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  His only response was to lower his head farther and take her core into his mouth and suck on it gently, at first. Then his sucking grew with intensity as he drew more of her tenderness into his mouth.

  She raised her hands, clasped his head, scoring his scalp with her nails while fluxes of pleasure pulsated throughout her being. She ground her body into his mouth, wanting more.

  “Greedy,” he muttered.

  She blushed, felt the heat rising to her cheeks and was thankful that he wasn’t looking at her face, that all of his energy and attention was riveted to giving her pleasure.

  “I love that you’re greedy for me,” he affirmed.

  She rode more and more waves of sheer desire, surrendering herself to him until all she could do was grab his shoulders and try to pull him up.

  Her need for him was overpowering.

  He nodded, his face passion filled, his handsomeness rugged, fierce, and filled with promises of a passionate forever.

  She wasn’t even sure what promises he could make her, a captive, but tonight, she was his, and he was hers.

  He rose, his hard body on top of hers as he pulled himself until their lips were touching and his hardness was pressing against a part of her that wanted him so completely.

  He rubbed his shaft from her core to her entrance and back, over and over, until she was sure she would scream at him to take her.

  And just when she was a breath away from crying out for him, he pressed inward, filling her, slowly, then pushing forward.

  Her body took him in as if he were made for her. His width spread her, filling her, touching ever part of her, leaving her breathless, with just a twinge of pain to merge with the pleasure of it all.

  Until his first real thrust.

  She released a cry. He ceased moving and covered her mouth with his, drinking in her gasp.

  Then he raised his head and studied her face. “I’ll stop. I did not think it would hurt you so.”

  “Don’t stop.” She smiled at him while tears formed in her eyes at his sweetness for worrying about her.

  He thumbed a tear away. “You are crying? It hurts this much?”

  She shook her head. “Tears of joy. To have a wonderful man like you for my first time.” She wondered, too, what the future held. Would they be torn apart when the ruse about her husband was learned? “Please, continue.”

  He kissed her tenderly. And slid in and out of her, gently, expertly, as if instinctively knowing what to do for her. After several moments of this, he pulled completely out, then plunged in with one long stroke. Over, and over again.

  Her body surprised her by delivering more of those waves of pleasure that she rode while she buried her nails in his back. Gasp after gasp, moan after moan, he drove into her, until finally, the wave crested so that she knew she’d be spent, completely and fully.

  “Calder! Oh!”

  With that, he drove in hard, and she felt a pulsing heat merging with her own. He buried his face into her neck, whispering her name over and over.

  Chapter Twelve

  Brenna snuggled deeper into the warmth that surrounded her. The morning sounds from the nearby forest filtered into her sleep-laden mind, but the comfort of her surroundings repeatedly tugged her under, like the whirlpool in the ocean pulled on a swimmer.

  She rested her head against a solidness which rose and fell in a rhythm that matched her own breathing. Frowning, still confused, she opened her eyes.

  And found herself looking into Calder’s eyes with their darker flame that she knew now was his bear. Her lips were tender from a night spent kissing into the early morning hours. Calder had been tender with her, and it was a tenderness she hadn’t expected from a man of his people, a man that also was a bear.

  Whispers entered her subconsciousness, and for a brief second, she believed she might be hearing things. Or hallucinating.

  Then she recognized the voice.

  Freyja!

  She listened closely to the words filling her mind, but couldn’t understand them. This was not a language native to Brenna. The foreign words were chanted, and they grew louder and louder. Brenna couldn’t have said what made her realize that the voices were in her head. The chanting became so loud that it eclipsed her own thinking.

  Seconds later, Brenna’s world erupted into chaos. The sounds of men yelling, cursing, and women screaming filled the air.

  Calder grabbed his head, an expression of sheer pain etched into his handsome features. Tendons on his neck and forehead popped out from the utter agony he was experiencing.

  He grunted. “Brenna,” his voice was a growl of anguish. “What is happening to me?”

  He rose to his feet, barely able to manage that. Brenna stood, put his arm around her shoulders. “I need to get you out of here.”

  “My bear, something is happening to him.”

  Brenna gave him a sideways glance. Could she tell him about Freyja? She wasn’t sure she could. Then she noticed—

  Brenna gasped. “You’re bleeding.”

  Tears of blood flowed down his face.

  What was Freyja doing? Would this kill him?

  Brenna couldn’t have said what instinct drove her next move; she had no experience with witchery or shifters, but somehow, it came to her.

  “We have to get you out of here. Away from Freyja. Away from the sound of her chanting voice.”

  “I hear no chanting. Only yelling and screaming,” he managed to say around the cloud of pain that must have ruled his existence at that moment.

  “I know. I know you don’t hear it, but…” She grabbed his other arm, and tugging him along, pulled him out of the hut.

  The village was mass chaos. Men fighting each other, and at the same time appearing to fight ghosts while women came upon them and managed to stab, hit, and club them with anything that could be used as a weapon while the men were incapacitated and holding their heads.

  In front of the village’s central fire, Freyja stood, clad in a black robe, face upraised, arms lifted to the sky, her lips moved soundlessly. Her eyes were unfocused, looking at nothing in particular.

  This was the time. Brenna knew instantly and instinctively she had to get Calder out of there.

  Freyja was the most powerful of witches, that was no secret, and whatever she was doing to the men would not end well for them. And by default, that included Calder.

  Brenna found herself wishing she had knowledge of how witchcraft worked. How to avoid it, how to circumvent it. But she knew naught about the mystical arts.

  She glanced at Calder. Blood streamed from his eyes like uncontained tears of crimson, more than before. She gasped.

  He raised a brow. “What is it?”

  She shook her head. She couldn’t tell him that the bleeding had gotten worse.

  “I need to help them.” He pointed to his clansmen.

  “You can’t.”

  “I must.” He made to go toward the melee.

  Brenna grabbed his arm, held tightly. “You must come with me. Now.”

  “Why?” he asked, but he followed her, allowing her to lead him at a sprint, toward a nearby grove of trees.

  Once in the cover of the trees, Brenna turned to survey the fracas they’d left behind. More and more of the men had fallen.

  “What is happening to my people?” Calder swiped at his face, then stared at his bloody hand. “What in the curses is happening to me?”

  “Your people have made a mistake. They’ve trifled with the wrong witch. This village is one that belongs to Freyja. It’s her daughter’s village. She’s wreaking her vengeance on your kind. The others will not survive. I need to help you.”

  He shook his head. Blood flew from his face. “No. I have to help my brother. My men.”

  “No.” She refused to release his arm. “For the sake of our baby.”

  He scowled. “What is this madness you speak of, woman? You cannot know you are with child the next day after a coupling.”

  She would have to tell h
im about her dream. She hadn’t really had a chance to process the meaning herself yet.

  “We will have a son. He will be the start of a new breed of people. I will not let you put that in jeopardy.”

  “Are you saying…”

  She shook her head. “I do not know what I am saying. I do not know if the gods are revealing a child that will come this year or in the next few years. All I know is that we are destined.”

  Calder put his hands on her face, cupping her cheeks, his eyes locked with hers. “I know not of what you speak, woman. I only know that my heart calls for you. My mind calls for you. My bear needs you.”

  Brenna tried not to let her emotions get carried away. This wasn’t the time to tell him how much he meant to her. How he’d become engrained in her very soul. “Then you must come with me. You must let me save you.”

  He gave her a nod and they took off at a sprint with only the clothes on their bodies, an axe in his hand, a knife in hers. She led him to a mountain, winding their way up, she knew of a cave, one she’d found ages ago when she’d visited the village as a young girl and explored the area.

  At the cave’s entrance, she paused. “This is where we will stay.” She thought for a moment, then added, “For now.”

  He was pale, the hand holding the axe shaking.

  She led him into the depths, sitting him against a wall. Uncertain what to ask or how to say it, she relayed what was on her mind. “What is it that you’re feeling?”

  “That my bear is chained. He cannot come forward. I cannot shift into my bear.” He leaned forward. “I’ll start a fire.”

  She stayed his hand. “No. Not until we know we are safe.”

  “Safe from whom?”

  “From the other women. From Freyja.” She didn’t want to tell him that the other men would be dead without a doubt, including his brother.

  “They are mere women,” he scoffed.

  “You’d be ill-advised to think they are mere anything. You know not who Freyja is.”

  His chest puffed out in defiance, his jaw set firmly.

  “Please, Calder. Please, listen to me.”

  He gave her a nod.

  “I’ll be back,” she told him.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Just to the entrance.” She hadn’t told him she’d heard a noise behind them. She didn’t tell him she wondered why his inner bear had not picked up that there was someone—or something—following them. “I won’t be long.”

  “Don’t go far.” His eyes fluttered closed, his face a visage of pain.

  “I won’t.” She wiped the blood from his cheeks with her sleeve.

  She picked up the axe he’d set nearby, and with one final glance in his direction, she made her way toward the entrance.

  Brenna hadn’t been wrong. There was someone following them. She caught a glimpse of a shadow moving within the trees not far from the entrance. Moving to the side of the entrance, she made her way out, and circled around to behind where the shadow had last been.

  A tiny sound, a leaf being crushed beneath a careful footfall alerted Brenna. She whirled around, the bladed weapon in her hand at the ready, raising it above her shoulder, poised to strike.

  Just as Brenna was bring the weapon down on the figure that had stepped out of the trees’ cover, she froze.

  “Eerika,” Brenna hissed.

  Eerika’s eyes were wild. “Hush. One of them escaped.”

  Brenna narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean?”

  “One of those bastards. He came this way. He’s not traveling alone. He’s with—” Eerika paused. Her eyes took in the axe Brenna wielded.

  Brenna knew she could see this belonged to one of the captors, it was clearly of their people.

  Next, Eerika’s gaze traveled to Brenna’s bloody sleeve. Her stare turned hard and cold. “You are…” She rubbed at her head. “You’re not traveling with…”

  Brenna dropped the axe and pulled the knife from her hip and lunged forward. “Say no more.”

  “You’d kill me?” Eerika’s voice was tinged with incredulity.

  “I owe you my life for the lie you told when they were going to kill me.”

  Eerika licked her lips nervously, her eyes dropping to the blade at her throat. “How do you know about that?”

  “Astrid told me. I owe you. Take yourself away. Now.”

  “But…” Eerika’s head tilted inquisitively. “You are harboring him?” Horror was etched in her features. “Why? Did you not see what his people did to us?”

  “His people. Not him. Calder is different.”

  “You trust me not to go back to the village and get the women? We could outnumber and overpower you.”

  Brenna nodded. “I realize this. I do. But I know you won’t do that.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Astrid. We both love her. We wouldn’t put her in a position to choose between our friendships.”

  Eerika’s anger and concern faltered. “True.” She glanced around Brenna, toward the cave’s entrance. “You love him?”

  I do. More than life itself. But it was so much more than that for Brenna. Mere love did not convey the depth of the emotions she felt for Calder. “He is my destiny.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Calder couldn’t explain what was happening within him. His bear growled and snarled like a beast in chains. Calder remembered seeing a bear like that once, long ago. A traveling band of entertainers had been going through the village Calder lived in with his family.

  The travelers had a captive bear they used for entertainment. It was easy to see that said amusement was based on the cruelty they exhibited on the bear to make it appear fierce to the audience. The bear’s body and face were covered in scars and burnt tissue.

  Calder had seen twelve summers, maybe thirteen when he first caught glimpse of the bear. He’d complained to his father, telling the older man that he wanted to save the bear, to release it from bondage.

  His father had scolded him and reminded him that they did not interfere in the goings-on of humans. That the bear was not a shifter, nor was it human. It was merely a beast. This answer did not satisfy Calder, who against his father’s orders, in the still of the night with the snow falling, slipped out of the warmth of his bed and the security of his father’s cabin, into the cold night.

  Finding his way in the dark, his shifter vision enabling him to see clearly even on this moonless night, Calder found the bear. The creature was hungry and miserable, and Calder’s heart broke to witness this.

  A large padlock served as the obstacle that would allow him to remove the chain that held the bear prisoner in a cell too small for the beast to even stand in.

  A key. That’s what Calder needed. A key to free the bear.

  “I’ll be back,” he whispered to the bear, who seemed to understand that Calder was not the foe, and watched the young human with curious dark eyes.

  Calder expected to hunt a key, to have to pilfer through possessions and tents. What he did not anticipate was that he would actually spy the large brass key hanging from a wooden peg driven into a post nearby.

  It almost would have felt like a trap, finding the key so easily. Calder slunk into the shadows, not retrieving the key until he was certain it wasn’t a trap. That someone wasn’t waiting for another to reach for the key.

  Then again, why would they? And why would they want to keep the key hidden? There was no reason for that. It wasn’t as if the bear could get out of the cell and retrieve it, or even have the manual dexterity to use it.

  Calder wondered if perhaps his paranoia had gone too far. He rushed toward the key, slipped it off the peg and was in front of the bear in seconds.

  “Here we go.” He unlocked the chain and beckoned the bear forward.

  The bear snuffled and studied Calder for what seemed like an eternity while it made up its mind.

  Then, taking one ambling step after another, the bear made its way out of the cell, tentatively, as thoug
h not believing it actually could leave the iron bars behind.

  “Come on,” Calder whispered. “We need to get you out of here.”

  And get him out of there, Calder did. They made their way toward the forested area that bordered on the town, and then Calder led the way into the depths of the shadows, where he shifted into his bear.

  Together, Calder and the bear explored the forest, taking down a deer, enjoying the fresh warm meat in the icy temperatures of that far northern climate.

  For three days, Calder led the bear farther and farther away from humanity and the dangers that people brought to his kind.

  Finally, mission accomplished, the bear free, and Calder’s heart at peace, the boy made it home.

  Sadly, what awaited Calder was a whipping at a post not unlike the one that held the key.

  His father’s hand was heavy as he laid the leather straps into his son’s back until blood was drawn.

  “You do not disobey me,” his father had said.

  “How did you know?” Calder said between unshed tears. He’d refused to let the tears flow. “How did you know I was—what I did?”

  For it was not unusual for Calder and his brother to occasionally vanish on hunting trips—together or separately—and return days later. Their father had never been concerned before, as bear shifters, they were perfectly capable of caring for themselves.

  His father’s smile was grim. “I can smell the bear on you.”

  And so, the bear he’d saved had inadvertently betrayed Calder. But neither Calder, nor his bear, had regretted the act they’d committed in saving the other animal.

  It was that other bear’s confinement that brought Calder’s circumstance to his mind. His bear was as captive in Calder’s mind as that bear had been in its cell.

  What is happening to me?

  Calder knew it had something to do with witchcraft. What else could it be? What else could make all the men in his clan have the same symptoms? Were the men alive? Was Halvar? Or Gunnar, Torsten?

  Calder had to get to them. To help them, but at the moment, he couldn’t move. His bear was chained within his mind, but something had paralyzed his legs. He couldn’t feel them. How did that happen? When? Was it related to his bear? He opened his eyes, and found himself encased in darkness so dark as to be midnight black.