Her Grey Men

Old Bones

Jennifer.

Hell yeah I want to see where my mate came from! I wanted to see how this man grew up. He’s my mate, so I felt that I should know as much as possible about him. When Dave asked Brian to go on this ‘quest’ as he put it, my husband suggested that we make a weekend of it. 

Well, a get away at any rate. I know we are leaving on a Monday. Dave’s boss was going to take us to the Sand Clay pack house to look around, and see if anyone was still around. I didn’t know how I felt about it exactly, but I wanted to be there for my mate. We have gotten closer since we completed our mating and were settling into a comfortable life. Once news got around that he is my second mate the rest of the pack members didn’t even look twice, they just accepted him, and my decision to keep him. For the wolves this seemed more natural than having a fairy for a pack leader, even if they did like Brian. 

Right now we are sitting in the conference room that is at the end of my office hallway speaking with my captains. I needed to have everyone set up and comfortable before we left again. Leaving my Dad in charge last time was an emergency situation. This time I had time to brief everyone their expectations. 

“Okay Tony, just keep the active patrolls on target, change up your schedules as needed, and make sure that you keep the police in the loop.” He nodded and jotted down notes as I instructed him. “Sophie, you are already in charge of the catering side of the house, just make sure your guys keep up with their physical training as needed.” Sophie nodded understanding that just because her squad had a day job, it didn’t mean that they could slack off. It’s one of the reasons her squad moved to second from fifth in so little time. “Okay Matt, what do you have for me as far as construction requests go?” I asked, directing my attention to the third captain. 

“The elementary school has put in an order for a new HVAC system, but after our inspection we have decided to turn it down unless they hire a hazmat crew. My guys found that their insulation is purely asbestos. Kind of expected that, but it is still a disappointment, because the school was built after the regulations changed.” I shook my head and wrote down the notes that I needed. I would fill out the reports to send to state myself on that matter. 

“Thanks, Matt, let me know if they try to pull anything shady while we are gone, I’ll make sure the paperwork is filed before I leave.” I instructed. “Okay Mike, what are your plans for this week?” I didn’t have any specific tasks at hand, and required my captains to be pretty autonomous unless we had issues. 

Mike grunted, then flipped through his note pad. “Well I have given half my guys to Matt, for the school project, and I have two that just found their mates, so have given them the week off to move and settle, the last three are rebuilding the pack playground with me.” 

I nodded, “Great taskings. Okay, Jannet, I’m assuming you are just going to keep running the clinic and supporting the human emergency room as usual?” my pack doctor nodded and just handed me the report of injuries and sick members. “ Okay Hank, how are our new guys?” I asked my fifth squad captain. After Sophie started a catering business we decided that the fifth squad would be where all our new warriors would be trained up in, leaving the sixth to the Doctors. 

“They are doing really well, After, uh, Dave taught the class a few days ago most of the pups that were having a hard time catching on were able to grapple with me without tapping out.” Hank beamed with pride in this group of fighters. I smiled at his enthusiasm. Hank was always awesome to work with, he really enjoyed the teaching aspect of being in charge of our new guys. 

“Okay, great I think that wraps things up for this week, this afternoon, Brian, Dave and myself will be working with the council on a few matters, and should return by wednesday. If anything changes my dad is on hand for emergencies, but I will be available by phone too.” I dismissed them but they awkwardly hung around for a time. “What’s up?”

Tony cleared his throat and spoke up. “First this is a late congratulations for you and Dave, but that kind of brings us to our question.” Tony paused and passed glances around the table before continuing. “Do you plan on handing Alpha to Dave, if so when?”

I flinched. My guys were smart, of course they would notice what was going on. So I answered truthfully. “That’s kind of why we are leaving for a few days. Once we have a few things figured out, yes I will become Luna. But we want to make sure that there are no conflicts first. Especially since Dave is still technically one of the council's Grey Men.” My answer satisfied the room, and everyone filled out to take care of their tasks. 

Dave placed his hand on my shoulder and said. “That went better than expected. I guess your plan to let everyone slowly get used to me worked.”

I held his hand and kissed his wrist. “It only worked because you have true leadership skills, and something about your aura makes people comfortable.” 

On the other side of me Brian agreed. “We’re just confirming our suspicions that you are an alpha at this point.” I quickly finished the needed paperwork and made a few phone calls while my mates grabbed our backpacks. Now I just needed to wait. 

Maggie should be opening the door any moment now, I was tense with the anticipation. I don’t think that the pack would care if I just went ahead and transferred power to Dave, but after speaking with my dad, my mate wanted to know his origin for sure. Truth be told I sort of wanted to know too. There was a very real possibility that I would have children with this man. I would want to know where my kids come from.

Dave’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He told the mage that we were ready and hung up. The door opened revealing his current boss. She was dressed in some sort of explorer outfit, with a wide brimmed fedora hat, tall boots and leather vest. This woman is just as eccentric as they get. Every time that I see her, her behavior and mannerisms have me thinking about the nutty professor. 

“You ready for an adventure?” Maggie excitedly demanded.

“Chill Dr. Jones, we are just going to look around.” Brian said jokingly.

Maggie looked at him bewildered. “My name isn’t Jones?”

I shook my head, chuckling “He’s talking about Indiana. You know the movie?”

The mage inspected her clothes, then smirked. “Oh.”

Maggie reopened the door in a dark and dusty office, barren of furniture except for some built-in shelves and file cabinets that were bolted to the floor. The windows were yellowed and covered in a film of dust. One unsettling thing that I noticed after turning around in the room was that the door faded into non-existence as soon as it was closed behind us. 

I pointed at the gaping hole in the wall that we just walked through. “Um, is that going to be a problem?”

Maggie shrugged. “I can use any door.”

Dave went right to the file cabinets and opened all the drawers finding them all empty. “Figured as much.”

So we went looking through the empty pack house in search of anything. We looked through the bottom floor and the basement, and stuck together as a group, we’ve seen way too many horror movies to split up, and the feeling in this house was chilling. One thing that kept nagging at the back of my head was that Maggie said she could use any door, but every room that we looked in had their doors removed. 

Maybe the second floor would prove more hopeful. So we climbed the stairs. The house got darker the further we climbed, like all the windows had been boarded up. But that wasn’t the case. I used my phone flashlight to look in each empty room that we walked past noting that each door was missing, and none of the rooms had windows. The rooms were never built with windows, at least on the second floor. 

“Dave? Did this pack house always look like this?” I wondered, allowed.

His eyes reflected my light back at me as he turned to answer. “What do you mean?”

“None of these bedrooms have windows. And Maggie, all the doors are missing.” I pointed out. 

For a second panic flashed across the mage’s face. “It’s okay, I’ll just have to make a call.”

I checked my own phone. “Hope you have a sat link in your temple of doom outfit.” 

“Like I would use a phone.” the mage smirked.

We looked around some more finding everything empty. Dave suggested one more location to check for any left over documentation. So we headed to the pack clinic. It was located next to the pack house but was connected by a breezeway and awning. Strangely the sun was already setting, even though we arrived early in the morning in this time zone. We couldn’t have been in that house for longer than an hour. 

“What the hell is going on?” Brian asked the question simmering in my brain. 

The mage was looking more and more uneasy. We reached the pack clinic and found that the front door was missing there too. However, the office door inside was still intact. I breathed a sigh of relief seeing that we should still be able to get home. Dave grasped the knob and pushed the door open revealing the fully furnished office with working lights, exam table, and running computer. Strange. 

Once we all entered the room the door slammed shut behind us and faded just like the one in the pack house office. s**t. I quickly walked through the doorway only finding an empty storage closet. The exam room only had one entry, and now it was gone, replaced with a dead end. We were effectively trapped in a two compartment cell. 

Terror crawled up my neck as the realization set in. the four of us looked at each other not understanding what was going on. We assumed that the pack house would be empty, or at the very most one family of wolves would have stayed behind on the land. But this wasn’t something that wolves would have done. 

The computer started beeping. We all looked at the screen. It was an annoying green background, but had black lettering scrolling across. ‘Hello David. It is good that you have returned.’

“What is going on?” he asked. 

I’m assuming that there is a microphone in the computer, or the room, because more words started scrolling across the screen. ‘It is time. You must complete your task, fulfil your duty. Revive the living, and save the dead. Dance in the shadows, drink the moon, howl at the sun.’ 

“None of that makes any sense!” I shouted frustrated and scared. 

‘Kill the mate, free your soul.’ Chills ran down my spine.

Dave was stricken, and just shook his head in disbelief. “I’m not doing that.”

Suddenly we were plunged in total darkness with nothing but the green screen illuminating the room. The letters started getting bigger and were sending more garbled messages. ‘Eric Weatherhat. Sanga Red. Moss grows in the stone. The golden one glows. The Warg war unjust.’

Maggie stepped in front of the computer screen this time and whispered. “What does that mean?”

This time the screen went blank, and we were left in absolute darkness. I held onto Brian, scared of the unknown. This is the most unsettling thing that has happened, probably ever. “Maggie, can you get us out of here?” Dave asked. 

“I’ve been trying to since the door closed.” Her voice was soft, barely audible if I wasn’t a wolf. I only clung to Brian harder. He wrapped his arms around me, and kissed my head trying to comfort me. 

We had no choice but to wait in the dark. I sat on the exam table with nothing to do other than worry and panic. How were we going to get out of this? It felt like we were in the room for hours, that worried me, because being in the pack house only felt like a few minutes. What is wrong with my sense of time? Where even were we? Did we open a door in another place like the mage does? Or are we still at Sand Clay? 

The anxiety must have sapped my strength because the next thing that I knew was that I was being roughly shaken awake. As soon as I opened my eyes I saw sunlight filtering in through the open door of the exam room in the clinic. “Oh my gods!” I yelled startling Dave who was waking me up. Brian and Maggie were already on their feet standing ready at the door to leave just in case it closed on us again. “When did that happen?” I asked.

“I don’t know, we all fell asleep.” Dave said, helping me off the table. “I was the first to wake up, these two woke up easily, but you didn’t.” 

“Oh, I’m sorry.” I groggily replied. I still feel tired, more than anything. Like I was drugged.

We left the room closing the door behind us. Maggie then opened the door into another office. We didn’t ask questions, we just rushed through to safety. “Um we should stay here for a bit.” She grabbed some blank paper off of the desk and handed it to us with some pens. “Please write down everything that you remember. I’m going to get someone that might be able to help us figure this out.” We each took a seat around the desk to write down what happened. I started with what I remembered on the screen. 

While I was writing everything down I felt my eyes drooping and could barely concentrate. I laid my head on the desk and drifted off back to sleep. I don’t know how long I slept on the edge of the desk, but that wasn’t where I woke up. I heard voices in the background, and an incessant beeping. I groaned and rubbed my face looking around. I found Brian sitting in a chair next to the bed I found myself in. After taking full stock of my situation, I noticed wires and tubes attached to my arms and chest. 

“What’s going on?” My voice sounded ragged, like I had been strangled.  

My husband grimaced. “We couldn’t wake you up. Right now you’re in the council’s hospital.”

“Oh.” I stared at the ceiling.

“I’ll get Dave and the Doc, he just took a break.” Brian said.

Before he could leave I asked. “How long was I out?” 

“Since yesterday.” s**t, what happened to me?

After a short time Brian, Dave and a doctor came back into the room. She introduced herself as Doctor Green then started going over my chart. “So your toxicology is negative for any poisons or tranquilizers. We checked if you are pregnant, that’s negative, so then we started looking at neurology. And that’s where things started getting spooky.” 

“Spooky?” Why would this medical professional say something like that?

“Yeah, so um let me show you.” the woman pulled up an MRI and a couple sheets with a bunch of zig zags. “So this is what the MRI is showing. Looks normal, nothing to show over or under activity, no damage.” Then she put the zig zags in front of me. “But your brain scans are showing that you have a ton of electrical activity going on. Now if your MRI was off we could explain it as damage or a seizure, something treatable. But this activity, and the double lines here looks like a Mage’s normal readings. It’s almost as if you are a channeler.”

“What does that mean?” I asked. 

“Well, if you were mated to a mage, their magic would burn away your animal side, but this is something that is manifesting from inside you, not being pushed in.” The Doctor tucked the folder with my charts under her arm. “I hate having to say this, but I don’t know what is going on with you. But the supreme mage may be able to help.”

I absently listened, not really understanding what she was saying, so I just replied “Okay.”

“I’ll go ahead and discharge you for now, you can go home, and we are just a phone call away. Your mates have all the information.” She left me and my guys alone until a nurse came back to remove all the electrodes and my IV. I quickly dressed and Dave led us back to Maggie’s office with Dr. Green’s findings. 

Maggie took the folder without a word and raised an eyebrow at me. She continued reading before closing the folder and pushing back from her seat. “I’m going to get my dad.” The mage left the office, returning after a few minutes with the man we first met in the headquarters. Immediately his smell hit me again. He didn’t smell human like the mages, but he didn’t smell like any shifter that I have ever met. 

Maggie handed the folder to the man. He leafed through the papers and looked at me with the same raised eyebrow. “Well this is unusual.” 

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah tell me about it.” 

“I haven’t properly introduced myself. My name is Demitri Black. I used to be the supreme mage, and the head of the council, before I met Maggie’s mother.” I nodded, looking him over.

“Why don’t you smell human?” I asked.

“That’s why Maggie brought me in. Hannah was a wolf when we mate bonded. Mages call our other half our beloved, or anchor, because we transfer some of our magic to them to keep us from, well, self destructing basically. But when we bond with a shifter, our magic burns away our beloved’s animal side.” I flinched understanding what he meant. Their wolf dies.

Then I remembered, “But your mate is still a wolf.”

The man nodded, “Yeah, that’s where you have a parallel. What happened is her wolf remained intact and she took all of my power. She gave it back, but she still has power. She is the first shifter mage ever.”

I heard both Brian and Dave echo my thoughts “Wow.”

“So for now, I want you to go home rest, we will be at your service if anything starts to manifest with these readings. Dave, you have been formally released, if you need anything from the council here’s my personal number.” Demitri handed David a card, and stood up. “For now be careful, and try not to have any extreme emotions, I would rather your abilities manifest slowly, once you notice a difference, give us a call and we can start training you, or teach you to safely suppress. You have time to decide.”

Demitri walked out of the office leaving me stunned. Maggie quickly closed the door behind her father then reopened it in my office revealing my dad and squad captains. They were stunned to say the least, none of them had witnessed the magic of mages. Mike quickly stood up with his eyes swirling in colors and locked on Maggie. The mage covered her mouth with tears already streaming down her cheeks. “No.”

I looked between the two of them and smiled, then my expression turned to fear. “No, not him!” Demitri just explained what happens when a mage finds their mate, we can’t lose Mike! He has been one of my best friends since childhood. He would rather die than lose his wolf! My heart was racing and I could feel electricity in the air. Brian and Dave both tried to calm me down, but as soon as their hands landed on me they were thrown to opposite walls. 

Maggie quickly waved her hands in front of me. All sound was cut off from me and I felt like I was trapped behind a bubble. I tried to run to my mates but was held in place, arcs of electricity were leaping off of me. My head began to pound and all I could do was watch the pantomime around me. My captains roused my mates, they looked fine but shaken. Maggie threw open the office door again shouting something, her father came into the office, then suddenly nothing. I don’t think that I passed out again. But there was nothing. I was floating in a shell of my own emotions and couldn’t perceive anything else around me. 

I took a breath and settled myself bringing my emotions back under my control. Steady deep breaths in and out. Once I felt my heart rate return to normal I felt a pop, then my office came back into view. I realized that I was kneeling on the floor like I had been meditating or something trying to regain control of myself. When I looked up Demitri was standing over me. He smirked and snarkily said. “Told you to stay calm.” 

I snorted. “Easier said than done.”

“Always is with Black River women.” he rolled his eyes and held out his hand assisting me to stand. I looked around realizing that it was just me and the mage in my office. “Your mates are fine, just a little shaken.”

I dropped my head. “What about Mike?” I sadly asked. 

“He’s talking to Maggie, don’t worry she won’t let him bond with her unless he knows the risks. It will be his decision.” He explained.

“But what about Maggie then?” If losing her mate, or beloved meant that she could die then was that any better?

Demitri shook his head. “I don’t know what she will decide afterwards. All I can hope is if he rejects her is that her sister can take Maggie’s power before it destroys her.”

I shook my head. “Mike won’t let his mate die. Not if he knows what would happen to her.”

“I know, but then that leaves the possibility of him becoming like my wife, and Maggie becoming a Warg.” Why did that word seem familiar? 

“Wait! That computer said Warg war!” Demitri looked at me with such intensity that I shrank back. His eyes were solid black and held something terrifying. This didn’t feel like a mage thing. It was something dark and powerful boiling under the surface in this man.

He stormed out of my office, I followed him to the back yard where we found Maggie with Mike. They had a hand on each other’s chest and were glowing. What the hell is going on? Demitri stopped in his tracks looking on in horror as he watched his daughter and her mate in some magic ritual. “Why didn’t she tell me about that? Now I’m too late to help her.” 

I watched in fascination as the couple glowed brighter, then slowly dimmed. As soon as the light extinguished Maggie fell to her knees. I could hear the popping and cracking of bones breaking, then the ripping of fabric as the woman began to transform into something with far more power than me. My mouth was agape at the scene in front of me as the woman that was once a mage shifted into a massive solid black wolf. She was larger than anything that I have ever seen before. What’s worse is she looked feral. 

Demitri growled and ran to her shifting into some bipedal monster with a wolf’s head, his clothing just sort of adjusted to fit him. Mike, just stood there like an i***t with his hand extended to the wolf that was a mage. Maggie’s wolf eyes were wild, her lips were peeled back and she looked like she was ready to rend the captain limb from limb. I was frozen to my spot, a helpless witness to the scene unfolding before me. But right before the mage monster thing could get to his daughter and her mate, a beam of light left Mike’s hand and wrapped around the feral wolf immobilizing her. 

Demitri skidded to a stop before them and almost instantly shifted back to his human form. The light forced Maggie to shift back into a human, and Mike pulled his shirt off covering her up. I noticed a crowd gathering around me all wondering the same thing as me. What the hell did I just witness? None of this could be real right?