The Bear

world.

Chapter One

Fuck. Arcas paced in his room, fighting the urge to heal the many bites, bumps, and bruises he’d received as he kept trying to purge the insidious drugs from his system. That those bites and bruises had come from one he considered his sister just made him… What was he feeling? Angst? Frustration? Anger? Well, yes, there was anger. A whole lot of anger, but there were more underlying emotions he refused to process.

He was angry. That he was sure of. In fact, one could say he was way beyond incensed and approaching furious at a rapid pace and there was nothing he could do to stem the tide of righteous anger that filled him to overflowing.

He remembered each one. He remembered their faces, their nasty little comments, how they treated him as a beast, something less than human… less than the animals they had gathered for this modern-day travesty of a gladiator sport. They had treated him like he was an object. Brave in the face of the drugs they had constantly injected into his veins and blew in his face. He remembered them, each and every one of them from the time he opened his eyes in that piece of shit van after they dosed him the first time to the time when they applied electric cattle prods to his back in an effort to make him shift… because there was no way he would ever forget that no matter how hard he tried.

So now he paced as he tried to process what it felt like to be knocked completely off the food chain. They didn’t even want to steal his life energy, they just wanted him dead as if he didn’t matter, as if he didn’t live and breathe and think. They just wanted him dead, almost as an afterthought. And what was worse, they’d made him attack his sister.

He remembered her wolf form screaming at him as he lunged at her, unable to stop the cursed animal within him from acting on instinct and trying to obliterate any threat that would do him more harm. He was grateful he was incapacitated enough not to clearly think or he surely would have done more harm to his sister than he had actually managed. He shuddered as he remembered the feel of not being in control of his own body, of being a visitor in his own mind, screaming in futility, as the world turned into madness around him.

And he remembered his taste…

It was the taste of him, of his blood that gave Arcas the final push to take control of his own body and its actions once more. By then, it had almost been too late. He had been moving in for the kill. Caille, no matter how powerful she was, would not have been able to fight off the power of a god who was still being actively worshiped every time someone looked into the night sky. He would have snuffed her back to her component parts. It would have taken her centuries to re-form and it would have all been his fault.

So, yeah, add guilt to the pile of emotions threatening to drive him insane now, thank you. Guilt for not being fast enough, for not being strong enough, for not being wise enough… just for not being enough. Because of him Kern’s mate had been taken to parts unknown. When he opened his eyes in that rocking van, Thomas hadn’t been there. He could add nothing to the hunt for Kern’s mate, but he did remember each and every face that had hovered over him, had lorded over him, had spit in his face and applied their boots to his body. He remembered each and every one, and they would pay.

And there was him… How could he ever be good enough for Marshal? He himself was weak and useless… and… and… his blood.

Gods above, Arcas had never tasted anything as sweet… Marshal tasted of sunshine, of desert sands and of lotus petals. He had tasted of his forever and that was such a travesty it almost brought tears to Arcas’ eyes because he had almost killed the man.

Caille, a goddess in her own right, would have survived. But The Cat… he was not being worshipped, had never been worshiped because Arcas could taste that in his blood. He was immortal but not invulnerable. If he hadn’t acted when he had, Arcas would have been responsible for the destruction of his own mate.

That was something Arcas could not abide. So he paced in his room, withheld the healing he could have so easily done to his human form, and he did his best to stick to the story The Raven and The Wolf, along with help from his mate, had constructed. It was laughably easy how eager the police were to accept their convoluted tale. The story had all the hallmarks of a movie of the week. There were rich assholes to blame, an insane group of homophobic cultists who had access to poor, abused animals, and there were guns and drugs, lots of drugs. Hell, in this world where people cared more about animals than their own brethren, it was so easy to play the sympathy card. To add to the human interest angle, there was an obvious blended family, a person of color, and the sexual orientation of the one still missing man. The right reporter could earn themselves a Pulitzer with that story. Exotic animals were just the icing on a journalistic cake that was going to be served up on all media platforms, and with today’s sentiment about eating the rich… well, companies and stocks were going to be dropping like flies after a judicious application of bug killer.

Yet now, here he was, pacing ineffectually in his room, feeling his blood pressure rise as he sought to find some outlet for his wrath.

Yes, wrath was the perfect word for the emotions he was now feeling. Wrath and rage were coursing through his body, heating his blood, and making him want to explode.

But it was an impotent wrath for the moment for there was no clear target to aim his ire at, no one single person to blame… but himself.

And fuck, he had never been so angry in his long, never-ending life.

A knock at the door drew him away from his mounting self-anger, and as he spun around, a snarl on his lips, ready to tell whatever well-meaning sycophant disturbing his solitude to fuck off, he froze as a familiar scent suddenly filled the room.

It was -- it was The Cat… his mate… and he smelled concerned. Torn between wanting to hide his face in shame and run away or try and beg for the man’s forgiveness, Arcas’ higher brain functions froze and he stood there, in the middle of his room, a whimper on his lips and an appeal in his eyes, vulnerable as he had never been before.

In the face of his new emotion, this shame, flooding his brain, Arcas, the Little Dipper, The Great Bear, the once greatest hunter in all of Acadia, froze like a deer in headlights.

Chapter Two

Hello? Marshal had tapped on the door he knew led to his friend’s… No, Arcas wasn’t a friend. He wasn’t sure what Arcas was, but he knew he cared about the red haired man more than he probably should for someone he knew next to nothing about.

And it had nothing to do with Arcus throwing himself headlong into danger to save them or how hot he was although, let’s face it, the boy was smoking hot. Marshal couldn’t put a name to why he felt so drawn to the man. From the moment he met him he wanted to be all up in his space, something he was amazed no one called him on. When he had seen the tall redhead struggling in his bear form in that damn pit… he had to do something. No, more like he had been compelled to do something. So he had thrown caution to the wind and taken a leap of faith, hoping everything was going to be okay and his intuition hadn’t failed him.

He did think his intuition was kind of wonky when it insisted he shove his arm into the mouth of a fucking full-grown red grizzly bear but he had done it without really thinking.

Acting without thinking… that was one of the reasons he was on the bad guys’ collection list. And unlike his crazy brother Thomas, he didn’t have any real connection to the protection a partnership with a member of The Hunt offered.

Oh, sure, Manx had accepted him and he was now under the protection of a superior creature, but it wasn’t the same feeling of belonging he noticed circling around Caille and Bran.

Now those two were amazing to be around. They just slipped into partnership like a duck to water. It looked effortless, though Marshal was adult and wise enough to know what appeared on the surface often wasn’t what was going on underneath… keeping to the example of the duck. But now the two of them were locked up on Caille’s floor, probably doing unspeakable things to each other, and he was knocking on the door of The Bear that almost ate him.

That thought was perfect for a kinky sex novel, but now was not the time to be letting his mind drift into a gutter. He wanted… no, he needed to check on Arcas and once again his instincts were telling him this was the correct thing to do.

Hello? Arcas? He knocked again before trying the doorknob. If The Bear was sleeping then he would beat a hasty retreat, but if he was awake… well, maybe they could hold a conversation about what the hell was going on. In addition to easing the push he was feeling toward the redhead, it was better than sitting by and watching tears roll down the unconscious Kern’s face.

That was heartbreaking even in a comatose state, Kern was aware his mate had been taken and was probably imagining all kinds of things happening to Thomas. And the fact the two had a partial bond probably made everything worse. Kern could probably feel Thomas’ despair and was unable to do anything to ease it.

This whole situation was a clusterfuck of immense proportions, and although they were moving as fast as they could to rectify this whole mess of problems, it probably wasn’t happening fast enough for the two star-crossed… no. They were not star-crossed. Marshal would not jinx their efforts by thinking like that. They were confused? No, that wasn’t the right term either. Idiots. They were idiots in love. That seemed to fit.

Before he could stand there and come up with some new and fantastical terms for the two major catalysts for this situation, the doorknob twisted under his hand and the door swung open. Marshal felt his breath catch as Arcas, bruised and angry looking, stood in the doorway, glaring down at him. Why did the man have to be so tall?

What?

Marshal wrinkled his nose as the question was spat at him, tilting his head to the side as he examined Arcas.

His blood-red hair, with its orange highlights, was free and hanging in lank ringlets around his face and shoulders. He was wearing a tank-top, presumably for maximum effect to show off his stitches and bandages for anyone not in the know who was snooping around. He was barefoot, and damn if his toenails weren’t painted black. That was kind of cute… well, kind of hot, Marshal’s brain interpreted, as he felt his cock plump up a bit and take notice. It