Page 21 of Fate Unchained
“Wait, you said vulk don’t take mates.”
He scowled and didn’t say anything for a long moment. “Vulk shouldn’t take mates. Our creed is that we walk alone. But two of my pack have mates.”
She took another piece of jerky and swallowed. It really was divine. Quite possibly the best meat she’d ever tasted. “And they aren’t peltwalkers?”
“No, peltwalkers aren’t interested in having us as mates.”
Her brow furrowed. “Why?”
Something shuttered in his gaze. “In wolfwalker clans, a female who bears a vulk child is revered. Like I said, it’s rare, and when it happens, the female’s status in the clan rises, and for the rest of her life, she’s well cared for. After she has the child, she passes it off to the clan to raise and take care of. She isn’t interested in spending any more time with a vulk.” His eyes glinted with red, and she didn’t think it was from the fire.
“Wait, what? The clan raises vulk children?”
“Yes, that’s right. We stay with the clan until we take our vulk form at around twenty years old. We’re just biding time until we start our real lives. Our vulk lives. When we take our permanent and true form, then we are really alive. We leave our clan and don’t return.”
She studied his face. “You had a human form, once?”
He only shrugged in answer.
She tilted her head and studied him. What would he look like as a man? It was impossible to picture. “You said your vulk form is permanent? You really can’t take human form?”
He fed her a few more strips of food, ignoring her question.
She tried again. The more he talked, the less she had to. “So you were raised by a clan? No mother?”
Now his eyes were fully red. “I have no mother.”
She looked at the blanket at her feet. “Me either. She died in childbirth. Thank the heavens I had my aunt though, because my father fell apart.” Why was she talking about this? She never talked about this, not even with Brooke, her closest friend. “My aunt was a bit old-fashioned and had odd habits, but she supported me and loved me, in her own way.”
A small wrench tugged on her heart. She’d dealt with her aunt’s peccadillos all her life, most of them harmless. Dragging Lilah into her debt was a betrayal from someone she’d loved without question.
Kyril shifted her blanket, turning her so a different part of her body was closest to the fire. “The female who birthed me lives, but she gave me over to the clan to raise. She never spent a moment with me. So, I don’t give her the title of my mother.”
Her gaze flew up. “Kyril, that’s horrible—”
“It’s the vulk way.” He brought another piece of jerky to her lips. “Someday, I’ll do my duty and sire more vulk, too. My sons will grow up the same.”
She frowned, and her hand clutching the blanket pressed against the small golden rune now tattooed on her chest. “The vulk way doesn’t seem right. If I had the choice, I would have much rather had my mother and my father in my life.”
His expression was still hard. “I want to live alone. Do you know what it would be like to be the mate of a vulk? It wouldn’t be pleasant. It would be dangerous, and you wouldn’t live in a nice town, you’d live in my den.”
Had he realized he’d switched to talking about her as if he were seriously considering her as his mate?
“And you’d be in my bed every chance I had. I’d take you on all fours on the floor. Against the wall. I’d want to run together in the forest and take you hard under the moons. And I’d knot you. Do you know what that is?”
She was stuck on the image of herself on all fours, with him behind her. The cave had gotten really warm, and she let the blanket slide down a little. His stony expression flickered.
“Yes,” she whispered. “A book I read described it.” She’d found an autobiography of a woman detailing all of her experiences in the bedroom. She’d spent time explaining how the vulk descended from the peltwalker wolf lineage, and during sex, when they were close to climax, the base of their shaft swelled, locking them inside their partner. The author really enjoyed it.
He shook his head and looked away. “The vulk raise their children this way because it helps them prepare for a solitary life. We can’t have families. My purpose is to walk Ulterra killing spawn. There’s no time for anything else. Not for me, anyway.”
An icy chilliness unfurled in her chest, restless and edgy, as if looking for a way to break out and unleash.
Her eyes widened. This feeling was coming from him. Part anger and part … pain. Before she knew what she was doing, she wrapped one arm around herself, keeping her blanket in place, and put her other hand on his chest.
She stroked up to his collarbone, and he shuddered. His skin was tough, yet smooth, and the fur sparsely coating his chest and shoulders was silky. “I know what spawn are. My father was a great hunter once, and became famous for killing monsters that roamed the forests. He calls them spawn too.” Her father told her stories at night sometimes. The only stories she really wanted to hear were the ones about meeting her mother, but he liked to tell old hunting stories too. He’d described killing bauk and goblins lurking near humans, waiting to catch them unawares. “You’re protecting people like he did.”
The red faded from his eyes, and he leaned forward, into her.