Page 16 of Mated to the Wolves

I’m on an island. Metal clinks against metal in the distance. A massive dark shape rises before me. The wolf inside me grows restless.

In deference, the she-wolf acknowledges a power greater than my own. Clouds shift, and moonlight shines directly on the entity.

A giant wolf bound in chains, surrounded by flowers so dense they look like a blanket of snow, comes into view. It fixes its red-on-black gaze at me and I pause, going to one knee.

“Fenrir,” I whisper, bowing my head.

First of our kind, and king of all werewolves, he was born of the god of mischief, Loki, and a giant.

The god wolf is predicted to kill Odin, the Norse gods feared the great wolf, and began a love-hate relationship that doomed them to the fate they wished to avoid.

I can’t help but feel sympathy. He was doomed the moment the prophecy was made. Those who feared them, cause their eventual demise with their shitty treatment.

Keeping him close, they spent a lifetime trying to find a way to leash him. Powerful, he broke through every supposed prison, until a pair of chains were forged by the same dwarves who’d created Thor’s hammer, Mjolnir.

Distrustful, he agreed to be bound by the chains only if someone he trusted put their hand in his mouth. Tyrr, god of war and strife, and son of Odin volunteered. He’d trapped his friend and lost his hand in the process.

Here he waits on the volcanic island until he breaks free, and brings about the end of the world, known as Ragnarök.

“Daughter, come closer.” His deep baritone echoes in my mind.

I rise on shaking legs and move closer. “Am I hallucinating?”

He huffs what sounds like laughter. “No. You are descended from my line. The last of my lineage in

your pack.”

“Is that why you chose me?”

“Fate does not always give us a choice, so I extend the offer to you I did not have. Release me and bring about the end, or stay and accept your role.”

“What do you mean?”

“Be the mother who ushers in a new age of abundance and renewal, or the start of the fall.”

“How?”

“By accepting your true birthright. It’s there. Hidden under layers and repressed by your own

desire to hide away.”

“And if I release you, what happens?”

“The time of the magical beings on this planet runs out.” His nonchalance is chilling.

“Ragnarök?” I gasp, breath stolen from my lungs as electricity races through my veins.

He inclines his head. “Many things must align for this to come to pass, but you

Would be the first tipping point. Shall the pack fall, the effect will be kin to dominos for the

supernatural community. This is our test; the others will have their own.”

I spent my adult life seeking an exit from the pack that never wanted me. Now my exodus would

spell the death of millions.

Stomach clenching, I think of people like Fell and his family who accepted me and strove to

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