How much of what had happened was real? You never knew when Kjar’s daughters were involved. And though he didn’t think they were powerful enough, he had to ask. “Did you bring me to the future? Then bring me back? Is Lauren all right? Was any of that real?”
“It was all real,” Astrid said.
“In one fashion or another,” Freyja finished.
Feeling that same desperation to find Lauren again, he tugged at his bindings, but they weren’t budging. No wonder. Now he knew they were tied not only with Matthew’s dragon magic but with the seers’. Frustrated, his grin finally dropped, and he narrowed his eyes. “I need to know what is happening. I need to know Lauren is all right.”
“Lauren is not well,” Freyja said.
“But she will be soon,” Astrid said.
“If we time it just right,” Freyja continued.
Tait looked between them. “So she is really with the enemy then?”
They nodded.
“Loki’s cock.” He struggled at his bindings, growing more upset by the moment. “Then let me go. I need to save her.”
“Why?” Matthew growled. “When you so clearly want Shannon.”
Their eyes met and held. While he was about to assure his cousin he was wrong, he could not manage it because he did want Shannon. He had only met her once and briefly, but now that he was here, looking into Matthew’s eyes, he couldn’t deny it. He was definitely drawn to her.
“Oh, he is confused,” Astrid said, peering at Tait.
“Is he not?” Freyja continued, cocking her head.
“No, not confused.” Matthew narrowed his eyes. “Not confused at all.”
Tait shook his head because while he seemed clear-minded enough, he knew his reaction to Shannon was off-kilter. Though she was beautiful, he wasn’t attracted to her enough when they first met to feel this strongly about her now.
“Was Shannon really in the forest when I traveled back in time?” he asked.
“Yes,” Freyja said.
“And no,” Astrid said.
Tait sighed. Seers. “Could you be clearer?”
“No but I can,” came another voice through the darkness. “It’s time. C’mon guys!”
Samantha?
Nobody said a word but sprang into action. Matthew cut Tait’s binds and yelled, “Follow me,” as he and the seers bolted into the woodland. Not needing to be told twice, he raced after them only to end up in a long narrow pathway cushioned by tall, rock walls.
The Place of Seers?
Moonlight shone down through the trees far overhead, adding to the mystical feeling of the area as he followed his cousins and Sam.
“Get ready everyone. And don’t shift!” she called over her shoulder seconds before Matthew tossed Tait a sword and dagger then vanished into a cave ahead. He pursued them only to end up in an unknown forest.
His eyes widened as Bjorn appeared out of nowhere and he and Matthew attacked a band of warriors trudging through the darkness. It didn’t take him long to locate Lauren. She was no longer flung over the enemy’s shoulder but was carried by a different warrior.
Infuriated, unable to think clearly, Tait flew after them. His cousins took down men so quickly that it allowed him a direct path to her captor. The moment the other man saw him coming, he tossed her aside and met Tait head on. Angered even more by her treatment, Tait crossed blades three times with the imposter before he drove his sword through his gut and swiped a dagger across his neck.
Lauren’s eyes were wide with fear as he scooped her up, tossed her over his shoulder and kept fighting. She was so small, she barely slowed him as he thrust and slashed and killed four more before something started happening. The forest shimmered and compressed then seemed to expand.
Samantha’s magic.
Gateway Seer magic.
Seconds later, they were released, and they stood where he had been when he first arrived. Far and wide, he could see Samantha’s sisters standing beneath ash trees. A breath later, they became transparent and vanished.
“Is everybody here?” Sam took count and nodded before her eyes locked on Lauren, and she murmured, “Oh boy.” When her eyes met Tait’s, she shook her head and mouthed, “Let her down slowly.”
Lauren was so still, some might think her dead, but he knew better. She was in a state of shock. Or so he assumed as he lowered her. Her gaze might have been unseeing but the moment her feet touched the ground he felt something sharp press against his groin.
“What did you do to me,” she ground out, her eyes wide as she pressed the blade tighter in just the right spot. One that made him take her damn serious. Any other man talented enough—because it would take talent based on the skill she was showing—would disarm her immediately but he didn’t. Couldn’t.
No, like it had been at the house in Maine, he was caught by something…her.
Lauren.
It was the same frustrating draw he had when they were first cast beneath the curse. Then the same feeling he had when he returned to the future and laid eyes on her again. Did he desire her initially? Yes. There were few women he did not desire. Regardless. She was different, and he was still trying to figure out how.
Tait conveniently set aside how stunning she was. Delicate and fine-boned, she had a face that was elegantly drawn. Maybe too perfect. Too breakable. Her hair was fine spun white blond silk. Silvery almost. Yet it was her eyes that kept pulling him in. Wide, magnifying her every emotion, they were a shimmering shade of sage green that reminded him of the riverside moss that grew in one of his favorite spots back home. Of Midgard, its color seemed to have a life of its own much like hers. One moment, exploding green in sunlight. The next, mysterious and magnifying within the shadows.
“Well,” Lauren growled, enunciating every word. “What. Did. You. Do. To. Me?”
He was still surprised by how ferocious her dragon was considering the overly disciplined, uptight woman containing it. When the enemy had taken her, she hadn’t run away in fear but tried to battle him instead. She had looked an evil demi-god dragon in the eyes and bared her teeth rather than shrinking away.
Much like she was doing now.
“Hey, Sis?” Samantha said softly, coming alongside them. “It’s me. Sam. Everything’s okay now. You need to remove the blade, all right?”
Lauren didn’t respond but kept her eyes trained on Tait. She was not all right. Not at all. And he could see it in the way her pupils were dilating. More than that, he saw a flicker of something else. Something that made his blood inflame and his cock grow hard. Not good considering the blade pressed against it.
But there was no stopping his dragon’s response to hers.
“Lauren,” Sam said a little more firmly. “You need to give me that knife. Now.”
Tait was aware his cousins had moved into a position to defend him, but it was not necessary because he would never let them near her. He would cut down anyone who tried to hurt her. He frowned at his thoughts. Why did he feel so strongly considering the harm she was about to do him?
“Sweetie, you really need to drop the blade,” Sam said. “Or a whole lotta shit’s gonna rain down.”
For whatever reason, that statement seemed to get through to Lauren because she bit out, “Do not swear, Sister.” She clenched her jaw. “And now is not the time for slang.”
Sam snorted, her eyes flickering between the blade and Lauren’s eyes. “Yeah, sure, okay.” She put her hand on Lauren’s shoulder. “But it is the time to recognize who’s your friend and who’s your enemy, don’t you think?”
A slight shiver ran over Lauren before she finally dragged her eyes from Tait to Sam. She stared at her for far too long in his opinion considering the state of his cock, before she slowly lowered the blade and attempted to speak. Yet nothing came out at first. When she tried again, it was but one croaked word. “Samantha?”
“Yeah, hon, it’s me,” Sam whispered and pulled Lauren into her arms. “It’s going to be okay. I promise.”
She gestured for
everyone to back off as she held her sister.
Tait joined Matthew and Bjorn as his female cousins set to lighting a fire with their hands rather than with magic.
“Where are we?” he said softly. “There is a strange feel about these woods.”
“We are on my land,” Bjorn said. “It is called the Forest of Memories.”
Tait’s brows perked. He had heard of this place. How it captured events that had happened here and replayed them at random for strangers who might happen through. As it turned out, this location had been created by a turbulent, life-altering event that happened to Bjorn. Something so emotional that it formed an area that soaked up new memories daily. “Why are we here?” His eyes narrowed on Matthew because he owed him more answers than anyone else. “And where did the enemy go?”
“We do not know why you were brought to the future again,” Bjorn intercepted. “As to everything that has happened since, you can thank Samantha.” Tait was about to respond, but his cousin narrowed his eyes and growled, “And you will thank her as soon as she is available because she saved not only your life but Lauren’s.”
Typically, it took a lot to get Tait in a bad mood, but it was happening now, and his dragon was responding sharply based on the red filling his vision. He suddenly wanted to rip Bjorn’s throat out.
“Just let me explain,” Sam said softly, her voice growing more and more distant as she walked Lauren further out. The farther they traveled, the more intense his rage grew. The more intent he became on challenging his cousins. Perhaps even killing them.
“Bring Lauren back here now, Sam,” he managed to roar before he swung his sword at Bjorn. His cousin kicked him and gained enough time to pull out his weapon before they started parrying.
“What is the matter with you, Cousin?” Bjorn growled.
“It’s this curse.” He came at him with fury. “Unless Lauren is close, I am…different.”
“We all know he is,” Sam attested as she pulled Lauren back in their direction. “Evade him Bjorn. Tait’s not in his right mind.”
“I can see that,” Bjorn muttered as he ducked away and let Matthew battle Tait for a few moments.
Yet as Lauren came closer, Tait’s anger lessened. By the time she was a stone’s throw away, he couldn’t remember why he was so mad. Frustrated, feeling more and more trapped by this thing, he tossed aside his blade, crouched and held his head. Loki’s Hel, this was infuriating.
“What kind of curse is this?” he muttered under his breath.
“I could think of worse things than being cursed to be close to my sister,” Samantha said softly.
When his eyes met Sam’s, he shook his head. “I’m sorry, beautiful, it’s just...this is just…”
“It just is what it is,” Lauren said, her voice shaky but her eyes surprisingly strong as they met his. “I need answers. So please gather yourself so that I can talk to my sister.”
He was about to respond when her eyes narrowed, and her dragon flared brightly in her eyes. A dragon that he knew reverberated to all of his dragon kin, as she gave a dire warning. One that seemed so out of context considering her repressed personality, that all took notice.
“If you do not, I will destroy every last person here except for my sister.”
Chapter Four
Scandinavia
906 BC
LAUREN SAT PRIMLY with her back straight. She kept her hands folded neatly on her lap and her chin notched in derision. This made sense. Her posture. More than that, her level nature and reasonable mind.
“Alrighty, Sis, it’s done,” Sam said as she sat down across from her and held out what looked to be a dead animal carcass. “Here. Have a sip. It might help.”
Lauren did not respond, and she surely did not take the repulsive thing.
“It’s mead, Lauren. Kind of like wine.” Sam wrapped her hand around the top of it. “And you need to take at least one sip, okay?”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“I do not want alcohol.” She kept her eyes level with Sam’s, disgusted. “Especially whatever is in that.”
“You might not want it, but you need it.” Sam shook her head. “Seriously, you need to unwind and let everything that’s going on start to infiltrate, okay?”
Everything going on? Lauren still couldn’t make sense of any of it. Where in Maine were they? Where had she been taken? How did Sam find her? Yet for all the questions churning in her mind, she only kept asking one. “Tait cannot hear me but he remains close enough that he will not turn into a raving lunatic again, right?”
“Yes,” Sam assured. “He’s just outside, but Astrid and Freyja made sure everything’s soundproof, so you could have your privacy. He won’t go nuts, and you’re Tait-free.”
Lauren nodded and notched her chin back to where it felt comfortable. Back to where she could look down her nose and feel somewhat sane. Somewhat above all of this. Normal. “Good.”
“Good,” Sam agreed before she fished around in her satchel, pulled out a wine glass of all things and poured the contents of the animal skin into it. For all intents and purposes, it looked like wine.
“Here, Lauren. Take a sip and calm down,” she urged. “For me.”
“Do I not look perfectly calm?”
“You look like a woman with a nuke stuck up her ass,” Sam said, ever honest. “Eerily calm now but when you blow it’ll wipe us all out.”
“I am no such thing,” she lied. “Am I not sitting calmly? Do I not have my emotions completely under control?”
“So it seems,” Sam conceded as she lifted Lauren’s hand and forced her to take the wine glass. “But we’re all a little worried about how long that’ll last.”
Lauren clutched the stem of the glass and smoothed her expression. “My response earlier was to be expected. I was abducted.”
“You were,” Sam agreed. “We’re all just hoping you realize you’ve traveled back in time and not a few miles over in modern day Maine because,” Sam’s brows shot up in yet another round of surprise, “you’re a pretty scary chick when you get super angry.”
“Chick,” Lauren whispered and shook her head. “Why do you talk like that? You were not raised without an education, Samantha.”
Sam stared at her much like Tait had earlier. As if she had multiple heads. “Are you serious?” She snorted. “Are you really worried about how I speak right now in light of the horror show you just witnessed?” Samantha leaned forward and searched her eyes. “Because it was a horror show, sweetie.”
“It was…what it was,” Lauren said crisply and did her best not to grip the wine glass too tightly. “A show I thought beyond you, but at least I know you are well. At least I know you are still alive.”
Sam’s brows shot up again. “You think that was all a show that I somehow created?”
Lauren took a deep, measured breath and nodded, glad she could keep all of this in perspective. Because God knew, her sister needed to be kept in perspective. Especially considering all the roughnecks she had involved herself with.
Everything that had happened from her being abducted to all the blood and gore was nothing but a show. Perhaps a gang or biker initiation of some sort. And she was stuck right in the middle of it. An utter horror show that happened because her sister had come too close to crime this time.
She was about to speak, but Samantha put a hand on hers and shook her head. “You couldn’t be more wrong, Sis. About all of it.”
Like Tait had before, it almost seemed like her sister had responded to Lauren’s thoughts.
Again before she could speak, Sam said, “You are not in Maine anymore. You’ve traveled back in time to tenth-century Scandinavia. The man who took you is extremely dangerous, and it’s a miracle that we were able to get you away from him. A miracle that had everything to do with the people outside this tent.”
Lauren didn’t miss Samantha’s firm tone. More so, how confident she seemed. Changed. While Sam was still Sam, there was no denying that
she had somehow evolved into someone more admirable. Someone who took life slightly more serious than she had before.
So why was she still with these people?
“I’m still with these people because they’re mine,” Sam said. “I love Bjorn and his family. And it doesn’t hurt that Cyb’s nearby too.”
All right, that was just uncanny. Lauren set aside the wine glass and narrowed her eyes. “I never asked you why you were still with these people.”
“But you thought it.” Sam took her hand. “And I heard your thoughts.”
Lauren shook her head and swallowed. “Impossible.”
“Not so much,” Sam said softly. “Especially considering we’re family…and considering what I am…” Her voice softened even more. “What you are.”
Lauren shook her head in denial when Samantha’s eyes flashed catlike then words drifted through her mind. “These are my dragon eyes, Sis. The beast that lives inside of me. Inside us all.”
“Impossible,” Lauren whispered and kept shaking her head. While at first tempted to scream and scramble out of the tent, something stopped her. A sense of revelation almost. As if several doors in the hallway of her mind burst open and did not need to be shut again.
“You know what you are,” Sam murmured and squeezed her hand. “You’ve known for a long time.”
She shook her head and whispered, “I do not know what you are talking about.”
“Of course you do.” Sam’s eyes narrowed. “Now that I’ve embraced my dragon, I have a better understanding of yours. Of you. Why you are the way you are today. How your attitude stems from when you nearly shifted as a teenager.”
Lauren closed her eyes and shook her head, trying to ignore the memory that came screaming forth. A memory she had long ago convinced herself was a dream. “I was emotional over our mother’s death,” she whispered. “That is all.”
“Yes, you were,” Samantha agreed, compassionate. “And you thought you were alone by your favorite tree. You tried to convince yourself it was all a dream but it wasn’t.” She shook her head. “You almost shifted all the way, and Cybil was there. She saw. She helped you through it.”
Soul of a Viking (The MacLomain Series: Viking Ancestors' Kin Book 3) Page 5
