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All? My nostrils flare. “I will mate no other man!”
“Not a man,” Aston says, smirking and confusing me no end.
“A wolf,” Lor says, grinning very broadly in a way that shows a lot of teeth.
Aston shrugs, drawing my eyes back to him. “Your half-shift form is more of a beast.”
Wolf?Beast?I swallow as understanding blooms, my belly tightening in a way that is assuredly not fear.
“It’s time you met the other side of me,” Lor says, tone brokering no argument. “It’s time you mated my beast.”
ChapterEighteen
Freya
The falling snow brings to a head the matter of what to do next. Our many parties disband with plans to return in the spring when a lavish wedding will take place between Penelope and the barbarian king. Everyone is abuzz with the news.
With a last goodbye to my mother and the promise to visit her in the spring, we leave for home.
Home.
Once, I dreamed of making my home in the Baxter clan, and now that dream will come true with two of the most amazing mates.
I ride with Aston on his horse while Lor shifts to wolf and trots at our side. My eyes are drawn to him and, every time, I feel a flutter in my belly as I wonder about how I will mate his beast.
He was very clear about it being a beast and not his wolf.
But what is this beast? I don’t think I have ever seen a shifter as anything but man or wolf. I don’t know how it might work…. Or what that side of him might look like.
I’m nervous, yet ready to accept whatever is needed, so we might all finally be bound.
As we near the fork in the road, the party stops, and a brief conversation follows before we ride off again.
The rest of the clan continues for the village.
We turn left for the woodcutter’s cottage.
Aston lifts me down and takes the horse to be stabled. Not bothering to shift, Lor nudges the cottage door open and shoulders his way inside. Given he is the size of the horse, he must duck to enter.
I follow him in, wondering why he does not shift.
He shakes, sending a shower of icy snow all over the floor and me before he sits down. “Ugh!”
I belatedly notice the fire has been lit—someone must have ridden ahead to prepare it for us.
My belly is aflutter as a strange growing neediness invades me. Finally, after so much time, pain, and sorrow, I am alone with my mates.
I stare at Lor, wondering why he still does not shift.
Footsteps sound on the wooden steps before Aston enters, banging the door shut behind him and shucking out of his cloak. He comes over and divests me of mine, tossing it over the table before returning to my side. And all the while, Lor still does not shift.
“Why doesn’t he shift?” I ask in a whisper.
“He’s building up to it, I reckon,” Aston says. “Have you ever seen a shifter in half shift form before?”
I shake my head, glancing between Aston and Lor, who continues to stare back at me as a wolf. “I didn’t know they had a third form.”
Aston turns me to face him and away from Lor. “Not all shifters can hold their beast form. Only powerful alphas can do as much, and only the very strongest can hold it for extended periods. He probably looks much as you might imagine a half-wolf, half-man would—standing upright as a human does, except bigger and with features that are all beast. In place of wolf forepaws, he has beastly hands with retractable claws.”
