A Guardians Passion (36 page)

Rayne felt the same way.

“It is the way it should be,” Fenris replied without a shred of hesitation.

Rayne swore in that moment that he couldn’t love Fenris more.

“How big of you, Fenris. You really are worth my son’s loyalty. ”

Fenris stopped and turned, giving a cutting glare that Rayne knew had been learned by Freya, the visual equivalent of “Are you finished?”

Rayne went to his alpha’s side, demonstrating his conviction.

Dona held up his hands as if that could possibly deflect Fenris’s irritation. “Oh, the things your pack will be capable of! You will draw much envy, much threat as well, I sense. You will have your hands full with such offspring as you will create with your warrior female.”

“So you see the future now?”

“Oh no,” Dona insisted. “Just the present and our current fiasco.”

Rayne recognized the danger that Dona was evoking and held up a hand to bar Fenris’s progression outside of a single step and snarl. Staring down the male who had been responsible for siring him and nothing more, Rayne didn’t care for the insults one second longer. “Look. We will fix this. I don’t need you harping on it again and again. Leaving our own so vulnerable—you don’t think we know our errors? Well, we do, and this will not happen again. I won’t allow it!”

Dona’s ghostlike eyes went wide. He grinned madly. “Whoa! That’s what I’m talking about. Fire! I knew that my son had it in him. I don’t know if he’ll still be your little submissive for long, Fenris.”

“Well, he’ll never be yours,” Fenris snapped back.

“He is my son.”

“By seed alone. He is my other half.”

Dona scowled, jealousy plain across his face. “Other half or not, he will require my strength to protect not just the female, not just the cubs that you have and will have, but even you, the mighty Luna. My seed can do far more than just reining in your anger and your lust, more than serving as a second mother to a cub that is as much his as it is yours.

“I help you now. But Rayne is wytchen, not just half-wolf. Your cub is wytchen and Luna at that. She may be more powerful than even you, Fenris, perhaps even Rayne. You need me, and so does he,” Dona added with a nod to Rayne.

Looking at his father, he wasn’t sure which was worse: the vampires for wanting to breed their own beasts, or his father for his barely disguised play for power. Standing firm at Fenris’s side, he contained the curses he wanted to spew toward his father. While Dona hadn’t said as much, Rayne wasn’t ignorant of the game that had to be played for the safety of his family. If anything, Dona was right about one thing. Rayne would have to grow in order to secure the safety of his loves.

A child with the blood of a wytchen and a Luna had never been heard of, but Rayne suspected that the result would be nothing tame. Still, Rayne would not allow his father to instill in anyone’s head that Bun was too wild to remain with her mother and her sires.

Bun would not look upon her grandfather with more respect than him, Rayne swore to himself.

Turning his back on his father, Rayne looked up into his alpha’s eyes. “I’m going to need to spend some time away.”

Fenris showed his obvious dislike for the idea. “Rayne, we have a cub on the way. Freya will need you.”

“That’s why I need to grow, to get stronger. Birathan should never have recovered. There should have been wards placed around that complex. Freya should have had runes protecting her always. I should have known the spells needed to ensure that the Sohon compound was safe. I could have placed an anchor on her—”

Fenris grabbed hold of Rayne’s chin, forcing him into silence. “Enough, Rayne.”

Unable to control himself, Rayne sulked. “I’m serious, Fen. I could have done more. Freya deserves more. You deserve more, and our cub…will damn sure need every measure of protection and guidance that I can provide.”

Fenris closed his eyes, and for a second, Rayne worried that his lover would demand that he not go, that Fenris would feel slighted in his own masculinity. The alpha was bigger, physically stronger, and certainly capable of protecting those in sight. Magic couldn’t harm Fenris, but it could harm everyone else.

Rayne could prevent that. He needed to be able to prevent catastrophes rather than just react to them.

“Fen?” he queried as Fenris’s silence bored into him along with the emotion thick within dark blue eyes.

“I
could
tell you not to worry. I could guilt you into thinking that you’re being selfish. But that’s not my way. We will have a cub soon, and I would like you smiling when he or she is placed in your arms.”

In that moment, Rayne was thankful for the life and the choices he had made, reveling in the confidence that Fenris instilled in him. It was the difference between an alpha and a beta. Strength had little to do with who led. The need for affirmation played a much greater role in rank. And Rayne would always look to Fenris for support. Leaning in close to his wolf, Rayne spoke with almost certainty. “She. Our cub is a girl. Undoubtedly she is gonna be as fierce as her mother.”

Fenris smiled. He wrapped his arms around Rayne’s waist before kissing him on the forehead.

The actual sex of their child was probably meaningless. Rayne was certain that Fenris would have been happy, boy or girl, but that Fenris was okay with sharing parentage meant the world to him.

“Oh? So
now
you’re sure?” Dona interrupted.

Rayne snapped around to deliver Dona a warning. “Don’t start with me.”

Fenris had his own version. He clutched Rayne tight. “I’ve had enough of you, Dona. Either you wish to help us, or we can test how fast you can whip up that little teleportation spell.”

A wind sweeping through the tunnels brought along the citrusy scent of asprega. Dona inhaled, able to discern it just as ably as a were. “Right. We are to deal with a situation as I recall.”

“Exactly. We’ll discuss your plots regarding my beta and cub afterward.” Fenris’s voice had become a rumbling growl.

Stirred by the scent of prey, Rayne smirked at his father, all Dona’s petty comments proving meaningless. He heard his alpha’s breathing grow hoarse and the crisp crackling of bones lengthening, re-forming. Fenris had begun to transform into a wolf upon two legs. His neck had grown in size, his muscles swelling with the change and ruining the paltry clothing that had covered him. Fenris’s first transformation was normal, something any were could do, but Rayne was well aware how quickly that springboard could propel his alpha into a creature far more lethal than a wolf.

Rayne placed his hand upon Fenris’s abdomen. He stroked each of Fenris’s taut abs, which were satiny with fur, as he sought to keep his mate under some semblance of control. “Calm down, Fen. Calm down and come with me,” he urged gently.

He slid his hand down Fenris’s arm and took hold of an enormous paw, easily grown to twice its normal size. Together they walked down the length of the tunnel, nearly a quarter of a mile, with Fenris’s footfalls becoming slightly louder with every step. They stopped at the edge of the tunnel’s end, where a massive cavern opened up. Rayne peered down.

The den of the asprega could be easily viewed as a sweeping space filled with thick moss and lichen, mushrooms thriving on the damp and decay so abundant within. The creatures were at rest upon beds of vegetation while the sound of the gently flowing rivers that decorated their home provided a lullaby of serenity. There were several mounds of objects stolen from the human world—clothing, toys, furniture—Rayne even spotted a few televisions, although there was no source of electricity that he could detect. One might have believed them to be harmless curiosities, led astray by the cruel machinations of vampires.

Setting his sights on their leader, Rayne knew better. They could be just as devious.

He gazed down at the highest platform, surrounded by a condensed growth of fungus, pale, bulbous blossoms, and moist foliage. It was there that Birathan lay upon his dais, surrounded by his attendants.

Fenris snarled in recognition, the fire within him flaring so hot that Rayne shuddered with the warmth. He fed off Fenris’s energy, using it to trigger his own transformation. The clothing he wore tore at the seams, his skin took on the pale gold sheen of fur, and he yawned with the growth of his fangs.

He gave a final stamp of his foot to shake free the rags that had once been pants. He walked in front of his alpha and leaned back into a wall of rigid, hot flesh. Rayne swished his newly descended tail against the hard shaft of Fenris’s erection.

Gazing down at the unsuspecting fiends, Rayne felt his cock grow heavy as well. The added incentive of Fenris worrying the flesh of his shoulder didn’t hurt either in the building of murderous intent. “See below,” he uttered, using the guttural instruments of a canine. “There’s the son of a vamp who insulted our beloved, who threatened her life and the life of our daughter, Fenris. He’s almost healed. We cannot allow that. Freya is worth fierce, efficient guards, not clean-up dogs. She would be here like last time if she could, fighting her own battle, putting herself in danger yet again,” Rayne said.

“She killed one of them defending our cub because we weren’t there. We must guard her better. We must
be
better. And as our female often claims: ‘
We must not tolerate this bullshit
.’ Do you agree?”

Fenris reared his head back and released a roar that not only shook the cavern but the tunnels stretching far beyond as well. His alpha surely awoke every creature on the floor and millions of others inhabiting the depths of the mountain.

Rayne turned and snapped at Fenris’s jaw before receiving a reprimanding bite upon his shoulder.

“You two want to fuck or get revenge?”

Rayne laughed, entirely sure that he could do with both, with revenge coming in first. Turning his gaze toward Dona, he reminded him of a promise. “Father, a favor? A shield.”

“Gladly.” Dona spread his fingers out before him, each digit glowing with a silvery light. His lips moved, but the words he spoke were too low for even sensitive wolf ears to detect. The sheen around his hands began to spin and grow outward, becoming oscillating clouds of metal, moving faster and faster with every second.

As asprega stirred in alarm, Dona cupped his palms and brought them to his lips. A simple breath, and the swirling metallic gloves left his skin and drifted over to Rayne, where they coated his pale fur from snout to tail.

Rayne took only a moment to show off his metal-like armor to Fenris’s less than sane glee before jumping from the edge of the tunnel and falling down amid captivated asprega. Perhaps they had never seen a wolf with metallic skin, but then they had certainly never witnessed the likes of what dropped to the floor shortly after he did.

It was rare that Fenris took the exact same shape in his Luna form; after all, what did madness know of routine? Yet not even Rayne had witnessed a beast like the one that stood beside him, roaring loudly.

If a were could have a scorpion’s tail, six arms, the horns of bull, and plate armor over both his back and his gargantuan front, then Fenris would have been one. But werewolves’ bodies weren’t meant for such dynamics.

“You two again,” snarled the asprega prime.

Channeling his female alpha, Rayne replied, “You’re fucking right!”

* * * *

Tarik was one of the few vampires old enough to have witnessed the raising of the pyramids, who actually found the twenty-first century entertaining enough to remain awake through. Tanned like worn leather, his olive skin revealed the red hue of the finest of nourishment; vegetarians, Freya suspected. Although he was several millennia in age, the vampire looked no older than fifty, bearing the distinguished beauty of Egypt in his features. His hair was black as ink with only wisps of white at his temples, proof frozen in time that he had been turned in his latter days. Tarik’s strength and power were probably close to those of an asprega, gifts that only came to vampires through age. But for all of his might, for as dignified as he appeared on the wide-screen monitor brought in for conference, the caution evident in his brow proved he knew what disaster looked like and what wolves were capable of.

“All that we ask for is time,” Tarik pleaded. “Such brutality was uncalled for, Vaegar. If you had but notified me, you could have had my full cooperation.”

“If I had had your full cooperation, then none of this would have occurred in the first place,” Vaegar stated. “I did not act without the proper intel, and I can assure you that every coven we breached harbored a victim.”

Tarik frowned, his curiosity as obvious as his panic at Vaegar’s claim. No mention had been made of either Dona or François, but the vampire elder was keenly suspicious. “But what of the innocents?”

“The innocents?” The Sohon balked. “Oh, we took prisoners, if that’s what you mean. Those who stepped aside and aided us in our searches. They were released before my troops pulled out. Those that did not, well, I’m sure that you will have fun creating more little fangs.”

The suggestion didn’t seem to appeal greatly to Tarik. “Dammit, Vaegar! I am sincerely sorry for your loss, but what you’re doing will cost us both. Allow me time to call the council, to find those responsible. I swear to you that you’ll have their heads.”

“I don’t want heads! I want our females. Our cubs!”

Everyone in the room was rapt, their attention sweeping between the monitor and Vaegar. Freya was tense, nails embedded in the expensive wood of the table. Vaegar spoke for all of them.

The Sohon alpha had seemed impressed when she mentioned that her mates would be taking care of the asprega. He had made a comment about true fighting that she had brushed off at first as machismo. Yet looking at the exhaustion on his virile features, Freya knew that politics and tact waged a toll all their own. And with his niece Benna still unaccounted for, diplomacy was the last thing that Vaegar wanted.

With the setting of the sun, their edge had vanished. The teams that had not already redeemed their objectives swiftly found themselves on the defensive. Heart could only win so many battles, Freya figured.