Chapter Eleven

Ayelet

I never did one-night stands. Well, maybe not never but not recently. They were simply not satisfying and usually left me feeling empty and sad. As a young gazelle shifter, I’d sowed my share of wild oats before recognizing this issue and as my peers found their mates and began families, I doubled down into work, only now realizing how that was an attempt to mask my loneliness. Among other things, of course.

After the music and chatter of the club, outside’s quiet was weirdly loud.

The moon was climbing into the sky as we shed our clothes and folded them on the bench beside other piles of discarded club attire. Autumn meant warm days and cool nights in this area, as I recalled, and although we weren’t right next to the ocean, it was visible in the distance, the foam like lace edging on a dark flounced skirt and the crescent moon reflecting in the water. We had to stay no higher than fifty feet above the trees, but that wasn’t a problem for two of us. Only our magnificent dragon had that ability. And I couldn’t wait to watch.

“You don’t mind if I fly?” Magnus hesitated, standing nude in the moonlight, his long legs braced a foot or so apart, chest muscled, and skin glowing. I remembered all those parts of him plus what his stance revealed so clearly. I licked my lips, remembering the salty taste and silky skin encasing that long, stiff shaft. “See something you want, alpha?”

I shivered. That voice… My gaze left the dragon and moved to the unicorn. Every bit as mouthwatering as the dragon, but he stood sturdier, the unicorn’s equine connection visible in his limbs and long, graceful neck. I looked from one to the other. “I see everything I want.”

But we were going to shift, and if we stood here another minute, we’d instead be putting on the kind of show that Animals probably did not want on the property. At least not here where anyone—guest or staff— could come across us rolling about on the ground. Not that the image was present in my mind or anything.

I was never gladder to be in a place where shifting was possible. In the past, most of my shifts had been with members of the herd or on rare occasions, a random friend, but even they were usually gazelles or something similar. I’d never been with anyone so different than me but so perfectly right for me as the dragon and the unicorn who walked with me out to the area where Animals allowed us to shift. Inside, there was a lot of leeway because it was all paras and those who knew about them, but many humans chose to look the other way and the possibility of coming to harm was real.

Magnus and Harbor were fantasy creatures, the shifters even my herd didn’t know for sure existed. When Magnus and I met three years before, I’d been blown away by everything about him, and standing here now, I could not imagine how I’d managed to walk away after the most incredible night of my life to date.

I kept saying he wasn’t my mate. That I was overthinking and just needed to recognize it for great sex and wait for my omega. But I couldn’t have been more wrong. Fate had something else in mind. Something that took three to click into place.

“Ready, alpha?” Magnus asked, rising on tiptoe.

“Ready. Omega?”

Harbor didn’t even answer, just shifted in a way I’d never seen before. No incremental changes, no twisting or convulsing, no obvious hairs poking out. Just one second, two legs and the next, four and a magnificent horn sprouting from his forehead. Bam.

If I hadn’t seen it, I’d never have believed it.

Magnus and I approached him slowly, closing in on either side. I had never seen a unicorn shifter in person before and I guess I thought they were more delicate, smaller and maybe pony sized. Maybe it was possible for me to be even more wrong than when I didn’t know Magnus was my mate.

Harbor stood taller than any of the horses I’d seen or ridden growing up. He was white but not flat white. Rather, he glowed in the moonlight, his twisted golden horn rising from his forehead toward the sky. I laid a hand on his side, stroking the softness, feeling the musculature flex underneath. “Wow. Our mate is nobody’s toy.”

“He’s magnificent,” Magnus whispered, stroking the opposite flank. “I had no idea.”

The unicorn stood while we admired him for a few minutes, but when he stamped a foot, we stepped back and shifted at the same time. Neither as fast or graceful as our unicorn, but in our own ways every bit as magical.

My gazelle took in his mates with an appreciative eye, but his only comments to me were, Mate and Ours . And then Magnus took two steps, broad wings spreading wide, then lifting and lowering once before he launched into the air and lifted above the trees. I wasn’t sure if he was going higher than allowed but decided he knew what he was doing. And then he was heading into the distance. The unicorn bumped me gently with his horn and took off after our dragon. I took the hint and joined them, stretching out my legs and flying along the path beaten down by many before us. We came upon a few others as we ran, a rabbit and squirrel, a pair of deer. Even a bear. But most of the time it was just us, the native fauna giving us a wide berth.

The property was larger than I’d realized, and we were able to run for a while, climbing a slope behind the club and through an area of trees thick enough to make it hard to see our dragon above. But the flap of his wings was a distinctive sound that helped us know where he was. When we reached the top of the hill, we had another great view of the ocean in the distance. Magnus landed beside us, and we all stood side by side and just breathed the fresh air with a hint of salt. My mates were a sight to see, the unicorn standing solid, the dragon’s wings drooping until he lifted off again, and then we were racing back toward the club, the cool breeze ruffling Harbor’s coat and mane, his tail blowing out behind him. I could watch him forever. Both of them, really, but at the moment, Magnus was hidden by the tree canopy.

And then, with a whoosh of wings, he reappeared, leading us back.

Exhilaration filled me at running with my mates. It was an excellent way to start out our mating time together and a great time for our mates to connect. My gazelle hadn’t said anything else, but his mood matched mine.

We shifted back, Harbor’s taking nearly no time. And then we dressed and looked at one another. We’d already said ring shopping was in the future, but I could see something else coming up first. “Who lives closest?”

Harbor raised his hand. “I think I do.” We compared addresses and he was right.