Warrior's Moon

wolves, including Audrey, whimpered, but the big one just turned and ran away.

Caelis lowered the children to the ground and ordered Vegar, “Watch over them.”

“Aye.” The Ean did not appear offended at the other man’s imperious tone.

Caelis turned to the three cowering wolves and pointed to the ground. “Stay.”

None so much as raised a head in inquiry, but all dropped to their bellies completely and… stayed.

Caelis gave chase after the retreating Chrechte, running faster than she’d ever seen man or beast. Even after the head start Caelis putting the children down had given Maon, he easily caught up with the big wolf. Caelis grabbed the ginger wolf by the scruff of its neck and shook the animal.

Maon went limp and Caelis carried him back to the group, where the other three wolves had not moved the breadth of a single canine hair from their position of submission.

Caelis threw Maon to the ground and then barked, “Shift!”

All four wolves transformed to their human forms. The transition was no less magical for her having seen it before.

Shona recognized two of the warriors, one of an age to her and the other younger. Maon, the self- proclaimed leader, was three or four years younger. She had not immediately recognized the youth she had known six years ago in the angry man he had become.

A fearsome warrior to be sure, he stood leader over men both older and younger than him. Only one man appeared a complete stranger to her.

He looked younger, too, but Shona knew from Caelis that could be deceiving.

All stared at Caelis with varying degrees of respect—even Maon, though his was tempered by that unbanked fury he’d displayed from the moment of his arrival in the clearing in his wolf form.

“You are conriocht. It is not possible,” Maon snarled, his defiance barely tempered.

Vegar’s brow rose mockingly. “And yet here he stands.”

“There is no sacred stone for the Faol anymore. The Ean stole our Faolchu Chridhe.” Maon looked at Vegar with loathing, his disgust with the situation clear. “And you are this one’s friend.”

Caelis backhanded the man, knocking him back several paces. “He is my friend and you’d do well to remember that.”

“Wait until Uven hears about this. He’ll find a way to stop you. I could have, if these fools had not submitted.” Maon glared at his fellow Chrechte.

“He’s conriocht, guardian of the Faol chosen by the Faolchu Chridhe, our own sacred stone, to be our protector and leader,” said the older man Shona had recognized. She thought his name was Sean.

“If he was chosen, it was with a purpose to do the Fearghall’s bidding, but he’s living here among the Sinclairs and the Ean. He’s a disgrace.”

This time, Caelis kicked the stupidly stubborn man, his roar of fury even giving Shona pause. Not that she feared him, but he was an impressive beast. And he was definitely angry.

“What is a conriocht?” Audrey asked, her voice uneven.

Shona had not even noticed her friend had shifted back to her human form.

“It is an ancient term for werewolf…man and wolf combined,” Vegar said, his big body blocking Audrey’s naked one from anyone else’s view.

Interesting. Considering both Caelis’s reaction earlier that day and Audrey’s response to being seen naked in the loch by Vegar in his eagle form, Shona assumed the Chrechte were less concerned with nudity than their human counterparts.

Audrey pulled her shift back on and spoke with the sheer white fabric over her head. She looked equally skittish and fascinated by Caelis’s savage form. “I have never heard of such a thing.”

“Before yesterday, I had never heard of…” What had Caelis called himself? Oh yes. “Shape-changers.”

Audrey replied, “But none have three forms.”

“That is not true,” Vegar said. “Chrechte with parents of two races can sometimes shift into two animals, both wolf and bird. It is rare, but it does happen.”

“Truly?” Shona’s blond friend had managed to get the shift settled into place.

But honestly, it did little for her modesty as see-through as it was.

Vegar didn’t seem impressed with its covering properties, either, glaring at one of the MacLeod Chrechte whose gaze had strayed from Caelis to Audrey.

Vegar nodded in response to Audrey’s question, doing his best to bind her wounds even as he helped Audrey cover herself with her dress.

Caelis stood to his full seven feet and spare inches tall, towering over them all. “I am conriocht and I claim my right as alpha to the MacLeod. Follow me.”

Sean and the other two MacLeod soldiers who had submitted in wolf form immediately dropped to one knee with right fists pressed to their hearts and heads bowed toward Caelis.

Maon remained standing, his stance defiant, though he kept his distance from Caelis.

“Or what?” Maon asked with only a marginally less antagonistic tone.

“Or you die. My conriocht nature will be revealed at my choosing and no other’s.”

Shona wanted to protest. Not the killing of the odious man. Maon would have killed Caelis without a qualm, and Shona as well. Worse, he would have killed or stolen her children. Either was not a fate she would ever wish on them.

Nay, she wanted to protest the opportunity to live. “How can you trust his vow of fidelity? Or any of theirs, for that matter?”

What was the submission of a wolf worth when he had the deceitful heart of a man?

Caelis looked at her, his gentian blue eyes the one familiar thing in his conriocht face. “I can smell a lie.”

“You did not smell them approaching. They masked their scent,” Audrey pointed out, awe for the feat lacing her tone.

“In my human form, I may not smell the masked scent. In my wolf form, that almost never happens. As a conriocht, they cannot lie to me, or mask their scents at all.”

“Impossible!” Maon looked impressed despite his denial. “None can smell our passing when we do not will it.”

Caelis ignored him and looked at Shona. “You will have to trust me.”

He wanted her to believe in him when she’d learned six years ago to do so was to set herself up for untold pain. “My children’s lives are in your hands.”

“Our children.” The ferocity of his tone brooked no denial.

She did not give him one.

“Do not risk them then.”

“You would have me kill them without mercy?”

She spun away before words that would condemn her more than the MacLeod wolves could pass her lips. But when had anyone shown her mercy?

Caelis hadn’t. Her parents hadn’t. Certainly the baron had not, using her body when he saw fit despite knowing how little she wanted it. And the current baron would take what he wanted without remorse if she allowed herself to be within his grasp.

“You are stronger than all of us.” The words were in Caelis voice, but they had not been spoken aloud.

She heard them in her head.

Fear that had not taken hold during or after all the strange revelations of the past days rose now over her like a spectre. She could withstand much, but what would happen to her children if she lost her reason?

A hairy, oversized hand landed on her shoulder. “’Tis the mate bond.”