She cried out as a heavy clump landed on her injured leg, and Liam’s attention was fractured enough to allow Garrett his opening. She watched as his shape morphed into that of a giant snow leopard.
He was stunningly beautiful with his thick white fur and black spots, but it was his enormous paws that gave him the advantage, keeping him from sinking too deep into the snow. He sprang forth and was on Liam’s back in the blink of an eye, and the fight was on.
Liam howled and spun, trying to dislodge Garrett who had sunk his teeth into the back of Liam’s neck, his paws clinging to his sides as the giant wolf bucked like a bronco. The sight would have been amusing if the circumstances hadn’t been so grim.
With a roar, Liam slammed them both into a tree, sending more clumps of snow to the ground, but thankfully not on her, and managed to throw Garrett from his back and into the snow.
Garrett landed on his feet, in true feline fashion, and darted up a tree before leaping to the ground behind the wolf. He was unable to attack again, because Liam had turned and was now circling the giant cat with murder in his eyes.
It occurred to her that Liam and Garrett were both fighting for her. She didn’t think Liam would harm her, since he obviously thought her to be his mate, but he would have no problem killing Garrett if it meant he got to keep her.
The fight continued about fifty feet from her and Mandy tried to remain focused on the brawl, lest she end up accidentally trampled by the fighters, and noticed something that caused her heart to skip a beat.
In between the growls and snarls, Mandy could have sworn she heard the purr of an engine. She strained her ears and, yes, there was some sort of vehicle coming their way. Now she just needed to make sure that both she and Garrett held out until help could arrive, because if Garrett was here, then she was sure Nicolas and Jonathan were the ones en route.
She looked back to the fight in time to see the wolf launch himself onto the cat, jaws open and ready to strike, but she struck first. Mandy sent the canine hurtling through the air and right at the branch that she’d seen earlier, only she wasn’t able to throw him high enough and his body crashed into the tree, his left shoulder impaled on the branch.
The sound that erupted from the wolf was one of fury and pain. Unfortunately, the fury was now aimed solely at her, and when the wolf landed, he began slowly limping her way on three paws.
Overhead, the clouds above began to darken and roll ominously, thunder booming. This was all she needed to confirm that Nicolas was on his way, and she pushed at the wolf again.
He was at her right side now and she watched in horror as he leapt before she could gather her strength enough to deflect him, but Garrett flew over her head and sent them into the trunk of the tree that she was under, causing snow to rain down once again.
This time, when the snow-laden branches shook and groaned above her, Mandy knew that she was in trouble. She had only enough time to see two snowmobiles come into view before snow, broken limbs and ice came raining down upon her, the weight sending pain rocketing through her leg. Spots swam before her eyes as her vision grew dark, blotting out her view of everything around her.
Chapter Fourteen
Nicolas couldn’t believe his eyes. Garrett had shifted into a gigantic snow leopard and was wrestling with the werewolf. A cat fighting a dog, of all things, but where was Mandy?
Unable to see her anywhere, Nicolas called out to Garrett, needing them to separate so that he didn’t harm the man who was like a father to him. He gathered his power around him, the clouds roiling overhead and the air coming alive with the energy crackling in wait.
Finally, he got his chance when Garrett landed a solid bite to the wolf’s injured leg and took him to the ground before leaping out of the way. Immediately, Nicolas sent a lightning bolt to connect with the crazed beast.
The smell of burnt hair and flesh filled the air and the wolf collapsed, his limbs twitching from the electricity still coursing through his body.
Nicolas was starting toward the prone figure when Garrett shot past him and began digging in the snow.
Mandy! Her skin was pale, her lips blue, and her breathing was terrifyingly shallow. She was bundled in many layers, but somehow she’d been buried beneath a pile of snow and had not been able to get herself free.
Reaching down, Nicolas clasped Mandy under her arms and prepared to lift her out when a hand on his arm stopped him. He looked back to see a very naked Garrett shivering beside him. The fact that clothes never survived the shift had to suck right about now.
“Her leg is broken,” he explained through chattering teeth. “It happened during her escape, but not by the wolf. He was actually trying to help her until he tried to mark her and she launched him into a tree.”
“Thank you, Garrett. Now shift back before you freeze.” Nicolas turned his attention back to Mandy and began to dig the rest of her out.
Her stillness alarmed him, but he strove to keep his voice calm and even as he spoke to her. “Mandy, I’ve got you sweetheart, just hold on. We’ll have you warm and toasty in just a minute,” he promised. “Talk to me now, let me know you’re okay.”
Nothing, well, nothing but a growl coming from behind them.
Nicolas turned in time to see the wolf staggering to its feet, and his brother and Anna arriving on the scene. Garrett made a wide circle around the wolf, attempting to draw its attention away, but the wolf was focused on Mandy.
The look in the beast’s eyes was full of…sorrow? Was he really sorry for what had happened to her?
In the next moment, Nicolas had his answer. The beast thought that she was dead. His eyes went from sorrowful, to resigned, to infuriated before he attacked.
Before Nicolas could do anything, Jonathan hit the furry bastard with a fireball. The resulting howl would haunt Nicolas’ nightmares for some time as the werewolf went up in flames.
As fast as he could, Nicolas dug Mandy free and pulled her into his arms, cradling her as he quickly moved her away from the burning canine and called to his fire element to increase his temperature in an effort to warm her. He had his head on her chest, listening to her erratic pulse and willing her heart to continue, when Anna came to his side.
She said nothing, but placed her hands on Mandy’s chest. Whatever she was doing was working as the beat beneath his ear evened out and became stronger and stronger. He lifted his head and noted that her color was getting better as well, but she still hadn’t stirred.
“What’s wrong with her?” he asked. “How bad is she hurt?” He’d never been more aware of her humanity as he was in that moment.
Anna looked up at him, her face held carefully blank. “We need to get her back to the castle so that I can work on her leg. It would be best if she stayed unconscious until then since the ride won’t exactly be smooth.” Her eyes traveled down Mandy’s leg and she winced at the sight of her injury. “I want her to be as comfortable as possible because it will hurt when I work to heal her leg, there is no way around that.”
Nicolas nodded and rose with Mandy in his arms. He was making his way over to his snowmobile and trying to figure out how he was going to manage to hold Mandy while driving, when Jonathan called out to him.
Looking at his brother, Nicolas saw that the werewolf had shifted back to his human form…or what was left of it. His skin was charred black and sloughing off to reveal the muscles and tendons beneath, riddled with blisters. His breaths were sawing in and out with a distinctive rattle sounding with every shallow inhalation. There was no hair left on his body, and the werewolf appeared rather pitiful.
“He is requesting to see her one last time,” Jonathan explained. “It’s his last request. He knows that he’s dying, his body isn’t healing fast enough.”
“Why should I allow that?” Nicolas sneered. “It’s his fault that she’s in this condition.”
“He cares for her, Nicolas. He was trying to take her back to the cabin. He wanted her to be his mate, so despite the fact that he’s started
to lose his sanity, he had retained enough to maintain his emotions and his empathy,” Garrett explained his observations in that quiet way he had which always seemed to calm the brothers and ensure that they listened. “It won’t hurt to offer him a little peace by letting him know that she is alive and will be taken care of.” He shifted back once he’d said his piece, but Nicolas understood Garrett’s point, even though his instincts were screaming for him to deny the last request.
Wrestling with his conscience and his primitive urge to flee with his woman, Nicolas finally took pity on his dying adversary and carried Mandy over so the man could see her one last time. “She’s hurt, but I will make sure that she heals and is happy,” he told the dying man, uncaring if his voice came out cold. “I will always see to her happiness.”
“Tell her that I am sorry,” he rasped in a voice as raw as his body. “Tell her, Liam is sorry.” With his eyes locked onto Mandy’s still form, the werewolf took one last shuddering breath before finally succumbing to death.
The thing that finally reached Nicolas was the depth of emotion he saw in those silver eyes as they settled on Mandy one last time. Crazy or not, the man within the beast truly had believed that he was looking at his mate, and had needed to hear that she would be taken care of before he could let go.
“He needs to be buried,” Nicolas declared. He shouldn’t have bothered to say anything though, because Garrett was already off to the side, digging a hole for the grave using his large paws. “We need to get her back quickly, Jonathan, but I’m not sure that I can hold her and drive the snowmobile too.”
“Anna knows how to drive, and she’s smaller, so it would make it easier for the three of you to fit if she drove the two of you. I on the other hand am going to have to figure out how to get Garrett’s furry ass on mine,” Jonathan frowned. “He’s going to have a devil of a time holding on, and I’ll skin him down for a rug if he uses his claws.”
Nicolas chuckled, “Good luck with that. Let’s head out, Anna.”
Leaving Jonathan and Garrett to handle the burial, Nicolas and Anna traveled as fast as they dared back to the castle with Mandy. Regardless of the fact that her color had improved, Nicolas still couldn’t shake the feeling that Anna was keeping something important from him regarding her condition.
They took her inside and to the tower where they stripped her out of her wet clothes and placed her on the bed. “What do you need me to do?” he asked Anna.
“Bring me some warm blankets and place them over her middle so that we can raise her core temperature. I will begin working on her leg, but I will put her in a deeper sleep before I do that. I don’t want to cause her any additional pain or stress her system any more than necessary,” she explained.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes with the blankets, but I’ll start a fire before I go.” Nicolas turned and tossed a ball of flames into the fireplace, making sure that the blaze was sufficient before leaving to retrieve the blankets.
Once he was outside the room, Nicolas sank to his knees in the hall. He hung his head and thanked the Fates that Mandy was alive and promised to stand by her side no matter what the outcome. He was terrified that her injury could be serious or even that she could have suffered some sort of internal trauma Anna wasn’t telling him about, but he trusted the Fey princess to do whatever she could to save Mandy.
Gathering his frayed nerves, he rose to his feet once more and headed off to gather the blankets as ordered, glad to have something to do. He didn’t like feeling helpless, and he absolutely loathed having to count on someone else—a woman at that—to save someone he loved. He was a man, damn it, and an Elemental at that, one of the more powerful immortals in the area, yet he and Mandy were at the mercy of one of the most gentle of the Supernatural species.
If Mandy died as a result of this, then Nicolas had no doubt he would likely follow her. In such a short time, she had become an integral part of his life. He lived to see her smiles, loved the joy she found in the most simple of gestures, and the excitement in her eyes whenever she discovered something new. But most of all, he treasured the tenderness in her eyes when she looked at him.
She was not a woman who hid her emotions well, and he was well aware of her insecurities, yet she didn’t let them hold her back for long. No, Mandy possessed an inner strength that rivaled his own, which only further proved they were meant to be together, because the Fates knew that any woman destined to be with him for eternity had better be able to put him in his place when needed.
He warmed the blankets and returned to the room to find Anna running a cloth over Mandy’s forehead. “I thought we were trying to warm her, not cool her down,” he said.
“We are. She merely broke out in a sweat as I was setting her ankle and mending the bone. It’s a very painful process and one that is very taxing as well, on both parties.”
Nicolas noted the tremors in Anna’s hands as she dabbed at Mandy’s brow. “You need to rest, Anna. I appreciate all that you’ve done for her. That’s twice now you’ve saved her life, and now you need to take care of yourself as well. Jonathan would skin me if anything happened to you.”
“Oh, I am fine. I was referring to the babe. It feels the stress on the body the same as the mother.” Her hand settled over Mandy’s flat abdomen and Nicolas’ vision blurred.
“A b-babe?” He and Mandy were going to be parents?
“Yes. I did not want to mention it in the forest because I was not sure whether the pregnancy would survive the trauma, but I should have known better. It is very hard to shake an immortal child from the womb, so I believe that he or she will be fine.” Anna rose and made her way to the door, leaving Nicolas sitting next to Mandy in a state of shock.
“Lay with her, Nicolas. Be there for her when she wakes, but be aware that she has no knowledge of the pregnancy as it is still quite new. She will need to be informed of many things. The most important will be the shorter gestation of Supernaturals,” she explained. “Human pregnancies last for forty weeks while a Supernatural’s pregnancy lasts but twenty-five.” He gave her such a helpless male look that she couldn’t help but laugh softly. “I will try and explain this all to her once she is feeling up to it. Until then, watch her closely.”
Nicolas lay next to Mandy for what felt like hours, just watching her sleep. She was his miracle, his salvation, and his future, all wrapped up in a fragile human shell that now carried his legacy as well.
Finally feeling the effects of the day, Nicolas pulled Mandy into his arms, placed his hand over the place where their child rested, and joined her in sleep.
Epilogue
Two weeks had passed since the rescue, and even though they had been planning to have the wedding on New Year’s Eve, they decided to postpone the date and instead had a double ceremony, uniting both couples for eternity.
Mandy had unfortunately come down with a very nasty cold after her little fiasco in the forest and still needed some rest to recover completely. She was eternally grateful for having woken up with a healed leg, but even more grateful that the child resting in her womb had survived unharmed during the whole ordeal.
Her child. Their child. The thought had the power to bring happy tears to her eyes every time it crossed her mind…which was often. She was going to be a mother, and she vowed to be the best mother in the world. Mandy already knew that Nicolas would be an amazing father. He spoke to their child often through her belly and every time he did she felt her heart swell with love. Was it any wonder she wanted to spend the rest of her very long life by his side?
When she had awakened, Mandy had noticed the way Nicolas seemed to be so very gentle with her, almost as if she would shatter with the lightest touch. She figured he was still worried about her wellbeing after her encounter with the werewolf, until he’d finally broken down and told her that they would be having a baby.
He’d taken the time to allow her a few moments to process this news—roughly two minutes to be exact—and then promptly dropped another bomb on
her. Apparently, Supernatural pregnancies were quite a bit shorter than human pregnancies, so she would be experiencing all of the normal pregnancy woes at warp speed. Though he seemed a good bit more worried over that than she did.
It had been downright comical while she and Anna were planning the ceremony and receptions. Jonathan hung around, usually chuckling, while Nicolas was like a second shadow, following her everywhere, not allowing her to lift anything, even insisting that she put her feet up every so often, until she and Anna finally convinced him that she was fine and could do everything that she’d always done, so he needn’t worry.
Not that it helped.
Now, with the after-party in full swing, Mandy looked around at all of the guests. True there weren’t many, but the Royal Fey Court had come, the Fey King showing off some surprisingly good dance moves, along with a few of Nicolas’ and Jonathan’s friends.
It didn’t really matter to Mandy that she had no family or friends of her own present because she had everything that she needed right here. She had Nicolas, the love of her life and father of her child—a thought that still awed her—and his wonderful brother Jonathan, her best friend. Anna was already more than a friend to Mandy, they had grown to become more like sisters, and everyone knew that sisters were your very best friends.
“How are you feeling?” Nicolas asked as he hugged her from behind, his hands coming to rest low on her stomach.
“Amazing,” she replied. “I never thought I could be this happy. It’s more than I could ever have hoped for.”
“I know what you mean,” he whispered, kissing her neck. “I’ve searched for you for a long time, Mandy, but the Fates have a way of making sure that you receive what you need when you need it most, and there you were. I was in a very dark place when you came. I had begun to lose hope of ever finding my other half.”
“I’m glad that I met Jonathan. If I hadn’t, then I never would have come here,” Mandy turned and hugged Nicolas tightly, her cheek resting on his chest, his heart beating strong and steady beneath her ear. “I don’t think that I would have lasted for very much longer if I had remained alone. Perhaps the Fates sensed that both of our needs were at a critical point. Whatever the case, I’m here now and I don’t plan on leaving unless you are coming with me.”
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