Fated Hearts Ch. 08

"Do you mind? I can't bathe with you watching me like that." She frowned at him, the wheels spinning her escape in her head.

"Women..." he grumbled, clicking the door shut.

Thessa leaned over the tub, watching the as it filled with water. She stood up and took off her T-shirt, skirt and bra. The huge room had no windows and only one exit: the door that she entered it from. After she checked to make sure the water was warm enough, Thessa slid into it with a sigh. She looked down at her feet sticking out of the other side of the tub and wiggled her toes in the cold air.

The suddenness of the idea that hit her nearly made her bang her leg on the steel faucet. It was too perfect. She'd been eating mostly the vegetables, fruits, and whatever else Amelie brought for Thessa in the little satchel every day, so she had enough strength to sustain a shift. What better time than the present?

Thessa stepped out of the tub, shivering as the air cooled her soaked skin. She held her breath and visualized the animal. As the bones in her body condensed and elongated, she felt herself melting slowly until she lay on her belly. Her arms and legs shrunk into themselves and she felt her tongue slither out to scent the air. A snake was probably the easiest, most deadly thing she could shift into: It was the first thing that a young shifter learned to change into other than the pack animal she was required to shift into. She was fast and only had to strike once.

Naturally, she shifted into the deadliest one she'd ever seen. The bitis ariens, commonly known as the puff adder, was a snake she'd only ever read about. Its temperament was worse than her mother on a bad day, and its venom was potent and it was good at surprising its prey. So it was with great pleasure that Thessa slithered into the pile of her clothes in wait. The yellow and green shirt she wore was close enough to the color of her scales that she could keep her head above the pile.

"Hey! Hurry up in there!" The guard yelled at the door.

Or what? Thessa thought wickedly

"I'll come in there after you if you aren't ready by the count of three!" He shouted.

"One..." He started.

Thessa smiled, and readied herself for the attack. By the time the guard barreled into the door of the bathroom, she was ready to strike.

"Son of a..." he started, noticing the pile of clothes.

As he bent down, Thessa took the chance to dart out and latch onto his arm, large fangs injecting the debilitating poison into his muscles. While he yelled from the shock of the burning venom, she slithered up the sleeve to his shirt and wound herself around his neck. Inside the snake, Thessa took a deep breath and visualized another animal: this one hundreds of pounds heavier and stronger than the little adder she was before. The sheer force of her change toppled the guard to the ground. Thessa contracted the boa's powerful muscles and smiled to herself as; at last, the guard stopped breathing.

Don't stop now. She willed herself back into an adder and slithered out of the bathroom and up the cord of one of the security cameras.

This is just too perfect. She laughed to herself as three other men came running down the corridor.

"I don't care if he's not responding to the fucking walkie-talkie...make sure that bitch is still there. Goddamn incompetent fools." Dennis yelled behind them.

Thessa struck just as he barreled past her.

Too late, Dennis. She laughed, sinking her fangs into his neck. He swung around and grabbed her just below the throat.

She laughed even harder.

Dumbass!!! She forced herself to shift into the boa again, winding her body again around his neck and squeezing. She didn't let go until she felt his spine being crushed.

She shifted once more into a house cat, streaking through the hallway to the stairs leading upstairs. She almost knocked Amelie over.

Amelie! Amelie!

"Oh, where are you off to kitty?" The little girl turned, forgetting where she was going.

She shifted to a hybrid form. "Amelie, it's me Thessa!" The words sounded strange coming out of the cat's mouth.

"You need to hide me." She said before shifting into the cat again and jumping into Amelie's arms.

"Hey you, kid!" A guard huffed as he ran up the stairs.

"You see a big snake come through here?"

"No, sir. I haven't"

Good girl. Thessa purred and nuzzled Amelie's chin.

"I was going to take my cat to the vet downstairs but if there's a big snake loose...I don't want it to hurt my Mittens!" She cried.

Thessa was impressed, if not a little disgruntled as her friend's little arms squeezed her closer. The tears even seemed real. She's used the trick countless times to get what she wanted as a very small child.

"It's okay, little one. Just let a grown-up know if you see the snake." He awkwardly smoothed her hair before running off.

"I'll take you to my mamma. She'll know what to do." Amelie whispered in Thessa's ear.

~*~

"I see..." The woman nodded.

"I'll help you. But Amelie, you're forbidden to interfere anymore. That was a brave thing you did, but I can take over from here."

"Yes mamma."

"Thank you so much. This is all so complicated and..." Thessa choked back a sob.

After the adrenaline had worn off from her escape, Amelie's mother Brigitte, allowed Thessa to collapse on the bed in their room. She brought water and a few painkillers. Thessa refused the painkillers, but downed the glass of water in one gulp. Her throat had become raw from crying. The weeks she'd held back her emotions poured themselves out with her tears. It felt good to have someone take care of her.

"Your mate...he can't be dead. It has to be a lie." Brigitte assured Thessa, sitting on the edge of the bed.

"Maybe you will feel better after a nap." She smiled, pulling the covers up to Thessa's chin.

"Thank you. I can sleep in a chair I don't want--"

"It's okay you take the bed. The sofa is a pullout. Amelie and I will sleep there."

"Thank you so much, again." Thessa yawned. For once sleep came easily and peacefully.

~*~

She kicked and screamed for all it was worth. The door in front of her was ajar like the gateway to a foreign world.

"Let me go!" She screamed.

It was like she hadn't even spoken. Her gaze was drawn to the scene Dennis was forcing her to watch. The two other men had gotten Eric tied up. The one she knocked out, Anton, was taunting her mate. Her wolf surged forward furiously. Time seemed to slow as the black hooded figure rose from the couch. It had somehow become dark as her vision tunneled to the glinting steel of the wickedly curved knife in its hand. Thessa felt the color leech from her face. Those brightly gleaming green eyes flickered in excitement. She opened her mouth and felt the scream leave her lungs as everything rushed back to her: the color of the bright yellow walls, the green and gold throw pillows and the earthy brown wooden floor. The sound of Eric's struggle drew her attention when, like a lamb led to slaughter, the two men pinned his shoulders down. The slick sound of flesh being sliced into almost caused her to faint, but Dennis shook her awake.

Watch. He seemed to say to her. Watch as that monster ripped her helpless mate to shreds. The drug they shot into his veins paralyzed him, but his incoherent screams of pain were clear as he was mutilated in front of her. Body parts littered the wood, his blood seeped in between the boards as his last gurgled breath left him.

NO! She screamed surprised to find herself free from Dennis' grip. She looked around. He wasn't behind her. Thessa raced down the too long hallway to the room, slipping on her mate's blood to land on her hands and knees in the pool surrounding him. She clutched his shoulders and ignoring the awkward slump of his dislocated shoulder, Thessa half expecting him to scream in pain and beg her to take him to the hospital. Or to shift and heal. But he did neither. His stiff body lay cooling and dead in her arms as she screamed her sorrow at the walls. She pressed kisses all over his bloody face stopping at last where his lips once were.

"Thessa?" She heard her name and looked up.

"Eric?" She gasped, looking up.

The dream usually ended in Dennis arriving with a needle.

"What are you doing here? What is this?" He asked, looking down at a mutilated copy of himself.

"Eric where are you? Are you alive?" Thessa dropped the body. It disintegrated into dust at their feet. She looked up at Eric in surprise.

"What's happening?" She cried, throwing her arms around him.

"If this is a dream..." She started, stepping back to look at him.

"I don't know. Something really strange is happening that I don't understand. Pavla is making some spell to transfer Sorenan's spirit into my body. Thessa, she's strong. I don't know any magic. I'm just a werewolf. Do you know anyone who can help?" He begged.

"I don't know. I'm trying to get back home. I'm on Effrie Humbart's land...I don't know how to get home."

"Thessa you're not that far away at all. Do you remember our clearing?"

"Yes." She frowned.

"Well of you keep on the road that goes past it, and you leave the pack lands, it's straight twenty minute drive...If you can shift, it'll take only slightly longer than that."
"Okay. I'll leave soon. Will you be able to wait for me there?"

"I'm not sure...it feels like every day I'm getting weaker and less able to figure out where I am and who I am. Just hurry." He stepped back from her embrace.

"Wait, Eric. Please just hold me a little more. I'm dying here without you. And now that I know you aren't dead...I need you." She squeezed his hand and stood on the balls of her feet to press a soft kiss to his lips. Even in a dream they were just as soft as she remembered.

"What do you want Thessa?" He buried his face in her hair, inhaling the spiciness of her cinnamon scented shampoo. His fingers restlessly rubbed her skin.

"I want what it was supposed to be like, Eric." She looked up, her eyes glassy with unshed tears. She blinked and one rolled down her cheek. "I just want for us to be together without all of this craziness about revenge and death and—" her voice cracked and she pressed her face into his warm, solid chest.

"Please make love to me." She couldn't stop the tears that clouded her vision and obscured the dream-Eric.

"Shh...shh...it's okay. I will, I promise." He picked her up and carried her over to the chaise in the corner.

"Please, can we find a bed? I can't... not here." Thessa looked up at Eric with pleading eyes.

"I don't know where..."

"It's a dream. We can imagine one."

"A bed?"

They both looked as the room transformed around them.

"Too big." Eric shook his head at the pink monstrosity in front of them.

"Too small." They said together, laughing at the cot that was very similar to Brigitte's bed.

"Eric. I can't wait to do this for real when we get out of this mess..." Thessa smiled up at him as he lay her down gently.

"Me either babe we can have a bed just like this one and I'll make love to you on it day and night." He smiled wolfishly and dipped his head to taste her nipples.

"I wish this wasn't a dream..." He murmured, leaning over her to press soft, wet kisses along the column of her neck, over her shoulders and the hollow of her throat.

Thessa sighed, lacing her fingers through his soft hair. A moan of pleasure escaped her lips and she widened her legs for his broad shoulders as he knelt between her legs.

"I've missed this." He murmured as he teased the swollen outer lips of her pussy with his broad tongue.

Eric took his time, wishing that the lazy serenity of his dream would transcend to reality. He'd been retreating more and more into himself as Pavla started her...experiments. Some of the retreat was voluntary, most of it involuntary. It was like some unknown force was slowly but surely separating the essence of who he was from his physical body. He delved into his mate's folds with renewed vigor. If this was the only way he could have her until they found a way to physically be together, then so be it.

He pressed a kiss to her distended clit, flicking the nub with his tongue as Thessa writhed in pleasure in front of him. The sight of her wild hair fanned out on the pillows as he brought her closer and closer to her orgasm nearly made him lose control. Her moans sounded nothing like the tortured cries he'd heard while he watched her react to the illusion in her mind of his death.

"Are you really alive, Eric?" She gasped in response to the feel of his thick fingers entering and retreating from the warmth of her tight hole.

"Do you want to find out?" He asked with a grin, standing above her.

Thessa grinned back and took in the broad chest that tapered down to lean hips and the equally appealing erection jutting out from a light dusting of pubic hair so fair and fine that it seemed nonexistent. Before she knew what she was doing, she'd leaned close enough to feel the heat radiating from it like a live coal in a fireplace. She pressed her cheek against his hard abdomen and inhaled his scent. He smelled like sweat, man and his wolf: all hers. Thessa teased the shaft with her soft lips and flicked her tongue over the head tasting the drop of precum that leaked out. Eric's content sigh encouraged her to lean forward, hands cupping his firm ass as she slowly took him into her mouth: further than she thought she could in real life. He hissed in pleasure and fisted his hands in her hair, pumping his hips to slowly fuck her mouth.

He isn't fucking your mouth. Her wolf corrected.

This is love. You're giving it freely and he's only taking it because you want him to. The animal continued.

Thessa pulled back, pulling her mate with her as he blanketed her with his warm body. When he entered her, she gasped and tilted her hips upward, her pussy greedily squeezing him.

"I see something else missed me, huh?" He joked rolling his hips until his entire length was sheathed inside of her warm depths.

"Shut up mate. Make love to me." She laughed.

~*~

Thessa woke up with tears staining the pillow under her head. Her body felt sore, but in the way she'd grown accustomed to when she was with Eric. A deliciously mind-numbing heaviness kept her in bed until Brigitte and Amelie came running into the room.

"Quick, Thessa, you have to hide. The guards are back to search for you." Brigitte huffed, leaning over to rest her hands on her bare knees.

From the looks of it, Brigitte and Amelie had been in the flower garden. Amelie's mud streaked rain boots had tracked the dirt all the way into the bedroom.

"No. I have to leave. There's nothing I can do here to save my man. I thank you for helping me though. I'll come back some day to visit when this all blows over." Thessa shook herself awake and began packing the little bag that Amelie had given her. She mentally went over her list of belongings: a shirt, a bra, and a pair of frayed jean shorts.

She nodded and discarded the long t-shirt she fell asleep in.

"Amelie open the window." Brigitte ordered, slipping through the doorway into their small kitchen.

"Here. You'll need it." She thrust a ZipLock bag full of trail mix and a bottle of water into Thessa's bag.

"You don't have to—" Thessa started, only to be shushed into silence.

"Don't even worry about it. Go! Keep running until you see a pond. You'll be on...no that isn't Sorenan's pack land anymore..."

"That's exactly where I'm headed actually. A few miles you say?" Thessa felt herself almost burst with excitement.

"Yep." She nodded, "It's about a ten minute run if you go really fast..."

"Thank you."

She forced herself to calm down as she wiggled through the window and shifted into her wolf mid-drop. Thessa's bag dropped out of the window a short time later followed by Amelie's chubby face.

"Bye Thessa!" The little girl whispered.