Page 5 of Claimed for Eternity

“I think you just like spelling stuff out,” Xenos laughed.

“Sometimes I do,” I nodded and carried Stephie off to the sink.

Chapter Three

Xenos

While Barry cleaned up Stephie and the kitchen, I stretched out in front of the fireplace and whispered, ‘atsilv ko’ to light the hearth. My bear chattered away to Barry’s wolf, and I did my best to ignore them both. Quieting my thoughts to hear the spirits wasn’t always easy. On days like this when I really-really wanted to ask them something it took some extra work. I was pretty sure I’d get the same answer as always when I asked about Mori and Preston’s mates – which meant none, but I still had to try. Lotus had reportedly been reborn as Nelum and was back with Fred. So, I couldn’t try to poke her to ask.

“ORMUND!”I shouted inside my head.

My bear and Barry’s wolf both jumped to their feet ready to fight and flashed me dirty looks when they realized I was the one raising all the racket just to try to get the attention of a dead man.

“What?” I heard in the very solid world a second later.

There he stood. The man with the wings who caused all the trouble. He swept his long dark bangs away from his face and sighed at me. Someone had never grown out of their ‘emo’ phase but somehow even in death it suited him well.

“Are you going to cause trouble for my kid?” I asked, pushing myself up to my feet.

“No one’s going to shoot Mori or his friend,” Ormund sighed.

“Is Teddy Mori’s mate?” I asked.

“Ugh! Why do you do this to me? Why do you ask questions that I don’t want to answer? You called me all the way here to try to get your son laid? You’re still so fucking weird, Xenos,”Ormund sighed. “Why are you this way?” He tossed his hands up in the air and a second later said, “Don’t worry. This is why my and Dern’s sons moved away. He meddled a lot too. Here’s the thing. I know the answer. I know a lot of answers right now and I’m not telling anyone. Dern’s put a lot of work into all of this and things are gonna play out like they should. I’ll keep my promise and you’ll get what you need too. Well, eventually you will. You should call Dern, though. Before or after the kids visit but not too much after, okay? Organs don’t last forever.”

I let out a long, slow breath as Ormund faded away. Sometimes dead men can stick around with their mates. It helps if their mates are extra magical like Dern was.

Was.

Dern is.

Dern wasn’t a was yet. Not like Dad was a was. Not like Ignatius and Mariam and my carrier and….

No! No! I wasn’t going to have a crying spell right now. It was our night. Well, our evening together. The big kids were out and soon Stephie would be out too – like a light, but out none the less. Still, tears came. It didn’t matter if I knew in my soul, we all circled around again and again, and that the dead could be happy between lives – I was so tired of people dying. For the love of Juda and all his little babies! I was even tired of people like Finn dying!

“Mate? Do I need to leave the baby to ‘read’ her own book?”Barry asked over our mating link and I forced myself to take a deep breath and calm down. No one had died recently. No one had wasted away or been cut down in recent days.

“I’m okay. I’m fine,”I managed to tell Barry but even I smelled the lie.“Spend time with the baby, okay?”

“Okay. Let me know if you change your mind. She’ll be out soon either way. Do you need attention or time on your own when she’s asleep?”

“Attention,”I said too quickly.

“Attention it is. The spirits haven’t said anything disturbing, have they?”he asked as I stretched out on the floor in front of the fireplace again. They sort of had. Nothing I wasn’t expecting. Dern had… Well, he’d been getting up there in years and missing Ormund a lot. Eventually, all true-mates reunite one way or another.

“I’ll tell you later. Life is hard, alpha, but it doesn’t last forever. I just know I have to get the boys to go see Dern.”

Barry let it drop while he finished reading Stephie her bedtime story. I took a deep breath and tried to let go of what might or might not happen in the future. Years of working with spirits and visions had taught me nothing is set in stone. Darian was never delivered the head of a boyband drummer in a box and that was all the proof I needed to know that not everything that was predicted came to pass.

I must’ve dozed off in front of the fire and rolled onto my side because when I woke Barry was spooned in behind me, stroking my braid. He preferred my hair down and free but with a toddler in the ‘mush’ everything stage long, free hair was a recipe for disasters and there were enough of those in the world at any given time that I didn’t feel the need to add to them. I kept my eyes shut for a few moments and reveled in soft touches. He kissed my earlobe, letting me know he knew I was awake. When you’ve been on a mating link together as long as we had it wasn’t easy to trick the other person.

“Affection or talk?” he whispered in my ear.

I wanted to shout affection but knew I wasn’t about to focus on anything below our waists with Ormund’s words hanging in my thoughts.

“Talk it is,” he said.

“Sorry, alpha. I know this stuff always gets in the way.”

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