Page 19 of Shadow Spirit

Decker growled and Greg joined in Colby’s laughter. Greg was almost beginning to feel some sympathy for the captain of the guard.

“Wordsworth here started doing some research after speaking with Decker this morning. I’m going to turn it over to him.”

Wordsworth cleared his throat, obviously getting ready to pontificate on a topic he found interesting.

“Bottom line it for me, Wordsworth; are Greg and I going to have to face off in a fight to the death?”

“Don’t be so sure you could win that fight,” growled Greg.

“I’m not. I know Oliver Halsey. If he had you with him during his special ops days, you know how to hold your own. Besides, you’re a doctor; you’re going to know the places on a human body that will yield the most devastating results. I imagine you’re rather lethal. And that’s even if I didn’t think that us squaring off would harm Adriana, and that I am not willing to do. My apologies that I didn’t make that clear.”

Greg nodded. “And mine for thinking you were offering me insult. I should have known your first concern would be for Adriana.”

“Would you two like a moment alone?” Colby quipped. “If not, can we let Wordsworth speak?”

Wordsworth was not about to be interrupted for a second time. “So, here’s what I’ve been able to find. Although rare, a female having multiple fated mates at the same time is not unheard of. It does seem to be confined only to wolves, which I found interesting. The Celtic Iceni queen Boudica was thought to have been a she-wolf and had two fated mates: her husband, Prasutagus, and a druid mage whose name the Romans ensured was snuffed out when Boudica and her people were enslaved after Prasutagus died.”

“Didn’t she lead a revolt?” asked Greg, who had always been fascinated with the idea that a warrior queen like Boudica had a fated mate who was a druid and a healer.

“She did,” said Wordsworth, nodding. “But she was ultimately defeated. The Romans maintained she died, but I’ve found information that leads me to believe she, her remaining mate, and their daughters shifted into wolves and faded into the mountains, where they harassed the Romans until the Romans abandoned Britain.”

“That actually makes some sense,” said Greg. “Having the ability to shift and live wild would keep them safe.”

“I thought the same,” said Wordsworth. “From what I can find, this kind of triangular bonding only happens with two wolves and one she-wolf. It comes about when fate, if you will, realizes a singular bond will not suffice.”

“We have always known that a mate bond can be overwritten by a more powerful species or bond. My guess is Eoghan’s forced bond can be overwritten only by some kind of dual bond.”

“Adriana mentioned that in a vision, she saw Eoghan as bigger than both of us. Do you think he’s a dire wolf?”

“She didn’t seem to think so. She saw her wolf as the smallest in size, then mine, then Decker’s, then Eoghan’s, but she didn’t think he was that much bigger than Decker’s.”

Decker nodded. “But I don’t think the vision would be quite so literal. He might be slightly bigger, but what if the difference in size is more indicative of a difference in power?”

“Decker could be onto something,” said Colby. “There’s not a lot known about him or his pack. At first I chalked it up to being a minor pack, but the more I try to track them down, the more I think they are deliberately keeping themselves off the radar.”

“I would agree,” added Wordsworth. “I think fate has decreed Adriana as a warrior of the light, perhaps it is not just the banshees from whom she descends, but Boudica and the druid mage as well?”

“I can accept all that,” said Decker, “not happily, but if it’s what she needs, it’s what she’ll get. But why is the recognition of a fated mate not being resolved with her having been mated by both of us?”

Greg looked up. “How did you know?”

Decker chuckled. “The same way you did. I can smell her all over you.”

All three men looked at Wordsworth. “My guess is that as Eoghan has marked her, you will need to do the same in order to break the bond. Until the tether is broken, he’ll be able to track her.”

“How the hell do we do that?” asked Decker. “Eoghan is an alpha. Greg isn’t, but I am. If I eradicate his claiming bite with my own, then what? I can’t imagine Greg not wanting to mark her as his, as well, and I don’t blame him.”

“Maybe right beside yours?”

Wordsworth chuckled. “You two don’t know English history too well, do you?” They looked at each other and then back at Wordsworth. “When Henry Tudor defeated Richard III at Bosworth, he promised to unite the warring houses of the Yorks, who were represented by the white rose, and the Lancasters, who used the red rose as their emblem. He created the Tudor Rose—a large red rose with a smaller white one superimposed on it.”

Greg nodded. “Decker would claim her first, eradicating Eoghan’s claiming mark and breaking the bond.”

Decker grinned, “And then Greg would bite down into my mark, overlaying it with his own.”

“That should do it, I would think,” said Wordsworth.”

“I would think in order to do that, we’re going to have to both be there so that your bite can go over mine and they can heal as one bite,” Decker added.

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