It didn’t matter. Our body contained a momentum now, and we were being sucked into the Black Wolf’s orbit, no more able to fight him than gravity. He paused as the realisation struck us, his grin hungry now. Then, like some kind of horrific snake, the details of the Great Black Wolf grew fuzzy and obscure, until only the red eyes and yawning jaws were truly visible. They grew exponentially bigger, large enough to swallow the world, all the worlds, all of existence on all the planes of reality. I thought of Morgan and his mates, the men who we’d seen face down the Great Wolf in the cave under the Volken city, and the way they’d faced down the beast, not willing to sacrifice their bond, drawing strength from each other as they were swallowed down. It felt like I collected everyone to me, holding them close to my chest, murmuring reassurances as we ploughed on.
This was horrific, a bad trip gone wrong, but it seemed we were on a track and could not change it, so I focussed on our bond. If we were to go, so soon after becoming a pack, they would go with my love. I pushed it out into every single one of them—the most complete and radical acceptance I could muster. Instead of the incoming threat, I concentrated on them, all the memories, sensations, feelings, thoughts, needs, wants, and desires I’d ever had for each and every one of them, including the way they cared for each other. From the platonic mateship of Finn and Slade, to the burning, all-encompassing love of Jack and Hawk. They were everything now as the world narrowed down to just us. And then we hit the Great Wolf.
Being swallowed was not what I expected. It wasn’t a physical peristaltic process. We weren’t chewed and then gulped down. Instead, we disappeared into a place of complete blackness. It was cold, dark nothingness.
I reached for my mates, but of course, could not find them. This was the void, and bonds and relationships didn’t exist there. And yet, I couldn’t stop reaching for them. Where it had been a conscious thing beforehand, needing an intention to reach out to one of them, now it was as automatic as breathing. I kept searching for them, my body, my brain aching as I did so.
While hanging in a vacuum did a lot to focus your attention on what you could feel, mine became pain and need. My stupid brain wouldn’t let up, insisting over and over that the guys were here, that I just needed to reach out to them, the pain growing sharper and sharper with each minute. I wanted to cry, scream, claw at my skull, anything to make it stop, but I didn’t have any of those things anymore. I was just a tiny mote of consciousness, flickering painfully in the darkness, about to burn herself out.
This is the end, I thought, and the effort of forming those words just made the pain flare brighter. I can’t fight this. This was never meant to last. What makes me so special that I would form a pack of these men and be the centre of it? This is the way it all ends, for everyone. All you are winks out and then you’re no more than memories in other people’s minds. And who will mark my passing?
If I’d had a body, I’d have closed my eyes and tossed it back, skydiving into the blackness, rushing towards my fate rather than fighting against it. I was rewarded for my surrender by a slow decrease in the pain. As it slipped away, so did I, until there was only one thought left of me.
I love you.
The words lit a match to the world and boomed in the darkness, sending shock waves out in the infinite space, something it shouldn’t be able to do. This place was the absence of everything, and I’d created something. As if invited in by that denial of this place’s fundamental physics, more rushed in. Warmth, need, desire, the guys’ consciousnesses all popped into being one by one, and as they did so, I felt my strength return.
Are you OK?
What the fuck is this place?
Where did you go?
How do we get out of here?
I didn’t get a chance to answer any of them, and probably wouldn’t have wanted to. For the moment, I just basked in the fact that I could consider doing so. But that wasn’t enough. It never is for human beings. We are creatures of desire, and I desired to get the fuck out of here. I collected our consciousnesses together, and then…pushed.
Like the Wizard of Oz, revealed as a small man behind his projections, the void tore and dissolved under our combined will, and for a moment, I saw the man that looked so like Sylvan staring out at us, his wolf skull helmet pulled down low across his
eyes. And then we arrived, taking our human forms in a familiar landscape of endless white.
Well done, the Great White Wolf said, emerging from the featureless landscape, green eyes first, then the rest of her body. You are pack.
19
When my eyes opened, I saw the shift of light in the room—or lack thereof—and realised that we’d been out for some time. I peeled myself off the bed, having no memory of moving from the chair to here, but several arms reached out and pulled me back down again. It was then that I heard the groans and rustles of my men waking.
Jack woke first, looking up blearily, and took a moment to blink his vision clear before smiling when he saw me. His eyes trailed down until they came to the bite mark he’d left on me, and there they stayed. He tugged me down beside him until we were lying there face to face, his smile not faltering. It felt sweet and close, like we were a couple of teenagers who’d just found love or something. Then we heard Hawk’s groan.
His head popped up over Jack’s shoulder, and his grin was a reflection of his lover’s when he saw us.
“Congratulations,” he said.
“To you too, love,” Jack said, and tugged his head down to kiss him.
My clit, the little fucking Trojan, twitched at that, but I told her in no uncertain terms that there would be no more playing today, and tomorrow also had a question mark against it. I felt a deep, not entirely unpleasant ache up inside me that would need looking after in the next few days. Surely the good women of Sanctuary would have some sort of recipe for this, an ointment or salve to ease the pain of being very well used by your harem.
And I was. I rolled onto my back on the bed, arms stretched out above me as I just relished that. I’d never had a day where I’d lost count of the orgasms I’d had before I came to Sanctuary, and I definitely wanted to revisit that when we got home. Shack up in our new place, lock the gate, and see just how far we could go…
“Someone’s looking pleased with themselves.” Slade looked down at me with a smile, his eyes still crusted with sleep. “What’s got you thinking happy thoughts, princess?”
I liked the way his hand slid across my abdomen possessively, like he had a right to it. Consent was king in Sanctuary, something I was bloody happy about, but I liked that we could start making assumptions about each other—that we did want each other, that we would, for the most part, welcome each other’s touch.
But not right now.
I grabbed his hand before it slid any further.
“Sorry, but the vag is out of order until further notice.”