Mate Bond

Gil shouldn’t be alive after a thousand years, but there he stood. Kenzie shouldn’t be gone. But she was.

No. Bowman clenched his fists and pressed them to his stomach. He wouldn’t let her be gone. He’d find her. She was his mate.

Ryan didn’t know yet. Bowman would have to tell him—he deserved to know.

Damn it. Bowman straightened up, his eyes burning.

The others were waiting for him, expecting him to give them orders, expecting him to be leader, no matter that he was dying inside. Even Cristian, as impatient and volatile as he was, was taking his cues from Bowman tonight.

Bowman should know what to do. But he didn’t.

He strode back to the waiting group and took a deep breath, the cold mountain air washing into him.

“Pierce,” he began. “Take Gil home with you. The two of you will find out all you can about these pockets and how to get into them. Pull in every Guardian out there to help you if you have to. Cristian, you, Cade, and Jamie keep looking for Turner. I want him alive and able to talk. I’ll join you after I contact some resources of my own.” He pointed at the other Shifters who’d come to help. “The rest of you will keep looking around here for Kenzie or any of these gates. No one go in, just call if you find anything.” He swept them in a collective glare, ending at Cristian. “And no one is to blab any of this to my cub. I’ll be telling him. Got it?”

The Shifters didn’t stand around and argue. They dispersed to their tasks without a word.

Except Cristian, of course. He could never let himself be seen simply obeying Bowman. Oh, no. Cristian regave orders to the Lupines in his pack to search for Kenzie, then he joined Bowman.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Bowman asked him as he strode for his motorcycle.

“Back home to my mother,” Cristian said. “She deserves to know what’s happened to her granddaughter. From my mouth.”

He had a point. Bowman mounted his Harley, kick-started his engine, and took off down the rutted track, the slice of Cristian’s light close behind him.

* * *

It was forty or so miles back to Shiftertown, the first part of the trip slow through dirt roads that had frozen over. The highway was a little faster but full of icy patches. An hour later, Bowman rode into Shiftertown, not stopping until he reached Afina’s.

Bowman dismounted and strode up to the house, not worrying about territory and courtesy today. But once Afina let him into the kitchen, and Ryan ran in to meet him, Bowman halted, his feet suddenly unable to move.

“Ryan.” Bowman’s mouth was tight, words dying in his throat.

He heard Cristian enter the house behind him. Afina went to her son and asked him something in Romanian. Cristian shook his head, and Afina put her hand to her chest.

Ryan was looking up at Bowman. His back was straight, his head high, the wisdom in his eyes too old for his twelve years. “Just tell me, Dad.”

“Your mother.” Bowman swallowed, a world of pain inside him. “She’s gone.”

“Gone where?” Ryan’s question held no panic, only need for information.

“Don’t know.” The words rasped. “Lost her.”

Cristian quickly filled in about the idea of the pockets Gil had told them about. “We think Kenzie stumbled into one of those. But the way was closed when we tried.”

Afina’s face had lost color as he explained, her hands balling. “The mists?”

Cristian nodded. “I thought they were legend. Stories to frighten children.”

“No,” Afina said, her words hushed. “They are holes to other places, some of those places worse than Faerie.”

“Worse than Faerie?” Ryan said, worry entering his voice. “And Mom’s in one of these?”

“I have all my trackers looking for her,” Bowman said, “and the Guardian and Gil are working on how to get in . . .”

His words ran out, his mouth too dry to continue. The idea that Kenzie was no longer in the world took the air out of the room.

Ryan came to him and took Bowman’s big hands where they dangled uselessly at his sides. “You’ll find her, Dad.”

His words rang with conviction. No doubts, no hysteria. Ryan believed.

Bowman wished he could. “Everyone has told me that because Kenzie and I don’t share the mate bond it would be easy for me to let her go.” He shook his head. “They’re wrong. I won’t let her go. I won’t stop until I’ve found her.”

“Screw the mate bond,” Ryan said, scowling. “You and Mom are madly in love, and everyone knows it. You’ll take the world apart looking for her. All the worlds. Doesn’t matter about the frigging mate bond.”

“He is an intelligent lad,” Cristian said with warm approval. “I have raised him well.”

Ryan rolled his eyes. “Seriously, Uncle Cris? I’ll help you find her, Dad. I love her too.”

“And I,” Afina said. “Kenzie is as my own daughter. We will, as Ryan says, take the world apart.”

Cristian nodded his agreement. “If she can get into these mists, she should be able to get out. Gates to worlds work both ways. We need to discover the key, as it were. And where the gate opens out. They might not have a two-way door in the same area, and some can lead to more than one place.”

Bowman looked at Cristian, his vision fuzzy around the edges. “You’re saying she might come out in this world again, but in a different place?”