Chapter 10

Knowing his cousins were at work, Thor felt safe stopping at their rental cottage. If they’d been around… It had been too long since he felt steady enough to talk to them. He definitely didn’t want them seeing him like this.

Which was really saying something, considering he’d had no problem letting them watch him excavate a grave under their kitchen pantry, half-shift into a monster trying to king-bite a polar bear into becoming ruler of a desert clan, and carry a picnic basket.

Rita Wick had done something to him. Beyond convincing him to put his faith in a flask of rose soup. He put his hand over the breast pocket of his chambray shirt, pressing the crystal into his chest. The flask was smaller than the pony beer bottles that Gypsy stocked for the sole purpose of identifying hipsters to bounce out of her bar, but it still made a noticeable lump above his heart.

Rita had insisted that the pull between them had nothing to do with the attraction spell for the beast, and he’d suffered through—and resisted—enough mating seasons to concede that it wasn’t mere animal magnetism between them. Hell, he didn’t even have his animal right now. But still, the way he’d fallen into her so easily… He could’ve drowned in her, like the hidden underwater caves of Lake Angel swallowed the unwary. Only her cautious reminder—”until the sun rises”—had restrained his jaws when he’d bitten her. The mark remained this morning; he’d seen it under the tidy ponytail she’d forced on her wayward auburn locks. If the beast had been high in his blood, that mark might have been forever. Once the bear returned, he could never again risk being alone with her.

That was what she’d awakened in him. Not the bear, not just an unseasonable lust. But the realization that he couldn’t trust himself in this shape either. One night of passion with Margarita Wick had stolen the last of his belief in himself, the arrogance a king needed to lead his clan. When the last petal fell, his days in Angels Rest would be over.

Quickly he gathered up some extra clothes and food from the pantry. All shifter sanctuaries kept extra clothes for visitors, but it was always hard to find something in his size. He snitched a few cans of beans, keeping his gaze averted from the hole in the pantry floor that led down to the neurotic excavation he’d done in the depths of his despair. In retrospect, it was clear he’d been digging to escape his pain. But now he knew he’d have to run much farther than that, just as his father had done.

Shoving everything into his pack, he returned to the bike. With his boot on the kick start, he hesitated. This would be the moment for his cousins to return unexpectedly to tell him everything would be all right.

But the sun kept beating down like a punishment, as if night might never come again. When he dropped his boot, the engine let out the roar he couldn’t, and he peeled away.

But instead of returning to the hidden reaches of Mesa Diablo to await his fate, the front wheel of the bike twisted to the northeast, for the sharper peaks of Colorado. This wasn’t really Four Corners land anymore, but the bear clan ranged wider than most other shifters. This time of year, he knew his quarry would be in the higher, cooler forests feasting on pine nuts and yampa roots before the oncoming threat of winter.

He left the bike at the end of an old forest road and set out on foot. After a few miles of climbing, he was panting hard. Since he’d gotten lazy and soft on the lower plateau, this would’ve been much easier in his other shape.

Wouldn’t everything?

He founded the cached kill first, lightly covered in brush. The old bull elk had died with long strands of grass still in his teeth. One massive blow had done him in, and he’d never seen it coming. And nothing else had bothered the corpse, even though it was a high-value meal this close to winter.

Only one beast could’ve made and maintained sovereignty over a kill like this

Thor walked a little upwind—the beans didn’t seem so tasty now—and settled to wait. A while later, at a crackling in the underbrush, he stood and faced the approaching creature.

The behemoth that emerged from the brush was a beautiful cinnamon hue a few shades lighter than Rita’s hair. Even without the lingering aura of the rex ursi, the beast was magnificent.

“Hi, Grandpa.” Thor gestured to the small pile of gifts he’d left under the tree. “I brought you some of Ben’s canned peaches and a few other things.”

With a heavy grunt and a ruffle of its thick mane, the grizzly shifted into a wiry old man. In this shape, his hair was mostly gray, but if anything, the glint in his amber eyes was more wild.

“Peaches,” he exclaimed. He lumbered over to the pile and grabbed a can with one hand and the pair of Wranglers with the other, so Thor knew he hadn’t gone too feral yet. The old man shucked into the pants before turning back to Thor. “And my grandson.” He held open his arms for a hug, though he didn’t release the peaches.

Thor stepped into the embrace, closing his eyes at the undiminished strength in his grandfather’s grasp. Even when the old man had passed the king bite to his son—Thor’s sire—the unmistakable strength of an alpha male remained. Not the arrogance of a bully, but the natural confidence of a leader who had followers not out of fear but because they believed. Thor held on maybe a moment longer than he intended, and behind his back he could feel the old man fumbling with the lid of the jar. The soft pop of the releasing seal was followed by the sweet rush of high summer fruit, followed very quickly thereafter by the sound of slurping.

With a chuckle, Thor stepped back. “They are all for you,” he reassured his grandfather. “Although I might take a chunk of your steak.”

“I might let you.” His grandfather waved toward the coolness of the trees. “Come, sit, tell me the news. How long has it been since you’ve been up here? It’s hard to keep track of the time.” He frowned a little.

“Not so long,” he reassured his grandfather. Some shifters grew old in town, but most preferred to spend more and more time in their wild shapes, accepting the inevitable with a natural grace that Thor suspected he might need sooner than he wanted to let on. He hated to intrude on the old man’s peace, but he needed to talk to someone about the rex ursi.

“Mac is getting married in October,” he reported. “To a witch, if you can believe it. I know he’d love to have you at the party, and Grandma too, although she’ll need to leave her dress on, at least during the actual ceremony.” He glanced around. “Is she somewhere close? I brought her some salmon jerky.” He shook an admonishing finger at his grandfather. “So you make sure to save her some, hear?”

The old man cackled. “She’d rip my head off if I ate it all,” he agreed. “I reckon she’s around here somewhere, but you know she’s getting shy.” He smiled, an expression of such joy and sorrow and love that for a heartbeat Thor thought the flask in his breast pocket had broken and jammed itself to his chest. “Might be I could get her into town one more time, or at least as far as the mesa, but I think we’ll save that for when you take the king bite.” His smile flattened, replaced by a twist even more complicated than before. “And how is the king, my son?”

Even under the best circumstances, the change of power was hard. Yet another reason the old king took himself away from clan, so there was no confusion over who in charge.

No clan had ever faced a problem like this. “Dad is…missing.” No wonder the wily old bear thought his son was still rex ursi, considering that Thor bore no scent of the beast. Normally, he was sure his grandfather would’ve noticed his half-rogue condition, but the temptation of peaches overwhelmed the other male’s senses. “I’m trying to track him down.”

His grandfather tilted his head. “You don’t think it’s those Kingdom Guard bastards mustering a comeback, do you? Enemies like that don’t just give up.” When Thor blinked at his grandfather in surprise, the old man snorted. “I might be out here in the middle of nowhere, boy, but I got eyes and ears and a nose. I didn’t want to bring your grandmother closer to the trouble, but I’ve been keeping watch on the far-flung clan.”

Thor nodded. Of course the one-time king would still care about his clan, no matter how far removed. But their troubles were more dire than even a group of lethal bigots.

This time, the danger came from within.

He didn’t doubt Rita’s spell would do all it could—all she could—but he couldn’t just sit around and wait for the beast to come back to him. He’d hunt it down. And the best place to start out was the last place the quarry was seen: in his father.

“We’ve taken care of the KGB,” he reassured the old man. “But Dad… The fight was hard on him. And I think he’s gone to ground to lick his wounds.” What few wounds Thor had managed to inflict, anyway. “But the clan needs him.” Needed a rex ursi.

His grandfather’s wild amber gaze rested on him lightly, not quite a challenge, though more direct than was entirely comfortable, and he wondered how out of the loop his half-feral grandfather really was.

But the old man just huffed under his breath. “I should’ve waited to pass the bite to you,” he muttered. “That son of mine, he was always too much like me. Too sure of himself when he shouldn’t be, too hard-headed to ask for another way. You’re more like your mother, big enough to see all sides and don’t mind looking.”

Once upon a time, Thor would’ve been thrilled at the praise. Now... What would she have said about him fighting his father? She’d gone northwest as soon as he’d mastered the change, and though she’d kept in contact—as much as they could between nowhere Angels Rest and the even more nowhere of Alaska—she had taken a mate and had new cubs. A new life.

Depending on Rita’s spell, maybe he’d end up wandering the wilds beside his mother or his grandmother, but trapped in this shape.

“I can’t find the rex ursi,” he said, truly enough. “Have you sensed him around?” One ex-king to another might have some insights he could use.

His grandfather shook his head. “It wouldn’t come this way, not when I’m here. Not that I’m wanting to take up that struggle again.” But he looked maybe a bit the same way he looked when he opened the peaches.

Power was an aphrodisiac, Thor thought wryly.

Maybe that was why he couldn’t keep his grubby paws off of Margarita Wick.

“Abu, may I ask you…”

His grandfather’s bristling eyebrows raised in permission.

“Why did you not claim Abi as your mate until after you gave up the king bite?” When the old man frowned, Thor hurried on. “Everyone knew you were meant to be together.”

The scowl faded on a long sigh. “It’s the way of things,” he said with a shrug. “You can enjoy the ladies and the sows, even have cubs as I sired my son and he sired you. But leading a clan of apex predators spread thinly over hundreds of empty miles is no easy task. Not for the rex ursi. And worse for those he loves. We’re not like the wolves and the coyotes, all singing together. Better to keep the power pure and simple—better to keep your heart pure and simple—while it’s yours.”

Thor thought of the intricate dance of Rita’s spell. “Maybe the world isn’t so simple anymore.”

His grandfather grunted. “Maybe, maybe. Or maybe we just knew better than to make things complicated.” At Thor’s dubious expression, he cackled. “Nah, you’re probably right. But why do I get the feeling you already decided that?”

“Because you’re a clever old man.”

His grandfather cackled again but quickly sobered, his grayed chest sinking inward. “Sometimes I think I gave up the king bite too quickly because I wanted to claim your abuelita before she got tired of waiting. Bear gals ain’t patient or forgiving, and there was already too much space between us. But could be your father might’ve used more time to get his bearings in his not-so-simple world. He never really had a chance to test his own strength before… Well, that’s over with and done. And there’s still plenty of pine nuts for an old bear.” He reached over to settle his hand on Thor’s shoulder, his grip still heavy and steady. “Don’t make your world trickier than it has to be, boy.”

What would a witch with hundreds of crystal jars and dozens of illuminated grimoires say to that?

He gave his grandfather the pack with the extra food—any extra pounds would be good, come winter—and said, “Kiss mi abuelita for me.”

The old man nodded and gave him another hug. “We’ll see about coming into town for the wedding. If not, you’ll be in our hearts.” He patted Thor’s sternum, just missing the rose flask.

As he revved the Harley’s engine, Thor wondered why his heart must come second to the rex ursi. The wolves and coyotes were doing more than singing and dancing in the moonlight; fighting alongside the rest of the town’s shifters, they’d destroyed the Kingdom Guard bastards. For all the size and ferocity of its people, the bear clan’s isolation had left them vulnerable to the KGB, and they’d been a part of the problem, not the solution.

Holding the big bike rock-steady with one hand, he spread his other hand wide where his abu had touched him, his fingertips brushing the flask.

What was the point of finding the beast if he lost the chance to guide the clan to a better life?