I am not sure if Alice's magic has the ability to reason or if us not preparing for this made the portal react oddly, but it does as I say. It spits us out and I have no idea where. It is rocky and warm. Not hot or cold, just a normalish feeling…if such a thing is a real thing. I stand and look around. A mountain.
"Ahhh hell. Where am I? It's summer because the mountain is warm…"
I should’ve remembered that I have been tossed with a passenger. I hear movement and turn in time to get punched and only training with Snow makes me move enough for it to land on my shoulder instead of my face. Still it sends me flying back, where I land on some rocks. Awesome. Very comfortable.
"Was zur Hölle hast du gemacht?"
If only Leon were here to translate…though the anger on the guy's face alerts me to the gist of it. He is pissed. Like the punch hadn't showed that just fine. I stand and try to shake it off. Nope. A bruised shoulder at the very least.
"Hey ass, this is your fault for being such a dick owner!"
My knife is sheathed and I pull out my taser keeping it behind my back. I am going to have to let him get close. That is going to hurt. Another bruise. But once he is unconscious, I can go home. So, I go on the attack kicking and enraging him further. He is screaming something, but I am not paying enough attention to grasp a single word. Who cares? He is likely cussing me out as much as I am him.
I back off just enough he feels comfortable attacking and let him get a swing in. I taser his arm as it comes close and he shakes and goes down. This is not a normal taser. Alice has altered it to know exactly how much voltage is needed to put a person down but not kill them. The only problem is it is a one shotter because of that.
"If you knew a Fae you would have stood a chance. Too bad buddy."
I go to grab the stone and feel around in all my pockets dropping the taser so I can use both hands.
"Where is it!? Damn!"
It is gone. I search the area even venturing to the edge to see if it fell down onto a ledge or something. There is nothing. It’d been lost in the portal.
"Oh god Alice is going to kill me. If someone else gets their hands on it…or her sister…Shit!"
I don’t know the particulars, but I know with that stone her sister could use her own powers to invade IvyWood. I have to pray like hell it went home to Skylar when I dropped it into the portal. For now, I have to get the hell away from this guy so I can use the path of someone that belongs there to get home. Damn this day sucks.
Chapter Four
It doesn’t turn out to be as easy as I hoped because though the German went down, he didn't stay that way for long. Luckily, I have learned survival tricks from those that live it. I stay one-step ahead of him while trying to find a water source, food of any kind that I can recognize as safe, or shelter. A town would be awesome but let's face it, most people climb or skid mountains, they don't live on them.
I manage to keep a few steps ahead but everything goes downhill when I find water. By then it is dusk and cooling down and the German is in full throttle chase mode. Do they all learn tracking in school or something? If it were not for me being able to communicate with the animals, he might have snuck up on me. As it is, he is large and intrusive and I am respectful, so the animals take my side. Finally, this damn curse is useful.
By dusk, I have spent most of the day running, I am exhausted, dehydrated, and my stomach is refusing to stay silent. So, I stop for water. It is terrible timing. All the helpful little creatures went to sleep and the predators awoke. I have no lookout. Which is obvious when without warning, the blasted man is running at me and my only options is to fight again, I had not fared so well with that, or jump into the cold as hell water. I choose the latter and let the current take me.
I know it is a mistake the second I hit water, but by then it is too late. I try to find purchase but I am moving too fast. Fast running water usually means something, like help from gravity, is pulling it downward. The only plus is the guy chasing me was smarter than I was and stays out of the water allowing me to get away from his evil clutches.
I am trying hard to stay above the water when the falls comes into play. There it is. Likely, the last thing I will ever see. I take a great big gulp and try to keep myself feet first, harder when under water and having no idea where up or down is.
Ironically, all I can think is I owe an apology to Leon for not being a better companion. I am one ungrateful bitch sometimes. And all he has ever done is be there for me. So not the way to die, I want him to know how much I need his love and support and how I feel about him. It is not to be though. Here is where I will die.
Leon:
'Alice did you find anything in IvyWood?'
I have searched where Belle went but something had gone wrong. The animals have come through and told us about the lady that fought off their owner to free them. Alice has them healing and resting and I have searched the area in Germany she’d been in while Alice looks around parts of IvyWood. Neither of us has turned up clues.
"No and her enchanted knife is back in her safety zone. Which means she is unarmed. She should be able to come back without a gem portal, but something is off with the spell. The owner tried to come with her so it threw them both off. I don't think she can open a portal on her own until she has been brought back and cleansed."
'Your magic thinks she's tainted because the man tried to come?'
"Yes. We didn’t set the magic up for anything like this. With you there no one ever really chases her once she gets to you and the portal. Most of the time they do not even get that far because you two take care of them."
Alice goes by the rule if she doesn’t ask specifics, we don’t share them. She hates violence but she is not naïve. She knows abusers don’t often let go of their prey without a fight. Dillan has brought enough human victims, with the help of her magic or Belle and I for backup, to know the truth of this.
That doesn’t mean she likes the necessity, but then if there wasn’t need, she wouldn’t have IvyWood. It is something that weighs on her but she has to accept. Skylar tells her carrying a burden like that is very human of her. It pleases her then makes her feel guilt which is also very human of her. Her kind enjoys very little and guilt is definitely not in their vocabulary.
I know from experience, as my curse is the result of a Fae disagreeing when I showed no interest in her after she went to the effort of flirting with me. Were-creatures are very direct. Before the mating call, which happens by the time we hit thirty if we haven't already found our mate, we can philander as we pleased. Once our mate is in the picture or we hit thirty no one but our true mate will do.
I was celebrating my thirtieth birthday with my friends before I followed the call to find my mate; the call pulled me harder than anyone I had met before. Others felt the pull, but I had a sense of urgency. Convinced it was just because I was an alpha, I stayed one last night to party.
The Fae spotted me and an alpha male is an acceptable toy for a Fae maiden. My disinterest was an insult, one that landed me cursed.
I have been like this for more years than I can count, dying a little more each year before my mate found me. She swooped in too small and too stubborn for her own good, especially for one so young. She was barely fifteen. That didn’t stop her from taking blows for all of us penned up.
Not only had she freed the animals, but also, she had been able to communicate with us, even the ones not originally human.
She paid a lot of money to have every one of them smuggled back into their native countries seeing each and every one of them home personally. For the first time in years, I could take a full breath. She would not be dissuaded from her path so I joined her on it.
When we met up with Alice, I knew what Alice was and was prepared to die for my mate, to protect her. She was already burdened with a curse far worse than mine. I couldn’t let a Fae get a hold of her. It turned out Alice had been the saving of us. She could communicate with me though she couldn't do it in front of
others, unless it was mind to mind, since I wished her to keep my secret.
I couldn’t let Belle love me when I couldn’t be a man. And that was half the problem. Over time I learned to love her not just as my fated mate, but also as a person. She is kind, self-sacrificing, and intelligent. Though she could do with a bit more selfishness, I can understand why she will be an alpha's mate. The never-ending pool of strength she has for others, the care she takes with them, there is a light in her that draws others and makes her a haven of safety. She is everything I have ever dreamed of and more. She can't be lost to me before I can tell her how I feel. I can survive being trapped like this forever, never aging; stuck at thirty in a lion's body, but I can't lose her.
"We will think of something Leon."
I nod and go home to check once more. Perhaps she has found her way home. Or Tora and Fina might be willing to help look. I can only speak to animals and those magically inclined. And the one thing everyone and everything in IvyWood has in common is their love for Belle.
'We should start a search. The animals can search IvyWood and any humans willing to look around the places Belle has been to before can search that dimension.'
Alice nods. "I will alert the humans. Meet at Belle's home in an hour once the word is spread."
I nod and take off running. I am not the only one that can’t lose Belle. But I am the one that will give up everything to make sure she is not lost to us forever.
Belle:
I cough up the liquid in my lungs all while partly wishing I’d not survived. The burning in my chest makes me wonder if I have died and gone to hell. My head feels like a jackhammer has bored a hole in it. My limbs feel heavy and are so cold it hurts to move them.
I look around and there is a bear. He doesn’t seem like he wants to eat me considering I haven't been awake to ask, or beg, for my life. Though logically I know people are not a bear's first choice, I also know firsthand that a starving animal will eat anything.
"Thank you for not eating me. Did you drag me from the water?"
My voice sounds hoarse. Have I swallowed a rock? I mean it can’t be dry throat since I’d been under water for who knows how long.
'Stupid girl talking to a bear. If I were not really a human, I would have eaten you instead of saving your life.'
"You do not look human to me and I can understand you." Have I met a crazy bear with delusions of humanity? Well that is definitely a new one. Now I have seen everything.
It sits on its butt and tilts its head studying me. It looks confused. That is not uncommon when animals learn I can communicate, but this one…well it is more like my interaction with Leon. Too humanlike. Too normal…and yet so abnormal in an animal.
'You are not my mate or I would know. So why can you hear me in my animal form?'
"I am most definitely not your mate because well, you’re a bear and I am a human. And I can communicate with all animals. I have been able to since I was very young. Usually they hear it and accept it though. You are more like Leon, a lion I know, he seems a lot like a human as well."
'How young?'
I think back. Honestly, I haven't thought a lot about it because it seems so long ago. But I can remember a time I didn’t have this curse. I’d been gifted on my tenth birthday, for no reason. One moment I was normal the next I understood my cats. My parents cast me out once the doctors found no medical reason for my delusions.
I learned quickly to rely on myself and the animals that wanted to work together because there is safety in numbers when facing off the humans. After all I lived on the streets with them and could talk with them. For all intents and purposes, I was one of them.
"My tenth birthday. I've been on my own since then."
'So young to be alone.'
I shrug, I guess some would see it that way but it was my life and the past is the past. I can’t change it so crying over it is a waste of time. I shiver trying to curl up while keeping my eyes on the bear.
'Come you must be cold. My cabin is close.'
Cabin? Is this a trick? What kind of bear lives in a cabin?
'Can you walk? You are bruised quite badly.'
"I've had worse." I am just relieved I hadn't failed the dogs. The German would have had my hide for sure.
He sighs and lays on his stomach as flat as a bear can be.
'Climb on. It will be faster.'
I am used to riding Leon so I do as I am told gripping the fur as tightly as I can with my shaking hands. Apparently, nearly dying by river is not that different from nearly dying from a curse.
'Your lion lets you ride?'
"Yes. How did you know?"
'You sat on me for both our comfort.'
Huh, well who knew Leon being such a worrywart would come in handy?
'We will be safe and warm soon. Then you can tell me more of your story.'
I nod doing my best to stay atop the running grizzly not caring if we end up in a cave or a cabin as long it is not out in the wind.
Chapter Five
I sit in front of a fire, blanket wrapped around me, in an oversized t-shirt, sipping coffee staring at a mountain man that literally turned from bear to human in a flash. There he had stood, naked, as the day one is born, and grumbling about people invading his precious mountain.
He slammed a door and tosses out a way to big shirt telling me to change while he got dressed. I did so and quickly not knowing how soon he would be out. Then I grabbed the biggest thickest afghan I could find and cocooned like a caterpillar about to become a butterfly.
Once he returned, he made coffee, strong coffee, and tells me he is a shifter. He seems shock I didn't know. He seems to think only a shifter can talk to a shifter so I have to tell him my full story, the whole sappy thing up to the present.
I allude to IvyWood, but give nothing vital away. If he wants there, he has to earn it, it has to call him, like everyone else.
"So, there are tribes of people that can turn into animals?"
He nods. He gave up verbal assurances after my third time asking the same question. This has to be the tenth or so.
"All you have seen in your life and this shocks you?"
Well he has a point there. IvyWood is in another dimension…one created by a Fae that wants to be human and is in love with a human who is aging slowly because of his relationship with her…okay yeah, my life is a bucket of weird.
"I have heard of you. Well not you specifically but those you rob call you the night stalker."
I have to be proud that is a fairly kick ass nickname for someone only twenty. I am notorious, I have a nickname.
"So, you could smell I wasn’t a shifter, but you still thought I was one because I could speak to you?"
He shrugs. He has had about as much luck getting that through his mind as I have processing shifters. Hey, if people who turn into animals exist why can’t cursed people? We are both idiots.
"It makes more sense with you being tied to a shifter."
"Tied to…?"
"Mated. Though I don't smell the bond that marks you as taken, not strongly. Almost like, he's deceased or it has been a long time."
I try to think. "Oh, Leon bit me on accident once while trying to help…"
"Let me see it."
I shrug and rolled up the baggy sleeve enveloping my arm.
"That’s a mating mark. How long ago? It usually is refreshed once a month or so?"
"When did he bite me? Like six months ago."
He harrumphs and looks impressed. With my pet lion having bad aim and biting me?
"It wasn’t an accident. He was marking you so no other shifter would think you were available. A few of your rescues have been shifters and just not told you. After being caught by a norm I wouldn’t trust easily either."
"So, you think Leon is my mate and is secretly marking me? He has never been human, not once in all the years I have known him."
"That is strange, especially since he would have to be an alpha for the mark to have last
ed this long. They can turn easily whenever. They never get tired because of it. It's why they lead and protect the pack. Lions are solo shifters but so are most bears and. speaking from experience, even without a pack my shifting is not impacted."
I chew my lip looking around. I am stuck in here until my clothing dries. It is down pouring outside and I am only now starting to get warm. However, staying in a cabin locked up with an alpha bear that turns into a man starts to sound crazy.
"Don't worry imp. You are too tiny to make my bear want to mate you. An alpha respect another's claim."
I read his face as he talks and see no signs of lying. He is not attracted to me at all. Still I’d felt more comfortable with the bear. Like shifters, I find humans to be far more distrustful than animals. Perhaps I was one in a previous life and I retained some ability or other.
Is reincarnation real? I will have to ask Alice. She has been around long enough to know. I wonder if I met Leon in another life as well. Have we been the same species? Or does fate keep getting it wrong and putting us just out of reach?
I have no doubt Leon is my soul mate, but he is an animal, though if Robert here is right, he could be human as well. For now, though I have to assume my love for Leon has to be a well-guarded secret deep in my heart so far down even Alice can’t find it.
"Don't worry little imp. I will sleep as a bear tonight. The power up here is not always reliable and the storm will get bad. It is better if one of us is hairy and warm enough to keep us both alive should the worse happen."
That is reassuring. Suddenly being molested by a stray shifter doesn’t seem worst case scenario. Freezing to death does. Luckily, he is not offended I trust the bear more than the human. Instead, I am a bit more worried the cabin will collapse on us. Or maybe he will be hungry in the morning…oh great, more to worry over.
"So, imp. I am making some dinner then we are getting some shut eye."
"My name isn't imp."
He introduced himself through the wall when changing, but I had been in shock and never actually go to telling him my name.
Beauty the Beast Tamer- Light Page 3
