“These were originally intended for your brother,” she tells him. “But then we saw the flash and thought maybe you’d arrived without clothes, too. Though apparently that wasn’t the case.”
The smaller one with the huge bushy hair looks his leather jerkin and brown pants over with disappointed eye before saying, “Too bad.”
The taller sister keeps her smile, but admonishes the other woman between clenched teeth, “Tu…”
“What?” the one called Tu answers. “Like you weren’t wondering after his brother came through the gate! Like POW! WASSUP, ladies! Magic-Magic Mike ya’ll!”
Understanding little of her language, FJ merely bows his head in thanks. “You do honor me with this gift of clothing.”
“Wow, look at you with the fancy language. That thank you was so nice, it almost made up for you showing up here all covered up in baggy leather.”
“Tu!” the taller sister once again admonishes.
“What? We’re all supposed to act like he doesn’t have it going on?” Tu asks her sister incredulously. “We’re just going to pretend Chloe’s Viking sons didn’t turn out crazy hot?”
“Yes,” the older sister answers, sounding much aggravated. “When welcoming new people to our kingdom, it is important to remain courteous and respectful.”
Tu rolls her eyes in the manner of his mother and answers, “Well, I’m just saying whoever he came here for is not going to be upset. She’s lucky—I mean not as lucky as me...”
The large yellow-haired wolf makes several hand gestures to Tu, which she answers out loud accompanied by a glare.
“I am lucky, Wolf. Like, the luckiest she-wolf ever. I don’t know why I have to keep on telling you this.”
Fenrir Grady merely grins, but he must add something over their mate bond because not long after, she has inserted herself beneath her mate’s broad arm, and nuzzles her face into his chest. It is just as his mother often does after his father says something sweet with his mind.
The wolves of this time seem more affectionate outside the sleep bench than the wolves of his village, FJ notes as they head toward what Rafe calls “the clinic.” Grady keeps his arm around Tu’s shoulders and Fenrir Mag holds his queen’s hand as they walk.
And when they come upon Aunt Alisha outside a large wooden building with clear windows, Fenrir Rafe rushes to take his queen into his arms.
“Everything okay, babe?” he asks.
For good reason. She and the two smaller males she is standing with outside the clinic all look fatigued in the way of his mother after preparing a great feast.
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The one talking urgently into a black rectangle looks up at FJ to ask, “This the new one? Any injuries?”
Fenrir Rafe gives shake of his head before turning worried eyes back to his queen.
“Everything’s fine,” she answers at his concerned look. “The townspeople had a lot of questions about the second flash. We barely convinced them to go home before you showed up.”
But then she pulls out of their hug, her eyes going to FJ.
“Oh my gosh! FJ! I can’t believe it’s really you. Rafe told me over our mind link, but I thought maybe he was wrong. What were the chances you and Olafr would both show up here, in the same place?”
Truth be told, he thought the same. That Fenrir Rafe must be mistaken about his brother’s arrival. But now his play-aunt has confirmed it.
“So it is true? My brother has come to this place as well?”
Every one, save the male talking into the small rectangle nods.
“Yes, your brother is inside,” says the rounder of the two small males. He wears strange pants that must be made of some kind of shiny and smooth animal not known in FJ’s own land. Also, his skin is a much lighter and a different kind of brown than Aunt Alisha’s. But he smells like her and the queens who brought him clothing, so FJ assumes this must be her father, the Alaska fenrir.
“The doctor says he got the arrow out, but he still hasn’t shifted back to wolf.”
The fenrir nods to the man speaking into the rectangle. “Dr. Leesma is trying to figure out what to do now. If we should bandage up his human or figure out how to trigger him back into a wolf—”
“Get off of me! Get the hell off me!” a woman’s voice yells out. Then, “Help! Somebody help!”
Her. It is her. His fated mate. FJ knows this in an instant. It is her and she is calling for help.
Without thinking, he bursts through the clinic’s doors, his nose easily tracking her to a room in the back…
And that is when he knows, despite his attempts to speak with honor, that he has lied. Not to Fenrir Rafe, but to himself. For when he sees her, he recognizes her as the one. The one he did not know he was waiting for. The she-wolf written in the stars for him, by his father’s many gods and his mother’s one god.