by Tamar Sloan
Tara and Orin are there when I exit my room, dressed and ready. Their faces make me blush, a little embarrassed, secretly pleased. Neither of them say a thing for long moments.
And then Tara breaks the silence. “I’m considering bonding with you myself, Eden.”
My laughter breaks the heavy moment, and I’m glad for some lightness.
“I’ll go get the car.” Efficient as always, Tara is out the door.
I look to Orin, who smiles the smile of the proud. He steps forward and brings something from behind his back. My eyes widen as I take in the fragile wreath of blooms he holds up to me.
“Orin, it’s beautiful.”
The most prolific flowers I recognize—white columbines, just like the one Noah gave me, their star shape giving the garland a crown-like feel. But they are sprinkled amongst ones I don’t know. That I haven’t seen around here.
“This is our gift for you, Eden.”
The hand that was reaching out to touch the fragile, pale petals stops. Our…Orin’s eyes tell me why I don’t recognize the remaining white flowers. That they came from very far away.
“We would all be there if we could.”
Orin steps forward and as he places the woven threads of my Fae heritage and the one that stole my heart on my head; I feel my eyes sting with moisture. When his lips press on my forehead, the blessing is complete.
“Thank you, Orin.”
The sound of an impatient horn smashes the moment to smithereens. We hug as we both laugh. “Now go forth and bond, little sister.”
For a moment, all I feel is shimmering, blazing happiness, and I quickly kiss my brother’s cheek before I’m out the door.
On my way to my bonding.
Tara and her truck bring me to the Glade early, so I can take my position at the West end. Noah will enter from the East. Deep in the woods, several rows of trees between me and the Glade, I can’t see how many Weres are arriving. But soon I hear them. With each new group of voices, I hear the Glade shrink, crowding my ears, crowding my throat.
Nervousness triumphantly sports a gold medal.
Tara, glowing in a peach strapless dress, fusses around me.
Then I feel it. Noah’s presence, his anticipation. I realize he’s been hoping, looking forward to this day longer than I have. This was a horizon he was hoping to reach far longer than me.
And under the sun that is Noah, the nervousness evaporates. There is no longer a contest. Anticipation builds to excitement then grows to impatience.
Just as the music starts.
43
Noah
Eden is...
Eden is...
It sure would be good to finish a sentence right now. But there's only one word that’s a vortex in my mind. W.O.W.
Eden is stunning. The dress, a waterfall of pure alabaster, slips and slides over her curves. Dark hair down her back cascades like Niagara Falls. Forest green eyes defying the law of physics with the amount of emotion they contain.
The moment we exited the trees a hush blanketed the crowd, and considering how many Weres are here, that’s a feat. My mark, the wolf tattoo married beside the circle containing a five-pointed star, bold across my chest explains part of the silence. The rest, the majority, is totally owned by the phenomenon walking toward me.
The music, played by Dad, Mitch, Grandpa Ben, is the familiar lilting chords I've heard since I was a child. They tumble and glide around us, filling the already overflowing air. But this time, everything diverges from anything I’ve ever experienced. This time bears no resemblance to anything I’ve ever felt. The music more meaningful. The emotions more raw.
This time, it’s Eden, walking toward me, faith in her eyes. She doesn’t falter. Not. Once. I don’t think the Prime Alpha is supposed to run across the Glade, grab his mate-to-be and kiss her until oxygen is a life-threatening necessity…and then keep going.
Instead, I let the rhythm count out my steps, moving in the straight line that will bring us to meet in the middle. Nothing could stop the forward motion that takes me, beat by beat, toward Eden. My mate. The straightforward movement nothing like the journey that got us here. Which is okay. It’s a journey that means Eden never falters as she approaches the most intimidating calling anyone could ask of her, one where I learned to walk beside her.
When we meet in the center, the music stops, arresting the silence.
I grasp her hand, aching fingers finally touching what they’ve been yearning to hold. As we connect, the audience, the Glade, the whole world dissolves and disappears. Like the moment we met, before the trials and the hard won, barely survived, lessons, I look into profoundly connected green eyes and stop, floored by the same certainty that something is changing, rearranging, realigning into something I want to be part of. Eden and I create a whole new universe in the space between us, in the love within us.
How the heck is a guy supposed to speak with this much emotion clogging his throat? Luckily, these are words I’ve wanted to say for a long time. In truth, there are no words I want to say more. No words I want to hear more.
With the conviction of love, I start. “In your hands...”
“I place my trust.” My heart tightens with the truth in Eden's words. Her free hand comes up to tenderly stroke my cheek. “In your eyes...”
Man, I want to kiss her. “I found my home.” I place my palm over her heart. “In your heart...”
“I found my love.” Eden’s voice is gilded in honesty, a little choked with tears. Her hand comes up to mirror mine, resting over the mark that already knew this was true. “In your spirit...”
My chest expands, my voice gains conviction. “I found my mate.”
Together, our eyes locked, our hearts beating beneath each other’s palm, we say the words that will make this binding. Complete. Forever.
“I give you my body, so that two become one.
I give you my soul, till our life shall be done.”
As we stand there, I can feel the new, rightful whole take root from the seed that was sown so long ago. All of a sudden, I’m scared to kiss her. This has been centuries in the making; it’s expanding, swelling into something overwhelming. Can someone be crushed by this much love and adoration and implications?
Eden smiles, the most ethereal and beautiful thing I have ever seen. She knows; she feels it blooming. “I want it all.” She mouths, barely breathing the words.
I grin as I lean down. It’s a light kiss, and it’s the breath of a beginning, the life about to come, that I taste in those rose red lips.
The music starts again, the distinctive notes of the final dance flood the Glade. The medieval notes multiply, intensify the emotions barely under control.
I tuck one arm behind my back as Eden does the same. We’re both smiling as we begin the first steps as bonded mates.
44
Tara
Seeing my guy bestie and my girl bestie tie the knot is the most amazing, tear-yanking thing I’ve ever seen.
Eden, the girl with beautiful as her baseline, glows. It’s like her nervousness never existed. Probably because right now, we don’t exist. Noah looks like a guy who’s been through a trial by furnace. The hardest trial—where you almost lose everything and the one where you find out what’s really important, the ones where if you take up fate’s challenge you end up with the greatest reward. Something along the lines of everything your heart ever wanted, and something your mind could never have imagined.
Standing there with my pack, I hear a shuffling behind me. I spin, high alert still easily tripped after last month’s happenings. There’s nothing. Actually, there’s more than I expected. I squint, amongst the trunks hundreds of eyes— furred, scaled, low to the ground, taller than makes you comfortable—are watching alongside the biggest Were turn out in history.
Great Scot, Noah’s ark has come to see his bonding.
I can’t help an impressed nod. Some of these would be prey to us or the predator standing next to them, but they don
’t care.
Noah and Eden fold their arms behind their backs and begin to move. With the rhythm of the music guiding them, they step back, to the side, then in. Opposite shoulders brush as they turn half a step then step away, moving in a slow circle.
I’m glad Eden is too completely captivated to remember that Noah’s mark won’t change. It was the thing she spoke of the least, which means it worried her the most. But I don’t think it’ll be a problem. If I thought she had eyes only for Noah before, I’m pretty sure right now she wouldn’t look away even if her father turned up. With a salted caramel cheesecake.
The music picks up, and so do the lovebirds. They step, slide, then reunite. Even the animals behind me can tell that’s their favorite part. Then I see it, like it kinda crept up on me. Like I never saw it coming. Although Noah’s mark doesn’t change, it stays black on his chest, the two glow like the Aurora Borealis, a shimmering halo of love and happiness. I grab Mitch’s hand, and we glance at each other.
Something is building, you can feel the air being sucked into the center like a whirlpool, maybe a cyclone. The notes, that Celtic-Baroque music, pick up tempo. Noah and Eden match the rhythm; they brush, touch, separate, turn. It feels like two nuclear reactors have developed a magnetic force field and are inevitably, quite voluntarily, being drawn into each other.
The silk of Eden's dress billows; that heavy mass of hair that took forty minutes to straighten divides and reunites around her. She dances like she’s always been one of us (which I could have told you was true months ago). Noah’s steps are so full of meaning you almost want to look away. I. Don’t. Think. So. I take a quick peek around. No one else considers blinking right now.
Although the air is so thick it practically weighs a ton, the tempo picks up, and so do the lovebirds, sucking the weighted air into their magnetic pull.
This is gonna be one monster mushroom cloud.
As the music crests then dies, Eden throws herself at Noah, the smile the size of the equator on her face. Noah’s arms are already open, ready, and they instantly close around the person destined to be in them.
The moment they touch an orb of light, all the kinetic energy they’ve been accumulating, arcs out in a circle. A sonic boom of emotion, a herald of the future, leaves the two hearts where it was born. It grows across the Glade, streaking through everyone assembled, dispersing into the trees. The sensation of light and love flashes through me and everyone lucky enough to be here. As it hits the vegetation, a mass of birds, it looks like all of Wyoming’s avian population, lifts for the sky. Taking all that potential and spreading it to the world.
I look at Mitch, wondering if my face matches his dumbstruck expression. Lamest bonding ever my tuckus.
The aftermath leaves behind a hush and a stillness; shock has frozen everyone’s tongue. Noah would love to know I’ve been rendered mute. Not that I’ll ever tell him.
Noah and Eden never left the ground, but they look like they’ve just returned to Earth.
A round of applause roars so loud, if every feathered friend hadn’t already startled to the sky, the thunder of hands slapping hands with such enthusiasm would have done it. Beth is crying, so is Aunt Mavis, but with a lot less grace. Mitch’s chest has tripled with pride. Behind me, two palms clap with the force of faith. I turn to find Seth rejoicing with the rest of us. The one who has lost the most; even I, who carries the pain of a scorned father and a sister’s betrayal, still have my identity. Seth nods—he’s lucky he doesn’t wink—then turns back to my ecstatic besties.
Even the rumble of hundreds of hands going red from clapping doesn’t invade the bubble Eden and Noah have created. Noah leans down, the intent to kiss a banner on his face. To be honest, I have to give them some credit, they’ve kissed once since this Bonding started, and that was a peck that would be legal in a church. I’ve spent enough time with these two (like five minutes) to know it’s killing them. I thought Mitch and I were joined at the lips.
Their kiss is one that you know you should look away from but have no intention to. Hopping horse puckey, I don’t know how they manage to make it look so sweet and tender and so laden with just-wait-till-tonight all at once. I’m relieved, maybe a bit disappointed, when they keep their hands where they are. I almost applaud them again. And to be honest, it’s probably a good thing that Noah hasn’t found the great big patch of skin without the barrier of silk at Eden’s back.
Hands held, they turn and face the crowd. Weres upon Weres upon Weres. Even if you don’t know what these two have been through to be together, that much love in the Glade will have your mouth tipping up and your eyes misting over.
Most are smiling. The love between these two eclipses any Bonding they’ve seen so far.
Some are a little more serious. A couple have their arms crossed. The question, the one that’s whispering through my mind and probably the rest of the smiling crowd, is probably clamoring a little louder in their heads.
A question I can’t shake.
A question I can’t answer.
What now?
Prophecy Fulfilled
A divided Were nation. A hidden Fae heritage.
Newly crowned Prime Alpha pair, Noah and Eden are preparing for the destiny they have been chosen for. When the final Precept appears, three words etched in stone that change everything, they know their fated connection is about to be tested as never before.
Because the need to conquer is exactly what the prophecy is asking for.
As packs splinter, as the Fae reveal their secrets, and as a new threat to the Glade seems unstoppable, Eden and Noah are about to discover the Prime Prophecy is even bigger than they imagined.
For the Prophecy will dictate the future of all – Were, Fae and human alike – by showing that the power of uniting is far greater than choosing to stand alone.
Don’t miss this stunning finale to the award-winning and best-selling Prime Prophecy series.
Continue the Epic Journey HERE
I’d love to connect!
The best part of writing is connecting with fellow lovers of good books. I’ve written a fabulous behind the scenes bonus for Prophecy Awakened - Prophecy Awakened: Behind the Book that you should really check out, it’s exclusively available as a free bonus for my mailing list peeps.
https://www.subscribepage.com/TamarSloan
Once you’re on the list, you’ll receive exclusive tasters of upcoming books, awesome freebie offers, and an opportunity to connect (personally, I reckon that’s the best bit). I’d love to see you over there.
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Tamar
About the Author
A school psychologist by day, Tamar Sloan channels her passion for books into creating young adult stories about discovering love beyond our comfort zones. She is the award-winning author of the Prime Prophecy Series and the Touched by Love Series.
When not reading, writing, or woking with teens, Tamar can be found with her ever-patient husband and two beautiful sons enjoying country life on her small acreage in the Australian bush.
Tamar finds it deeply rewarding to share her stories and she loves to hear from readers and fellow lovers of all things book related. Make sure you head over to her website so you don’t miss out on the freebies she loves to give away www.tamarsloan.com.
Also by Tamar Sloan
Make it Count (Book 1 Touched by Love Series)
For All to See (Contemporary Young Adult Romance)
The Moment (Prequel Novella to The Prime Prophecy Series)
Prophecy Accepted (Book 2 of The Prime Prophecy Series)
Prophecy Fulfilled (Book 3 of the Prime Prophecy Series)
