Fated Hearts

by Garrett Leigh

  Fresh woodsmoke greeted Devan as he reached the tent city Zio’s forces had erected for shelter. Devan’s was at the back, the only way to get to it through the main area, crowded with off-duty soldiers letting off steam, and of course, he was sharing with Zio.

  Devan picked his way through the clusters of men and women indulging in Danielo’s prescription for the ultimate downtime. It was nothing Devan hadn’t seen before, but as the scents of arousal and sex filled his senses, blocking out the blood and distress he’d brought back from the field, he felt no urge to join in.

  He kept his gaze to himself until he found Michael in a quiet corner. Grateful for a familiar face that wasn’t attached to a naked body, Devan dropped down beside him. “Not your scene?”

  Michael spared him a soft grunt. “Not especially. I’m not as . . . well, horny, I suppose, as the rest of them. Perhaps that part of me is broken.”

  Devan hadn’t healed Michael, and so it was impossible to tell if he was joking. Given that he’d never seen the serious young soldier laugh, he went with the instinct that he wasn’t. “Being different isn’t broken. Have you ever been with someone?”

  “Once. But she was killed soon after, so I was never sure if the feeling was permanent.”

  “Emma?”

  Michael shook his head. “Emma, to my knowledge, only felt that way about females. It was someone else . . . a friend.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay. It was a long time ago.”

  “How long?”

  “Five years.”

  A blink of the eye in a supernatural lifetime, but Varian’s pack—Devan’s pack now—were still young. Devan cast his gaze around the clearing. Campfires were lit, tended to by men and women grilling meat and roasting potatoes. Those that weren’t cooking were generally fucking. Danielo and Bomber were both . . . occupied, though not, Devan noted, with each other.

  Zio was nowhere to be seen, but Devan knew that without looking. Knew that wherever Zio was, he wasn’t remotely close. He pondered where he might be, then cursed himself for caring. I wish I’d never met him.

  Michael got up and fetched a plate of meat and potatoes. For campfire food, it was pretty good, but Devan couldn’t bring himself to eat much. He’d healed so many today he’d carry their pain for a while. Food would’ve helped, but sleep would do more, and Devan craved the sweet oblivion.

  He excused himself and left Michael, retreating through the amorous chaos, so intent on reaching his bed for the night that he walked right into Bomber. “Damn. Sorry.”

  “No worries.” Bomber regarded him through hooded eyes. “Where are you headed in such a hurry anyway? Someone waiting for you?”

  His grin was suggestive. Devan rolled his eyes. “I doubt it, especially after today. I don’t think many people are gonna be queuing to hook up with the man who healed the enemy, do you?”

  “I’ll hook up with you.”

  Devan laughed, couldn’t help it, despite his connection to Bomber telling him the offer was entirely serious. “Thanks, but it’s okay. I didn’t fight today, so my, uh, urges aren’t quite as irresistible as yours.”

  Bomber laughed too and stepped closer, crowding into Devan’s personal space, grabbing his arm. “If you say so, doc. The offer’s open-ended, though, so come find me if you change your mind.”

  A lick of potent rage hit Devan. He blinked as his subconscious adjusted. That wasn’t me. But with so many emotions roiling in the air, he couldn’t pinpoint the source. As he glanced around, he extracted himself from Bomber’s grip and gave him a gentle push back to the party, but no one was looking in their direction or giving any indication that they had ever been.

  Unsettled, Devan continued his trek to the tent he was to call home for as long as this operation lasted. He fully expected to find it empty, but as he got closer, the tingling in his spine that had been present since he’d caught Zio’s scent tripled in intensity.

  Devan’s heart thudded with every step, and he began to wonder if the anger simmering in his gut was his own after all. Part of him wanted to throw Zio down and kick some sense into him. The rest of him just wanted to throw him down.

  Conflicted, Devan ducked into the tent. Zio was on the far side, sitting cross-legged on a spread-out sleeping bag, rubbing his temples. His discomfort broke through Devan’s confusion. He stepped forward.

  Zio growled. “Don’t.”

  Fine by me.

  It wasn’t, but Devan didn’t have the energy to force his powers on anyone, least of all someone who’d likely take his head off in return.

  He retreated to the sleeping bag someone had kindly left on the other side of the tent. Head spinning with fatigue, he unrolled it and opened it out. The night air was cold, but the warmth of the fires, combined with the heat of dozens of over-sexed wolves, was enough to keep it at bay.

  Devan stretched out and closed his eyes. Sleep hovered at the edge of his brain, but Zio’s pain and the weight of his fierce glare shone brighter. Sighing, he rolled over, turning his back on them both. After a moment, he sensed movement, and then a different heat as a body stretched out behind him.

  Zio pressed his face between Devan’s shoulder blades and threw his sleeping bag over both of them. He growled again. “Don’t.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Zio woke at dawn. At some point in the night, Devan had rolled over, and Zio was now curled into his side, his head cradled on Devan’s chest, his headache from the night before a dazed memory.

  Great. Now he’s healing me in his sleep. But Zio couldn’t find it within himself to be resentful. He needed Devan like he needed air.

  He just didn’t know why.

  And he couldn’t deny that it felt good to be in Devan’s arms. Safe. Right. If he could get back to sleep and rest a little while longer—

  Michael stuck his head in the tent. “Drones have picked something up.”

  Zio blinked. “Okay. I’m coming.”

  Michael ducked out with no sign that he’d noticed Zio was wrapped around Devan.

  But still. Shit. His unit up in his face about Devan was aggravation he didn’t need. At least we’re not naked.

  Zio held the small comfort close until he spotted the wood he was sporting in his combat trousers—wood that was currently digging a hole in Devan’s thigh. Awesome.

  Somehow, Zio disentangled himself from the hot mess he’d woken up in without waking Devan. His heart clenched. Loyalty and duty had roused his wolf, but leaving their cocoon of arms and legs felt like the end of the world and unsettled his wolf even more.

  I don’t want to go. But he had to.

  Zio slipped out of the tent. Daylight hit him, along with a face full of rain, and he cringed. In wolf form, the weather didn’t bother him. In human form? Yeah. It could suck a bag of southern wolf dicks.

  Grumbling, he followed Michael’s scent to the embankment where the drone pilots were embedded. Danielo was there too, viewing the captured footage on a laptop.

  Zio peered over his shoulder, still half asleep. “You stink of sex.”

  “You stink of a Shadow Clan healer, brother. Care to explain?”

  Zio had no verbal answer to that. He elbowed Danielo in the ribs and forced himself to focus on the grainy drone footage. “What have we got?”

  “They’re trying to flank us,” Michael said. “See here? The unit coming our way split in two an hour ago, one vehicle headed east, one west.”

  “You sure those are the only vehicles?”

  “No,” a drone pilot spoke up. “But we are sure these two are gunning for us. We’ve got them loading up with weapons—bats and knives. Pretty sure we saw a silencer, though we didn’t see any guns.”

  Zio felt sick. Varian had long feared that the southern packs would bring human weapons to a shifter fight, despite every law in the land forbidding them. Explosives could be explained away as accidents. But guns? The human authorities wouldn’t stand for that.

  “Maybe we should say fuck it a
nd get guns,” Danielo mused, voicing what was almost certainly on the collective pack mind.

  Zio growled, lacing it with every ounce of beta authority he possessed. “That’s not who we are, what we’ve lost so many friends fighting for. No fucking guns, not now, not ever.”

  He got no argument, for that or the hastily formulated plan to intercept their would-be attackers.

  Zio selected two teams. “I’ll lead one, Bomber the other.”

  “He stinks too,” Danielo offered as acquiesce.

  “Shut the fuck up.”

  Danielo grinned before sobering and returning to the task at hand. “What about Devan? He can’t be in two places at once.”

  “That’s if he’ll even come with us,” Michael said, gaze on the laptop screen. “After yesterday.”

  Another growl built in Zio’s chest. He swallowed it down. “Devan is under orders to be here as much as the rest of us. He’ll go out with Bomber’s team to the west. Go get your shit. We need to rock out in ten minutes.”

  The makeshift council adjourned. Zio exchanged a meaningful glance with Michael, grabbed the satellite phone, and dashed back to camp, unsure of what he wanted to find when he returned to the tent he was sharing with Devan. A grinding headache and a craving for peace, even if only for a few minutes, had driven him to invade Devan’s bed the previous night—along with an irresistible desire to keep Devan warm—and he’d never intended to stay till morning, but he couldn’t bring himself to regret it. I don’t regret anything about him.

  The realisation startled Zio. He’d spent so many long nights wishing he’d never gone to that fucking club, that he’d stayed home like a good beta—like Gale—and guided his unit through the grief they owned as much as Zio did. But it was true. Zio had little knowledge of the bonds and relationships shifters formed away from their units, sometimes even away from their packs, but what he shared with Devan was . . . something. It had to be, or he was losing his damn mind.

  He slipped inside the tent. Devan was awake, sitting among the mess of sleeping bags they’d slept in, lacing his boots. “What are you fretting about?”

  Zio crouched beside him. “I’m not fretting.”

  “Liar.”

  “Uh-huh. What are you going to do about it?”

  Devan glanced up, his upturned face so close to Zio’s that they could’ve kissed without moving a muscle.

  Zio licked his lips, his wolf stirring and demanding something he didn’t have time for.

  Devan laughed softly. “This is getting complicated.”

  “I know.”

  “So what are you going to do about it?”

  “I have no idea. I’ve never let wanting to fuck someone take over my life like this.”

  “That’s what you think this is? A crush that’s got out of hand?” Devan spoke carefully, like he always did among wolves, as though they were unexploded bombs that could go off at any moment.

  Zio frowned. “I wouldn’t call it a crush because I’m not twelve, but I guess so, yeah. The fuck would you call it?”

  Devan blinked a few times, then shrugged. “Nothing. Whatever. Your words work.”

  He was the one lying now, Zio felt it in every fibre of his being, but he didn’t have time for a deep and meaningful conversation. Fuck it. He gripped Devan’s chin and kissed him, crushing their lips together hard enough to draw blood from both of them. Iron coated his tongue, and he slipped his tongue between Devan’s lips, devouring him, dominating him until he abruptly found himself on his back, Devan pressing him into the nest of sleeping bags that smelt so deeply of both of them.

  Devan kissed Zio hard, and then softer . . . sweeter, drawing a moan from Zio that sounded as though it had come from someone else. Soft hands combed through Zio’s hair, fingertips stroked his cheekbone, and then . . .

  It was over. Devan pulled away, shaking his head. “You really don’t understand, do you?”

  “Understand what?”

  Devan let out a frustrated growl and gestured between them. “What this is. Gods, didn’t your parents, your alpha, teach you anything?”

  Zio flinched. “I was raised by humans while my alpha fought a war that still isn’t won. You think he had time to fucking school me? I’m lucky I can read.”

  “There’s more to life than war, Zio.”

  “Clearly, but not right now. Fuck, I don’t have time for this, and neither do you. We’ve got raiding parties to intercept.”

  “We?”

  “Yeah. You’re assigned to Bomber’s team, if you agree.”

  Devan held Zio’s gaze for a long moment, and then a tangible shift passed between them. The madness faded, and reality kicked back in. He rolled off Zio with a heavy sigh. “Of course I agree. Just because I fought you yesterday doesn’t mean I don’t understand how orders work. I’ll go wherever you need me.”

  Mourning Devan’s touch already, Zio sprang to his feet. “Good. Then head west with Bomber. I’m taking a team east. Hopefully we won’t need you in two places at once.”

  He fled the tent without waiting for Devan’s answer.

  Devan trailed Bomber’s team through the undergrowth, chasing down the southern force who were approaching the camp from the west. Dread filled his every step. Zio’s plan to go around them and attack from behind was solid, but something in the air didn’t feel right.

  Hormones. He kissed you. And you kissed him back. Nothing was ever going to be normal after that.

  Truth, but as ever, Devan was locked in a losing battle to put Zio out of his mind and focus on the task at hand. How can he know so little about basic shifter biology? The answer was simple: Zio and his closest friends were orphans and misfits who knew nothing but war. Mostly unmated, to them, attraction was a function that killed time and gave them respite from violence and pain. From grief and fear. Varian knew more, he had to, but he was young too, by alpha standards at least, and no pack leader in the wolf world could’ve predicted the shitshow Devan and Zio were currently experiencing.

  Your clan alphas didn’t predict it either.

  The taunt came from somewhere deep within Devan, from a place where common sense reigned, and he knew that even if Zio ever recognised what was happening between them, it could go absolutely nowhere. Hopelessness washed over him. He needed to speak with Varian, Dash too. Perhaps there was another healer who could take his place, and he could return to Bratislava. The current between him and Zio would fade in time, die out through forced neglect, and with Devan gone, Zio would be free—

  An explosion rocked the earth, tearing up the ground in front of Devan. The wolf he’d been trailing disappeared in a gruesome cloud of shattered flesh and pulverised bone.

  Devan sailed through the air and hit the ground with a dull thud, his ears ringing, both arms broken. Damn fragile bones. Though stronger than the average human, they didn’t hold a candle to his shifter form. He bunched his stomach muscles and sat up, the fractures already healing, but that didn’t stop the pain, some his, some that of his pack mates ahead.

  A huge gash on Devan’s leg seeped blood into the earth. With stiff, barely healed hands, he fixed it and crawled to the relative safety of a nearby ditch.

  In the muddy puddle at the bottom, he found Danielo, hurt but conscious enough to flash a steely grin.

  Devan healed him, and another brotherhood flared between him and the pack. “You’ve lost a lot of blood,” he said. “You might be dizzy when you stand. Give it a moment.”

  “I don’t think we have a moment,” Danielo ground out. “And you’re one to talk about losing blood. Doing okay, Devan?”

  Devan glanced at his own healed wounds. His arms throbbed and would for a few days, but the rest of it barely scratched the surface. My pack needs me. “I’m fine. You ready?”

  Danielo nodded. “Let’s roll.”

  They scrambled out of the ditch. Wolf howls greeted them. Danielo grabbed Devan’s arm. “I need to shift. Are you gonna be okay?”

  “Of course. Go. I’ll shift
if I need to defend myself.”

  Danielo was gone before Devan had finished the sentence, bursting into his silver-grey wolf form and darting forwards, wobbly at first, but then straight as an arrow as he picked up speed.

  Devan sprinted after him. Ahead, a fierce fight raged, punctuating the frosty air with battle cries and screams of pain. He was getting better at distinguishing between pack and enemy, his natural instinct to help everyone blunted by each new bond he forged with the northern wolves. In time, perhaps, he’d begrudge the fundamental change pack life had forced on him, but in the heat of the battle, protecting the pack was everything.

  More explosions boomed. Trees splintered. There was no way the human authorities weren’t going to respond. Devan pushed his human form to its limits, leaping into the trees and swinging through the branches to get a better view of what awaited him when he caught up to the wolves.

  A scene of carnage greeted him, blood on the ground, bodies scattered. For the first time since he’d been reborn, Devan resented his enhanced ability to see in the dark. So many dead. From this distance, it was impossible to tell who had been lost, but his gut told him Bomber and Danielo were still alive.

  Zio too. Devan had given up trying to quell their connection. Zio was angry and fighting, but for now, he was safe.

  Devan sprang out of the trees and raced the last hundred metres. The beast within prowled and snarled, eager to end any creature who sought to harm his pack, but his instinct to heal won out. He didn’t know the names of the northern wolves he passed his hands over, just that there were more of them than the southern wolves he ignored—for now. His connection with Bomber burnt bright. Devan found him at the foot of a tree, bloodied and broken in his human form.

  Dread filled Devan as he crouched beside him. He healed the surface wounds he could see, but lifeblood poured from the gnarled stump that remained where Bomber’s left leg had been.

  “It’s bad, isn’t it?” Bomber gritted out.

  “It’s not good.” Devan dug the berries he’d picked that morning out of the pouch slung over his back. He pressed them into Bomber’s mouth. “Swallow. I’m going to drip sap onto the open wound, okay? It’s going to hurt like the gods, but it’ll buy me some time while I look for your leg.”