Highland Shifters: A Paranormal Romance Boxed Set Read online

  He cleared his throat. “Rain Falling. I thought maybe ye’d like to walk with me a bit.”

  Rain screwed up her face and resolved that the best thing was to put them both out of their misery quickly. “Thank you, Liulf. I’m flattered, but I think the kindest thing would be to tell you honestly that I’m not interested in you. At all.”

  Liulf looked at her like he was confused by that. After all, he had a lot to offer a mate. He was alpha of the largest pack in the entire known world. Or worlds. There was no question that he could protect her and surely no one would question that his progeny would be healthy.

  “Why?”

  Rain shifted her weight to one leg, feeling like the conversation was growing tedious, although she did recognize on some level that it took some impressive self-esteem to hang around and demand reasons. Really, she’d wanted to keep it simple and have Liulf move on to something or someone else.

  “I’d rather not be hurtful, Liulf, but if you’re going to press, you leave me no choice. As far as I can see, you’re no fun. I have never even seen you smile. Not once. Which is just weird for a wolf. You know? Whoever heard of a wolf who doesn’t smile? Ever. I’m not the right one for you. So, if you’ll excuse me…”

  Liulf was a little stunned and was regretting the decision to force himself to talk to her. Somehow he’d imagined it going better. It didn’t escape his attention that he’d said similar things to Mave over the past three hundred plus years. He thought he might have to rethink his certainty that true matings couldn’t be one-sided.

  From the other side of a bonfire, Conn had witnessed Rain talking to Liulf. He’d seen her walk away without his older brother. He set the female he’d been kissing aside and walked to where his brother still stood unmoving. “What did she say, brother?”

  “That I’m no’ fun.”

  Conn sighed. “I knew she was young, but I did no’ realize she was yet an infant. Come. Let’s go get some of Cairn’s gut burner.”

  Liulf allowed Conn to pull him away toward a jar that contained a night’s forgetfulness.

  The next morning Liulf woke on the ground, covered in morning dew with his head pounding in a way that could only be caused by the worst alcohol he’d ever consumed. After soaking his head in the cold stream that ran by the encampment, he sought out Luna for a quick remedy.

  “Hangover, Alpha? Seriously?” she laughed. “You seem above that sort of thing.”

  Liulf snapped at her. “Are ye sayin’ I’m no’ fun?”

  Luna pulled back and grew serious. “Of course not, but Liulf. This is the best thing I could ever do for you. Don’t ever let my mate hear you speak to me like that. He really wouldn’t like it.”

  Liulf hung his head. “Nor should he. Accept my apology. My ire is no’ meant for ye.”

  Luna looked sympathetic. “Then what is it? I’m good at secrets. Would be between you and me and no other.”

  “No other?”

  Luna drew an X across her breast over where her heart would be. Not knowing what the gesture meant, Liulf looked at her intently and seemed to come to a conclusion. “I believed I found my true mate, almost a season ago. Last night I tried to speak with her. Finally. She wants nothin’ to do with me. Says I’m no’ fun.”

  Luna sat down. “Someone from your pack?”

  “No.”

  “I see.” Luna looked away for a moment. “Do you know how your uncle and I got together?”

  He shook his head. “No.”

  She smiled. “I was a healer on another world. Not this one. Not the one you came from. Stalkson was readying his pack to migrate here. My… facility was run by the demon’s auntie. He, Deliverance, stopped by to perform a, um, service for us and had Stalkson with him. He saw me and was sure I was the one. So he took me.”

  Liulf’s eyebrows went up. “Took you?”

  “Yes! I called it a kidnapping.” She smiled like she was thoroughly enjoying the retelling. “He called it a romantic abduction. He threw me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and demanded that the demon transport the both of us interdimensionally. Without my agreement.”

  “He just took you?” Liulf felt the strangeness of a smile coming. The idea of his uncle resorting to kidnapping… well, it was just juicy.

  “I know it’s shocking, but the only thing about it that scared me was going between dimensions. I was never afraid of the big, bad wolf. Well, except for when he shifted to wolf form to prove to me that werewolves are real.” She looked serious. “Now I’m not recommending you grab her and run away. Exactly,” she hedged. “But if you’re positive it’s a true mating…”

  “I do no’ think that’s the best way to proceed with this particular situation. For one thin’, her mother is alpha of the first colony. I suspect that would be the quickest way to unravel all the progress that’s been made with the idea of werewolf solidarity.

  “I do no’ know how I will be proceedin’, but I have found this talk very amusin’. Thank ye for the tale and for reshapin’ my head to normal size. Ye’re alright for a human.”

  Luna smiled warmly and patted Liulf on the shoulder. “You’re welcome. Get your brother to help you with your approach to complimenting women.”

  “Conn?”

  She just gave him a look. “Yes. Of course Conn. So far as I can see, Ken is too preoccupied with inventing better ways of doing things to be concerned with flattering females.”

  “Aye. Seems with few words ye’ve pegged the brothers Cu Ahlee.”

  Liulf was called over to a discussion by some of the pack elders, who regularly attended Council meetings to discuss the question of free passage between territories with a clause withholding hunting privileges. As the argument wound down he noticed Rain walking off toward the forest alone.

  Naturally he followed, not to stalk her, but more because she seemed to be a living magnet that pulled him along helplessly. Seeing Liulf headed away from camp, Conn decided to join him, eager to report on his Gathering conquests and gossip about his favorite subject, females. He was oblivious to the fact that Liulf was following Rain and also to the fact that Liulf was half listening as they ambled.

  The Gathering had been located by a shallow running stream that was picturesque and sufficient to function as fresh water supply for a large encampment. It served that purpose well, but had nothing to offer in the way of swimming or bathing.

  Since the Gathering was being held in Rain’s home territory of New Gaul, she knew the camp stream was a small tributary of a river on the other side of a pine and sweet gum forest. It was easy to keep her in sight because she was wearing the red shift she’d had on the first day Liulf had seen her.

  Conn didn’t stop talking when he stopped to relieve himself on some old tree roots, but Liulf kept walking.

  Rain knew exactly where to find the path through the trees with the deep river on the other side and, as she drew closer to the water, the trees thinned out to a park-like setting lined by a dense growth of thicket on one side. There were flat rocks at the water’s edge where she could wade in and get used to the cold temperature before immersing herself. She decided her shift could stand a rinse, too, so she removed her boots, but kept the dress on. She was shin deep in cool water and happy to be away from the noise and activity of so many packs together at once, when she heard a short high-pitched bray behind her in the direction of the trees.

  She looked toward the forest edge in time to see two curious and playful bear cubs racing out of the thicket underbrush on legs just learning to run. They were headed straight toward where she stood in the river shallows and she was too fascinated to do anything but watch, her own curiosity engaged. By the time she registered the meaning of the sound of crashing in the thicket and the hair-raising growl of a worried mama bear, there was an enormous grizzly charging straight at her, only fifty feet away.

  Maybe if the bear had been sixty feet away, her biped flight response would have kicked in. Certainly, if she’d been in wolf form, her survival
instinct would have overridden her fear because, on four legs, she could run circles around the bear and laugh. But fate comes with good days, bad days, and days that can’t be judged either for years to come.

  Rain was frozen in place, transfixed by the sight of six hundred pounds of furious grizzly coming straight for her.

  As soon as the healthy bear cubs had emerged from one of the clumps of underbrush running toward Rain, Liulf had known what would happen next. There would be a protective mother close behind. He’d begun sprinting toward Rain as hard as he could, trying to shift as he ran. He yelled for her. “Rain! Run!” His voice was deeper and more gravelly because he was in mid-shift. She heard Liulf’s call and somehow knew it was him. She understood the command. She wanted to comply. She knew she needed to force her feet to move, but her eyes were locked on the advancing bear and she couldn’t look away. She was still as a stone statue and just as pale.

  Seeing the terror on her face caused everything inside Liulf to roar in protest. He shifted and caught up with the bear’s lumbering jog just before she reached the water’s edge. He launched himself hard and sailed through the air. He landed on her back snarling and, instinctively, trying to bite the tendons above her shoulder blades at the base of the neck. The bear stopped and momentarily went still from the shock, but quickly reacted with a bellow so loud it vibrated through Rain’s body. The interruption got Rain’s brain functioning again and released her from her stupor. She began screaming for help without knowing if she could be heard all the way back at the Gathering camp.

  Conn had heard his brother yell a frantic warning to Rain Falling and wasn’t far behind, but he got momentarily tangled in the sleeves of his hemp shirt when he shifted. He struggled frantically against the accidental binding made by his clothes. When he freed himself, he ran in the direction of the screaming until the trees opened so that he could see. The bear let out an enraged bray of protest, then, as Conn watched in horror, she gave a mighty shake of her massive shoulders and upper body, dislodging Liulf. He twisted as he hit the ground, scrambling to get to his feet, but she caught him with a mighty sweep of her paw and threw him against a tree trunk as she rose to her hind legs. She extended her neck, damaged and bleeding, and roared in his face as he slumped to the ground. The big wolf had pulled away some tendons between her shoulder blades so that she was holding her head at a strange angle.

  Liulf had heard cracking on impact with the tree and knew that it was bone and not branch. But the only thing that seemed important at the moment was trying to get back the breath that had been sent gushing from his lungs. He lay immobile seeing only blackness with flashes of red, without breath, as if his body was in such a state of shock it had forgotten how to inhale. Unable to breathe, unable to move, when his vision began to clear, he wished he had also lost his ability to see. The grizzly was poised over him. She raised a set of black claws that looked like daggers and slashed down hard across his abdomen, opening four evenly spaced gashes across the width of him.

  Conn ran straight for the bear’s tail and gave her a sound bite on the left buttock, crunching through fur to make contact with muscle. He only had a second to use the leverage of his comparably slight body weight to tear back and forth and she squealed in outrage. The bear had raised her giant paw to strike at Liulf again, but was stopped by the surprise attack from the rear. She whirled, going down on four legs, and shook her head at Conn. She jumped up and down twice on her front paws to warn the second wolf off, but Conn continued circling, running in for a nip, then dodging out of the way of her deadly reach, trying to keep her distracted from Liulf until help could arrive from the rest of the pack. Given the way Rain was screaming, that couldn’t be much longer.

  First to arrive on the scene were five wolves who had shifted. They didn’t hesitate to assess the situation or plan strategy or to weigh the risk to themselves. In a dance as old as the race, they circled the bear and busied themselves taking turns as they parried, keeping her attention on them and away from Liulf as they drew her further and further away from where his body lay slumped at the base of an ancient hemlock. In another three minutes the hunters, who had kept their biped form, arrived with bows and arrows.

  The wolves broke away to give the hunters a clear shot.

  At some point Liulf’s burning lungs relented and allowed him to take in air, but the pressing need to breathe was immediately replaced with enough pain to make him wish for death. He knew Conn had drawn the bear’s attention, but even though he was terrified for his brother, he hadn’t been able to call out to Conn and tell him to run. He couldn’t even make himself stay awake. As he drifted in and out of consciousness, he became aware that the pack was taking the bear down. His eyes slid in the direction of the battle as the grizzly was being riddled with arrows. So many arrows. She went down with a great thunk and huffed, her hot breath blowing the stems of newly sprouting wildflowers.

  Somewhere behind him, in the midst of all the commotion, Liulf’s sensitive ears heard the cubs’ soft whining.

  A shadow fell over Liulf. At first he thought it was the bear returned to finish him off, but then he heard Rain’s voice. When he’d involuntarily shifted to biped form, his long hair had ended up half covering his face. She gently pushed the strands away and had the absent thought that it was strange that such a hard, hard wolf had such soft and silky hair.

  “I’m here, Liulf. What can I do?”

  As she knelt beside him she heard an alarming squish where her knees depressed the earth. She looked down at the wet area next to the tears in his abdomen and realized how much blood had left his body. Her hands fluttered helplessly above his ruined body. She wanted to give him comfort and was afraid that touching him could do more harm than good.

  Liulf’s eyes, barely open, focused on her, his face contorted in a mask of pain, his breathing labored, but he was trying to say something. Using the arm that wasn’t pinned under his body, he caught her wrist and gripped it tight enough to make her wince. She leaned down, putting her ear near his mouth.

  “Tell them no’ to kill her.” She pulled back to look in his face.

  “Kill her?” Rain’s brow knitted in the middle, while trying to discern what he might mean. Her first thought was that he was hallucinating, thinking she was still in danger. Then suddenly she understood him. “You mean the bear. You don’t want them to kill the bear.”

  For the rest of her life, Rain Falling would recall the precise moment when the film lifted from her eyes, the moment when she had seen Liulf truly. She was awed by his willingness to give himself up for someone who had treated him badly, but more than that, she was amazed that his mind was focused on protecting the very bear that may have killed or crippled him. She knew that she’d badly misjudged the Highlands alpha.

  Looking over her shoulder she saw that it was too late to pass on the alpha’s command. The great female grizzly was dead. Rain swung her head back toward Liulf, not knowing what she’d say, but it didn’t matter. He’d slipped into unconsciousness. Her heart broke to see his magnificent naked form lying bloody, dirty, broken and torn, because he’d rushed in to save her.

  When she felt hands on her shoulders, urging her away, Rain’s own tears were flowing as fast as Liulf’s blood was leaving his body. She resisted leaving Liulf.

  “Rain Falling, let us look at him.”

  She rose and backed away a couple of feet, but continued to stand close by. She could tell by the way the experienced hunters looked at Connuchur that they didn’t believe Liulf would live. Two of the wolves were sent back to let everyone, particularly the New Scotia pack, know that the Highlander alpha was wounded, perhaps mortally.

  Luna always brought a wide range of supplies for healing when she came to Gatherings and welcomed wolves from all the packs to consult with her. Word had quickly spread that she was a talented physician so, logically, the wolves ran straight to her for help. She was peering into the mouth of a little boy, when they arrived shifting to biped form and speaking hurr
iedly.

  Once she understood, she gathered all the supplies she thought she might need into a large woven bag with handles. A few wolves had gathered outside her tent. She stopped to give them instructions.

  Turning to one of the humans, she said, “Watch my girls for me?”

  “Of course, Luna.” The woman took the twins by their hands.

  Speaking to one of the Elk Mountain she-wolves, she said, “Find Stalkson Grey and tell him to make a stretcher for Liulf and bring fresh clean blankets. He’ll need to be carried and not pulled in a wagon.”

  The bag of supplies was too heavy for her to carry and run at the same time. So she handed it to one of the wolves who had come for her. “Will you carry this?”

  He nodded as he took the bag. “This way.”

  Luna was young and strong and ran as fast as she could, but it took ten minutes and she was badly winded when she arrived. She sank down next to Liulf and heaved for breath as she looked him over. She hadn’t known him long, but she had such a tender heart that she couldn’t keep her eyes from stinging when she saw the mess the bear had made of him.

  She pulled back an eyelid and murmured to no one that he was in a coma. A part of her thought that was just as well given the extent of his injuries. Using a combination of the few precious supplies brought over from Loti Dimension and the herb remedies she had wildcrafted on Lunark, she got the wounds as clean as possible. She couldn’t check him over completely without turning him so that he was flat on the ground.

  Looking at a devastated Conn, she said, “Come around here and try to keep everything as immobile as possible while we lay him on his back.” With the help of three wolves they moved Liulf so that Luna could have better access. She held his head, giving instructions and saying again and again, “Carefully. Gently. Slowly.”

  She found that his right humerus had broken where it had impacted the tree trunk with more force than she cared to think about, but she needed to give a priority to the gashes.