No, I didn’t let those thoughts consume me. I wouldn’t. I’d forever search for her. I’d forever stay positive that she was out there and I’d find her.
I stayed in my human form as I stalked the forest, my inner Lycan moving within me. The wolf tattoo that covered my entire back shifted along my skin, moved as the beast paced underneath. I didn’t shift very often anymore, didn’t allow the feral creature I housed to run wild. He was hard enough to control within me while I was a human, let alone when he had free reign of his surroundings.
And because he was snapping and snarling for our mate, it made him even more dangerous, destroying anything in his path. He was known to take our hundred-year-old oaks that stood in his way.
I curled my claws inward, the sharp points stabbing into my palms, drawing blood. Even though I was in my human form, I was still fearsome at a towering six-foot eight height, and three hundred pounds of solid muscle. But in my shifted Lycan form?
Nothing could match my strength and brutality.
My animal was front and center, moving right under the surface and showing itself. I knew my amber-colored eyes while I was a human changed to a glowing blue as he made himself known, trying to dominate.
Not today, you impatient bastard.
But still, the motherfucker pushed forward.
Fingernails as claws.
My body starting to become even taller, muscles becoming more pronounced with the need to shift.
Night vision perfect.
Canines unsheathing and descending.
Hearing and smelling even more accurate than any night predator.
I was the predator to predators.
I made my way closer to the village, finding myself drawn to the little Romanian town tonight for some reason.
The trees started to thin the closer I got, before opening up and showing Dobravina. I stood there and watched the villagers converse, shop, none of them having this eternal hole in their very being because they were missing the most important thing in the world to them.
Their other half. Their mate. The one person born to be theirs and theirs alone.
It made me jealous and angry, bitter and resentful. Humans may be one of the weakest species in the grand scheme of things, and I may be superior in strength, intelligence, and being a cunning hunter, but they had the only thing I wanted—love.
I wanted the love of my Linked Mate.
I tipped my head back and looked through the break in the trees at the sky. The full moon was coming, and it was coming fast. And when it did, I’d have no control over myself. Only my mate could ever calm me, could ever control the beast within me. It was her and her alone that held that power.
And for every full moon, the creature inside of me ripped and snarled, clawed its way out. And once it passed, once I was back in my human form and saw the destruction my Lycan wrought, that hole in my soul magnified all over again, and I yearned for my female even more.
I glanced at the village again, narrowing my eyes and getting even more pissed.
My Lycan snapped and growled, causing my human jealousy to grow tenfold as his rose as well. The tattoo on my back shifted and moved across the flesh, rising up slightly. I knew to the naked eye it would seem three dimensional. But my Lycan was pissed, as if he was telling me this was bullshit.
It was. It so fucking is.
3
Mikalina
Two weeks later
I felt like I’d lived a thousand lives in the last fourteen days. It was crazy and wild, unexpected and such a learning experience that for the hundredth time since deciding to take this trip, I didn’t regret it for one minute.
With my sightseeing behind me, I was finally in Romania, having taken a small aircraft to the tiniest airport I’d ever seen. Now, I was crammed into the smallest car known to man and going down an uneven and bumpy road, excited about the prospect of what this new journey held for me.
I couldn’t even describe the feeling that churned in me as I was taken closer to the little Romanian town of Dobravina. I’d never been there before, would have never even known about its existence if I hadn’t decided to do this trip. But as I looked at the map, I swore something pulled me toward it, telling me that was where I’d finally find my peace.
I reached out and braced my hand on the handle of the door to steady myself, and had one foot pressed down hard on the floorboard in an attempt to not roll around the interior of the tiny tin-can-sized car.
Over the last fourteen days, I’d done the whole sightseeing thing through Europe. Eating exotic foods. Saw strange new lands. My camera was full of those experiences, memories that I’d be able to keep forever, even when I went back to my dull life—whenever that may be. As it was, this trip was open-ended, something that probably wasn’t realistic, given the fact that I only had a certain amount of money to my name, but a reality I was going to try to make work.
Because I needed it, not only for my health, but for my sanity as well.
The little cottage I’d managed to rent had been found through a rental company. After contacting the owner, they told me there was the option of staying long term, and that they could discuss it when I got there.
Maybe I should’ve been more afraid of this whole situation, where I may have lost my damned mind. But there was something inside me, this flicker of light, this moment of feeling alive—hope—that told me this might very well be the best thing to happen to me.
This very well could be the exact thing I needed to reboot what was dead inside me.
We only lived once, right?
We only had a certain amount of days, a certain number of hours. A preordained amount of memories before the light in us was extinguished and we moved on to the next thing.
Whatever that was.
And I supposed I was just living that to the extreme, to the fullest, to experience all I could in the short number of years I had in this world.
The road evened out, and I was able to relax against the worn leather seat, my muscles aching from tensing during this trip. The driver was an older man with white hair, an unequally white thick beard, and eyebrows that looked like they were trying to crawl off his face because they were so bushy. His hands were curled around the cracked steering wheel, the skin tanned and worn, wrinkled and showing he’d no doubt done hard labor throughout his life.
He only said but a few words to me, and I had to wonder if it was because he didn’t speak much English or if he just wasn’t sociable. Either way, that was fine with me. I’d never been much for socializing anyway.
I looked out the window and stared at the thick line of trees that were passing us by in a blur. The radio he had on played some type of folk music, the volume turned down low, so I couldn’t make out the words. Not that I could understand anyway.
I didn’t speak Romanian. Although I did brush up on a few key terms before my trip, wanting to be respectful, so I could say thank you, please, and ask where the bathroom was. Things like that, although I just shook my head and once again felt like a complete lunatic for what I was doing.
The rental host, Andrei, had arranged the car ride—thank God for that, ‘cause I’d for sure be up shit creek—and I realized I was putting a lot of trust in a complete stranger, but when in Rome, and all that.
The driver started to say something, his words broken but clear enough I knew what he meant.
We’d be there shortly.