Then Astrid’s fingers had touched my skin,
gripping my throat—I was an enemy until proven otherwise—and the
shock of our irreversible, unchangeable, eternal connection swiftly
ran from my neck down my spinal cord, spreading through my body, my
soul and my mind, overpowering me completely. I had never met
Astrid before yesterday. I knew she existed—back home, her name was
on everybody’s lips—but I’d rarely given her a second thought. I’d
seen her pictures many times in the last six months, but never felt
any specific emotions looking at her pretty, but always so serious
face and smart dark-blue eyes. The other detail that had stuck in
my mind was her luxurious hair—a long, silky golden-copperish
cascade that looked like a halo around her face.
I was shocked. She felt it too, of course,
but didn’t have a clue what it was.
Oh, God!
was all I could
think. Later, watching her sitting across the table, her arms
crossed over her chest, I thought of what she would say once she
knew. She wouldn’t say anything, probably. She would just run away,
before I could have a chance to explain that she still had some
choices, no matter how small and pathetic, and that, at least,
anything she didn’t want to happen to her wouldn’t. Not with
me.
I said
a part
of me was relieved,
because the bond had already started working and another part
didn’t like being separate from her. That was a new feeling,
equally exciting and annoying. Annoying because, again, it had been
forced upon me. Exciting, well, because I could hardly wait to have
that stiff, skinny and not at all my type of woman beside me
again.
I shook my head and smiled. Seven-of-Nine,
exactly my type of woman, would say that it was futile to try to
resist Astrid. And I couldn’t agree more.
I went back to her place. Her natural scent
was all over it, and I inhaled it thirstily. She smelled fresh, of
rain and wind, of a clear spring morning, of the sea breeze. Deep,
deep under all these elemental essences, there was a subtle touch
of musk, earthy and tangy.
All insanely arousing.
I’d talked to James and my mother, without
revealing too many details of my first encounter with my
step-cousin, and spent several hours on my laptop trying to catch
up with my work.
It was around eleven when I became restless,
so going to see Tristan suddenly seemed like a good idea.
THE HOSPITAL administration, including
Tristan’s office, was on the fourth floor. I asked to see him and
he instructed the receptionist to send me up.
A brass plate on the door read
Dr. Tristan
Blake
, and under that
CEO, Hospital Services
, without
the usual string of titles that people from the medical profession
were sometimes so fond of. Tristan was a genius in his
field—genetics, not hospital management—and one of the least vain
personalities I’ve ever known.
“The first thing Astrid asked me this morning
was if you were her blood relative, then if you were married,”
Tristan said, as I stepped in and pointed to an empty chair across
his desk.
A sudden surge of primal male pride took me
by surprise. “Did she now?”
“She’ll kill me if she knows I told you so
don’t mention it to her. And no reason for that cocky grin; she
asked that for practical reasons. You are about to camp at her
place for several weeks, so she would prefer you were unmarried,
cousin or not. Espresso?”
“Sure. She made something undrinkable this
morning. So, was she relieved or disappointed? Did you tell her I
wouldn’t jeopardize her chastity, cousin or not,” I said as I sat
down.
“I told her that no danger would come to her
from you. And that you are not married and, to the best of my
knowledge, not her blood relative.”
“She’s my other half, Tristan,” I said
quietly. I saw that for an instant Tristan didn’t get it.
“You’re kidding!” he said when the meaning
reached his mind. “Wow. What now? How did Astrid take it?”
“She doesn’t know. I didn’t have the heart to
tell her.”
“She’ll freak out.”
“At this point she doesn’t need to know.
After she spends some time in Red Cliffs, she’ll start to
understand us better. And I’m not going to twist her arm to make
her cooperate.”
“What about you? Do
you
want her to
cooperate? How do you feel about it? You at least know what it
means.”
“I’ve already freaked out. It was a total
shock.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Proceed with the plan. Take her home. I
don’t know more than that.”
“Do you like her?”
“Tristan, I met her yesterday. People think
that bonding is romantic. It’s damn scary. Your finger accidentally
touches a stranger and the next thing you know you’re tied to her
for the rest of your life, which is a pretty long time.”
“All species have bonding.”
“Yeah, but ours is a more complex process. We
bond on two different levels: our human and wolf spirits. Everybody
has to be in sync with everybody else. It usually happens easily
and instantly, but it can also be a quite lengthy process.
Sometimes we bond easier with other species than with another
werewolf, or half-werewolf.”
“But less commonly. It’s not always simple
for us, either. You know that outside our own kind, we most often
bond with humans. No matter how civilized we are, deep inside we
still consider them as a source of food. That could be a bit of a
challenge, you have to admit. Bonding doesn’t always go smoothly,
not even within one kind, but I truly believe it doesn’t happen
haphazardly.” Tristan smiled and slapped Jack’s shoulder. “Cheer
up, man. It will be easy to love Astrid. You’ll see that when you
know her better.”
“We’ll see. Never mind that now. There’s
nothing I can do about it now. Astrid still needs my help, bonded
or not... You and Livia have been with her during her recent
changes. Tell me about it.”
“It’s painful.”
“Painful? It shouldn’t be painful at all,” I
said. I wanted to find her right now, keep her close to me and
protect her somehow from that pain. Where was she now, I wondered,
trying to pick up her scent. The bond seemed to be interfering with
my common sense. I made an effort to refocus on our
conversation.
“It’s always been painful for her, and it’s
becoming worse. She does it quickly, faster than you. Maybe that’s
the reason. She’s an enormous wolf, way bigger than her human size
would suggest. But then, when she turns, she’s nothing like you
guys. There isn’t that burst of energy and life that always
impresses me when I see you changing. She’s as sick as a dog—no pun
intended.”
“Oh, God! She didn’t say anything about that.
Why’s that? Do you have any explanation?”
“No, except that it could be because she is a
different sub-species. Offspring from interbreeding between wizards
and werewolves are extremely rare. We know almost nothing about
them.”
“She changed for the first time when she was
twenty-three. That’s quite late for us.”
“But not for them. Sometimes those children,
especially females, don’t transform at all. They’re
half-werewolves, of course, but their shape-shifting gene is
recessive.”
“Well, Astrid’s gene apparently isn’t. With
each subsequent transformation the process should be easier, not
more difficult, as we learn how to control it. And not painful, for
heaven’s sake!”
“She can’t control it, that’s the problem. I
don’t know, Jack. I always check her after the transformation. Once
she recovers, she’s fine. There is no damage, nothing unusual. She
needs a day or two to become herself again.”
No wonder she hated it, I thought, trying
hard not to imagine her curled up in pain, exhausted, lying on the
ground, unable to move. It hurt like hell. “We’ll find out why she
suffers through the change. What can you tell about her genetic
make-up, besides shape-shifting? That’s your field.”
“She combines the best of both kinds.”
“Psychologically, emotionally,
intellectually, socially...?”
“Astrid’s much more emotional than wizards in
general. You know them; they’re like a crossover between Tolkien’s
Elves and Mr. Spock from
Star Trek
. Their rational side is
far more prominent. Not that they do not feel, they do, as
intensely as we do, they just don’t show it. She does. You
should’ve seen her when she was about fifteen, she was a
handful!”
Tristan smiled and then continued, “She’s
fiercely independent. Don’t expect her to be submissive to you or
anybody else. Or dominant, for that matter, at least not in her
human form. Those concepts are still alien to her. As a werewolf, I
can’t say for sure, but the wolf should reflect the human side, and
vice versa, right? She’s a private person, though, she’s happiest
in her own company, but she’s loyal once she chooses you as a
friend. She’s smart, well-educated and sophisticated. Nice sense of
humor, the kind that’s never meant to hurt somebody else.”
“As a doctor?”
“Born to be one. She is both an orthopedic
and trauma surgeon, and brilliant in both fields. Wizards are
doctors par excellence, but she’s exceptional even by their
standards. I’ve haven’t seen anything like that in a long
time.”
“Physically, she resembles more her
father—same eyes, same hair—than her mother.”
“Rowena and Astrid, they’re different, and
not only physically. Rowena is—or rather was; we don’t know a lot
about her now—impatient and passionate and, don’t forget, young.
She wanted everything and she wanted it now. She was too young to
be married, too young to have a child, and too young to be turned
into a werewolf. Had she had several more years, she could’ve
turned out quite differently. She was a self-centered,
irresponsible, spoiled little teenager caught in serious grown-up
circumstances, but I’ve never thought she wanted her husband and
your father dead.”
“I know. It’s been a comfort all these years.
It was Seth who killed Brian and Hal, not Rowena, I’m aware of
that.”
“Jack, Astrid’s a mature and responsible
young woman,” Tristan repeated softly. “Maybe too mature and too
responsible. I tease her sometimes that she was born as a
twenty-five year old woman. She had one or two stormy teenage
years, but even that was more or less a typical hormonal rebellion,
although Arnaldur and Ella probably wouldn’t agree.”
Tristan’s phone buzzed. He glanced toward it,
reading the message on the display. “She’s going home early. She
said she’d ask you if you wanted to come to our place tonight...
That’s a nice little concession, good job, Astrid.”
When he saw my puzzled look, he explained, “I
asked her this morning if you two would come. Liv’s eager to see
you. Oh, she’ll be ecstatic when she hears about the bond.”
I bet she would be.
“I asked Astrid to phone me to pick her up
when she was finished. Why didn’t she?”
“Oh, don’t worry, she’s not going to make
your life a picnic, at least not at the beginning,” Tristan said.
“She’s independent and territorial, and you just stepped into her
precious little space. She’s challenging you. Why don’t you
surprise her? She’ll be leaving in twenty minutes.”
“I might...Tristan, she’s not even my type.
She’s too serious and... and too skinny.” I meekly tried my futile
resistance one more time.
And no boobs
. I added another
irrelevant complaint to the whole list of other ridiculous ones,
but at least I knew better than to say it aloud. Tristan was a
first-rate old-school gentleman, and Astrid Mohegan was his
protégé.
He looked at me as if I’d suddenly sprouted a
second head. “With the exception of Mrs. Livia Aurelia Lucilla
Blake, Astrid’s the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen, in both
her forms. You should think beyond bonding. Have a good look at
her, you old fool! Relax, Jack, you’ll be eating out of her hand
before you know it, and you’ll love it.” I heard my friend’s hearty
laugh as I closed the door behind.
I RETURNED to the reception desk and asked if
I could please see Dr. Duplant. This time a young girl sat behind
the desk.
“And who is asking for Dr. Duplant?” the girl
asked with a flashy smile.
“Jack.”
“What’s your last name, Jack?” The question
was unnecessary, her voice had the wrong intonation, and the smile
was too sweet.
All I wanted was to see my girl. “Jack’s
enough. Please call Dr. Duplant for me, will you?”
She lowered her eyes and dialed the
number.
ASTRID SHOWED up five minutes later and
looked at me with an arched eyebrow. She was ready to go home:
handbag over her shoulder, her light coat draped over her arm. I
took the coat from her hands and helped her to put it on. I rested
my hands on her shoulders and let the warm current run between us
for a moment.
“You said you would phone me when you were
done. Don’t tell me you were about to,” I said casually.
“I wasn’t,” she said and turned. A little
smile that lurked in her deep-blue eyes reached her lips. In a
split second I realized what Tristan had tried to tell me just a
few minutes ago.
God, you are beautiful!
I almost said
aloud, looking at her as if I hadn’t seen her last night at
all.
She opened her coat to smooth the blue dress
under it. Last night she was in an oversized shirt. This morning
she’d been fully dressed when she left her bedroom, her coat
included. Now I realized I was grossly mistaken about at least one
more thing. Or rather two. The boobs.
I laughed aloud and wrapped my arm around her
shoulders. She glanced suspiciously at me from under her lashes,
but stayed close, and the brave smile still lingered on her
face.
I had a secret, and for the time being I
wasn’t going to share it with her. For a while, I’d decided, I
would enjoy the fact that she didn’t have a clue that I was about
to happen to her.