Kalina ~ Book Four

The scratchy underbrush cut Sylvie’s skin as she sprinted away from Elias, the abrasions stinging only for an instant before they healed over completely as if nothing was even there. Her hypersensitive hearing picked up on the screeching tires and engine cutting off. With a grin, she pushed herself harder.

Hiding was no use with Elias or any of her mates, so she’d have to settle for outrunning him. If she beat him to the house, she got whatever she wanted in the bedroom, but if he won… She still won.

She pressed her lips together against a smile to avoid tree matter, bugs and cobwebs ending up in her mouth and made a sharp left. Kian and Rowan were in that direction, serving as her marker of home. They teased her for her games, but they always found ways to join in.

The creatures of the forest had no chance to go silent despite the predator stalking through their home; instead, they shot off in a flurry of squawks and screeches as Sylvie sprinted noisily past. The foliage cleared away slowly, and Sylvie recognised the trees standing guard of her home.

Almost there!

She threw herself headlong through the last layer of trees and screamed as the force of a truck slammed into her back and spun her so she landed on top of the person.

“Goddammit!”

“Gotcha, Kitten.” Elias's crimson eyes glowed beneath a head of unruly black curls. Even his fangs made an appearance as he flashed her a devilish grin. She raised her head and spotted an equally wicked look from her other mates standing on the front steps of her home.

She was so fucking close! That had to be a record of some kind. Normally, she hardly made it halfway through the forest before Elias caught her and ravished her completely.

She dropped her gaze back to him and scrunched her nose. “How’d you find me so fast?”

He wrapped his hands around her lower back and sat up with her straddling his rippling abdominals.

“I’ll always find you, kitten.”

“Anywhere?” she baited him with a light push on his chest. From that position, she still had to crane her neck up to see his eyes.

He chuckled. “I will find you anywhere in the world and beyond, Sylvie. ”

She blushed and pressed a kiss to his lips savoring the taste of him.

Even after years, his words and the meaning behind them made her heart race. She’d found him and rescued him from death in the Realm of the Fates. She had no doubts he would do the same.

“Now what?” she whispered into his shoulder, placing kisses there as he stood, still holding her. Elias headed towards Kian and Rowan, wrapping his hands around her ass, readjusting her in his bearhug grip.

From Elias’ exhale, Sylvie knew he was smug. Normally, Rowan needed to get out some extra energy from the Tournaments, and primal sex tended to do the trick, but Elias’ homecoming ritual interrupted that plan. Elias had to have planned it.

She knew they cared about each other in some way, but Sylvie sensed Elias never completely forgave him for her torture at the hands of his beta all those years ago. Thus, the eternal tit-for-tat games.

“It’s lunchtime, right? We should probably go eat.” Sylvie leaned back just far enough to gaze upon her mate's glacial blue eyes, and he smirked.

“Are you offering?”

She tilted her head slightly. “You haven't fed on me in years. Why now?”

“Bad day.”

She frowned a little and cupped his cheeks. No doubt, selling his business, even if it was just the position the public saw, was a loss. He’d built it from the ground up.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

He shook his head and put her down on the bottom step of their home. Kian and Rowan had gone in, and she crossed her arms.

“Is he nice, at least?”

Elias flashed her a warning look, and she threw up her hands.

“Fine. No business talk.”

With a hum, he strolled past her into the waiting house, and she pattered in behind him. Stippled light cast the home's interior in a warm glow, and Sylvie found a patch of sun by the counter to bask in while her mates, namely Kian, cooked her some lunch.

Elias and Rowan had gone to shower, not together, but Sylvie wouldn't have minded. Any of her mates' encounters with each other were few and far between, but every time, she almost died of desire.

“Are you quite alright, princess?”

She cut him a look as he diced some pear and rested her blushing face on her fist. “Just reminiscing.”

He scoffed. “Well, cut it out. It’s distracting.”

With an eye roll, she sat on the breakfast barstool and checked her watch. One fifteen. She only had thirty minutes before her students would be back in the classroom. There would be no romp today. Not with those eagle-eyed bloodhounds about to sit in an enclosed space with her for another hour. It was Friday, though. She’d have plenty of time over the weekend.

“Here,” Kian slid a bowl of fruit salad under her nose, and she picked at them with a smile.

“You are too kind.”

He chuckled. She had long learnt the rules of the Fae, but it still seemed to impress Kian every time she didn't thank or apologise to him.

“Anything for my beautiful wife.” He rounded the counter and pressed a kiss to her cheek. “Your sandwiches are just about done. I have to return to Sagehill to finish a few orders, and I’ll see you tonight.”

“See you tonight. You’re free tomorrow, right? For the secret but apparently not a secret Gala.”

Kian smiled and stole one of her fruit pieces before heading for the door. “I’m free as a bird, Princess.”

She laughed as he disappeared from sight, and his Harley roared to life a few minutes later.

She still wasn’t too keen on the death trap that was Kian’s bike, but he’d warded it to the nines, so it was probably safer than any car on the roads. She finished her lunch and padded to the bedroom, where Rowan and Elias were in the middle of a conversation.

“Sorry- am I interrupting something?”

“No. It’s just pack stuff. Boring shit, really. We’ll talk about it later if you want,” Rowan said a fraction too quickly. The old Sylvie wouldn’t have noticed it, but with her connection to him, she knew something was up. She had no time to delve deeper, though, because she only had eight minutes to race back to class.

“Alright. I love you. I love you,” she said each declaration to her two remaining mates and spun, darting from the house. After her earlier sprint, she opted for human speed walking along the cobbled path to the classroom and made it with a minute to spare.

“Alpha, how come you didn’t fight?” Delilah asked, hopping from foot to foot with flushed cheeks.

“Yeah!”

“Mum… I mean Alpha Sylvie…”

“Why, Alpha?”

“I wanna see!”

“You’re so cool!”

Sylvie opened the front doors and shushed them as they bounded in, and she followed behind them with a smile.

The growing chatter was starting to make her ears ache, and she stood in front of the children, sitting behind their tables. “Alright, alright. I hear you. Settle down.”

The noise ebbed, and she exhaled in relief. Maybe her ears wouldn’t bleed today after all. “My fighting days are behind me, my loves.”

A crescendo of ‘awws’ ricocheted around her, and she held up her hand.

“I am your teacher and learning to be a pack healer, and that’s all I need to be for now. We have many skilled warriors here, and I’m sure many of you will join them one day.”

“After our first shift?” Daniel asked.

“Yes, honey. After your first shifts.” Ten years old felt far too young to shift for the first time, but it was typically sparked by puberty, an event that hit far younger for shifters than the typical human. Her students were all a lot larger than the human population, looking more like average human thirteen-year-olds and brighter than some adults she knew, at least before she moved out of the city.

She hadn't seen or spoken to a human besides the people of Sagehill in years. And Sagehill hardly counted as many of the inhabitants weren’t full-blooded humans anyway. Most had some fae heritage from changelings half a century ago, and the full humans still avoided her like the plague.

She didn't know what it was about her that scared the humans so much. They accepted Kian with open arms, his apothecary becoming the most popular alternative medicinal shop in the whole town. Only Sagehill locals knew what he really was, but tourists from all over the country visited him now, asking for ‘spells’ and protection from only they knew what.

Sylvie though.

They wouldn't even meet her eye. It was like she was invisible.

“Alpha?”

Her attention snapped back to the children, and she smiled tightly. She wasn’t invisible to them, and that was all that mattered. To her children— Her students, she was wonderful and perfect and had it all together. Maybe the validation wasn’t always healthy, but it gave her a chance to pretend it was true, and in some ways, it helped her heal from the things she had done— the things she was forced to do to protect herself.

“Forgive me. It’s certainly been a long week, hasn't it? Let's finish the day with a quick game, and then you can all head home.”

‘Yay’s’ burst forth in a chorus of voices, and she smiled, her heart full. Life truly couldn't get any better.

Sylvie completed the final touches of her olive, skin-hugging Gala gown with a pair of diamond drop earrings and classy, matching pumps. Her mates were waiting outside for her, but she had something to do before flitting off to another realm for a night.

Kerensa promised their couple hours at Evergreen would have a similar time difference back on Earth thanks to some spectacular magic from the Sun Fae high lord, so she wouldn’t even need to find a replacement to look after her children.

She shoved the vials of drugs into her mini purse and pulled out her cell phone, flicking through the contacts with a sigh. Since her phone wouldn't work in Evergreen and any sudden unanswered calls had her parents swarming her from their new home in Aken to make sure she was alright, she dialled the number. Their relationship wasn’t mended by a long shot, but she accepted their concern for her with a tight smile.

“Kalina?” Magnus’ sharp voice stung her ear, and she jerked the phone back.

“Hi, Magnus. Is Kora there?”

“Uh.” He cleared his throat. “Your mother is busy at the moment.”

Sylvie’s brows furrowed as a rustling sounded through the phone.

“Okay, well, I’m going to Evergreen for a bit. I probably won’t be reachable for at least a day, so don’t panic and come down here.”

“Alright.” He sounded distracted.

“Are you alright?”

“Yes, fine.” More shuffling sounds. “Some more recent Kindred bonds have caused unrest amongst the vampires. I have it handled.”

“Do you?” Sylvie couldn't help the accusation in her tone. She had heard occasional words from Mila and Shan about the current state of the vampires. It wasn’t great, and most of them hated her. She didn’t blame them after she ripped them all from their home realm and killed the only king they knew, but at the time, she thought it would save them— their species.

Some even thought she was punishing them by withholding kindred bonds. It was ridiculous, and the people who counted knew it, but it still bugged her how much the species that would have one day called her Queen now only looked at her like she was a monster.

“Yes, Kalina. Watch your tone.”

“Bye, Magnus.”

He sighed, but the damage was done. “Kalina, I-” She hung up and turned her phone off, throwing it on the bed as she strutted from the room, ready to take on the night.