At those words, he recalls his Aunt Bera’s dire predictions about what would come to pass this winter and feels his heart grow heavy.
“Well, you grew up, dude,” Fenrir Rafe answers. “But it’s only been a few years for us. The boys are seven now. They might even still remember you.”
FJ’s heart lightens at the thought of finally seeing again his young “play cousins”—as his mother and Aunt Alisha did call them. And so little changed from when he last set eyes upon them. However…
“My deepest apologies, Fenrir Rafe. Though I greatly wish to see your sons, I fear my time here is short. Like my father before me, I have come to seek refuge from a great enemy.”
He covers his heart and bows his head solemnly. “I must ask the advice of your learned queen, my play aunt, Alisha. I must also find my own fated mate, so I might return with her to my time and vanquish the enemy who brought bloodshed to our village.”
In truth, FJ is not nearly as interested in finding his fated mate as he is in gaining the advice of Aunt Alisha. She might be the only one who can gather enough information to help him defeat their seemingly invincible foe. And though he can already feel a connection to his mate tugging him down the mountain, he is most concerned for his village…and his parents who will eventually be returning to it. Possibly to an ambush if Randulfr, the beta who led the village wolves retreat, cannot warn them first.
Of all of the things he must accomplish in this short period, fulfilling the fated mate spell “falls low on his list,” as his mother would say.
But everyone in the small group, including Fenrir Rafe, now stares at him with wide eyes, as if addled with confusion by his words. Then the large yellow-haired man standing beside Fenrir Rafe makes many gestures with his hands.
“Yes,” Fenrir Rafe agrees aloud, as he, too, makes a series of hand movements in return. “He speaks way better than his brother.”
FJ starts. “My brother?” he repeats.
* * *
FJ’s father has raised him to be honorable in all things. For this reason does he make little mention of his fated mate to Fenrir Rafe or the other two fenrirs with him. FJ wishes them not to think him as the love-besotted girls who did come oft to their longhouse to ask his mother for the spell that fated her to his father.
In truth, FJ has much enjoyed himself as the future fenrir of the North Wolves. The wenches and the mead, both offered aplenty wherever he and his father, the Prince and King of the North Wolves respectively, do travel.
His father is well mated to his mother and unlike many of the mated Vikings they traveled with, his father only has eyes for his mate. But FJ has enjoyed availing himself of human and wolf females alike, and never has he lamented his lack of a mate—though his parents did and quite loudly, too, once he passed seven-and-twenty winters, the age his father was when he crossed paths with FJs mother.
“Look at all this cooking I do,” said his mother to him not long ago. “I deserve some grandbabies. Myrna’s too damn stubborn to marry anybody and Olafr’s sticking with his wolf, so you’re my only hope.”
Seeing the distress his continued unwed status brought his mother, his father the Fenrir had even offered him the fated mate spell, on the condition that he bring his she-wolf back to their lands after she was found. “Make her your queen here while your mother and I take to our cabin in the woods.”
But FJ was not a romantic like his father, and much doubted one she-wolf would ever bring him great satisfaction. Also, did he already possess full knowledge of the spell. A secret he’d been keeping from his father for most of his life. For nearly as long as he could remember, FJ had known he might very well die on the battlefield during his five-and-thirtieth winter.#p#分页标题#e#
And for this reason, from the time his manhood first gave rise, he has been much more eager to spend time with other females than in seeking out a she-wolf to widow. So no, a wife, much less a fated mate, did not interest him in the least. And even now, walking down the mountain in this strange new land, he saw acquiring his fated mate as more of a necessary evil that would allow him to return to his own lands, after he crafted a plan to vanquish their serpent enemy.
So when two comely she-wolves meet the small party at the bottom of the mountain, both bearing the same slightly tilted eyes as Aunt Alisha, he allows himself to appreciate their beauty. From their smells, FJ can tell they are sisters, but the smaller one carries the mating scent of the yellow-haired king, while the taller one with the face as lovely as a field of spring flowers, smells of the king with the tattooed face. The taller sister hands him clothes, a strange sort of smooth wool shirt and blue pants that smell of her mate.