second longer than necessary, he fastened his jaws around the windpipe of the elk and applied pressure. He used his power to soothe the elk as the last bit of life drained from the hulking body.
His she-wolf came to stand beside him, her dusky gray fur brushing his. He released his hold on the elk and turned his muzzle toward her. Her silver eyes glowed in the darkening twilight. He licked at the rich blood of the elk painting her snout. She pressed closer to his side, her body warm against his.
He needed no other.
Brand came out of his wolf"s dream confused by the conflicting sensory input. Dagny nestled against his side in the bed, as she had in the dream. Her hand rested on his chest. The scent of her filled his room. Her breath tickled his skin.
She shifted sluggishly, her hand gliding over his stomach. His skin heated where she touched him. Her face 83
nuzzled against his shoulder until he moved his arm around her and tucked her against him. She made a sleepy murmur into his chest, and he smiled.
His wolf had never invited another into his dream.
Beasts as strong as his seldom did. It had developed an attachment to her, and such a connection wasn"t trivial. As long as Dagny lived, the wolf would not accept another.
The moon crept closer to full. He rubbed his hand over her back as they lay together, almost but not quite sleeping. The rumble of her stomach startled him out of his near-doze.
“I have to go out for a while.” He kissed the top of her head. “Stay here.”
He got up and began to dress. Despite his best efforts, his eyes kept drifting back to the appealing shape curled up in his bed. Twice, he almost abandoned his plans to hunt down something for her to eat, but he managed to escape the room.
* * *
Brand pushed open the door to the butcher shop and was surrounded by the mouth-watering aroma of fresh meat.
The man behind the counter looked up from trimming a pork roast and smiled when he saw Brand. Though he was elderly, there was no mistaking the strength in his arms attained through decades of lifting and shaping large cuts of meat. “Nice to see you again. Been a while.”
Brand nodded and looked through the offerings in the glass showcase. “Don"t suppose you have any wild elk?” The white paper hat twitched when the old man shook his head. “Only farm-raised, but it"s just in today. It was on the hoof a week ago.”
“A full rack of rib steaks, bone-in, please.”
“Sure, it"ll be a minute while I cut that up.” He scrubbed his hands under the sink and then turned toward the thick plastic curtain leading into the refrigeration room.
An image of Dagny"s jaws clamping onto the elk"s leg 84
came to him, and he couldn"t have repressed the smile that came to his face if he"d wanted. “If you"ve got a shank, I"ll take that, too.”
A toothy grin lit the butcher"s face. “Surely do.” He disappeared, leaving Brand to peruse the delectable array of meat on display with a rumbling stomach.
To her credit, Dagny hadn"t mentioned his poor hospitality, but he wanted to make the slight up to her. Brand paused in his pacing. It was unusual for him to dwell on such old-fashioned sentiments. He supposed it had to do with the new brood bonds and a sense of responsibility for both Dagny and Alice.
Thoughts of them reminded him of the danger he"d placed them in just by linking to them. Brand"s eventual death had been a near certainty since he"d killed Geir.
He"d slain his sire for the most basic of reasons, because the brutal son of a goat had killed his mother. Taken away by Ingrid months before, he"d been unable to protect her and no one else had raised a hand in her defense. Why would they? Geir had never taken a mate. His sire preferred to keep a harem of females that he treated like trash. When he killed one, no one was surprised, and no one said a word. It was expected, even encouraged, for the leader of the Broods of Fenrir to behave in such a way. Everything the king did was calculated to emphasize the fear of him because, if his subjects didn"t cower before him, they would tear him down.
Years later, as he stood over the shredded corpse of his sire, Brand had sworn that he would never become