Let’s Talk One True Mate (One True Mate Companion, Vol. 1)

6-Bruin and Willow ♦♦

“Why do you keep saying ‘fire chief’ like that, Chief?”

“Like what?” Burton growled.

Canyon and Timber exchanged a look.

“You know, all full of hate.”

Burton looked shocked that he would even ask. “Are you kidding me? Every fire chief I’ve ever worked with has been a big fat pain in the ass. You saw what happened to the last chief—he got the bearen disordered, their renqua taken away, he summoned Khain, and now he’s rotting in jail like the criminal he is, and you want me to respect his son?”

Canyon nodded. He's got several sons, and we want you to respect them all.

Timber spread his hands and said, “B3 fucked up, Chief. He fucked up bad, but he was working alone. The bearen have renounced him and supported Bruin as chief and Conri, his twin, as assistant chief. Both Conri and Bruin have helped us again and again. Both are honest and straightforward and on our side. Hell, Bruin’s practically a saint, ‘cept he drinks beer and eats pussy.”

Canyon burst out laughing. Just not in that order.

Timber grinned. Burton only glared.

“C’mon, Chief, hear me out.”

Burton’s face remained stony. Timber hoped he was listening anyway.

“Bruin went with the team to search for Amaranth. They spent a month visiting cities with river walks, but turned up no clues. Nothing interesting happened while they were gone—everyone out at VF was canoodling; we were putting up cameras and wiring up the station and VF, plus supporting Sebastian's investigation, but there were no new mates found. As soon as Bruin and the others returned from their search, BAM, Bruin met Willow out at the Honey Depot.”

Burton looked confused momentarily. He shook his head, then said, “Are we sure she’s a One True Mate?”

Timber raised a brow, surprised at the question. “Well, considering she returned Bruin’s renqua by touching him, and then all the other bearen renqua , yeah, I’m pretty sure she is, plus she helped Ella through a c-section to deliver Track and Treena, with no drugs .”

Burton looked at Timber with an expression that clearly said, ‘bullshit’.

“She considers her power to be a kind of super-charged empathy that lets her see what people are thinking, and she can help them with physical and emotional pain.”

Timber sat on the edge of his desk. “Ask Ella about it, she’ll tell you. She says Willow quite possibly saved her life and the lives of the twins.”

Burton dropped his eyes, his expression conflicted. He may have hated a long line of fire chiefs, but Timber knew he loved Track and Treena, and Ella, too. If Ella said it, then it was true, in Burton’s eyes. Burton looked defeated and Timber hated to see it.

Timber stretched and said, “I gotta get outside. Let’s take a walk.”

Canyon stood, nodding. Burton didn’t respond.

“Come on, Chief, let’s walk and talk.”

Burton got up and walked quietly out of the bunker with them. They made their way through the tunnels, until they came to a door with, ‘Dirty Deputy’ scrawled on it. Timber put his eye up to the retina scanner, opening the door, revealing concrete steps leading up. Up they went, to a landing with a door on the far side. At that door, another retinal scanner released the lock, and they all stepped into daylight in SPD’s private park, full of lush foliage and paths through thick trees.

“Crap,” Timber said, blinking in the sunlight. “I guess we’re not making it up the bluff by sunrise.”

“Just give me the short version of the rest of it—I’m tired,” Burton said, as they chose a trail and headed down it, Timber in the lead, Canyon bringing up the rear.

Timber spun around to face Burton, walking backwards. “Wait, you've been up all night?”

“Yeah, yeah. I'll sleep in my office, once you’re done.”

“No, way, Chief, I'm taking you home.”

“Just tell me what’s left—there can’t be too much more—bullet points only.”

Timber turned back around, thinking he was going to loop them back around to the tunnels. “We’ll tell you tomorrow,” he said over his shoulder. “I'll take you home now, or to VF, or wherever Eventine is.”

From behind him came a long, low, vicious growl, chilling Timber. Oh shit . He spun around and put his hands up. “Whoa, hold on there, Chief. No need to get all murdery and stuff. I’m on it—bullet points. Give me a sec...”

The trio walked on in silence, faintly hearing cars whiz by on unseen streets beyond the park boundaries, but the critters in the park had all fallen silent when the predators entered.

“Ok, got it,” Timber said, turning around to face Burton, walking backwards. “So Willow owns the Honey Depot and Bruin met her there, but just before that happened, Soren Brenwyn went there looking for Rogue. He found Willow, told her he was a wolf and took her on a date, but they didn’t even make it into the restaurant. Once our team figured out it was him, the chase was on. He got away but Bruin got the girl, and the first time she touched him, his renqua returned.”

Timber spotted a familiar path and pointed at it, heading that way. “Let’s go to the Clink.” The others followed.

They pushed their way through thick brush until they reached the Clink, which was nothing but a clearing with makeshift seats made from logs and stumps, surrounding a natural hole in the ground. Small piles of pinecones dotted the area. Canyon and Timber both grabbed a handful of pinecones while Burton sat down.

Timber stood at the edge of the clearing and lobbed a pinecone at the hole in the center, which was about six inches across, perfect for chucking pinecones or rocks into when they need to think or blow off steam. Someone had lined a portion of the hole with metal, so rocks that hit just right made a satisfying ‘ clink ’ sound.

Timber and Canyon took turns lobbing pinecones into the hole while Timber spoke.

“Later, Seb, Harlan, and Wade interviewed Boe out at Rogue’s house. You’ve been out there, right Chief?”

“Yeah.” Burton scuffed his boots in the grass. “He’s dying.”

“Which could present a problem—he says he stole Khain’s power of omnipresence, and he’s holding it inside himself—he doesn’t know what’ll happen to it when he dies.”

Burton picked up a rock and threw it in the hole. “It’ll go back to Khain.”

Timber and Canyon looked at each other. That was the worst-case scenario.

“Boe’s marked—you’ve seen it?”

Burton grunted affirmative, eyes on the ground.

“The only other marked foxen he knows of is his sister Adil, who he hasn’t seen in a hundred years or more, not since they were children.”

Burton looked up sharply. “He was marked as a child?”

Timber nodded. “Both of them were. He thinks he might have been three or four when it happened.”

Burton winced, then opened his mouth like he wanted to ask a question, then closed it again, his expression troubled.

“He says he remembers nothing but the pain and the terror of it, and watching his twin sister also be marked by a demon who said he was their father. Other than that, most of his childhood and the rest of his life is blank to him.” Timber paused, chucking another pinecone in the hole, before picking up more. “He said it was hard and he suffered a lot. He tried to be loyal to Khain but it stressed him out constantly. The only thing he recalled clearly is, just before Ella came to the Pravus, he had a dream that Rhen told him ‘the Promised’ was not a promise for Khain, but rather a promise to Boe himself, and this meant his time was served and his duties were fulfilled, and he could escape with a clear conscious.”

Burton stood and moved to the edge of the clearing near Canyon. He crossed his arms and leaned against a tree, frowning at Timber. “He dreamed Rhen told him that?”

Timber nodded. “Our informant in Chicago knew about it without us saying a word. He says it was a hidden sign in the Vahiy. It has something to do with the tether we told you about, and with a foxen prophecy called the ‘300 Year Bondservant Tether’.”

Burton scoffed. “ Foxen don’t have prophecy, all they have is the Vahiy, and that’s not true prophecy.”

Canyon and Timber looked at each other.

“They might though,” Timber said.

“They don’t have Citlali so how can they have prophecy?”

Timber thought carefully about what to say next. “On a scale of 1 to 10, how sure are you that they don’t have Citlali?”

Burton’s frown slowly turned from mulish to suspicious, as he watched Timber, likely thinking about digging into Timber’s mind to find the truth there. “Are you saying they do have Citlali?”

Timber shrugged. “I’m not saying anything, but we have an informant who says they do,” he said, even though that wasn’t quite the truth.

“Wait,” Burton said, pacing around. “If there’s foxen Citlali—” He stopped short and pointed a hand at Timber. “If there’s foxen Citlali , I need proof.”

“Got it, Chief. It’s on our list,” Timber said with a grin and a glance at Canyon, who was also grinning. “Anyway, right after our team interviewed Boe, Shay—still in a coma—had her young. Two males. So far, they look like normal human babies. No red eyes or powers. Shay’s boyfriend showed up and took her and the young with Sebastian following him. Since then, Seb’s been on round-the-clock baby surveillance and we were assigned to take over the Abigail White investigation.”

Timber snapped his fingers as something popped into his mind. “Oh, wait, we haven't been showing you the pendants.”

He and Canyon gathered close to Burton as Canyon pulled up pictures of the pendants on his phone, swiping through them slowly. All were gold with an angel on one side, and either a wolf, a dragon, or a bear, on the other side.

Timber spoke as each picture appeared on-screen. “That’s Ella’s, that’s Heather’s, that’s Dahlia’s. Cerise doesn’t have hers—Khain took it to the Pravus. Rogue doesn’t have hers—she never did, but these are two she found in Grey’s hideout. Cerise has this one now, and Leilani has that one, but she says it’s actually hers—Grey took it from her mom. Here’s Willow’s—see the bear?”

“I see it.”

Timber and Canyon moved back to the edge of the clearing, Timber still speaking, Canyon scooping up handfuls of pinecones for both of them.

“Those’re the six we have—there’s one more, but we can’t get a picture of it until Troy shits it out.”

Canyon mimed gagging. And cleans it with bleach.

Burton shook his head. “I don’t even want to know.”

“He swallowed it whole during a fight so Grey couldn’t get his hands on it.”

Burton growled lightly. “Good wolf.”

“Now, after all that, you’d think we’d all get a break but no, BOOM, Track and Treena were born conjoined and surgically separated. Treena shifted right away, but Track didn’t. We thought he couldn’t, but he could speak ruhi super young—you know that.”

Burton smiled like a doting grandfather. “He only says the one word though— rowr .”

Timber whipped three pinecones into the hole in rapid succession, saying, “We’ve heard they have powers now, but they have to be touching to do it. Cool shit like moving stuff with their minds, heavy stuff, too.”

“You don’t have to tell me—they turned me upside down a week ago,” Burton said, making Canyon and Timber laugh.

“So later on, Bruin tried to take Willow to his house, but Leilani traveled through time and stopped them right before they walked inside and the place blew up. Turns out his dad rigged the house to blow, trying to kill him. Bruin went to confront his dad and found him calling on Khain to bring back the bearen renqua .”

Burton shook his head. “Stupid-ass bear. Renqua come from Rhen, not Khain.”

Canyon laughed. Super dumb.

“Abigail White was there, she was the one who summoned Khain,” Timber said.

“She is working with him! She could even be Boe’s sister.” Burton raised his cupped hands, palms out.

Timber scooped up a handful of pinecones and gave them to Burton, then said, “She’s not Boe’s sister, we know that for sure because she’s not marked. After she was bitten by the fox, the paramedics cut through her shirt and there’s no mark on her chest.”

“She hid it,” Burton said, with no conviction in his voice.

Timber shrugged. “Could be, if that’s possible.”

“She’s working with Khain though, how else did she call him?”

“We don’t know—but maybe it’s just a power she has and Khain doesn’t know it was her.”

Burton whipped the entire handful of pinecones at the hole in frustration, then faced Timber, arms crossed, face irritated. “That’s stupid! Why don’t we know this shit?”

Timber held up his hands. “Look, Chief, Canyon shook a Magic 8 Ball all day and nothing popped up, but we’re working on it. Remember the foxen tether we told you about? Where certain foxen have to live in Serenity, close to Khain?”

“Uh huh.”

“Our informant in Chicago says the purpose of the tether is so Khain can find foxen in the Ula, but most of the foxen don’t want to be found—don’t want to be his servants, and Abigail White definitely doesn’t want to be found. Just like she’s hiding from us, she uses magic to hide from Khain. It just makes sense that she could call him somehow, but still hide from him once he got here.”

Burton calmed. “Yeah,” he said. “Okay. I can see that.”

“So that’s what we think happened. She called Khain to the Ula, then she disappeared—not literally, just once Khain showed up, the bears lost track of her. Khain marked B3, then the bears fought Khain off and he retreated to the Pravus. We held B3 in the cellblock for a few weeks, then took him out to Cook Correctional Center where he’s been ever since. He hasn’t shifted and says he won’t, not for the rest of his life—he’s scared if he shifts Khain will be able to control him.”

“Smartest thing he’s ever done.”

“Bruin and Willow left to return bearen renquas all over the world—they’ve been gone for almost three months now. Last we heard they were in Japan.”