Chapter 26 Nico
NICO
Maddy’s confession had freaked me out. There was no way I’d let her see how concerned I was about her, though.
Something was very wrong. She should not be able to shift.
If her blood was as diluted as it was supposed to be, it should have been impossible.
Her wolf was so strong. There should have been no way she could actually feel the mental movement of the wolf within her.
I remembered how it felt as a child. The awakening of the wolf, the way it was hungry for release. It really had felt like something was crawling beneath my skin. It was the exact description Maddy had given me. I was worried for her, worried what it all might mean.
I pulled my phone out to text Luis. I needed advice, and he was with the one person who might be able to give me the answers I needed.
Me: I need to talk to Kenneth.
Luis: What’s wrong?
Me: Something’s going on with Maddy. I think she might be on the verge of shifting.
Luis: What???
Me: That’s what it sounds like. What she’s experiencing sounds just like the lead-up to the first shift.
Luis: That shouldn’t be possible.
Me: Exactly why I need to talk to Kenneth.
Luis: He’s out in a village on the outskirts of Oslo. Had a lead about a descendant of a human who’d worked as a servant for Edemas.
Me: Tell him to call me as soon as he gets back. Got it?
Luis: Will do.
The next several hours went by excruciatingly slowly. Maddy was out grocery shopping with Felipe. I really hoped Kenneth would call while she was out. I didn’t want to hide away. That would have been strange and hard to explain. Thankfully, I got a call not long after she’d left.
I answered the phone, almost dropping it in my haste. “Hello? Kenneth?”
“Yeah, it’s me. Luis said you had an issue?”
I sighed, took a breath, and explained everything that was happening with Maddy.
Her dreams, the sensations, and feelings.
I went into detail about her mood swings, and how she felt like something was inside her.
I laid it all out, and once I was done, I waited for Kenneth to tell me what he thought.
“Well, I’d hoped this wouldn’t happen, but I guess we don’t always get what we hoped for.”
I blinked and shook my head. “Wait…what? You expected this?”
“Based on my research, I knew it was a possibility.”
My blood ran hot, and I gripped the phone hard enough for my knuckles to crack. “You knew this might happen, and you didn’t think I might need that fucking info? That Maddy might need the info?”
I could hear him sigh on the other end of the phone. “I didn’t want to stoke fears based on a hunch. There was no reason to freak you all out if there was no proof or if there really was no reason to be worried.”
“Well, what the hell is going on? Maddy shouldn’t be able to shift. So what the hell is going on with her?”
“My research goes all through the genetic lines back to when Edemas was assassinated. I’ve gone back hundreds of years.
Of course, I can’t say I’ve found every single descendant, but from what I’ve discovered, Maddy is the first instance of a first-born female being born to the bloodline since the fall of Edemas. ”
I didn’t understand what that had to do with anything. My frustration was boiling to the surface. “Why does that matter?”
“There have obviously been other females born, but in three hundred years, none have been first-born. Ask yourself this, Nico. What bloodline, out of all the different bloodlines, ever produced female alphas?”
I knew what he was saying. Female alphas were practically unheard of. The only time you ever heard about them was in legends. Stories about… “Oh shit,” I whispered.
“Exactly. If the stories are true—and at this point we have no reason to assume they aren’t—what does that tell you?”
The dots started to connect inside my mind. Puzzle pieces clicking together, revealing a picture I didn’t like. “Maddy’s an alpha?”
“That’s what it looks like,” Kenneth said.
“I’d wondered about it. Worried is a better word probably.
So, I kept tabs on her. I went so far as to hire a private investigator to stake out her house and watch her as she neared puberty.
Nothing. Not a whisper of an imminent shift.
I kept watching her until she was almost twenty years old.
Still nothing. I’d decided we were in the clear.
I didn’t anticipate her finding a fated mate, or that it was even possible.
I think now that she’s found her mate, the alpha wolf is trying to break free. To take over.”
“Will it hurt her?” It was the only thing I could think to ask. My concern for Maddy was growing by the second.
“No, I don’t think so. She still shouldn’t actually be able to shift.
She’ll just feel all the emotions and feelings of her wolf.
It will be intense. You need to be there for her.
Treat it just like a teenage shifter getting ready for their first shift.
But you need to remember that she’s an alpha. She’s gonna have some bite to her.”
That was true. It was a known fact that alpha wolves were much more aggressive during the initial change. After that first change, the shifter was able to bring it under control and begin the symbiotic relationship that would define their lives.
If you’d never shifted, though? Jesus, how long would it take to control it?
“Okay. Thanks. I need to talk to my dad. See if he has any suggestions.”
“Glad I could help. Call if you have any more questions. I don’t know if I can answer them, but I’ll try.”
I sat for a minute, letting the information ruminate in my mind. The hope I’d had before his call had evaporated. Now, I had more to think and worry about.
Before Maddy got home, I headed out the door and walked down to Dad’s house. I’d never needed his advice more than I did now.
“Nico?” Dad looked surprised by my unannounced visit.
“Can I come in, Dad? We need to talk.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Your mother didn’t do something again, did she?”
I waved him off as I stepped in. “No, nothing like that. I need advice. You have experience with this.”
“With what?”
“Raising a teenage alpha shifter.”
Dad squinted at me. “Uh…do you have some love child I never knew about?”
As stressed as I was, a laugh managed to escape my lips. “I don’t. It’s Maddy.” I went on to explain everything that had been going on with her. Then I told him about my conversation with Kenneth, and the fact that it looked like Maddy was a female alpha.
Dad listened patiently. Once I was done, he whistled and tilted his head back to stare at the ceiling. “That’s a lot to deal with, son.”
“Kinda what I thought,” I said with a nod.
“I can’t even begin to understand how Maddy must be feeling.
Like going through puberty all over again, but this time with a wolf breathing down your neck manipulating your emotions.
Christ, Dad, it was bad enough when I was eleven, and I knew what to expect. ”
“So, we still don’t think she can actually shift, right?” Dad asked.
“No. Kenneth and I both don’t think her blood is strong enough to allow that.”
Dad nodded and leaned forward. “There’s only one thing you can do, and that is to have patience.
I remember when you hit puberty. We already knew you were an alpha, so we had a bit of warning.
” Dad grinned ruefully. “You? Oh man, you were a handful, though. Pissy attitude, angry outbursts. It was all your mother and I could do to handle you. I’ll tell you, that first night when you finally shifted, I’d never been so relieved in my life.
It was exhausting, but we loved you. We supported you through it.
That’s what you’ll have to do with Maddy.
That’s the only advice I can give you. Until she’s comfortable and the wolf settles into the fact that it will never shift, you’ll have to be understanding. ”
I walked back home and saw Felipe sitting outside. He was on the steps of the porch. When he saw me he sighed and stood. “Thank God, bro. I don’t know how much longer I could handle her,” Felipe said as he stood.
“What’s wrong?”
Felipe rolled his eyes and nodded toward the house.
“Maddy just about killed a lady.” My eyes bulged, and Felipe patted the air in front of me, motioning me to calm down.
“Not literally. Some chick in the grocery store pissed her off. To be fair, the lady was an entitled bitch. Just yanked a pack of hamburger out of Maddy’s hands.
Like, big as shit, ballsy as hell. Took it out of her hand.
Even my jaw dropped at the audacity of it.
Maddy gets in the bitch’s face and more or less tells her to back up and get out before she beats the shit out of her.
I’ve never seen a person look so scared.
Lady beat feet and got the hell out of there. Left her cart and didn’t look back.
“So, then the whole rest of the time we were shopping, Maddy was raging about the chick. I couldn’t calm her down. Then the whole drive home?” Felipe shook his head in exhaustion. “I’m tired, bro. I’m gonna go home and take a nap.”
“Great,” I said and walked inside.
I found Maddy pacing in the kitchen. She kept going back and forth, not even noticing me until almost a full minute had gone by. She jolted to a stop and looked at me. “My period started,” she grumbled.
Oh good, I thought. Late-onset wolf puberty and PMS. Secretly, I wondered who I’d pissed off in a past life to deserve so much stress in this life.
I stepped over, and before I got close, Maddy released a growl. I stopped dead in my tracks. The sound had been exactly like a shifter growl.
“Something’s wrong, Nico,” she hissed. “It’s not just stress. Something is wrong inside me.”
“I know,” I said, taking a seat on a stool. “I think I know why.”
The anger on Maddy’s face gave way to surprise. “What? What’s wrong with me? Tell me.” She sounded so desperate that it made my heart ache.
“I called Kenneth. I wanted to get his opinion on how you’ve been acting. He is almost a hundred percent sure that you’re a female alpha. The first one in almost three hundred years. It means your wolf is stronger, more powerful than usual. It’s why things have been so rough for you.”
Maddy put a hand to her chest. It took her a few seconds to respond, and I could almost see the questions forming inside her head. She took a seat beside me, and she already looked more relaxed. “So, you guys are sure?” she asked.
I nodded. “It’s really the only explanation for what you’ve been feeling. I can’t say it’s a hundred percent because no one has dealt with this before. You’re kind of like a unicorn. We’re learning as we go.”
Maddy groaned and flopped her arms onto the kitchen island. “Why is my life so fucked?” She gave me a sideways glance. “So, I’m basically going through puberty a second time?”
I shrugged. “Kinda.”
“Well, the first time wasn’t very fun. I remember screaming at my parents for stupid stuff. I’d break down, crying for literally no reason. And, oh God, so much masturbation. Like…so much.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. A grin spread on Maddy’s face, and it delighted me to see it. At least she was a little more relaxed. Sometimes the most stressful thing in the world was to not know. Once a name had been given to something, it became less scary and easier to deal with.
She turned to me and wrapped her arms around me. “Thanks for not hating me. I’m sorry for being such a moody bitch lately.”
“Hey, at least you didn’t threaten to kill me like that lady at the store.”
“Fuck.” She put a hand to her face, covering her eyes. “Felipe told you?”
“He did. Pretty cool story.”
She sank into me. “How long does shifter puberty last anyway?”
I grimaced. “It, uh, it could be months.”
“God almighty,” she muttered and put her face into my shoulder.
I rubbed her back. “It’ll be okay. We’ll get through it. I survived, and so will you. We’ll just take it one day at a time.”
“Can you promise me that you won’t hate me? Like, if it gets worse? I don’t want you to get so frustrated with me that you start to despise me.”
“That’s impossible,” I said, lifting her chin to meet her gaze. “How could I hate you when I love you so much?”
Maddy’s face went pale and her mouth dropped open. “What did you just say?”
It took me a second for her words to sink in. A light clicked in my head. It was the first time I’d ever said it to her. I meant it.
“I love you.”
“Do you mean that?”
I grinned. “I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it.”
She kissed me, hard and long, sliding her hands through my hair. When she was done, she pulled away and studied my face for a long time. Then a grin spread across her face. “I love you, too.”