The Witch and the Wolf Pack
Book Six
Moonlight Journey
by
K.R. Alexander
Copyright © 2018 K.R. Alexander
kralexander.com
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Dear Moonlight Pack
Chapter 1
The wolf padded into the ring of standing stones on a cliff above the sea. He paused, turning his muzzle into the wind, nostrils quivering and thick coat rippling in a salty breeze.
I waited, mesmerized both by the beauty of the setting and the magnificent animal I had followed here.
When he walked on, I continued as well, breaking into a jog to keep up with his effortless stride. As he reached the center of the stone circle the wolf faded, blurred by fog.
I opened my mouth to ask him to wait. Fog rolled down my throat, cutting off my voice, filling my eyes. I blinked into a world of white mist, blotting out sight and truth.
Was this truth? Or the tip of the iceberg?
Rows of war graves. Black, burning city skylines. Wolves fighting wolves, blood-soaked bodies across blood-soaked fields. A wizened old vampire holding out a fistful of eyeballs. A cave of broken, desecrated elemental spirits.
They were only memories. All I saw now was a white fog.
I walked forward, despite blindness, until I remembered the cliff: a sheer drop of how far? Hundreds of feet. I hesitated.
Someone laughed, a soft, musical sound.
I looked around as the coyote padded from white to join me. She was smiling, her mouth open, several teeth showing, her large ears pricked toward me. Her coat was gray touched in gold and white, with a rust-colored muzzle and ears. Her eyes were large, yellow, and amused.
What’s so funny? I asked.
Afraid? she chuckled. Afraid to fall? Even in a dream?
Am I dreaming? I almost forgot…
She went past, still laughing.
She had a point.
I followed through the white, where wolf and coyote had vanished. And on. No cliff, nor anything else. Only fog.
Don’t forget. My own voice inside my head, a gentle tap on my shoulder. You know better than this.
I stopped again. Several slow breaths. Drumbeats in my ears.
Help. I have lost my way. I humbly ask for a guide.
I opened my eyes, not having been aware I’d closed them, and stepped around a lush, tropical jungle pool to sit on a monstera leaf the size of a queen bed. My spirit animal, the red-eyed tree frog, waited for me.
Thank you. You know what’s happening. We are here seeking answers for a series of murders taking place halfway around the world. My scrying has been magically tampered with, though I am unsure how that is possible—much less how to block it. People are dying. I can help them. I hope. It’s only … right now … I need the help.
The vividly green, blue, orange, and red frog hopped onto my knee. She lifted a sticky little forearm.
I held out both cupped hands. Into them she placed a set of footprints and paw marks, a beam of moonlight, a compass, and a songbird with speckled brown feathers and a yellow chest. The bird flew to my shoulder, its song filling my ears and spirit with a lightness and joy that set me beaming. The yellow feathers were rays of sunlight, the music like a child’s laughter.
Thank you. Thank you…
I rolled over, smiling, floating. So warm and relaxed, it didn’t seem possible I’d been fretting about anything—much less life and death.
“Thank you,” I sighed.
“For what?” an answering voice whispered in my ears—not inside my head.
“The path, the light, the song,” I murmured, only to discover my lips moved. The bed felt like cardboard, sheets smooth and flimsy. I wasn’t flying. That had been yesterday. And I wasn’t leaned back, drowsing in a cramped coach seat. I pressed into solid muscles and warm skin that I’d just discovered. Just … woken up.
Why? He hadn’t been there a moment ago. He was sliding over against me. How? I was sure I’d gone to bed with him. So how could he not have been here all along?
Chest hair… They were not a particularly hairy lot as a rule. Which suddenly struck me as so comically ironic I almost laughed. So this would be…
“Isaac? Why were you up?” My voice remained about as loud as moth wings, vague and far away, even in my own ears.
“I let Jed out,” he whispered. “I didn’t mean to wake you, arä. Did it work?”
“Did what work?”
“The lucid dreaming?”
“Oh … a bit. It was wonderful. I should make notes.”
“Would you like me to grab your notebook?”
“I said I should, not I was going to. It’s the middle of the night. Too tired…” I snuggled more against him, drawing up a leg to push between his until he draped one leg and one arm around me.
“Will you remember if you wait?” He kissed my hair, enrobing me like chocolate around an almond. “Want to tell me about it?”
“We’d wake the others…” I was already drifting away again, aware of Isaac’s heartbeat, plus soft snores from Zar in the bed by the window and door. Zar would be milk chocolate if he was a candy. Isaac would be dark chocolate. The others…
I was inclined to label Andrew caramel just because he liked them so much. But … maybe cinnamon. Those cinnamon bears: adorable and sharp. Jason was the caramel; smooth, sweet, able to get you in trouble if you over-indulged. Kage was a marshmallow dipped in chocolate, then chopped nuts, then sea salt—protective layers to get to the mushy stuff. Jed … Jed…?
I blinked, starting back from my Isaac cocoon. “What did you say?”
“I asked if you wanted to tell me about your dreams? So you could remember them for in the morning.” Kissing me again—soothing after a hellishly long travel day to get to this highway motel outside Denver. A gift: a dreamlike partner to curl up with after such a day. Moon’s luck—fate—that I should be with him at all since there’d nearly been a riot over dealing out the beds. Two rooms, four beds, six people wanting them.
Plus one.
“No, you said … Jed went out?” I shifted back more, opening my eyes and trying to look up to his face in the dark. A bit more awake made me more aware of him as well, from the strength of his arm around my back to the weight of him with a leg across me. Greater detail than just his chest hair: down to the play of his fingertips stroking my sk
in between the straps of my tank top, his breath in my hair, and the shape of his penis, half-hard through my pajama bottoms and his shorts.
“It’s all right, arä. Neither of us could sleep. He was sitting by the window with his nose on the screen, reading the night. It’s two in the morning. I’ll let him back inside in a few minutes.”
Reading the night. I loved the visual of Jed’s nose on the screen and Isaac being compassionate enough to let him out to scout around our motel. I did not love the idea of Jed being out there, in a strange place, a foreign country that he’d never set nose on before, next to roads, a service station, and other motels and traffic to and from the Denver Airport at all hours, people out for late or early flights, dogs, truckers, wild animals…
“We’re not in Sussex anymore,” I whispered. “This is not the moment for him to explore Colorado. Plenty of that in our immediate futures.”
“I know.” He eased down while I moved up until we could kiss. “Ten minutes at most. I’ll go get him if he’s not back at the door on his own by then.”
I hadn’t realized I was monitoring Zar’s breathing until he snuffled, shifted—making me hesitate as I opened my mouth for Isaac—then went on with the deep breaths and slight snores.
Isaac did not seem troubled by our roommate. He followed me back, led by his tongue while he found mine. His beard felt shorter and sharper than usual. Everyone extra well-groomed for our recent journey in the world of airport security, gate agents, and hundreds of mundanes trapped together inside rockets launched across the globe.
Which reminded me that it would probably take more than whispers and soft motions to wake Zar after the day he’d had. He’d been so stressed, maybe I should have stayed in his bed. Yet I’d been with him and his brother for twenty hours. This seemed fair.
On the other hand, Kage had been arrogantly certain I would stay with him and Jason in their room with Andrew, which adjoined this one.
Once all the guys had a bed chosen, we’d flipped a coin twice—once for my room, once for my bed in that room. Moon’s fate.
Zar had accepted his lot and been asleep so fast he didn’t have to resent it.
Jed, of course, had changed to sleep on the floor with its maroon, spider-hiding carpet—no pets allowed—and was banned from beds due to his dark fur.
It had taken me much longer to sleep. Exhaustion mixed with a racing mind and jet-lag. Plus a determination to try lucid dreaming, which I hadn’t done in years—but must find other outlets besides scrying. I couldn’t trust myself to scry as long as scries were meeting interference.
I had, however, slept. Apparently Isaac and Jed could not. Lying awake: looking to electric lights shining through the curtains that fluttered with a hot summer breeze while the AC also hummed.
The place was no dump, but a run of the mill roadside motel with our ground-floor doors, side by side, opening straight onto a cracked sidewalk and our rental van. Above the sidewalk was a balcony where upstairs doors let out.
The wolves had been fascinated and nervous about the place—poking, prodding, sniffing. Eyes bloodshot and expressions glazed, yet alert enough to jump at the sound of the AC rumbling to life, and to argue about the sleeping arrangements.
It was no wonder Jed, suffering from insomnia, fancied a nighttime stroll. I was surprised, however, that Isaac had found this a reasonable idea.
Now Isaac had someone else to share his insomnia. I was glad to oblige as I found myself awake with concern for Jed, as well as making a greater effort to remember the dreams. More aware of Isaac than dreams. And Jed. How worried should I be? Plus Zar in that next bed, ten feet from us. It seemed indecent…
Isaac was even more my cocoon, kissing me almost silently, motions slow and careful. I knew he was also listening—not only for our companion’s continued unconsciousness, but for our other companion’s return. Would he scratch the door?
I almost laughed again. No pets.
“I’ve missed you,” he whispered into my neck.
“I missed you too.” All of them.
I’d been more or less confined to quarters at The Abyssinian in London for two days while we’d made arrangements and everyone had made ready for the trip—mostly having to be home at the Sable’s territory. Without being able to scry, and staying away from the mobile home park myself due to an unfriendly climate, it had been a lonely couple days. I’d seen more of Gabriel in the forty-eight hours before the flight from Heathrow than the rest of them—a condition so depressing it had been a breath of fresh air even to be around Jed again.
Then together with Zar and Jed all day for the flight, including a change in Iceland, while Isaac, Kage, Jason, and Andrew had a whole other airline and were already waiting for us in Denver when we’d arrived.
Together again. The accommodations had downgraded. But I would rather sleep on dirt and be with Isaac—with any of them—than stay in The Ritz.
Isaac had been trying to work down the drawstring waistband of my pajama bottoms and it finally crossed my mind to lift my hips so he could do so. Falling back to sleep? No … still partway asleep… Still totally asleep…?
I’d missed him pushing down his boxers as well because it startled me to feel the naked contact. I caught my breath, moving in tighter, our legs twined together. A dream? Last time I’d dreamed of being with Isaac like this it had been a foursome. I’d never done that in real life. Never before wanted to…
With the orange outside light filtering aggressively through the room, I found to my own wonder I could look into his eyes. Dream eyes or waking eyes?
Still flying, still high, while I held his face in an effort to keep him back from kissing me: needing to watch his eyes in the hot glow. Instead of my lips, he kissed my fingers, which became my palm, while he gazed back into my eyes.
I inched up, pressing in so I could to help him reach into me while he rolled his hips, silent, watching me.
Lucid dreams were meant to be like this: more real, hearing through ears, not only inside my own head. Real feelings, self-guided journeys. Yet I’d been seeking shamans and answers and truth. How had that ended up here?
The last time I’d been in bed with Isaac had been a disastrous morning one week previously when an altercation between himself and Andrew had—I’d been afraid—nearly led to Isaac being finished with me. And that one night together hadn’t exactly been joyous from the start. He’d been sick with a fever from vampire bites. I’d been sick with my own emotional and mental issues.
Was this making up?
No. We didn’t need to. Not anymore. This was amaus.
I miss you, I love you, Neä amaus Vinu, I told him—sure now of the dream, though still uncertain how it lined up. We would find shamans through moonlit trails, songbirds, and making love?
Not that I was complaining. Honestly, it sounded like a sweet deal—and my companions would enjoy such news. Only … confusing.
The hush, the gentle motions, feeling him against me, part of me, took my mind back to the mist. Why the stone circle? Each stone was strong, yet it took a group to make a circle. Each wolf was strong, yet it took a group to make a pack. It took connection inside the pack to make it succeed.
Heart, connection, journeys together: yes … perhaps this dream did make sense.
Don’t let the alarm go off. Let this one finish. Together.
Isaac? You’ll stay with me, right? Strong together, as one.
He’d asked me to be his mate. So had Zar. So had Kage. Wait … had Kage? Kage’s might have been implied.
Stay. Together.
Isaac? Wait … it’s too…
No, it didn’t matter. Nothing in a dream was too soon or too late. It was just right: we came roughly at the same time, looking into each other’s eyes. At least to start. I was perfect. Perfect eye contact, mouth open as I gasped in near silence. Isaac broke. He leaned in on the first rush to return his face to mine, kissing me, fighting to be quiet as he moaned my name. “I love you, Cassia.”
&nbs
p; It was my lucid dream. I should have been able to keep the eye contact all the way through. Apparently these wolves had just as much minds of their own in dreams as in waking life. Zar could do it if I told him to upfront. Then again, I was pretty sure Zar would eat his own foot if I told him to. Which was so disturbing it made me shiver.
Still, almost perfect dream. Dream Isaac couldn’t help it. It must have been me doing something wrong. Martha, in Germany, had told me to give up control—among much more I had to remember. A work in progress, yes, but I was learning.
Still kissing. I loved how he touched me, worshiping but strong. So quiet, so soft: dreamy.
It wasn’t until our bodies were no longer one, when I felt his semen on my skin, that it again crossed my mind I might not be dreaming. Why should I have to deal with real life aspects like this in a dream? Stupid thing to do. Dream sex shouldn’t be messy.
Even so, I was all wet as I wriggled my underwear up—making me think of when we might get a chance to do laundry—while Isaac was still kissing me.
Don’t be silly. It’s only underwear. Wash it in the sink, shower, and put on a fresh pair, sheesh. Woman up. It’s no big deal.
“Sorry, Isaac,” I whispered.
“For what?”
“I shouldn’t have been exasperated with you. It’s only a dream.”
“What’s a dream?”
Wait … were we really speaking with our voices? So it wasn’t a stupid dream at all? Or any other kind?
“Isaac?”
“Hmm?” He’d subsided, first waiting for me to get my pants pulled up, then draping himself around me again: my shelter, holding me, drifting off.
“Am I asleep?” I asked.
“I hope not.”
“What?”
He kissed me. “If you’re asleep, arä, then I’ve taken advantage of a sleepwalker.”
“Not talking in my sleep.” I frowned. “I mean, am I dreaming this?”
“You think you’re still lucid dreaming?”
“Well, I thought I woke up … then … I wasn’t sure. This … felt like a dream.”
“I concur. Perhaps we’re both dreaming?”
“You think we’re sharing a dream?”
“No, Cassia.” He kissed me. “I think we’re both awake. But it opens an interesting field for conjecture.”
Moonlight Journey: A Reverse Harem Shifter Romance (The Witch and the Wolf Pack Book 6) Page 1
