3. Leif

Chapter 3

Leif

H e listened in a distant fashion as Alec used the water-closet, only paying enough attention to catch if the young man fell or hurt himself in his weakened state. He didn’t sense any major injuries; the scent of blood was faint in comparison to the saturation in the air that came from open wounds or severed arteries or veins. Alec was covered in scratches and bruises, and his wrists were swollen, rubbed raw in places from either rope or cuffs of some sort, and he had what appeared to be a partially healed split lip and a fading black eye under the dirt and mud.

Alec was running from something. Someone. He sensed no malice from Alec—his ability to see into the nature of a person had more to do with centuries of experience than any magical gift. Alec was tired, scared, used to violence from big men, and had literally escaped from a bad situation. Leif was not one to believe in coincidences so he was very certain the explosion had something to do with Alec.

He heard Alec finish up just as he ladled some venison stew into a deep earthenware bowl with a spoon, putting it on the small table beside the armchair. Alec came into the main room at a slow shuffle, and Leif approved of the fortitude shown by the young fae, despite his willingness to help. Alec was much like Leif, it seemed.

Hair wet and finger-combed back from his face, Alec was clean at last, and he was swamped in the too-large clothing Leif found for him to wear. The pants hung past his bare toes and the drawstring was pulled as tight as it could be, bunched at his waist, but at least they were staying up. The shirt was huge on him, the collar wide enough it kept falling off one shoulder, and Alec had to pull it back up a couple times before he gave up with a grumble.

He was adorable.

Leif held out a hand to help him across the living room, and Alec took it despite his earlier hesitation, and he quickly got Alec back in the chair, bundled with warm furs, with a bowl the size of his head on his lap. Leif was reminded again of his size compared to his guest when Alec picked up the long-handled spoon, which looked like a serving spoon in his hand instead of one meant for eating stew.

Leif enjoyed the sight of the pretty young man eating his food with obvious and vocal delight, Alec’s happy little groans making heat pool in his belly. He’d gone far too long without carnal companionship and for Fate to hand over a sweet, adorable, and attractive young man was a temptation he was not expecting so he had little in the way of defenses.

Leif left Alec to eat, and went to the front door, opening it a handful of inches and breathing in deep, as much to clear out the enticing scent coming from Alec as to make sure they hadn’t been followed. Nothing was outside except the usual suspects—the owl that perched in the pine tree on the south side of the cliff and a few critters in the underbrush. No humans, no fae, no other wolves.

Leif shut the door and threw the latch for the first time since he built the cabin decades before—no one had ever been here except a mountain witch he hired to set the sigils and wards in his cabin right after he built it. And she hadn’t been back, taking his bundle of cash and disappearing into the brush without a word.

If he needed supplies, something he couldn’t build himself, he went into town, an hour away as the wolf runs, and he usually went as a wolf, carrying clothing and shoes in a large bag with a reinforced strap that he could put his head through as a wolf, and then carry it back the same way, full of supplies. Last time he went was the week prior, so he wasn’t strapped for food or necessities like toothpaste or toilet paper. He might live alone in the woods, but he wasn’t an animal, and nothing compared to modern conveniences like toilet paper, an actual flushing toilet, and a bidet.

He leaned against the door and listened to the night, able to hear out past the cliffs and down into the valley, the mountain’s natural acoustics helping to catch the sounds of even the stealthiest of passersby—and humans were loud, even the trained ones.

“What are you listening for?” Alec asked, quiet, as if afraid to disturb him.

“Nothing,” Leif answered, and hurried to explain when Alec’s face fell, not wanting the young man to think he was brushing him off. “The night is quiet. No one followed you, at least not yet.”

Alec eyed him with a mixture of suspicion and admiration. He leaned forward and set the now empty bowl and the spoon on the small table in front of the armchair. He tucked himself back into the furs, snuggling, and Leif caught the way the young man buried his nose in them and breathed in deep before looking at him with somber gray eyes.

“What do you know?”

“Not much,” Leif tapped the side of his nose with a finger before tipping his head to the side, much like he would as a wolf. He spent a lot more time in that form than his human and lycanthrope forms. “My nose told me of stress and fear and pain, blood and metal. A hint of fire. An explosion happens on the edge of my territory, and then you appear. Those people who took over the old gravel factory at the edge of the woods aren’t the type to help, more to harm, and you’ve been held in shackles.”

Leif dipped his chin and Alec looked down, where his hands were hidden under the furs.

“You know a lot,” Alec replied ruefully. “Damn werewolf noses.”

Leif snorted out a short laugh and Alec smiled, the first real smile he’d seen on his face since he found him lost in the woods.

“You don’t need to tell me anything,” Leif said. “I won’t make demands of you. You’re tired and hurting, and not from around here. I might not get out often, but I know the area well enough, as well as most of the residents within twenty miles. You don’t smell like a local.”

“My stepfather sold me to the mountain mafia, and I blew them up while escaping into the woods,” Alec said, and Leif’s brows went into his hairline from surprise, even though he’d suspected some of it. Not the stepfather bit—that needed some more context.

“I don’t mind a story before bedtime,” Leif replied .

“It’s not a long one, but it is a mess,” Alec said. “I don’t feel right involving you in my troubles.”

“I’m old, little greenbough, and my teeth are sharp,” Leif informed his guest with a faint smile with a hint of those sharp teeth. “Trouble doesn’t want to get involved with me.”

Alec

Even though he trusted Leif not to eat him, those sharp teeth made him gulp, very aware he was locked away in a cabin in the mountains with a sexy, protective alpha werewolf. Alec was feeling hungry himself, and not for another helping of the sumptuous-smelling stew bubbling away over the fire. Leif was wildly appealing, in a feral way that had nothing to do with his werewolf nature and everything to do with the way he stared at Alec with a hunger of his own in those expressive eyes.

He wanted to thank whatever deity was responsible for his happy improvement in circumstances.

Leif left his place by the door and prowled closer, and Alec jumped a bit when Leif sat on the floor beside the chair, long legs stretched out in front of him toward the fireplace, and his back leaning on the chair, pressing against Alec’s legs from knees to feet. He curled in his toes, afraid to press the cold digits to warm flesh and risk driving off the very welcome sensation of all that wild, half-naked manliness sitting at his feet.

“Tell me this messy tale,” Leif ordered, though not unkindly. He was big enough to lean forward a bit and swing the kettle steaming over the fire away from the flames, and then grab a pair of mugs stacked on the edge of the hearth.

Watching Leif make tea was relaxing and hypnotizing.

“Oh. Um,” Alec gathered his scrambled thoughts, the memory of the past several weeks enough to ruin his growing arousal at being so near Leif.

“My mom was fae, she’s where I got my magic from,” Alec said, and Leif made no reaction to that opening comment, making the tea from loose-leaf sachets he filled from a small box on the hearth near the mugs. Leif stayed silent, but his patient expression told Alec he was listening attentively while making the tea. That easy silence helped him relax even more, absorbing the heat from the large man beside him as well as the tender care from a complete stranger, who somehow felt less like a stranger with every passing moment.

“My mom was on her own for a long time, and I never knew my dad. No idea who he was or is, and Mom never told me. She ended up marrying a human man when I was nine, and he was a rotten bastard. Not at first—he played the besotted and doting husband long enough to con my mom into selling her powers out to his buddies.”

“Dozens of fae species, and a nearly infinite variety of gifts,” Leif said softly as he poured hot water into the mugs, the scent of rich, fragrant tea rising with the steam. Black-leaf tea and bergamot. Leif handed Alec one of the mugs; it was huge, more suited to someone of Leif’s size than Alec’s, and he had to hold it with both hands.

Leif’s words made sense, in a way. All those who weren’t human knew that to try and categorize who and what the fae were after the Great Migration from the Old World was a pointless and frustrating endeavor. After reaching the shores of the New World, many of the younger fae peoples interbred with humanity, breeding like wildfire and muddling what little humans and magic folk alike knew about the fae. Plus much of the knowledge of who and what they were, their original cultures, had been lost either to time or to genocide at the hands of the High Council in Europe.

And adding human bloodlines made for some random and entirely unpredictable modern fae abilities and gifts.

He held the mug in his lap, waiting for it to cool. Leif sipped his, impressively unflinching at the temperature. Alec found it hard to look away, and made himself continue his story. “Stuart is my stepfather. Mom got sick from the various jobs he forced her to do, using her powers to make designer drugs and illegal potions and shit. She died.”

“Younger fae, then,” Leif added, though without any judgment in it. The elder fae species were increasingly rare in these modern times—the remaining fae species were those called collectively the younger fae, species that arose in concurrence with humanity, and came with the less impressive, and not nearly as divine gifts that the elder fae could once boast.

Alec nodded. “I had her cremated before Stu could sell her body on the black market.” Alec grimaced. “He never forgave me for that, and the only reason he didn’t make me take her place right after she died is that I was enrolled in public school at the time and my teachers kept an eye on me. I was out of luck when I graduated high school.”

“What happened?” Leif asked, though he could probably guess considering how he found Alec in the woods.

“Stu hired me out, but I wasn’t so great at doing what the customers wanted of me. Stubborn, and I back-talked and fought Stu on it all the time. I call myself an alchemist, one born, not taught, and there’s enough interest out there from legal entities and practitioners that I could pay my own way. I was about to get my own place when Stu finally had enough and sold me outright to the mountain mafia.”

Local gangs and crime organizations in the hills went by different names. The ones typically run by the humans in his home county were the mountain mafia, homegrown thugs aiming to be rivals with the more infamous outfits run in the major cities. His stepfather started as a junkie and moved to dealer once Alec and his mom were under his thumb, and most of the people he farmed their talents out to were drug runners and local manufacturers of drugs with a magical component.

Instead of asking what gifts Alec had that made him so valuable, Leif sipped his tea, waiting patiently. Alec tried sipping his own tea, cautious in case it was still too hot, but the tea was finally at the perfect temperature and helped soothe some more of his aches as he slowly drank it. He managed a solid third of it before stopping, Leif watching him with blatant satisfaction. The general consensus that alphas enjoyed taking care of people was on the mark, it seemed.

“How’d you blow up the building?” Leif asked. “Same magic that makes the drugs?”

Alec figured he had nothing to lose. “I can alter the basic molecular structure of physical matter and even incorporate spells on a microscopic level. Or at least, magic with a purpose and intent that’ll last beyond my active control. Spells are more of a practitioner thing—I’m fae, and I’m more instinct and intent than structured casting and rote spellwork. It’s why I call myself an alchemist.”

Leif frowned a bit. “Not sure what exactly that means but it sounds like it meant making fancy drugs with a magical kick to it?”

“And making explosives out of random bits and pieces in my prison cell.”

Leif leaned into his legs, a gentle pressure. “Well done, greenbough.” He paused, tipping his head back a bit to look Alec in the eyes. “Do they know you’re alive?”

Alec shrugged one shoulder. “I don’t know, I hope not? I made sure to take out the lab and the room they were keeping me in, and that half of the building. Whether they noticed I was gone before it all blew or not…” Alec let that sentence die out. Leif nodded anyway, understanding.

“They might be looking for you, then. And there’s no government out here in the woods, not in my territory, so no authorities to come investigating. It’s at least thirty miles to the east to find decent people with badges.”

“Yeah.” Alec finished his tea, not relishing the prospect of another hike through the woods, even in daylight. And involving the mundane police with his business merely meant exposing himself to more people who might want to use him for their own ends. Fae, no matter the species, had an almost instinctual aversion to mundane policing, based on thousands of years of abuse, genocide, and forced assimilation.

“No one is looking for you here,” Leif declared with charming confidence, and Alec found himself believing it.

“What about you?” Alec asked. “Where’s your pack? I thought lone wolves were a human myth.”

Leif stared into the flames for a long moment, and Alec had a feeling he’d put his foot in it with that question. “I’m sorry. That was rude. I’m tired.”

“A normal thing to ask, under the circumstances.” Leif rubbed a hand over the scar on his chest. “Not much to tell, really. All boils down to an evil witch and a curse.”