The Second Covenant

I froze and lifted my head to stare up at him in shock. “What?” He smiled gently and tucked my hair behind my ear. “I’ll explain, come on. Let’s go to the bridge Red Riding Hood.” I blinked, knowing that I hadn’t told Drustan about the bridge where Druex, he, had come to me, or that he called me Red Riding Hood. “I don’t understand.” He nodded and got my bags of chocolate down and scooped up my basket. “I know. When your mother calls, tell her you have spontaneously discovered a date or something.” He paid for my stash and led me to my car, opening the passenger door for me and walking around to get into the drivers seat. “Do you even know how to drive?” I asked, still in a state of total shock. He grinned at me and started up the BMW. “I sure do baby.” I blinked again over his slang and the absence of his Ye Olde World accent. “Oh.” was my lame answer.

My phone rang and I picked up. “Hi mom.” I said. “Hey honey, did you get everything?” I was unable to look away from Drustan, Druex, shit! Whoever it was that smelled, tasted, looked and felt like my mate. “Yeah, I um, I’ve met up with a um, friend of mine. I won’t be back for a while.” My mother made an interested sound. “Oh, a male friend?” She led hopefully. “Uh hu.”
“Is he good looking?” He looked over at me with a grin and I swallowed thickly. “You have no idea. I‘ll call when I‘m on my way back.”
“Take your time honey.”

I hung up and rubbed my fingers over my mouth to savor the tingling. I didn’t understand, or even comprehend what was going on. Technically, having returned to the beginning, Druex shouldn’t have remembered anything, or me. But although he said his name wasn’t really Druex, when I closed my eyes and tested his scent, my wolf wasn’t confused. He was my mate, in the mind of my wolf, there was no debate. The man beside me was my mate, and my doubts dissolved. But I still didn’t understand. It was a short drive from town to the dirt road that would get us close to the bridge, but it wasn’t the road I was thinking of. It was the road to the colony house. He stopped the car on the bridge and got out, coming around for me. I got out and looked at his chest briefly, nervously, and then up to his face. My nose said it was my Druex, but when I‘d been in 1692, it had said that Drustan was Druex. This was so confusing. “It’s me, I promise.” He said giving me a reassuring smile and took my hands to help me sit on the stone ledge. He kept one and sat beside me, his fingers laced tightly with mine, his thumb moving back and forth over the back of my hand.

The breeze tugged at my hair and we sat quietly for a moment before I got the nerve to speak. “How are…I don’t…” I couldn’t figure out what to say to explain my confusion. “Were you…This is way to damn confusing.” I managed and he pressed a kiss to my hair. “I know sweetheart. How about I start from the beginning?” I nodded and turned my face to his wool clad shoulder. “I am who you knew before, but in the cosmic…whatever, the first time we ever met was in the coven seat, in 1692. You coming back changed much more than you thought.” My head was spinning with the confusion. “So, you followed me back from there?” I asked, tilting my head back to look up at him. “Sort of. You were absolutely right when you said I smelled the same, that no one person has the same scent markers. When you told your forefathers your story about Shaw, I had just come out of the hidden room. Your scent hit me like a ton of bricks and my wolf rose up and demanded I claim you.”

He shifted and turned towards me so I could look up at him more comfortably. He cupped my jaw and traced his eyes over my face lovingly. “I listened and got more and more angry that you had already been mated, but dying a little inside every time your breath hitched or a tear streaked down your face. You told me later all about your life, those few weeks that you’d been mated and I was drowning in the scent of the love you had. But I kept thinking about how you said I looked exactly like your mate, that I smelled the same and it didn’t make any sense to me. And once you were gone, I went a little crazy.”

I nodded, remembering the desperate look in his eyes right before I’d vanished. “It took me a while to just accept that somehow, it was me you had lost. I told your ancestors I was going back to my wilds, because it was time for me to go home and they accepted it completely.” I frowned. “Did you go home?” He shook his head and sifted his fingers through my hair. “I went back to the Phoenix and was a royal pain in their ass until they agreed to send me forward. But they kind of messed up and I got dropped into the midst of the pack, at age two.”

I rolled my lips under to keep from interrupting, or laughing. “I got adopted by the pack because they recognized what I was, and that I shared their unique eye coloring. I had all my memories of you from 1692, and somehow I got the ones of us from the previous time we were together.” he frowned a bit. “Well, the time we had before you went back in time. How did you manage that by the way?”

I shrugged and swallowed hard. “I was a little crazy myself. I was just so determined that there wasn’t any way I would have failed. So you had to grow up, again?” He nodded and gave me a droll look. “Yes. And I had all those memories inside me.” The hand in my hair stroked and sifted, twirling the curls through his fingers. “Every smile you ever gave me, every kiss, every touch…”
I finally grasped the scope of what he was saying and my stomach flopped, hard. I’d only had to endure a few days of knowing he was dead, a few days without him, remembering, but Druex had endured years! “I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to…” He kissed me then, with all the pent up longing he had endured and I leaned into him, my every bone, muscle and cell, going completely lax with relief. “You cast yourself back to 1692 to bring me back from the dead. Don’t you dare say sorry.” he rasped and a small sob of emotion fell from my lips. “You died for me in the first place, time travel was nothing in comparison.”

I stroked his hair, couldn’t stop kissing him, and then another thought horrifyingly occurred to me. “Oh shit.” I said softly and he frowned at me in worry. “What?” I let my head fall back in utter disbelief. “I haven’t ascended yet. I have to go through that all over again. Mo-ther fucker!” He chuckled and lifted my head up to kiss me again. “So for three more days, you’re seventeen and I am robbing the cradle.” I swatted his arm playfully, but then snuggled up against his chest, hearing his heart beating strong and sure under my ear. “Druex?”
“Mm?”
“Don’t die for me again.”

He stood up and hugged me tighter, our bodies meshed together perfectly. “I wont.” his lips brushed a string of kisses over my hair. “I’ve missed you.” I said softly and felt him smile. “Baby, I missed you my whole life.” My arms snaked from his waist to around his neck, my nose buried against his throat. “I love you. So much.”
“You know I love you more.” I sniffled and thanked any and all Gods for allowing me to have him back. “Probably.” I agreed and he chuckled and bit my ear gently. “Witch.”
“Wolf.” I answered and we stood there, holding each other for a long time. “I was thinking, once your dad and family gets used to me being attached to your hip, we could talk about buying the colony house.”

I blinked and drew back to look up. “What?” he shrugged and nodded towards the old building. “It’s a house, it’s away from a graveyard, private, there’s an attic, or a basement for your magic stuff, and it’s kind of a hobby of mine to refurbish old houses.” My mouth worked a few times and I looked from the house, to Druex, and back to the house. “And I figure that the pact my mother made with Lucas Danvers still holds we can tweak it a bit that you and I can keep this place safe for the future generations.” I was overwhelmed by his offer, I guess he thought I wasn‘t happy with it because he started to ramble. “I can put in wiring and everything, and…” I cut his nervous rambling off with a kiss. “Okay.” He sighed a breath of relief.

I bit my lip as an idea came to me. “Druex?”
“What?” I cupped his cheek and looked up into his amazing, love filled eyes. “I don’t want to ever loose you again. I found this spell when I was back in the day,” He inclined his head and smiled a little roguishly. “The Handfasting spell.” I nodded and he pressed a kiss to my brow. “Do it.” I took both his hands and breathed deeply. “Life to life and mind to mind Our spirits now will intertwine. Whither thou goest, so too shall I. Heart to thee, body to thee, always and forever.” Druex repeated the words and a web of gossamer spun magic spun around us, binding our souls together. Our hearts. If we were apart, we would always be able to tell how far, and know when the other returned. When our lives were done, and our spirits cast adrift into the universe, we would always find each other again on our next turn at life. “Love you.” He said softly and I rose up on my toes to taste the words. “Love you more.”
“Probably.”
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If you made it this far, congratulations. this story is OVER!
The next one will be coming soon. Molly And Dax.
Look For it.