Wolfs Magic

Chapter Six

Az pressed his lips firmer against Leah’s. Gods, she smelled so delicious…like lavender essence mixed with vanilla soap and the natural essence that only belonged to her. The amazing thing—the gift—of Leah kissing him was like something out of a dream. In his real life, things like this just didn’t happen.

Now let’s not screw it up.

Not even his wolf was going to dampen the excitement this moment created for him.

Even as his heart beat loudly in his ears, he was overcome with a sense of completeness, with a sense of, for the first time in his life, coming home. The kiss ended too soon as her soft, dainty pink lips moved off his.

He opened his eyes. Leah’s were still closed and he was glad to see her breathing was as fast as his own. Raising his hands, he touched her cheekbones with his palms. She opened her eyes and grinned.

Her smile was infectious and he grinned right back. “What are you grinning about?”

“You just kissed me lightheaded.” She chewed on her bottom lip. It was all he could do not to start biting her himself. “You know, Az, since I have no idea about my personal history, those two kisses were my very first ones.”

“Leah, with as gorgeous as you are, I find it very unlikely that you haven’t been kissed many times by many people.”

“No way. Not when I was so obviously waiting for you.”

Gods, the things she said made his heart flip flop. If this was what it was like having a mate it was a wonder anyone ever got anything done. He rubbed his thumb over her left eyebrow, loving the soft feel of her light brown hair under his rough callused thumb. She sighed and his groin got even tighter.

Leah’s next noise sounded quite different. She shrieked and her eyes rolled to the back of her head. Az managed to catch her barely, before her knees gave out and she hit the floor. What the hell?

“Leah?” He yelled loudly, as if he could will her back to him just by the sound of his voice alone.

What was going on? Seconds later, her eyes opened and her head shot up. Fury stormed through Az’s veins. They weren’t her blue-grey eyes that looked at him but dark, almost pitch black pupils.

“You know what has to be done, Azriel.” The voice was Leah’s but the intonation was wrong. He hadn’t known her long but he’d bet any money that Leah never used that singsong pitch he heard now. In fact, he was sure he’d recognize it anywhere.

“Mom?” His mother’s death had wounded him but not for the same reasons it had ruined the others. He and his mother had never been exactly what he would have called close.

“He knew you would know what to do, it’s why he tried so hard to kill you as a child. You and my Angel.” Her angel? Realization dawned fast on Az. Angel was his sister. He had no memory of her except that Cullen had recently remembered her existence and told everyone her name. Their oldest brother Michael searched for her.

“Let go of Leah. Whatever you’re doing, I don’t want to communicate with you like this. Give me back my mate. Now.”

Leah smiled and he wanted to wince. It wasn’t his mate’s jovial, side smile but his mother’s practiced grin. “She’s not being harmed. This is her gift, her magic. She can commune with the other side.”

“Somehow I doubt she intentionally allowed you into her body and mind while we were getting to know one another. Now get out.”

She reached out and touched the scar on the side of his face. “He did that to you during the horrible night where nearly everything was lost. I’m sorry.”

Az batted away her hand. “It’s too late for apologies and even if it weren’t, I don’t want sorrys delivered from beyond the grave. Maybe that makes me a bad person and a bad shifter. I don’t like magic. It’s what got us all into this situation to begin with. Now, give me back my mate.”

Leah’s eyes narrowed and he groaned. Obviously, his mother wasn’t any better at listening to him now than she had been then. “You haven’t yet figured out that of all your brothers you always held the most magic at your fingertips?”

“Only the women have magic.” He sighed. “Get out of her now.”

She gripped his chin, turning so he had to look her straight in the eyes. Her fingernails tug into his skin. “That is nonsense. You know it and I know it. We both know what you were capable of doing as a child. If you’re not doing it now then that is your choice. I didn’t protect you. That is my burden and my guilt. You have to take Leah on a memory spell. It’s the only way she’s going to remember and you need her to do that if you’re going to bring back your father.”

Abruptly, he pulled away. “What the hell makes you think I want him back? I want him dead.”

Her slap surprised him. The side of his face burned from the impact. “Use your head, Azriel.”

He bit down hard on the side of his cheek to keep from wincing and to keep his grip on Leah’s shoulders soft. No way did he want to hurt his mate just because his mother, who had driven him nuts while she was alive and had now found a way to do it dead, inhabited her body.

“If you have something to instruct us, why don’t you go and speak to Tristan. Find a way to bother Ashlee about this.”

Her eyes filled with tears and he cursed. Women’s tears, especially ones that seemed to be coming out of Leah’s eyes, were always his undoing. One tear slipped out and ran the length of her cheek before they stopped. “You have to do this, not Tristan.”

With that statement, Leah’s head fell backwards again. Seconds later, she was back shaking her head. “Oh my, that was odd.”

He picked her up in his arms, carrying her to the table before he sat her down on it.

His eyes roamed her body, looking for any signs of physical distress. She grabbed his head, turning his attention to her.

“I’m okay, let’s talk about what happened?”

He closed his eyes. “I don’t want to.”

“Open your eyes and look at me.” Since he was being a baby and he knew it, he complied. “I could feel what she felt and I could see what she remembered. How on earth did you survive your childhood?”

He shrugged, he would have preferred it if she had never known about any of this. “We all had our burdens. Michael, as the oldest, was made to feel weak. Dad didn’t want competition for Alpha. Gabriel was all but destroyed to make him tough with a killer instinct. Tristan, they ignored. That was probably on purpose. All of us knew he should be Alpha but he never knew it. Mom must have wanted to spare him Dad’s notice. Theo has his temper. Dad tried to encourage that but T’s a really good man and couldn’t be destroyed that way. Rex was all but forgotten.”

She smoothed the hair on his forehead. “And you he blamed for everything.” It wasn’t a question. He knew she’d seen it in his mother’s memories. Just how much she had seen still remained to be discovered. “You he tried to kill you when you were a child.” Okay, she’d seen enough.

Letting go of her he stalked to the other side of the room. “I don’t want your pity, Leah. I’m just fine.”

“Everyone has a past, Azriel. Even me and I can’t remember it. Evidently, there is something you can do about that.”

Az really wanted to throw something. “Men are not supposed to be able to do magic. There are rules to these things, order in the universe even to magic. What I can do is an abomination.”

“That’s nonsense. Your father told you that because he was scared of your power. I saw that. So what did you do? Bury it so far inside you that you can’t find it anymore and only your wolf’s pestering you reminds you that it even exists?”

Ouch. That was a direct hit. Inside of him, his wolf perked up.

Maybe mating isn’t just about lovey-dovey stuff. Maybe she sees us better than you would like.

No, he shook his head, this was Mom’s fault. She never had to know.

She did.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said it like that.” He noticed she wasn’t sorry for having said it just the way she’d done it.

Az cleared his throat. “We’re a funny pair, aren’t we? You had access to all of my most horrendous memories and we can’t get anywhere near yours.”

“Apparently, we can.” She jumped off the table. “I’d say we’re a perfect pair.” She wrapped her arms around his waist, burying her head against his chest. “I can’t remember anything and even though you hate magic, you can give it back to me.”

She was right. “Okay.”

Her head jerked up. “Just like that? Okay?”

“You want it. For you, I would do anything.” As he said it, he realized he meant it. If Leah needed him to, he would walk through walls. “However, despite what my mom thinks, I’m going to have to speak to Tristan. The pack isn’t run that way anymore. We don’t hide things from the Alpha unless his life is in danger and we know he’d throw himself in front of the bullet. Then we might lie to keep him safe.”

“I like that idea better.”

He didn’t like anything about it, not one damn thing.

I do. I think it’s a great idea. His wolf danced around in his head.

Of course you do. Az rolled his eyes.

Az watched Tristan shake his head in wonder. All the Kanes were in the room with him and, of course, Cullen and Summer who might as well be Kanes these days. Leah had requested Malcolm and Jana be there too. In their brief contact, his mate had come to trust the other woman. Since he was doing this for her, he might as well indulge what she wanted in all things. The whole pack would know of his humiliation soon enough.

“Why did I never know you could do this?” Tristan turned on Cullen. “Did you know he could do it?”

“No, my Alpha, this is the first I’m hearing of it.” Cullen raised an eyebrow at Az in the infuriating way he did where it was like he believed you but he questioned everything you said at the same time.

Hit him. His wolf’s solution for everything.

Shut up.

“Jana, have you ever heard of a male member of the pack being able to perform this kind of magic?”

Malcolm’s mate shook her head. “No, my Alpha, but I would venture a guess that Az’s wolf must be very strong for this to work.”

“Dad beat it out of me by the time I was fourteen. Mom forbade me to speak of it. Frankly, I’m not even sure I can do it anymore, which is why I didn’t offer it up right away.” That was, at least, partially true. Leah knew all the circumstances. The rest of them didn’t have to.

From the corner of the room, Gabriel spoke. “I knew about it.”

Tristan turned around to look at him. “Why didn’t you ever say anything? Why didn’t either of you ever say anything?”

Gabriel shrugged. “Not my story to tell.”

“He tried to kill me as a baby because he had an inkling that I was ‘different’ and then again when I was a child because he thought I was a freak. In the pack, only women have magic. My existence and my ability to do what I can do goes against nature. I didn’t exactly feel like advertising it.”

Leah placed her hand on his back and he immediately felt better.

“Besides, memory walking is not exactly a useful talent. Most of the time when we forget things, it’s better if we can actually forget them.”

Cullen spoke up. “It would be extraordinarily useful in interrogation. You could just slip into their minds.”

Az shook his head. “Doesn’t work that way. It’s never that clear or that easy.”

Ashlee took a small step forward. “You know Braden sometimes does things that seem magical to me. I thought maybe it was just my imagination but now that I know that you can, and you’re his uncle, maybe I’m not hallucinating.”

Tristan looked at her sharply. “You never mentioned this to me.”

“He’s still so young, I didn’t think it warranted attention yet.”

There was a moment of silence in which Az became convinced Ash and Tristan were speaking telepathically.

He looked at Leah. It’s a personal nightmare for me to be standing here doing this. I think it would be much more useful to be in the basement figuring out a compound to break Dad’s hold on the wolves he’s creating. I had this idea about a vaccine…

She shook her head. First off, I still have to get used to the fact that you can speak to me like this. Second, you are not going to go run away to the lab. After we get my memories back, you can go hide there if you want. Everyone is acting just fine towards you. Kind of stunned but not weirded out or disgusted.

Was she right? Was he being too sensitive about the whole thing? It was so hard to give up a lifetime of believing what he could do was wrong based on a few minutes alone with his family.

I never told you that it was bad. I’ve wanted you to do it for years.

That was true. His wolf had only become hostile towards him when he’d stopped doing it.

“Alright.” Tristan nodded. “Do it.”

“It’s a little more complicated. I can’t just do it.”

“What do you need?”

“I guess I need quiet and time alone to give it a try.”

“Do you want my office?”

Az appreciated the offer. “No, thank you. Do I still have a room here?”

The room erupted in laughter. Az felt his face turn red. Tristan walked to him and placed his hand on his arm. “Yes, little brother, you still have a room here. We haven’t thrown you out of the house for lack of attendance.”

Placing his hand in Leah’s, Az led her from the room. The hallways were quiet; it was early in the morning, and other than the pack members he’d awaked from their beds no one was up and around just yet.

They arrived at his room and he turned the knob, opening it up. A quick cursory glance told him that the room was exactly as he’d left it. No one had been in it at all and it showed. The main sitting room had pillows thrown around everywhere—he could remember doing it, he’d not been able to settle down and relax, having wanted to be in his lab more than he wanted to be in the rooms—and he’d thrown things around in frustration. If they walked into the bedroom, it was likely that there wouldn’t even be sheets on the bed.

Feeling sheepish, he regarded Leah. “Um, I don’t stay here very much.”

She nodded, her eyes dancing. “I can tell.”

“I tried to tell you earlier. I’m not normal. I mean forgetting the fact that I can do what I’m about to do with the memories, sometimes I just forget to do basic things. I might disappear in the middle of the night and you’ll find me at four in the morning up to my elbows in chicken fat as I try to figure out if I can use the stuff to create a new way to fuel the compound.”

He really needed her to understand. The life she saw with Tristan and Ashlee or any of the other mated couples, it was never going to happen with him. Az had always suspected that the universe was going to curse his mate with a miserable existence. It might be better off for the woman if he never mated.

But now there was Leah and gods help him, he wanted her with every part of his soul. Wolf and man both needed her, desperately, except she needed to understand. It was pivotal that she really ‘get’ what she was buying into.

“I have to believe that a lot of these things will work themselves out. I’ll tell you what, if I find you missing in the middle of the night, I will come and find you and bring you back to bed.”

Gods, the idea of being in bed with Leah…

“Let’s focus on this so you can see if you actually like who I am, shall we?”

Was she worried about that? “I can almost guarantee that I’m going to like you. You’re like a dream, a gift from the universe.”

“Oh, the things you say.”

Only he meant them, every word. “Leah…”

She placed a hand on his arm. “C’mon, let’s go.”

He nodded. She was right. “I need to touch you to do it.”

Raising an eyebrow, the teasing glint he’d first seen in that picture and had noticed briefly here and there since appeared in her expression. “Even better.”

He sat down on the floor and he tucked his legs under him like a pretzel. “I discovered I could do this by accident and unfortunately in the presence of my father when I was about two years old. I travelled backwards into his mind.” He shivered at the memory. Not too many people could remember things from that age but he could remember doing that. First off, it had scared him that it happened and second because of the way his father had reacted to the whole thing. “He didn’t much care for the experience.”

“Will we get to see what happened to me? Or is it just going to be my childhood, my parents and stuff like that?”

He shook his head; maybe he would actually start laughing at how little he understood what was going to go on. “She-wolf, I have no idea what’s going to happen. I’m so sick of saying that to you. Sit here.” He indicated the spot next to him.

“Do we have to be right there next to each other or can it be just that you’re touching me?”

And it was already starting. She didn’t want to be near him. Well, he had warned her.

He shifted slightly trying to cover his discomfort. “Just sit close enough for me to be able to reach you with the tips of my fingers.”

She nodded. “Right.” Moving to him, she placed herself directly on his lap, her back pressed up against his chest. “Does this work?”

Yes, it worked. His heart pounded hard and his groin jumped to attention. Shit, she smelled so good. All he wanted to do was stick his face into her colored hair and stay there for eternity. Forget anything that didn’t exist outside of Leah. “Um, yes. It works.”

He heard her laugh slightly. “I saw your face. You thought I didn’t want to sit near you.”

Okay, now he felt foolish. She squirmed in his lap and before he could stop himself, he groaned. Her tight, snug ass moving on top of him nearly undid him.

“Are you going to be able to concentrate?” Her voice had taken on a low, husky sound.

“No, but don’t you dare get off.”

She snickered and he grinned at the sound.

“Alright, let’s do this.”

He placed his right index fingers on her temples. She closed her eyes and sighed under his touch. Even though it wasn’t necessary, he ran his other hand down her face tracing her features with the pads of his fingers.

“You’re so beautiful.”

“That’s not true. Right now I’m really funny looking.”

He closed his eyes. “For the rest of my life, I will be able to picture the perfection of your face in my mind’s eye.”

“Are you sure you’re a scientist? You sound like a poet.”

With that strange thought in his mind, he pressed his hand harder against her temple until he could feel her pulse. Three seconds passed and the strange falling sensation he hadn’t had since he was a child gripped him. Everything went black. He heard screaming and had no idea if it was Leah or he. Not that it mattered. They were both going in.