by Amelia Jade
“Will there be any, um, dragons, stationed here?” she asked.
Aksel smiled. “I wish. But no, the dragons are small in numbers, and tend to keep mostly to themselves. They have, and will continue to fight, and if Fenris commits any of their own, they will deal with that. But the majority of this war will be fought by the Green Bearets and our cousins in the other races here on the ground. Not in the sky.”
“I think I’m glad to hear that,” she said with a little sigh. “That dragon last night, what was his name—Dominick?—he was powerful,” she said a little nervously.
“That he is,” Aksel agreed, nodding sagely. “Dragons often forget just how strong and powerful they are compared to the rest of us mere mortals.”
“They’re immortal?” Nina asked in surprise.
“No, but they do live much, much longer,” he explained, leaving open just how much longer that might be.
Nina nodded, and Aksel sighed internally in relief. He really shouldn’t be sharing the secrets of the other races. That wasn’t his place to discuss.
“Listen, I’m pretty much on break,” he said, starting to walk down the sidewalk, tugging her along after him, their hands still entwined. “Why don’t you come have lunch with me? You know Cloud Lake better. There’s gotta be some good grub around here.”
Nina laughed. “Oh for sure. But didn’t you bring your own food? You’ll eat us dry!”
Aksel laughed. “We did, don’t worry.” His face clouded over. “I do have one question for you though.”
She tensed, and he wondered what that was all about. He wasn’t interrogating her.
“What?” she asked slowly.
“Did it seem there were excessive amounts of Fenris shifters in the city?”
“What do you mean by excessive?” she asked, relaxing almost immediately.
“Like, several hundred or more.”
“Not that I noticed, why?”
“Well, one of our squads tracked a survivor of the fight last night to a warehouse. And when they went inside, they found it was absolutely piled to the roof with rations and supplies. Enough for a fairly large—by shifter standards anyway—army. It was almost all packed up and ready to move as well.”
Nina shook her head. “I’m sorry, no, I can’t say anyone ever mentioned seeing that many shifters here. There were more than before they arrived, yes. But not hundreds worth, no. Cloud Lake isn’t big enough to hide that fact if they were staying in town.”
“I know,” he said, letting the topic slide. “I was just curious. We didn’t encounter anywhere near enough forces to justify that sort of equipment.” He shrugged his shoulders and smiled, trying to put her at ease, even as it ate away at him inside. “Anyway, let’s go get that food, shall we?”
As they turned and began to walk down the sidewalk, Aksel noticed a shifter peel himself away from the group and begin to walk after them.
He paused.
“One moment.”
Turning back, he strode forward and confronted the man. “Can I help you?”
The big bear shifter was perhaps an inch shorter than Aksel, though they were both about the same build.
“Orders, Corporal.”
“What orders, Lance Corporal?” Aksel stressed the rank difference, letting the other shifter know this was a formal situation. He didn’t like doing that, but the shifter had his guard up, and Aksel was following suit.
“From Major Eidelhorn, sir. He wants the human woman followed.”
“For what purpose?”
“I can’t say Corporal, I’m sorry.”
“She’s with me. We’ll be having lunch, and then returning here. You have my word on that, soldier. So stay here, help out, and when she comes back, you may resume your job. But I won’t have you following us around, interfering with a peaceful lunch. She deserves that much. Understood?”
“Corporal, I’m supposed—”
“Is that understood?” Aksel growled dangerously.
Behind the spy the rest of his squad turned from their conversation, sensing their leader’s unhappiness. The spy, whoever he was, seemed to pick up on that, and decided it was best not to argue.
“Yes, Corporal,” he said unhappily.
“Excellent,” Aksel said with a false smile.
“Men, this charming young lance corporal has just volunteered to help out while I am absent. See to it he’s kept in good hands, won’t you?”
“Yes, Corporal,” his squad said back in unison.
They didn’t need to speak so formally, but they’d done so anyway, to stress to the spy that they were a united front, and that he’d better not try anything with them.
“Very well then. Carry on the good work,” he said with a dip of his head at his squad, tossing his second-in-command a wink.
Spinning on his heel, he resumed his position at Nina’s side. She didn’t take his hand again, and Aksel wondered if he’d gone too far in getting rid of the spy.
But a moment later her arm threaded through his, and he smiled.
***
Nina
“What was that all about back there?” she asked as they were seated by the hostess. “Thank you,” she said, accepting the proffered menu.
“What was what?” Aksel asked, though she knew he didn’t expect her to believe him for an instant.
“With that shifter, as we were leaving the site?” She opened the menu and began perusing it as she waited for Aksel to explain.
“Just dealing with a little internal disciplinary problem,” he said with a shrug. “Nothing major.”
“Really?” she asked sarcastically.
“Really.”
“So how is it then that you had to discipline the same shifter who happened to escort me everywhere I went this morning while I tried to track you down? Who did so without giving me a name, or even acknowledging my presence? That seems rather…coincidental, don’t you think?”
She watched as Aksel sat back in his chair, the metal frame creaking unreliably under his weight as he did so. Part of her worried he might break it because he was focused elsewhere. But then he sat forward, resting his elbows on the table as he looked at her.
“You are extremely observant,” he said at last. “Keenly so, in fact.”
“I’ve learned to look over my shoulder and spot a tail, yes. You can thank the past two months of everyone in this town running from their own shadow for that. But yes, I saw him almost instantly this morning. I noticed him coming after us today at the same time you did.” She paused, wondering if she should ask the question that was on her mind.
Do it. You deserve an answer.
“Why am I being spied upon?” she asked.
Aksel hesitated, and for a long moment, she thought he was going to lie to her. Nina would have been up and out of her chair, completely done with him, if that had been the case. But then he sagged slightly. “I don’t know. He didn’t tell me.” His brown eyes hardened, glinting dangerously. “But I intend to find out.”
Nina looked at him, evaluating his words and the emotions behind them, trying to judge how she felt.
“Okay,” she said at last, deciding that he was telling the truth.
Aksel nodded at her once, sharply, as if confirming that she’d made the right choice in believing him.
I sure hope so. I can’t believe I’m trusting you even though I barely know you!
The silence continued for a few moments, only interrupted when the server came around to take their orders.
“I know what I’m having already,” she said to Aksel. “Do you have any idea?”
“Order slowly, and if you stall long enough, I’ll have decided,” he said with a grin, flipping the menu open and beginning to look at it.
Nina looked up at the server, who was ready with her pencil. “I’ll have the club, extra tomato, fries, and water with lemon, if you don’t mind.”
“Sounds good,” came the cheerful reply.
“That wasn’t stalling at all!�
� Aksel protested in defeat, his shoulders slumping.
“Oops,” she said, shrugging her shoulders with false innocence.
The large shifter laughed, his shoulders shaking as he grinned at her. “I’ll take the same, but just regular water, and extra bacon instead of tomato, please,” he said.
“Coming right up,” the server said, whisking their menus away and disappearing swiftly to the back.
“Next time, maybe try to occupy another like, three to five seconds?” he teased.
Nina laughed softly. “I’ll see what I can do. No promises though.”
“You’ve been here before I take it?” he asked.
“Just a few times,” she said, trying to downplay it. “I worked just over there,” she said, pointing at the Town Hall barely visible down the block. “So I came here for lunch if I didn’t feel like packing one.”
Aksel just looked at her.
“Which was rather often,” she admitted after a moment of scrutiny from his devastatingly handsome, and yet rather youthful brown orbs.
“Aksel, how old are you?” she asked suddenly.
“Thirty,” he replied without hesitation. “Why do you ask?”
She shook her head. “Your eyes, that’s all.”
“Are they that bad?” he asked with a smile, looking away.
“No!” she practically shouted. “No, not at all. I just meant, they look young from a distance, but the deeper I look into them, the more they say you’ve seen a lot for your age.”
She put her words to actions now, gazing into his soul as deep as his defenses would let her. Aksel didn’t flinch away, but she could tell there was more hidden away. Her mind automatically assumed it was pain, but she wondered if perhaps there was more to it than that. Almost like it was…
“Shame,” she said, then clamped her hands over her mouth. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“It’s okay,” he said, reaching across the table and gently pulling her hands from her mouth, though she noticed he once again didn’t let go of them.
Nor did she pull away, letting his big, strong, warm hands surround hers, warming them up. His touch was shockingly delicate for a man of his size and abilities.
Kind of like a big teddy bear.
“Why did you say what you said?” he asked, not looking away from her.
Nina didn’t want to respond. She wanted nothing more than to just take back what she’d said.
But you can’t. Besides, now is as good a time as any to get to know him.
“I feel like that’s what I’m seeing in your eyes,” she told him. “And I don’t understand. You don’t have anything to be ashamed of.”
Aksel looked down at the table for a moment as their server dropped off their drinks, and then back up at her in an uncharacteristic show of emotion for a shifter, as far as she knew.
“It’s nothing to do with the current situation,” he told her.
Something more deep-rooted, she thought. Perhaps this wasn’t something she should be pressing him on.
“I see.” She left it open, for him to end the topic if he wished.
“It’s…complicated,” he said.
Nina simply gave his hand a reassuring squeeze, letting him know he didn’t have to tell her.
“No, it’s okay,” he said, verbally acknowledging her action.
“It’s about my family. They’re…different, from most shifters, I guess. And they tried to raise me that way. But I didn’t, I don’t, agree with their methods. So I became my own person. They don’t speak to me much anymore now,” he said, breaking out into a wry grin. “I’m more ashamed that I couldn’t make them proud, even though I know what I’m doing is the right thing.” Aksel shook his head. “If that makes any sense.”
“It absolutely does,” she said. “We often aren’t what our parents expected or wanted from us. We become who we are, not who they are. Some can accept that, some can’t. I’m sorry yours didn’t.”
Aksel smiled wanly. “Thank you. You’re very perceptive though, picking that up.”
“I was looking deep,” she said, then felt her face heat as she blushed slightly at the admission she’d been staring into his eyes.
Not that he could have missed it, since he was looking right back at you!
But Aksel just grinned. “Find anything else? There’s plenty more to see than just that, I promise.”
Nina’s face mirrored his own as she leaned in to gaze into those remarkably deceptive brown eyes yet one more time.
If you insist I look…
Chapter Six
Aksel
Having returned Nina to her room after picking up a change of clothes from a nearby store for her, and informing her escort where to find her, Aksel set off on his own quest.
There was somebody he needed to find and have words with.
He didn’t like the way Nina was being treated. She’d gone through enough, losing her house—they’d gone to look at it, and seen little more than debris. There might be something salvageable on the lower floors, but it would require a lot of careful cleanup to get there. It would have to wait, he’d told her.
After that, she’d just sort of wanted to be alone, so he’d brought her back to the motel so she could shower and change. But now his steps led him down the left side of the dual curved staircase that emptied him out into the grand lobby. The motel had once been a huge part of Cloud Lake, back when it was a mining town, supplying the miners in the nearby mountains. The interior showed that, despite it only being two stories high.
“Where can I find Major Eidelhorn?” he asked a passing shifter.
“In his office, Corporal,” the private replied, pointing down the hall.
“Thanks,” Aksel said, taking the indicated hallway.
He could hear the major’s voice as he grew closer, and simply followed that until he came to an open door. Whatever the room’s prior purpose had been, it was a conference room now.
The major was talking to several shifters who had the look of civilians about them. They weren’t as muscular as their fighting brethren, nor did they have the same predatory grace to their movements. Even as the major spoke, dictating the various reconstruction efforts they were going to take, his point was confirmed.
Aksel bit back a snort. He had little time for civvies, though he knew they had their purposes as well. It was just that he was of the mindset that everyone should receive Green Bearet training, as a sort of mandatory skillset for any shifter. Or even a pared down version of it.
He wasn’t a believer in the “Peace First” initiative some shifters followed, that said they should dispel with their animal sides and try to imitate humans and their quest for peace.
Aksel thought it was bullshit. They weren’t humans. They were part animal, and those animals were violent. It was best to be trained to handle that violence, and know when and how to apply it, instead of being willfully ignorant.
If something blew up in Aksel’s face, he would be far better prepared to deal with his bear’s reaction than the civilians in front of him, who may very well lose control of themselves—and thus of their bears—becoming a danger to anyone around them.
The Peace First folks often went without shifting for weeks, months, or even longer at a time. That could do dangerous things to an animal when it was finally set free. Aksel had heard rumors of beasts going berserk after being let out for the first time in months, to the point that the shifter in question had to be killed because they couldn’t be subdued, nor could they contain the rampaging animal within their brain.
So it was that he waited patiently at the doorway until the meeting was over. As the civilians filed past, Aksel felt his lip curl up slightly, despite his best efforts to avoid it.
“Corporal Muller. What can I do for you?” the major asked, though his eyes were already on the tablet in front of him, reviewing one update or another.
It never ceased to amaze Aksel how the major could keep track of so many things
, and how many of them there seemed to be. It was always go-go-go with him, and it never seemed to slow. Now that they were at war and not back at Base Camp, he knew it was likely to be even worse. Part of him feared moving up the ranks for exactly that reason.
“Sir, I need to talk to you about something.”
The major looked up at his tone, and after seeing the expression on his face, set the tablet down.
“Very well, Corporal. Air it out.”
Aksel looked at the door. “May I, sir?” he asked, indicating that he wished to close it.
The major tilted his head in acceptance.
“What’s on your mind, Aksel?”
“Sir, why is Nina being treated like a prisoner? She hasn’t done anything wrong.”
Major Eidelhorn’s first name was Jarvis, but as a lowly corporal, Aksel would never dream of calling him by his first name. He would leave that up to the likes of Colonel Richter or the commandant. People far loftier in rank and title than he.
“Nina? That’s the human woman you rescued from the Fenris thugs, yes?”
Aksel nodded, though he didn’t doubt for a moment that the major knew exactly who she was. This was all for show.
“Tell me, Aksel, you’ve been spending a lot of time with her lately, I hear.”
He bristled at that, realizing that despite his orders to the other shifter, someone was reporting to the major about his habits. That irked him almost as much as having one of his own kind spy on her. He suspected the only reason it didn’t was because he was used to it. Being in a military organization, he always had superiors to report to. It was only natural that they would want to know where he was most of the time.
To a degree though. They need to relax a little on this.
“Sir?” he asked in response, not sure where the major was going with the line of questioning.
“Did you ever ask her why the shifters had her?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And what was her response?”
“She doesn’t know, sir.”
“Indeed. Well, Corporal, assume she truly doesn’t know. Why might a group of shifters kidnap a human? Nefarious and evil reasons, you would assume, right? Slavery, rape, perhaps torture if they’re truly that messed up. Things along those lines, right?”
