Fenris had laughed and patted her hand, before confiding. “Oh, we all ‘just knew’ as soon as we gazed upon each other. You and your mate are only the first ones to be not too stubborn to admit it. Mayhap you are proof that we are…what is that word your father Odin is always going on about? It starts with an e…?”
“Evolution?”
“Yes! You and your mate prove we are evolving.”
And now here his quiet granddaughter was, getting married in the middle of a Chinese garden covered in snow. Why was it not cold inside the pagoda which had no walls separating it from the outside? Fenris could never be quite sure how things worked in this future land, but he imagined it was due to the magic the people of this time call climate control.
Whatever the reason, it was a lovely setting for the wedding that had finally broken the Viking Wolf curse.
Where was he?
Oh, yea, time to sit down.
That was even harder than standing up, though this time, he did not wait for Olafr to assist him. Mayhap that was a mistake. He was sweating by the time he plopped himself down.
“Are you alright, baby?” Chloe asked him, a worried look passing over her beauteous face.
No, he was not certain he was all right. He felt weak in a way he never had before.
The church blurred, and suddenly Chloe, young and stunning, stands in front of him, speaking a strange language he cannot comprehend.
He has never seen the like of her dark beauty in his land or while traveling. But this she-wolf…she is his fated mate. Of that he is sure…
Suddenly his fated mate is locked inside a cage, writhing on the floor and smelling of heat. She tells him to stay back in her strange tongue, but he uses the pendant on his necklace to unlock her cage. This she-wolf…she is his destiny…
“No! No! You can’t send me back!!” his dark beauty screams at him while lying in the dirt outside their longhouse. She is covered in the blood of his vengeful cousin, who attacked her while Fenris was out with the other North Wolves on a traditional wedding hunt. She is also in the early stages of labor. Too early labor. Their bairn will be arriving too soon.
Despite her crying protests, Fenris answers, “I must, beauty. Your wound is deep and your waters have already broken. You cannot shift to heal, and we have no human medicine in the village. There is no other way.”
“No, I don’t want to leave you!” she sobs. “And you said you wouldn’t abandon me.”
Oh, how his heart shatters at the sight of her tears.
“And I will hold fast my promise. I will find a way back to you, beauty.”
“How?” she asks, knowing as he does that what he is saying is impossible.
Yet Fenris is certain he speaks truth when he answers, “I do not yet know. But I will. I promise you this on my life. I will be your mate and a father to our pup, and we will be as one again.”
He vows this, then he kisses her sweet lips before saying the words to send her back to her own time.
His extended family is all around him now, talking about how he has most certainly gone mad. He has done nothing but sit outside the longhouse chanting a spell to return to his mate for the last several seasons. His kin implore him to take another mate and warn him that if others outside their village hear of this, he will surely be overthrown as fenrir of the North Wolves. Only Aunt Bera, the sorceress who communes regularly with Odin and acquired this spell for Fenris, does not try to convince him to stray from my efforts.
Fenris does not answer the naysayers. The only words he speaks out loud are those of the spell that will reunite him with his mate—
Without warning, a tunnel opens up in front of him and sucks him in. Fenris is shot once more like an arrow through time. And when he opens his eyes, there is his Chloe, standing over him in a place of healing. They are reunited once more….
Their second child arrives inside the longhouse while Fenris waits outside. Afterward, his sorceress aunt carries the squalling baby to him and tells him, “Your mate wishes for her to be named Myrna.”
“Yea,” Fenris answers, taking the bairn in his arms. “Myrna is a good name for a strong girl.”
He almost loses his Chloe again with Olafr’s birth. She lays in bed bleeding for days afterward, her skin sticky and hot with fever. In her delirium, she gives him final instructions for the children. “Tell them I’ll miss them in heaven. Tell them I loved them. Tell them I loved you, so they should listen when you tell them stuff.”