Wilma, “I called it off.”

The shocked looks that come over all of their faces is so instantaneous, I can almost hear them catching their collective breath. Which I totally get.

See, most state princesses from nice, normal kingdoms wouldn’t have the nerve to call off their engagements. But my dad is Wilton “Muthafuckin’” Greenwolf, the alpha king of a pack that has at least fifty different rituals (read: excuses) for killing a shifter.

I can just about hear Aunt Wilma’s mind trying to figure out if I’m crazy, suicidal, or both as the cold Alaska wind blows through the space between me and her family.

Then my crazy cousin, Tu—the one who insists on perceiving my Detroit accent and lack of social skills as some form of “keeping it real”—chooses that moment to crow into the shocked silence, “See, this is why I like Tee! She is
so hardcore.
”

M
yrna was
wrong about Olafr being unable to serve because he was ever the wolf. In fact, the only reason the village does not fall instantly is
because
he is ever the wolf.

He soon finds he was correct to fear the coming of this enemy for nearly all his two-and-thirty winters.

The serpents…monsters…whatever they be are unlike any he has ever heard tale of. Varying in their dark colors, he spots creatures red as blood, green as wet moss, blue as a winter’s night, and black as a North Wolf’s shadow falling upon ebony rock. Each stands on four lizard-like legs higher than his father’s longhouse, and when they give voice, the sound rends the air as a hot screech, with a killing spray of fire spitting out from their mouths with every roar.

Though there be but a small number of these monstrous creatures, the village warriors quickly begin to fall.

Armed mostly with clubs and spears, they find the monsters’ skin to be near impervious. Even those who get close enough to strike find their weapons bouncing off the enemy’s skin. The warrior often having earned nothing but an answering fire, under which he and many other North Wolves do gruesomely burn.

Only does his brother, with his fine steel sword,
The Death Maker,
taken from a Gotar Viking king, manage to fight well their enemy. Jumping upon a blue creature’s back and swinging around its neck to plunge his king’s sword into the monster’s throat. And even then, he is very nearly crushed when the terrible monster falls, crashing down upon their meadow with a ground-shaking thud.

This is how they come to find that as with the North Wolves, these terrible creatures become human when fatally wounded. The serpent skin shrinks away to reveal a large, naked man bleeding from his throat.

However, this is but one serpent, and his brother but one male. The only male in the village with so fine a sword. So the Vikings have little time to ponder this finding.

With most of their force wielding inferior weapons, the first tide of the battle is little more than a slaughter. Olafr alone survives the front line. After marking his brother’s great feat, he dodges flame and launches himself at the scaly throat of the nearest monster. Not letting go until he has torn out everything that lies underneath this one vulnerable soft spot of skin. In this way is another of the serpent monsters made man, thrashing about at the end of Olafr’s jaw.

The monster’s blood tastes of the bitterest herbs and burns his mouth. After his first kill, Olafr becomes more cautious and avoids swallowing the blood for fear of poisoning himself and dying alongside his victims.

However, as he fights a second dragon, he can hear his brother, ever the clever fenrir to be, yelling out orders to the remaining wolves. Soon after comes the sharp sound of rent fabric and the clanging of fallen weapons upon the ground.

And then is Olafr joined on the meadow turned battlefield by several of his fellow fighters, now in wolf form.

For a brief time, it appears they might successfully defend the village, but then…

Something strikes Olafr, piercing him through his back, near the shoulder. There is a hot searing pain like nothing he has ever known before. A pain that makes him convulse with the need to tear out whatever is lodged in his back and vomit at the same time.

It must be an arrow. Silver-tipped.

Olafr topples to the ground, unable to think for the pain. And his body…it feels so strange. Weak. But long, too long…

He drags a foreleg towards his muzzle and is horrified to see a human hand instead. For the first time in his adult life, he is in his human form. And he hears his Aunt Bera’s words, as if she whispers them now, directly into his ear:
An enemy who will kill so many of our wolves and fell Olafr’s human..

“Brother!” A pair of strong hands grab him, turning him to his side.

He feels a tug on the arrow.

“No…” he croaks. The voice he hasn’t used in years bursts painfully from his throat, sounding like the hoarse squawk of a raven.

But his warning comes too late. The pungent smell of burning flesh is rapidly followed by the sound of his brother cursing in their father’s tongue. Not only is the arrow silver-tipped, but the shaft contains silver as well.

FJ crouches down in front of him, rubbing his now injured palm. His face is smeared with blood and dirt. And he looks deeply troubled.

“Brother,” he says again, this time in their mother’s tongue. “The battle is nearly won by these strangers and your human has come to great harm. Recall the remainder of the prophecy.”

In his mind’s eye, Olafr hears their aunt’s sibilant whisper.

“Only a fated mate can save our Fenris, his queen, and our people. Otherwise will they perish at the hand of this brimstone enemy, if you and your brother cannot this challenge meet.”

Their aunt also bade them memorize two spells. One was the same spell she gave their father long ago, knowing he would have need of it. It is a spell that allows the speaker to sail through space and time to find the wolf one is fated by the gods to mate.

Olafr shakes his head. Even if he could trust his human mouth to speak, he cannot say these words. He cannot leave his brother here to battle alone.

“I must give the command to retreat and I must find our sister…” FJ grimaces as if he has swallowed spoiled meat. “Only then will I also say the words. I must ‘buy time’ as our father did when he traveled to meet our mother. But I cannot do this if I am not certain of your safety, Brother.”

His eyes bore into Olafr’s. Olafr, who has sacrificed his human so this moment might never happen, so Aunt Bera’s prediction might not come to pass. But it
has
come to pass. Despite all, a silver-tipped arrow caught his wolf and now is he vulnerable to death.

“You will die if you do not say the words,”
his brother says now inside his head, his man’s head.
“I will find a way to bring us together again. I swear this to you, Brother. But first these words you must say.”

FJ is like their father. He would rather die than break an oath.

And for that reason alone does Olafr speak the words.

As soon as he does, he knows the great tunnel of which his father did speak must have appeared beyond his gaze. For does his brother step away from his fallen body then and repeat his vow over their Brother Bond,
“I will find a way to bring us together again.”

Olafr opens his own mind to say words back. So much easier than trying to speak with his clumsy human tongue. But too soon is he sucked into the black tunnel of time and sent hurtling toward the mate the gods have fated for him to meet.

A
knock sounds
on my door at 12:00 PM on the dot. Just as it has every day since I arrived. I close my laptop and climb out of bed. Time to pay my hotel bill.

“Hey, Uncle Ford,” I say when I open the door. “Are we going outside to have another one of our chats?”

“Yep,” answers the big beefy wolf whose stature leaves no doubt in anybody’s mind as to why King Tikaani came all the way to Detroit to scout him thirty-five years ago.

“Got your coat from downstairs,” he says, holding up my Aiden Pearce leather trench that I’d left hanging on the coat rack in the foyer. Not that anyone appreciates my gamer fashion sense here. There’s just not a whole lot of video game appreciation in the Alaska kingdom house. The Alaska princesses grew up with one dinky TV in their family, and they’ve never had so much as an Atari. Same goes for their alpha king husbands: Grady’s deaf, Mag grew up in a caravan without electricity, and according to Rafe, he was too busy with football and then running his kingdom to bother much with video games. That means the only people who game in the house are my seven-year-old triplet nephews. And though their mother, my cousin Alisha, was fine with letting them re-enact Viking sword fights with the Wii version of
Viking Shifters
, I have a feeling I’d be hearing about it if I tried to introduce them
Watch Dogs.

And I’ve already gotten an earfull from my history professor cousin during Christmas dinner for including dragons in the game. According to her, dragons were firmly in the realm of myth and she did not appreciate all of the questions she’d been getting from her students in her “
actual history”
wolf classes since the game had come out.

But hey,
Viking Shifters
keeps her bored triplets busy while she mothers her newly toddling twins, so no complaints, right? In fact as I walk through the family room with Wilford, Alisha calls out, “Thanks for bringing the console and games with you, Tee. You’re a lifesaver!”

“No problem,” I answer, liking how my cousin perceives me flying all the way to Alaska with four different gaming systems in my checked luggage as benevolent and not just flat out weird. A she-wolf could get used to all this acceptance.

I slide a look over Uncle Ford’s back, wishing everybody was as happy about my surprise visit. I could do without these daily conversations he’s been forcing on me.

But other than that, Alaska has been a real nice place to hide out. There’s no TV in my room. In fact, there’s only the one in the family room downstairs. But the Wi-Fi signal is strong and my room is super cozy with cedar walls and a big comfy bed. All the peace and quiet has given me plenty of time to work on the concept presentation for
Ninja Shifters.
All in all, my visit has been like a workcation.

Except Aunt Wilma keeps asking me about my future plans, before intoning, “Your father isn’t going to put up with this mess for long. You know that, right?”

Yes, I do know that. But now I follow Uncle Ford to the pier, fully prepared to go through the pantomime of acting like my head’s full of unicorns and rainbows.

Most days, our conversation on the pier involves both of us staring at our feet and saying something like this:

Ford: You ready to go home now?

Me: Nope. Just finishing up a project.

Ford: Your dad keeps calling your aunt. Telling her to send you home.

Me: Mmm-hmmm. I better get back to work.

Mumble, mumble, and so on and so forth.

By the time we get to the pier on New Year’s Eve, it almost feels like a tradition.

So I’m shocked as shit when Uncle Ford opens with, “You need to leave.”

I blink, a little surprised he wants me out so bad, especially when Aunt Wilma hasn’t made any moves to kick me out. I’m so surprised, I tell him the truth. “I can’t leave yet.”

Uncle Ford shakes his head, “Look, I don’t know what went down between you and your dad. But I grew up with him. We…” He cuts off and seems to reset. “He ain’t just going to let you stay here.”

“He might,” I say hopefully. “He really hates the outdoors, so the chances of him coming up here—”

“He’s already threatening to send Yancey up here after the next full moon. And you know Wilma ain’t going to be cool with Detroit drama coming to Wolf Lake.”

I inwardly curse. That much is true. Despite her less than civilized upbringing, I’ve watched the former Detroit princess swan around the Alaska kingdom house like she was born “old money.” She was the kind of woman who insisted on a family hug before each party, grandchildren included, only to whisper inside the circle, “If any of you embarrass me tonight, I will
end
you.”

“You her niece. But we Detroit through and through,” Ford says, as if co-signing my thoughts. “If Wilton send somebody up here, she will put your ass on a plane before she lets you embarrass her in front of her kingdom. So you need to go. Only question is, do you want me to call for a plane now or after the New Year’s Eve party?”

I shake my head, bitter disappointment stealing over me. “Wow,” I say. “As welcoming as you and Aunt Wilma have been to all these snooty Alaska wolves, it looks like you don’t have any kind of feelings about your actual
family
at all.”

Now, and only now, does Uncle Ford’s expression change, his face shifting from awkward confrontation mode to troubled frown. “No, no, that’s not what I’m saying. You’re my family. I…I…care about you. I’m on your side. Always. But I know my brother and my Pop.”

A shadow crosses over his face, hinting at a still locked backstory interstitial that I’ve never heard. But even without hearing it, I’m getting loud and clear that something happened when Uncle Ford was still living in Detroit. Something that makes him think I cannot possibly win this battle with my father. That I might as well give in now, because any form of resistance will only cause him and Aunt Wilma more pain.

“Okay, well I’m going back to my room now.” I turn away then. Not because I’m disappointed in him, but because I know he’s right.

I’ve run away to Alaska, but the truth is, there’s no escape. Not from my father.

I expect Uncle Ford to run after me as I start back to the kingdom house. To demand I agree to get on the plane, like my father wants.

But eventually I hear footsteps, and when I look up, he’s headed in the other direction. Presumably back to the cottage he shared with his mate before she died in childbirth a couple of years after my mother. Geez, no wonder the guy isn’t so sold on happy endings for us Detroit Royals.

The truth is, neither am I. Uncle Ford is right. This ain’t over. Not even close.

My father was raised by Leroy Greenwolf, one of the most brutal alphas Detroit—no forget that—the
world
has ever seen. So cold-blooded, there was still a rumor going around that my grandfather gave his eighteen-year-old daughter something to trigger her heat when the King of Alaska came through to consider my Uncle Ford for his beta. And believe me, it’s a rumor anybody who’s ever met my grandfather would have no problem believing.

He and his oldest son were born ruthless, unwilling to stop at anything to get what they want. And I already know I, the nerdy recluse, am no match for the Alpha King of Detroit…

Yet I’m unable to give in and tell Uncle Ford to just go on ahead and schedule the three plane rides it will take to get me back to Detroit.

There’s no way to win this Boss Level. I know that. But on the coldest New Year’s Eve I’ve ever experienced, I’m still holding out for the gold token that gets me to a game ending I can live with.

Fuck
, I think as I return to the now very temporary sanctuary of the kingdom house guest room.
What am I going to do?