Page 49 of My Fugitive Wolf
"Two shadows?"
"Yes, yours and the Primum Genus Suum . You're not just an alpha, Samara. You're the first of our kind, the alpha of all alphas: Primum sui generis, the feminine of Primum Genus Suum ."
Chapter
Nineteen
I will not get sick again. I'm sick of feeling sick. I'm tired of feeling tired. I will not cower in a corner hiding behind three brothers wishing the nightmare away. Samara pressed her knuckles to her mouth to smother her cry of outrage.
Kellen of course was right by her side in an instant, but she brushed him away with a forceful swing of her elbow in his general direction. She missed his nose by a fraction.
Finding out she was not only an alpha, but the alpha of all other alphas nailed the coffin of their relationship closed. She gripped her coffee mug, wanting to swallow her sorrows in the drink, but after staring at the dark brew, she put it down again. She already shook like a leaf in a blizzard clinging to its branch. The last thing she needed was more caffeine.
She'd lost Kellen before she ever had him.
Did her grandfather know what he'd condemned her to before he cast the spell? Had he known what Josiah intended to do all along? Her grandfather had a powerful judgmental streak when it came to people. He could look a person over and know exactly what they were planning.
Kind of like what Kellen did when you walked into his restaurant with blue lips and fingertips
Regardless, looking at Kellen or his mother was out of the question. She pulled her knuckles away from her teeth instead, and looked at Stephen, then Leo, and back again.
"How is this possible?" she asked, desperate to talk quietly, so they wouldn’t hear her scream. "From what I've been told..." Don't you dare look at Kellen. "...wolf shadows are a part of a person, like their DNA, and not a separate entity like a spirit."
Stephen put his pen down. "That's why your grandfather died. Josiah might not have killed him immediately because he loves to torture people. Your grandfather might have had enough control to withstand the immobilization spell long enough to cast the extraction spell and the ingestion spell simultaneously. When his wolf shadow escaped, his body died without it."
Something still didn't sound right. "My grandfather looked old, though. He had wrinkles and gray hair. You guys still look like you're thirty, rather than one hundred and eighty."
"Age can be faked—" Leo started to say.
"—with makeup, hair dye, and prosthetics." Stephen finished for him.
Grace shook her head. "I think the answer is simpler. The problem we're overlooking is that Josiah never knew how to cast spells. No matter what spell he tried, it never worked, which would send him into a rage for days."
"Wolf shifters don't practice magic." Kellen's smooth baritone soothed her, even though she still refused to look at him. "We're magical creatures, but we leave manipulating the environment through spell casting to wizards, witches, sorcerers and the like. Your grandfather must have learned how to cast spells long before that tradition was accepted. That doesn't mean he'd live forever, just longer than any other wolf shifter."
She heard Kellen pick up the tintype photos again.
"If he was over a thousand years old,” he continued, “it would seem to me that his age caught up with him in the later part of the 19th century and continued to slowly decline from there."
"So, why now?,” she asked. “If Josiah knew he couldn't cast a spell, why did he attack my grandfather knowing he couldn't and my grandfather could?"
Grace grunted in disgust. "Impatience. Josiah lost track of your grandfather at some point. When he found him in Helena, his impatience got the better of him. That's his biggest weakness and why he has fits of destruction even if it sets him back."
"Or he hired someone who could cast spells," Leo suggested. "Most magic wielders learn quickly that magic will backfire if they use it for evil, so they're careful?—”
"—about who they'll work for using their magic unless—" Stephen continued.
"—they're a rogue," Kellen finished. "Like wolf shifter packs, we trust that humans who practice magic will police themselves, but if there is someone out there who doesn't care about the rules?—"
"There is," Grace said, licking her lips, for the first time sounding unsure of herself. "I don't know his name, and I don't know why he showed up at the Riverstone compound. He was just there, waiting for us when we returned from burning..." Her voice hitched, "...the dead."
"Grace..." Kellen moved quickly, sitting beside her, wrapping his arms around her.
She looked at her son. "The sorcerer and Josiah had a huge fight, but I couldn't hear most of it because of the remaining wolves partying over their victory. I managed to sneak out of the house with you, hoping to make a run for it, but before we could, the sorcerer intercepted. I begged him to take us with him, but he just placed a hand on your head and stared at you. He'd seen your future and said you were destined for great things. That you were what the magical world would need one day.”
All three brothers looked at each other.
“We’ve all accomplished great things,” Stephen said.
