Chapter 26

THE MORRíGAN

Eventually, we get up. Neither of us want to, that much is clear, and getting dressed is difficult when all we seem to do is keep getting distracted by flashes of skin, but when we are finally clothed again, we head back to the lake.

Ciara still has a leave of absence from her job, and so we have nowhere that we need to be today. I want to share with her the forest that I've come to know and love, and maybe take her for a swim.

Her eyes shine as we walk along hand-in-hand, like some lovesick teenagers, and I can't help but preen a little that it is me and my actions that have made her glow like that. She is sparkling, effervescent. Her joy waterfalls over me and I can't help but feel it too. Everything about this moment feels wonderous.

There's a wolf by the lake, and she eyes us knowingly. Ciara blushes. "Did she hear us, do you think?"

I don't know whether to explain to her that every creature for miles around could hear us, but try to reassure her instead. "Don't be embarrassed; they have excellent hearing. Can hear things that are miles away."

That doesn't seem to work. Ciara looks directly at the wolf and nods her head. She bumps Ciara's knee with her nose and saunters off round the lake.

"See," I say. "We're all good."

Her trepidation melts away when we return to the lake and see the baby wolves playing by the edge. They are splashing each other and rough housing, and it makes Ciara laugh and brings the sparkle back to her eyes.

"How could is it?" she asks me, and it's cold, colder than anything she's ever swum in before I think, but she reaches down to touch the water anyway.

Looking up at me, she grins, and then she's wriggling out of her clothes and taking a running jump into the water.

The wolf cubs all bark as the water splashes over them, and they're all running and jumping too, splash splash splash.

She emerges, hair flying back in a curved spray of water, and the sun catches it and a rainbow shimmers around her momentarily. It is breathtaking.

She is breathtaking.

Then she threatens to splash me, and I shake my head, backing up until I find somewhere to fold and place her clothes, and then place my own.

I have no intention of swimming in my humanshape—I always prefer swimming as a wolf.

Ciara's eyes widen as she watches me shift; the fur cascading over my skin with startling speed. And then she calls to me. "Come join us in the water, Red!"

It is far colder than I remember, and I swimming over to her, encouraging her to put her arms around my neck, and then move us both to where the sun is warming the water. A trail of little wolf cubs paddle after us, like ducks following their mother. It is warmer here, and their yips of pleasure tell me how much they prefer it.

My Ciara is cold, though, and I nudge her over to where a rock is protruding out of the water.

"You want me to sit in the sun?" she asks. "Without a single thought for how fair my skin is. I'll burn, Red. Not all of us have a shaggy coat like you do." She runs her hands over her legs and looks a little shy, "Though it's been so long since anyone has seen my bare legs, that I'd given up on shaving them."

I don't understand why she cares. Hair on women is not a failing, in fact, in a Pack it's almost expected. Besides, I like how the red curls between her legs look. Like they're hiding her clit from general view.

I lick her face and she grimaces, but she's laughing too. "Okay, okay, Red, I'll stop."

Good. I nudge her up towards the rock again. The sun is not at its highest point in the sky. She'll be alright for an hour. She scrabbles at the rock, and then appreciates the boost I give her with my snout.

Sitting atop the rock, she looks like a mermaid, water droplets glistening on her skin, and I'm reminded of Lí Ban. But then she lies backwards, and her hair tumbles down the side of the rock and all I want is it have that hair covering my belly as she licks me.

The wolf cubs bark to get my attention, and I give in to their playful nippy requests and chase them through the water. They go hurrying away, yipping their pleasure, and then chase back after me as soon as my back is turned. They are quite adorable.

But soon the sun feels warmer than I'd like, and I bark up at where Ciara sits sunning herself.

"What?" she asks, but her voice is filled with laughter. "How can you be so bossy when you don't have any words?"

I growl, and she sits up, cheekily kicking water over me with a splash and a grin. "Okay, you. Stop grouching, I'm coming."

I don't want her fully submerging herself again, and getting her hair all went when it's dried so beautifully wild, and keeping backing up against the rock until she gets the hint and climbs atop my back.

Wolves are not the same size as horses, but I can certainly be her mount as I swim across to where our clothes are.

The wolf cubs' mothers are there too, and they sniff over each cub as they get out of the water, and nip them when the cubs try to shake themselves dry too close to them.

"This feels like home," whispers Ciara, and she's smiling at me, and I want to say that she's got it wrong, that she feels like home, but the words get caught in my throat and I don't know how to say them.