Broken and Bonded Ch. 17-18

He turned around casually, and his eyebrows shot up in surprise as he faced several bright-eyed young women, all with their attention fixed solely on him.

For the first time he registered the scent of pheromones in the air, and as realisation hit, he stepped back against the ladder.

They were like a pack after their prey, and that prey he saw was him!

Two of the girls sat forward, and slowly came to their feet. Never taking their smouldering eyes from him, they began to close in....

"Matt! There you are!"

The spell broke as quickly as it had formed, and the girls dropped back down as the colour stained their cheeks.

Trudy strode across the room and reached up with bright twinkling eyes to kiss him full on the mouth, clearly stamping her claim on him.

She gave his hand a reassuring squeeze before turning to the women.

"Marcie says that your chores are waiting to be done still." She told them brightly.

She gazed up at him, as the girls reluctantly began to file out.

"Sandra, please could you close the door after you," Trudy kept her gaze on Matt, but the door closing sealed them into their own private cocoon suddenly.

She stood back with a sigh, and Matt followed her and looked at her with open confusion.

"What the hell just happened?" he growled.

Trudy looked at him with exasperation tinged with pity.

"You do realise that you are probably the first male in those girls lives who had treated them with any sort of respect or even kindness and care?"

"Well, I guess...?"

"You were like a kindly uncle in your business suits, and your.... old man work clothes..."

He stepped back in offence. "My old work slacks are suitable for crawling around attics and across roofs, but they were not old man clothes!"

"If you say so," she sighed patting his hand. "Any way since you shifted, you seem to have re-found your vigour, and... she looked him over with feminine approval. "And your choice of clothing seems to have also done a shift for the better."

Matt actually felt the heat in his cheeks, he had never thought of himself as attractive to females. His role for the council had always meant that most feared him and kept their distance especially the females of their kind.

His needs were to intimidate and browbeat wherever he went, and to indulge in any form of relationship, would have undermined that.

Oh, women had often been offered for the duration of his visit, as a 'social gift', and to refuse would be seen as an insult to the host. Besides he had needs like any other, and to indulge once in while had not just been satisfying to himself -- he had always made sure of that.

Now though as Trudy eyed him up so possessively, and the way those girls had watched his movements!

Trudy had watched as the emotions flickered across his face, in a way that she knew only she could read. She grinned suddenly and reached up to gently stroke his jawline. "Poor baby," she murmured, her vibrant eyes locked onto his. "Don't worry my love, I will protect you!"

**

Trudy's claim on Matt had been noted by the girls much to Matt's relief, but it also meant that they shuffled back into their shells around him, and the light-hearted relationship that he had been trying to cultivate with them also died a death.

He tried to shrug it off and tell himself that he was actually relieved, but part of him, deep inside where he locked his alter ego, that part of him mourned the loss of their friendship.

Once again it was Trudy who came to him with understanding and sympathy, and he began to relish his time with her -- just her and him and none of the world's woes.

He wished that he could remember their time before -- when they had been untouched and uncontaminated by others. He felt the memories buried deep, but he just could not shake them loose.

**

As the sun made its way across the sky, on the day of the full moon, it began to hum its energy, felt long before it would be visible, and Trudy began to tap into its influence.

Her bright blue eyes held a metallic glint giving her an alien beauty that captivated Matt as he saw yet another side of this complicated woman's personality.

He had heard how she shunned the moons influence preferring to shift at any time other than the full moon.

Now he realised that it was not so much shunning but more of a deeper understanding of the moon's energy and how and when to tune in to it. Waiting and therefore feeling it that much more acutely when she did open herself to it.

She was soaking up the energy, building her reserves and as he studied her, she actually seemed to grow a little. Taller and leaner, her soft curves toned to muscle, and the years seemed to fall away too.

Her golden hair which had been just below her shoulders when she first arrived, now streamed gloriously right down her back.

The house settled down and its occupants gathered, together in the kitchen at the back. The uneasy conversion dulled down into silence as they waited.

"The sun has almost gone," Sandra whispered with a tearful sniff. "The moon... it...it's here!"

As the heat of the last rays of the sun melted away, the temperature dipped slightly, and Trudy shivered.

Matt draped his arm across her shoulders and smiled confidently at the girls.

"Everything is going to be okay," he told them.

Outside the first howl pierced the early evening and was quickly taken up by other beasts.

"They came for me!" Sandra whimpered.

Matt reached out suddenly and tilted her chin. "No one is going to take you, Sandra! We are all here for you -- to protect you and we will not fail you!" his tone was so determined and held such conviction that Sandra nodded slowly, and her shoulders relaxed.

"Yes," she whispered.

A low growl sounded nearer to the front of the house and Matt turned with a sigh and looked at Trudy.

"Are you ready?"

She nodded firmly.

"Let's go then."

He was determined to try one last time as a man to reason with these -- beasts.

But as they slipped out the side door, they could hear low growls and sniffing as the wolves hunted for a way to get in.

He realised then that they were on a mission and nothing, but a show of superior force would stop them.

The latch dropped behind them and with a low grunt Matt tapped into his alter ego.

He was dimly aware of Trudy also channelling her inner wolf but knew that he could not risk being distracted by her.

He had to stay firm and channel his anger and outrage at what these men -- animals, thought they had the rights of.

"As we discussed," he hissed through clenched teeth.

They slipped silently around to the front of the house and further away from the main building and started to run away from the house and its occupants.

Of course, it did not take long for them to be discovered.

A single howl, and then another, and then more, and they could hear them as they began chasing after them.

Trudy waited as long as she could, luring them further from the house, but just as they came close, she suddenly turned with a snapped. "Now!" And she melted into her wolf form.

Matt did not melt or shimmer or shift.

He exploded into his wolf form, and those who had given chase stumbled to a halt, falling over their own paws, and bumping their snouts into the dirt.

He moved in between Trudy and them, and simply stood over them, magnificent in his vastness and terrifying in his total blackness, as though he could draw all light from the world, all energy from all surrounding life, from these beasts in front of him, these animals who would threaten his mate!

As he stood over them, they seemed to shrink, to wilt to fade, and as they diminished, he grew.

He was sapping their strength, and life energy and drawing it into himself.

He did not absorb all the energy though, standing slightly behind him Trudy could feel him channelling some of it through to her, through the bond that she thought had long ago been broken. And as she felt its strength surging through her, she saw the world around them, with new eyes, and the beasts before them, she saw it all properly for the first time, and then she understood.

Matt was not a shifter in the usual sense. It was not tooth, or fang, or claw with which he fought an opponent.

She now knew why for so many years he had refused to embrace or submit to his alter ego.

The beasts in front of them began to yelp, and whimper and whine as they began to curl into the ground.

They were beaten before a battle had even begun.

And still the black wolf towered over them.

The yelps became panicky filled with pain as the crushing presence of Matt continued to bear down on them.

He would kill them, she realised. Totally and utterly destroy them.

And if he did do that -- if he killed these men, then he would never be able to live with himself as a wolf or a man again.

She shifted back to her human self.

"MATT!" Trudy called out to him. "Come back to me!"

She fell across him wrapping her arms around his huge neck.

"Please Matt!"