Warrior's Moon

“What, what’s the mate bond?” Audrey asked.

“He…I…no…” She shook her head beyond the ability to accept one more unbelievable thing, particularly one so very intimate and invasive.

If Caelis had access to her mind, he had known exactly how much he had hurt her six years ago. And still he had repudiated her.

He had known her desperation, her hopes, her fears and he had rejected her despite them all.

“No,” he barked, the giant beast’s expression pained in a way she could not comprehend. “I do not read your thoughts.”

“You are reading them now!” she accused.

He shook his head, a sound that was no human word she’d ever heard coming out of his mouth.

She looked around her, wondering for one terrible moment if any of it was real. Or was she living in some twisted dream?

The impossible did not happen. She had believed because she had seen. But what if all she had seen were fevered imaginings of a mind lost to reality? She must be mad. Mayhap that explained all of it, this new world that was too wondrous for the mundane life she led.

She had never thought to see Caelis again. He hadn’t wanted her. How could she believe he was really here, laying claim to her, Eadan and another man’s child?

’Twas beyond imagination.

But she had imagined it. She must have.

“I am dreaming. You are not here at all.” She could not help that her words came out more accusation than statement.

Her fantastical warrior had made her believe.

“Och, lass, stop this. I am here. You are here. ’Tis no dream.”

“But…”

He shook his great head, tenderness she had not seen in those gentian blue depths for more than six years. “You are not dreaming.”

“You—”

A claw pressed against her lips with the softness of a butterfly. “Shh…”

Chapter 15

A sacred mate’s ability to share words through a mental bond is one of the greatest gifts of mating.

—ABIGAIL OF THE SINCLAIR

Tears sprang to Shona’s eyes, though she knew not from where. Surely she was past crying her stress away.

Caelis’s hand moved to cup her cheek, the palm so big it covered part of her temple and neck. “You are mine. I will not allow you to be harmed.”

Vegar snorted. “Aye, you’re his mate right enough. Under no other circumstances would he have revealed his conriocht so quickly.”

“But…” She looked up into mesmerizing blue eyes. “I heard your voice. Inside my mind. You know I did.”

“Aye.”

“That is not normal.”

“I stand before you a conriocht. ‘Normal’ does not define your life now, if it ever did.”

“But…”

“You are mine.” He said it again. Inside her mind.

She pulled away from him, his touch too much in that moment when she feared a connection of such magnitude she could well lose herself in it. “Can you hear my thoughts?”

“Only when you direct them to me.”

“But I didn’t…what I was thinking. You knew.”

He shrugged. “I do not understand it, but it was as if each thought was an accusation from you to me.”

“I wanted to say it, but stopped myself.”

He nodded, as if that explained it. She didn’t know if it did, but if this mindspeak between true mates was real, then Shona would have to be far more careful what she thought loudly around him.

“What will we do with them, then?” Vegar asked.

“Take them back to the keep.”

“And then?” Audrey asked as Shona wanted to.

“Then we extend mercy and the opportunity for submission, as Chrechte ancient law dictates.”

“They had no mercy toward us.” And if Chrechte law was so merciful, then how had so many of his kind died to war as he’d claimed?

Of course, two wolves lay dead in the clearing. Men who would never return to their families or homes. Men, Shona suddenly realized, she’d probably known at one time.

The thought made her queasy even as she worried that allowing the others to live put her children at risk.

“Mum, Da will make it all right,” Eadan said.

Shona looked down at her son and tried for a smile. Her son’s worried look indicated her attempt was less than successful.

“These men have been taught to disregard the honorable ways.” Caelis looked with regret down at their son. “As was I. I learned a new way. Perhaps they can, too.”

Audrey didn’t reply and Shona had nothing to add. Caelis claimed she was stronger than the need to withdraw mercy.

Mayhap he was right.

But in that moment, she could be glad the decision was not hers to make.

“We will go into the forest. Vegar, you go to the keep and fetch more of the Sinclair’s soldiers.”

“And some coverings for the men. They are naked,” Audrey pointed out as if no one else had realized yet.

So, she still had the modesty Shona had always thought such a deep part of the younger woman. She’d simply…what? Accepted Vegar seeing her naked because they were mates?

This mating business had a lot to answer for.

“Take the children with you,” Shona implored Vegar. “Please.”

“No, Mummy. We need to stay with you and Da,” Eadan immediately denied, reaching for his father with the first sign of true fear Shona had seen in her son this whole time.

Caelis lifted the boy without hesitation, saying something in a low voice that brought a relieved smile to Eadan’s features and a nod of agreement.

Marjory latched onto the conriocht’s leg, her thumb tucked into her mouth. Caelis’s giant hand rested carefully on her head, the gesture both gentle and clearly protective. Neither child showed signs of being overly upset by what they had witnessed, though both very obviously did not want to be separated from their savior.

Considering her son had barely survived his stepbrother’s machinations and Marjory had spent two sennights on the run with her mother and friends, they might well consider this day less upsetting than Shona did.

“The big dog keep us safe,” Marjory said around her thumb.

Shona found herself laughing and was glad to see that Caelis did as well. It was a strange, more guttural