Change of Heart 05 - Forging the Future (17 page)

She had lost everything, but that day, she had chosen life. Crane had helped, but she had found her footing and her strength. When she was whole again, she had reached for my best friend, realizing he was the best
man
, and now, years later, she had forged a new life and had a place at Logan’s side. She was a wife because of Crane and a mother because of a surrogate. Everyone in her old family, in her old tribe, had turned their back on her. To them, she was dead. But as she told me often, it didn’t matter. She wasn’t Narae Yusuke anymore; she was Yusuke Adams, so when she told me that it was the
people
who made a home, not the land or the house, I had to listen.

“But it is important to so many people.”

She scowled at me. “Of course, Jin. If this was a farm or a place where generations of people played music, if it was land we’d fought for or something of great significance, then yes, your argument would be valid. But it’s a house on top of a mountain.”

“No, I—”

“And I understand, it was the first place that
you
called home, it was the first place you had a mate, the first place you felt safe, but Jin… come on… it’s Logan you need. It’s Ilia. It’s Crane and Delphine and Eva… and me. It’s your people, nothing else.”

I rubbed the back of my neck as I regarded her.

“And Jin, think about it. If you go to Sobek, Mikhail is there. Yuri is there—well, when he’s not traveling with Domin—and Taj, and even more than that… you and Ilia would be safe.”

“I won’t have Logan give up his birthright for me. That was the whole argument to begin with, that was what his father feared all along.”

“Yes, but did Logan fear it?”

I shook my head. “You don’t understand. The tribe of Mafdet has had a Church as semel since the tribe was created.”

“Of course,” she agreed. “And when was that? Two hundred years ago? Three?”

“I don’t—”

“The tribe of Rahotep is the first tribe, Jin, the very first. You’re talking thousands of years. They trace their legacy back to the pharaohs, and now Domin is saying that the position of the akhen-aten will be one without a tribe because all tribes are his, because all the semels will make up his tribe.”

“I understand.”

“Do you? Because I don’t think you do.”

“Domin’s tribe will be made of only semels,” I said snidely.

“Yes.”

“See, I get it.”

Her eyebrows lifted.

“I do.”

“The tribe of Rahotep will become Logan’s,” she reiterated, in case I’d missed it again.

“I heard him,” I snapped.

“So Logan’s new legacy will be that of the tribe of Rahotep,” she said again, like I’d missed it. “Are you following that? Is that sinking in? The tribe of Rahotep is the largest in the world. It’s the only tribe with its own city, its own palace, its own library of antiquities, its own museum, and its own great feast. My God, Jin, you and Logan would host the Feast of the Valley. You and Logan would be… the rulers of Sobek. It’s just… I can barely wrap my head around it all. He would be the semel-aten.”

“That’s not anything he ever wanted.”

“He didn’t want it
before
,” she informed me. “But he’s not the same man he was ten years ago, or even five. His son will be semel-aten after him—are you getting that?”

“I hear you,” I flared, irritated that she didn’t understand my concern.

“But Ilia can’t succeed his father as anything if he can’t learn to harness his power, and really, there’s only one place in the world for him to safely do that, and that’s in Sobek.”

“No,” I argued. “We could go off to the middle of Montana or an island in the South Pacific or—”

“No, you can’t,” she contradicted. “Because there are other semels everywhere, other tribes, and you’ll be infringing. You’ll be scary to them.”

“We would not.”

“Oh yes you would,” Crane barked, and we both turned to look at him as he charged into the kitchen and crossed the floor to stand in front of me. “You scare everybody. Even your friends, even people who love Logan, like his buddy Justin Cho, cannot have a nekhene cat in their territory. That poor bastard in New Orleans, I bet he drank until he passed out when he got you and Logan out of his city.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking—”

“The hell I don’t,” he ranted. “You are scary. Your son is scary. The only one in your little family who doesn’t make people piss their pants is
Logan
, but he can’t even concentrate on leading anymore because all he’s doing is managing you and Ilia.”

I glared at him. “So Logan’s cursed with both of us? This is what you’re saying?”

His bark of laughter was worse than a slap in the face. It hurt me more. “You’re an idiot and you’re not listening!”

“I’m lis—”

“He worries day and night! What will Ilia shift into today? What will Ilia do today? What will Jin have to do today?
Will I lose my family today?
”

I suddenly couldn’t breathe.

“But all his power, all his warmth, all his kindness and strength, that all comes from you and Ilia. Without either one of you, he’s not the semel he was born to be.”

And I understood that, because it was the same for me. I had been different without him, I would be different again.

“But have you actually thought about it?” Crane urged.

“Thought about what?”

His wicked grin with the squint made me smile in spite of myself.

“Jin, the Shu is in Sobek. Jamal Hassan is in Sobek. He trains the Shu, he’s in charge of them. Don’t you think he could train Ilia to control his power?”

I had actually never thought once about the Shu. Crane was right: the greatest warriors in the werepanther world would be more than well-equipped to deal with Ilia.

“Taj was part of the Shu, then part of your tribe before he left to go to Sobek with Domin. He’s Domin’s sheseru now. He’d be Logan’s if Logan took over the tribe. Logan would get Mikhail back as sylvan, and I understand that Domin has a wonderful maahes.”

I seized on that. “So then what would Yusuke do?”

He laughed at me. “Logan would find a place in his household for Yusuke, and I remain, forever, the beset of the reah, but Jin, honey, how is Sobek
not
the best place for you and Ilia? I can’t imagine any better.”

The
honey
that he’d called me only a handful of times in our lives… only when something was really important, when it was imperative that I heard him….

“Jin?”

“But is it the best place for Logan?” I asked, recovering.

He nodded. “I think so, yes. When we first came, would it have been? No, I don’t think so. When Domin took over, was it then? I don’t think it was then either. But now, now I think it is. Now, I think Logan could use a tribe that is used to dealing with the things like the Feast of the Valley, that understands about protocol, and rules of hospitality, and more than anything, respects their semel and doesn’t expect him to be human.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

He put his hands on both sides of my neck. “Right now, this tribe, the tribe of Mafdet, resents Logan for being distracted, resents him for loving you and Ilia more than them.”

I shook my head but didn’t pull away from his hold. “But a good semel, like a good king, should care more about his tribe than his family.”

“What?”

Grasping Crane’s wrists, I lowered his hands from me and stepped away. “A good semel would sacrifice his mate, or children, for his tribe. The tribe must always come first.”

“Then I’m a bad semel.”

We all turned to the door as Logan strode through it in that fluid, rolling stride he had where it really felt like he owned the world. It wasn’t a swagger, but it was close.

“I made you bad,” I husked as he reached me and pulled me into his arms.

There was no place better to be than trapped against Logan’s hard, muscular body that both thrummed with power and radiated heat. All I’d ever wanted since I met him was to be wrapped around him.

“You make me strong,” he whispered into my hair. “You make me kind and gentle and more caring than I ever would have been.”

I shook my head. “Ilia and I together are causing exactly what your father always said I would when you first found me: we’re taking you from your tribe.”

He began stroking my back with one hand as the other slid up under the red Henley I’d changed into after my shower.

“He said that having a male mate would isolate you from your tribe because many of them wouldn’t understand how you could claim me, reah to your semel or not.”

His rumbling purr was comforting even as his fingers traced over the small of my back and moved lower.

“Logan, you’re confirming all his ominous predictions about your time as semel from all those years ago.”

“Am I?” he asked, his voice a sultry whisper.

I wanted to twist free and talk to him, wanted him to listen to me and see the logic of my argument, but my body betrayed me as the roar of desire caught me off guard, and I shivered in his arms.

“Let me talk to you out here a minute,” he said before he lifted me off my feet, hands cupping my ass as he carried me to the back door.

My head cleared when he stepped out onto the deck. He was forced to let me go when I twisted in his grip, and I leaped back to keep my balance. He reached for me, but I danced nimbly away, congratulating myself on my quickness before I realized I’d backed myself up against the wall.

The smile he flashed me was wicked, all heat and yearning. I was in trouble; I would succumb fast if I didn’t run. But this time, I’d make sure I ran
with
my mate, not
from
him.

I pulled my clothes off and shifted before he got a word of protest out, but then he must have remembered that gallivanting through the forest with his mate was one of his favorite things to do. I waited only moments for him to be there, right beside me, and then we flew down the stairs and across the yard to the tree line.

It was a beautiful night for a run, and in the moonlight, my mate at my side, I felt free and exhilarated and whole. The happiness rolling off my mate was so strong, I could feel it tickling my fur, and I swerved and tackled him, the two of us tumbling head over heels and landing in a warm pile. His purr resonated through my body, and I nuzzled against him, my own sound almost a hum of delight.

After several minutes he nipped me playfully until I rolled to my feet to chase after him. We ran high into the mountains, to the edge of the property, and I had a feeling he was taking me on a tour. He was finishing our talk visually, showing me that what I thought he was giving up was, in fact, only land, as Yusuke had said.

I dived after him, but he knew me and so corrected for my maneuver and bolted by. He couldn’t outrun me, but the huff of breath, like laughter, as I caught up with him, made me growl. Trying to attack his legs was difficult in the bush, and when he simply froze midstride, I barreled past him and rolled into a bush.

When I got to my feet, I found him ready to play, crouching on his front legs, backside in the air, swaying back and forth as he prepared to jump me. I threw myself at him in a snarling, puffed-up ball of fur, not at all resembling the normally regal creature I was. He batted at me as I came at him, sending me careening into an enormous pile of leaves.

In my nekhene form, I was formidable, I could do damage, I was the apex predator. In my panther form, facing off, even in play, against my bigger, more heavily muscled mate with razor-honed fighting skills… I was a mouse to his cat.

The thing was, in my life, I could count the number of times I’d had to fight or spar. Logan could not. A semel was raised to defend, to fight; a reah was not. I was designed to make peace, soothe, and offer comfort before resorting to violence. Semels were trained for combat from the time they first changed. So Logan could send me tumbling away from him for hours, and there was nothing I could do.

When I got frustrated with being bumped and pinned and pounced on and dumped on my back, I finally darted away, only to have him follow fast. When he started driving me in a certain direction, I got the idea of where he was taking me. There was a secret cave only Logan and I knew about, and he wanted us to run there.

I was startled, as was he, that there were so many scents there, and for that to be the case filled me with rage. It was not a human emotion; it was an animal response to another trespassing in my territory, in my den. As we both slunk closer, I heard voices, and immediately my human brain kicked in and understood.

Peter had revealed the location to Russ because he was about to be, in Peter’s mind, the new semel, and Russ, in his wisdom, had given it to the tribe. It was no longer a sacred spot for only the semel of the tribe of Mafdet and his mate. It was for the whole tribe to enjoy… and desecrate. I wanted to drive everyone out, but Logan merely nipped me on the ear to get my attention before he took off in the opposite direction.

I was devastated.

He didn’t care.

In our panther forms, there was no hiding emotion. I could sense and smell the truth on him. He was unaffected.

When we reached the guesthouse again, Crane and Yusuke were there with robes, and as we shifted and stepped into them, I whirled around to plead with Logan.

“No,” he said flatly. “Russ thinks he can seduce the tribe with gifts. I’m sure the gatherings will be lavish—he’ll forgive trespasses that I never would, more money will be funneled to them, and all the while, that which I used to set aside for college tuition, mortgages, retirement, and medical emergencies will be steadily depleted until the reserve is gone. The year after we leave will be a boom for the tribe.”

But after that… two years later, three, Russ would be as hated and vilified as Logan was now. Only then would people remember Logan for the true semel he was. It would take time for their vision to uncloud, and when it did, the remorse would be as great as the desire now to have him gone because he dared to love his mate and child more than them.

“Logan,” I began—but stopped because I smelled blood.