CHAPTER TEN #2
The clear magical fluid ran out quickly and in icy rivulets and streams. It was icy against my tongue and tasted like a blend of marshmallows and vanilla bean ice cream.
I lapped it up and a chill went through my body and spread out through my limbs and up the back of my head as if giving me a shield.
Then came the memories – slow and sweet.
So much snow and ice and so many wolves who shifted into forms that might’ve been yetis or bigfeet or something else altogether.
Loop, Sawe, Damon, and others. One very frequent visitor years ago named Hudson, but he’d since found his true-mate within his own pack.
More snow. More ice. Garden statues that buzzed with magic and victory.
The train ride here with the world blurring by and the first time he laid eyes on my twin who he was suspicious of at first. Then seeing me and losing is cool.
The ball comment that made my mate want to face paw.
Then Venal in the snow with his frozen gun.
Glimpses of visions – or at least what I thought must be visions – came next.
Mori missing his mate in the bar. He was indeed wearing a Grim Howler’s shirt.
I couldn’t catch enough of his face to see him properly even when I squinted.
The image was fleeting but he had a five o’clock shadow that night.
Maybe Wess’s magic was pouring into me and sharing his gift.
Only I knew these weren’t new visions. He’d already seen all these things before.
I kissed him hard when the clear magical fluid ran dry. His memories now lived inside me and somehow that made me feel more whole than I’d felt in a long time. My bear and his nuzzle, reminding me how much bigger than me a polar bear was.
We held onto each other, kissing and licking, while our hips rocked bringing us both closer and closer to the edge.
A delightful cold fire danced in my limbs and my fingers and toes.
It spread over me again and again, stretching out my pleasure and teasing me all over.
I moved it around my flesh, spinning it here and there, and somewhere in the middle of it all I realized these cold sensations didn’t fully belong to me. That’s how Wess felt all the time.
“It’s yours too,” he said over our newly opened mating link. “Snow and cold like to move around. I didn’t know it would happen but I think the claiming vows have actually given you some new sort of magic. I can feel you moving it over your skin.”
“Maybe I can freeze the next asshole,” I teased.
“Anyone you want,” he agreed, running his fingers through my hair.
He dug his heels into the bed and thrust up into me hard and fast, giving me more and more until the cold danced in quick, hard spirals over my skin, bringing more and more blood to the surface.
Reaching between our bodies, Wess took my throbbing cock in his hand and stroked me in time with how our bodies rocked together.
Everything inside me drew up tight and my balls were heavy.
So heavy that I knew it wouldn’t take much more.
I didn’t need to tell Wess I was close because now that our mating link was open, he could feel my pleasure just as easily as I felt his.
We kissed hard and I growled against his lips as the pleasure overtook me.
He tightened his grip on me and I roared as warm, sticky lines erupted from me.
He kept stroking and teasing as he thrust faster and faster, giving me more and more and drawing out my orgasm as he chased down his own.
Everything inside of him called out for relief.
I hugged him tight with my body, squeezing his cock as it rose up into me.
He growled and snarled and finally threw his head back and roared back at me as he came.
The sound echoed around the bedroom and probably beyond our home, but everyone knew what newly met true-mates did on their first night together.
We collapsed, spent. It had been such a long day and the start of a long night. Sharon Claudis was still roaming around but now I could probably freeze her and chip some of her off to use in my drinks. That was the happy thought that carried me off to sleep.
I woke the next morning all wrapped up inside Wess’s arms and with a slight headache on the top of my head as if someone had bit me in my sleep. I patted around and couldn’t find the cause of the pain.
“Maybe it’s from the cold magic,” my bear yawned and turned over to go back to sleep inside his inner sanctum. “Like a brain freeze. A patchy brain freeze?”
My bear wasn’t worried about my headache but then again he didn’t worry about much of anything when he was asleep.
I wiggled around and rolled over onto my back.
Wess snuggled in close, keeping me against him.
The corners of my mouth pulled up into a grin.
This was nice. This might even be close to perfect but my baby wasn’t home.
So before even rolling out of bed, I checked in on him.
He was still asleep and dreaming of tearing apart a giant throw pillow that had rows and rows of teeth.
It was slow going but my kiddo was getting the best of the dream pillow of doom.
Wess chuckled and kissed my neck, picking up the dream over our little family link once I zoomed in on it.
Then I shut my link to my baby tight as I rolled back over onto my side for a long, slow good morning kiss.
I lost myself to his warm, sleepy mouth and our bodies came together as if this had been our morning routine since time immemorial.
Then after a quick shared shower we headed into the kitchen.
I put on the coffee because I was pickier about it.
The claiming vows hadn’t shown me how Wess liked his coffee, but I knew because he knew.
It was as if someone had poured extra knowledge in through my ear while I slept.
He liked coffee as long as it was coffee.
I drank mine strong enough to standup and walk away on its own.
I had missed it while solely chest feeding but Baby Andy was mostly on the bottle and baby food now.
So, I indulged here and there. Today was definitely a day to indulge.
The sun was just peeking into the backyard, so I pulled Wess away from the fridge where he was planning what to make for breakfast and outside with our steaming mugs.
Mine had a snowman on it and his, a polar bear wearing a Santa hat.
I bought it years ago, but it fit him perfectly.
We sat on the back porch leaning against each other and watched the sun greet the day. Our first full day as true-mates.
The ache in my head rattled again and I shook it until the sensation passed.
The headache reminded me that somewhere not too far from here Venal was frozen into an ice statue.
After we finished our coffee, I sat the mugs just inside the back door and looked to Wess.
He popped his neck and yawned before sinking down as translucent fur sprouted from his skin, making little rainbows in the icy morning air.
It didn’t appear its trademark white until his transformation was complete.
I ran my fingers through it, it was soft and warm.
He bumped against my side and started thinking about my own bear.
He came out slowly as if not quite ready to conquer the day.
Venal being a frozen mess was bittersweet for my inner beast. Sure, something had to be done about Venal but at one time he was at least a net neutral in our life.
He didn’t sign up to be a sire and since we weren’t trying to make a baby when Andy was conceived, I didn’t hold that against him.
Our hookup was exactly that but once he started working with his mother…
. That was another story. Still, it was surreal to think that the man I conceived my baby with would willingly hand him over for sacrificial purposes.
Wess nuzzled into my side once I was fully shifted and led the way across the snow to where he had buried Venal.
With one big, white paw, he knocked the frozen snow away from Venal’s frozen face and I peered down at him.
Yeah. At some point we had to move him but now wasn’t the time and it wasn’t like he was going anywhere.
He was a solid ice statue. Part of me wanted to say poor Venal but the other part knew better.
Some people who were hurt healed and helped others.
Some hurt people went on to hurt people.
One way or another, Venal had ended up in the latter category.
The pain thrummed through my skull again and Wess nuzzled me.
His touch made me forget about the pain for a while.
Instead of heading straight back to the house, Wess and I wandered through the snow for a bit.
He kept his mouth open, breathing in the scents of his new home.
I hadn’t originally planned on it, but I ended up leading us to the sleepy, nearly empty village square and then to my parents’ house.
My carrier was already up with my youngest sibling, a rowdy cub, banging his paws on the tray of his highchair.