Where Wild Things Roam

Ceremony

Jack    

“If we were going to wait until dusk to make her the Luna, why did we have to start this party at noon?”

Though Candlewood’s a small town made up of mostly weres, a few other shifter species have taken up residence here too, along with a few humans, mostly extended family of humans turned were that live with their mates. Right now, I’m certain exactly all of them are crammed into every nook and cranny of the three blocks surrounding the pavilion in the center of town. 

The plaza is closed to vehicle traffic, but it’s packed nearly shoulder to shoulder and people have set up blankets and folding lawn chairs on the grass around the pavilion, even in the streets. Darla and Joe’s, the local sandwich and pie shop that makes my favorite lemonade is packed, even the plastic patio seating they brought in for the event is filled, and the line for a glass of lemonade or a scoop of their famous homemade vanilla bean ice cream stretches half a block along the plaza.

Even without the band playing on the pavilion, it’s noisy, with people talking and laughing. Children with balloon animals, bubbles and battery-powered nuisance toys are squealing and giggling as they run around or shrieking like banshees in the bounce houses placed strategically nearby. I’ve got a full security team working the event and I’m still listening to random chatter through the pack link even though the road into town is closed.

It’s a safety shitshow, and the entire thing annoys the hell out of me.

“Because that’s the way Ian’s mom planned the event, Jack. Would you stop lurking over me like a vulture and sit down?” Ivan gestures at the portable chairs set up for us at the far side of the park surrounding the pavilion under a tent for shade. “Why are you so uptight anyway?”

I flop into one moodily. “Because this little shindig has turned into a huge affair. Look at that!” I point as a pair of weres cross the park, pausing at the pavilion. Apparently, they make a request because the band begins playing again. “This is supposed to be a closed event. And those two—who are they? Do you know? Because I don’t.”

“Silas and Sean MacOmb. From Desert Pack,” Ellie says, startling me when she presses the side of a cold, wet cup against my shoulder, the condensation soaking through my sleeve. “They’re invited.”

Rising, I grin, seeing it’s the largest cup of raspberry lemonade from Darla and Joe’s. “Thanks, Mom!” I offer her my chair. “So how many people from other packs were invited to this closed-to-the-public event, hmmm?”

“Shut it, Jack,” Ellie tells me, smiling brightly and waving to someone she knows. “The leaders from the neighboring packs and any pack we have an alliance with were invited. It’s basic courtesy—something your triumvir mate will take care of. Not that I’d expect you to know.”

I snort. “You raised me.”

Ellie flashes me ‘the look’, then pats my thigh. “And I did good. Look what a handsome strapping young man you’ve become.”

I beam, pushing my chest out, then slump again when she adds, “Now if only we could do something about that mouth.”

Beside Ellie in the other chair, Ivan starts laughing. “Where’s your husband, Ellie?”

“He’s over at the packhouse trying to weasel some mead out of Townsend.” She shakes her head. “It’s disgraceful. I sent Ian to collect him.” She glances at her watch, then out at the lengthening shadows as the sky overhead turns cotton candy pink in the sunset. “That should be the last song for this band. Another half hour they’ll be clear, the light will be right, and we’ll be a pack with a Luna again.”

Hearing squealing, Ivan slips out of his chair and onto his knees as his daughters race up to him, throwing their skinny arms around his neck. “Gross! You’re all sticky. Where’s your mom?”

“She’s coming with Mr. Michael,” Tavie, Ivan’s oldest answers his question.

“We had ice cream!” Tasha supplies to Ivan’s unasked question, bouncing up and down in place.

Ivan quirks a brow, watching her sugar-induced energy spike with abject horror. “Of course you did. You ready to watch Miss Darby become Luna?”

“S’kinna boring,” Tasha says glumly. “Can’t we play in one of the bouncey houses? Pleeeeeeeeease?”

“You come here, little lady!” Ellie swipes at her, pulling Tasha onto her lap. The child squirms for a minute in the gentle hug, then stills, her eyes going wide as Ellie whispers in her ear.

She bounces off Ellie’s lap like she’s spring-loaded, then whispers in her sister’s ear.

“Really?” Tavie asks of Ellie.

Ellie just smiles and nods, and a moment later, both girls are seated by their dad, quiet and still. She’s a great mom, and she’ll be a fantastic grandmother someday, if Ian will ever knock up that mate of his.

Since I don’t have one.

“Why are you so sullen, Jack? Ellie asks so only I can hear. Mind-reader.

I take a deep breath, look down guiltily. There’s really no way to answer her and not sound like a selfish prick. There’s no sense trying to hide it from Ellie though. “Jealous, Mom. That’s the long and short of it. I guess while Ian was still looking, I felt okay that I’m still looking.”

Ellie extends her hand to me and I take it, kneeling behind her chair. “Jack, my sweet boy. Patience is a virtue.”

“Right now it feels more like a waste of time, Mom.”

Ellie chuckles, then turns to face me in her chair. “Ever since we took you in, after we lost your mom and dad, you thought you were living in Ian’s shadow. When are you going to grow out of that?”

“Come on, Mom. He’s the one girls can’t take their eyes off, the Alpha. Bigger. Stronger. More responsible. And with a bottomless bank account. There’s no ‘thought’ about it.”

“You were never expected to be any of those things.” She smiles gently and lays her hand on my cheek.  “You’re his little brother, one of his best friends and his Triumvir. And pushing him constantly to be a better man. He is what he is because of you. You let yourself get distracted and you miss the point. Even though you’re four years younger, Jack, you’ve been right on his heels his whole life. And if I know you, this isn’t going to be any different.”

I can’t help but smile. “You going to throw one of these fancy schmancy shindigs for my mate?”

Kissing my forehead, Ellie laughs. “Twice as big. Just to annoy you.”

**

Ian    

“Whoa.” It’s all I can manage as I get out of the car in advance of the Luna ceremony. Packed with people, the plaza has become its own living, moving organism, even more so than usual for events in Candlewood.

“Your Second triumvirs are already waiting on the pavilion.” David closes the car door behind me. “I’ll return in a few minutes with our Luna.”

“Thanks, David,” I answer distractedly, watching Ivan on the gazebo talking over the railing to someone out of my line of sight. Beside him, Jack’s looking for all intents and purposes like he’s having an apoplexy.

It takes nearly twenty minutes for me to make it through the crowd as people stop me to offer congratulations. The MacOmb brothers, Sean and Silas, the Alpha and Second respectively, of the Desert pack are front and center, each offering a handshake and another congratulations, eager to cement good relations and secure a formal alliance with Candlewood when we meet early next week.

I tap the mic Jack hands me and if it’s possible, people push in even closer and a hush settles over the crowd. “Hello everyone. Thank you for coming.”

“About time, Alpha!”

The tease is followed by sporadic claps from different areas of the crowd. One is probably my mother.

I laugh at the random heckling, glance over my shoulder when Jack taps my arm and I see David has returned with Darby. “I promise you, I couldn’t agree more, but when you meet her, you’ll know she was worth it too.”

This earns me a few hoots from the crowd and a new round of taunts about alpha babies before a rising whisper ripples outward, silencing them.

Darby steps out of the car, Tessa coming to heel beside her.

I haven’t seen her since this morning at breakfast, when my mother and Kasey whisked her away. Even though it hasn’t even been twelve hours, I ache to feel her velvety soft skin and her lithe body yield to me, to drown myself in her scent and the sounds she makes when I make love to her.

“Keep it together, Ian,” Jack whispers beside me. “Big bad Alpha falling to pieces is a bad look for you.”

“Only one thing going to stop that.”

The dress she’s wearing looks like she smells-- a lilac colored corset bodice with some ornate closure detail on the front and a layered lace skirt in shortbread yellow that falls in an irregular hem about her slim calves.

“Yeah, I’ve heard her keeping you upright. At high decibel and all damn night long.”

My wide grin just gets wider watching Darby wander her way across the grass to me. Though she’s not wearing much of it, it’s the first time I’ve seen her with make-up and the impact is dramatic.

Her plump perfect lips are a deeper shade than her usual pink and the soft gloss over them makes her look like she’s been well and truly kissed. Smokey purple and shimmery gold eye makeup makes her wide, tip-tilted eyes even larger and their color stand out, and black mascara turns her long, thick lashes impossibly longer and thicker.

Her normally simple braid got an elaborate upgrade and twists and curls intricately at the back of her swanlike neck, adding a fair amount to her overall grace, and immeasurably to my desire to pull her into a dark corner somewhere, unwrap and plunge my fingers into the dark silky waves of it.

Darby takes my hand when I offer it, and I stare at her mouth hard enough she can feel the deep, wet kisses I want to put there. She bites her lower lip and smiles.

“Either get a room, or get on with it,” Jack groans.

“I have to side with Jack on this one, Ian,” Ivan seconds, swapping the muted mic in my hand for the glass athame we had made for this occasion. “Crowd’s getting edgy.”

Turning Darby’s hand palm up, I make a quick, shallow cut with the blade at the base of her palm where her fate and life lines meet, releasing her as a dark red bead wells there and her faery gleam swirls and coalesces around the wound. I cut myself in the same spot and as the blood wells, press it to the blood on her palm.

“By my blood so be bound, Darby, Luna of the Candlewood pack. Us to you. You to us. For as long as Arianrhod smiles down on us.”

“By my blood, I, Darby, accept the bond—me to you, you to me—as Luna of the Candlewood pack for as long as Arianrhod smiles down on us.”

Ivan’s ready with a couple of bandages, but when I lift my hand, Darby’s faery gleam has healed us both. Her only acknowledgement is a flick of her brow, then she turns with me to face the crowd. There’s an assault of greetings and welcomes both internally from the bound pack members and externally from the unbound ones and guests, and a gorgeous smile pulls her lips.

She glances down at Tessa, rubbing the dog’s ear. “So this is what you hear,” then smiles brightly when Tessa answers.

Not one to miss an opportunity, I open my own private conversation.

Even through the pack link, Darby’s reply sounds appalled.

Raising her head, she silences the noise of the multitude. “Candlewood pack, I thank you for your warm welcome. It’s my privilege to be so accepted as your Luna.” As she speaks, Darby places her hands together before her, almost as if in prayer and slowly, her filigree wings unfurl, shimmering with faery gleam. Then her eyes begin to glimmer with green magic, ghostly tendrils of it curling around her hands. “I offer this to you, a sign of our covenant that by our blood I promise to keep. For as long as these bloom, I am with you.”

She opens her hands, cupping them loosely before her and my pack gives a collective gasp. As if holding water, the green magic drips off her fingers, swirls outward in dancing motes like dandelion seeds on the wind. They spread to the far reaches of the awestruck crowd, dodging like fireflies as eager children swat and poke at them and others try to capture them in their tiny hands.

A collective sigh of anticipation ripples over the plaza as the faery magic sinks in unison, pulsing where it touches the ground. Tiny glowing seedlings writhe in fragile tendrils, produce low growing leaves then burst to life everywhere they’ve touched with a pale rainbow of dainty, multi-colored lily-like blooms edged in faery fire.

Beside me, Ivan stumbles back against the railing, his eyes blank with amazement as he looks out over the faintly glowing flowers.

“Sorry, buddy.” I pat him on the back. “I forgot you haven’t seen it either. I should have warned you.”

“Holy s**t, Ian—wow.”

“You’ll get used to it.” I grab Darby by the hand and with Tessa at the heel, we leave the pavilion to mingle and are immediately stopped.

About as tall as Jack and kind of rangy, the MacOmb brothers are clearly desert-hard alpha stock. Both brothers nod to me, but I can see the alpha brother searching Darby’s exposed neck, shoulders and chest for her mark as my mate, his nose flaring, drinking in her scent.

 my wolf half growls, surging to the front of my consciousness.

 comes the snarling response.

“Darby, these are the MacOmb brothers from the Desert pack. Alpha Sean and Second Silas,” I introduce. “Mountainrose is in their pack’s territory.”

“Luna, you give a whole new meaning to being from the Land of Enchantment,” Sean says smoothly, bowing slightly and pressing Darby’s hand to his lips lightly. “Thank you for putting us on the map.”

Silas smacks him on the shoulder, physically separating Darby’s hand from his brother’s. “She’s mated, Sean,” he hisses. “Sorry Alpha,” he says to me, clearly contrite. “We’re actually really happy to claim the faery Luna from a pack as robust as Candlewood was from our territory. You’re both welcome back anytime and we look forward to a long and beneficial alliance between our packs.”

Ah, the diplomat, just like my Second triumvir, Ivan.

“It’s my pleasure to meet you both. Please do enjoy yourselves. I’m certain you’ll find Candlewood as diverting as I do.” Darby smiles politely, without acknowledging Sean’s attention and allows me to steer her further into the crowd.

“What are you doing!” I hear Silas snap sharply as we move away. “She’s mated! You just saw her become Luna!”

“She doesn’t have a mark,” Sean retorts, and in my periphery, I see him turn and eye Darby again, his gaze sliding over her appreciatively.

I prick my ears, listening closer as Darby carries the conversation around us.

“And great goddess! Her skin’s as pure as white sand in the moonlight and her perfume more intoxicating than every flower in the desert.”

“Dammit, Sean! Not her! Look around you—Candlewood is packed to the brim with beautiful weres. Get your entertainment somewhere else.”

At Silas’ prompting, Sean looks around him, then sighs. “There are beautiful desert roses at home, Silas. The Candlewood Luna is the only faery.”

“And mated to an alpha. The most well-connected and fiercest alpha I’ve ever seen. Find yourself a different conquest.”

“We’ll see.”

**

Darby    

At full dark, the trees in the park light with tiny twinkling lights and the firepits at each of the four corners of the plaza park dance with red-orange flames. As the evening wears on, I’m positive I’ve met every single person of Candlewood’s population, some of them more than once. The blend of weres, other shifters and humans surprises me, but not so much as the alpha, Sean MacOmb, moving on a parallel path through the crowd, but constantly within sight as Ian and I mingle.

His fascination makes me uncomfortable and not a small amount perturbed. Whether I bear Ian’s mating scar or not and regardless of his ardor, it’s impertinent. And quite frankly, boorish and moronic. Ballsy, I’ll give him that much, but still insipidly stupid.

It’s nearing midnight when I meet Charlie, the local chemist, geologist and surveyor, who also happens to be an incredibly paranoid conspiracy theorist. And somehow completely unaware he lives in a town more than half populated with shifter species and now, a faery.

“He was here for the whole Luna ceremony. How is that contradiction even possible?” I ask Ian as Charlie excuses himself suddenly to duck into the darkened entryway of one of the closed shops along the plaza, pressing himself flat against the building and scanning passers-by suspiciously.

Ian chuckles. “Best not to ask. He’s useful and keeps to himself, and just accepted as one of the harmless local crazies.”

“One? You have a collection?”

Grinning, down at me, Ian chuckles quietly, then tugs me along.

At the next shadowy shop entrance, Ian pulls me in, pinning me roughly between the wall without hurting me, his hard body shielding me from view on the street. Yellow and green of his wolf half flash in his deep blue eyes, visible even in the dim light and his gaze burns, staring hungrily at the neckline of my dress. “He’s watching you. He wants you.” The words come out in a deep, menacing snarl, the gravelly growl of his wolf half.

The immediate invasion of my mouth is fervent and furious, his hot tongue overpowering mine, demanding my surrender, rewarding when I willingly concede. I’m swept into the possessive torrent of his desire, breathless and gasping when he releases my lips. His large hand closes brutally around one breast, growling when he feels my n****e harden as he kneads and pinches it through my bodice. I wilt at the mixed pain and pleasure, the only thing keeping me on my feet is the force of his hips trapping me between him and the wall.  

“You’re mine.”

The words are an ominous rumbling in his chest, and like deep rolling thunder, draw a shudder from me. His lips greedily consume my feeble reply before I can speak it. Releasing my tender breast, he balls my skirt in his fist, dragging it rapidly up my thigh.

Wrenching my mouth from his, I take hold of his wrist with one hand, pushing ineffectually against his broad chest with the other. “Not here, Ian. Look at me!” My resistance starts to buckle under the intensity of his gaze, but I force myself to say it again. “Not here. Take me home.”

A couple long minutes pass of his eyes boring into me, and I begin to wonder if he even heard me at all. His breath comes harsh and through flared nostrils, gradually returns to normal, then his hand drops my dress and his body relaxes.

“Home.”

“I—yes. Home. Take me home, Ian.”

He takes my hand in his, turns sharply then stops dead in his tracks, facing a gray-haired old woman standing just off the curb. She’s hunched slightly and wears oddly patched clothes with several animal skulls bleached white and fragile by the sun dangling from a hand-braided belt tied at her middle.

“Hello, Kassandra.”

She makes no reply to Ian, just hobbles closer until she’s right up beside us.

“The faery Luna,” she rasps, peering at me. Her hazy blue eyes rake me from head to toe, then she reaches out slowly and with gnarly, emaciated hands.

Uncertain what’s happening, I put my hand in hers and she nods, smiling.

“A special blessing. A special blessing indeed.” Her face sobers abruptly, and her voice gets softer. “They told me you’d come.”

Taken aback, I inhale sharply. “Who told you I’d come?”

Kassandra taps her forehead with one bony finger. “I hear them,” she says, then pokes Ian in the chest. “They’re afraid for you.”

“What? Why?” Ian demands.

“The others are coming for the Luna.”

Protectively, Ian moves closer with a snarl, reaching out to separate my hand from Kassandra’s.

“Ian! No! She’s a diviner. Don’t break the bond!”

Though I can see his frustration, he abides my wishes. “Who’s coming for her?”

“Can’t see them, Alpha. Only feel them. Many of them. Desperate to get to her. Here,” releasing my hand, she removes an opal ring from her finger, sliding it gently onto one of mine. Even at night, the fine iridescent colors—pale pink, green, blue and yellow—dance in the stone’s glowing white. “Take this. It’ll protect you. Give you a place to hide.”

As unexpectedly as she approached us, Kassandra hobbles away, mumbling under her breath to herself.

“We’re definitely going home.” Spooked in a way that unnerves me, Ian drags me along behind him, his eyes scanning the crowd.