Total pages in book: 254
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
Smiles crept over their lips.
And I had to try not to flinch because in their mouths were sharp, needlelike teeth. I’d always thought they were herbivores….
“You may be your father’s daughter, but you are also your mother’s daughter. Our brethren to the south lived among her people for a time,” they answered.
I wanted them to elaborate so bad, but that was all I was going to get when the gnomes deemed our conversation over and marched in the direction of the tree they had come from. The light from their torch gradually disappeared into the darkness in a way that made no sense because the trunk didn’t look deep enough.
I stared at that tree. I stared at it for a long time. Until twigs snapped and leaves crackled in the distance. Until red eyes and a blue flame came running straight at me from a distance.
And that—he—was the only thing in the world that could have made me smile when my nose felt funny and my fingers tingled over the conversation I’d just had.
Duncan charged over, leading the way with Agnes at his heels, Pascal behind her, his tongue hanging out. The adult wolves were further back, loping gracefully through the trees without the urgency that my donut had.
I held out my arms, and Duncan jumped into them, knocking the wind out of me when he landed.
“Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes.”
He was real. He mattered. He—
“Dunky, why is your face wet?” I cried out as he licked my cheek, hoping to the freaking universe that he’d found a creek and that it wasn’t bodily fluids that had his snout soaked. “Oh,” I whimpered, not moving an inch or trying to stop him from licking me but fully aware I was rolling the dice letting him rub all over me like this.
He kept licking, and it was a warm nose nudging at my right hand and the feel of fur at my other that distracted me from what could be water, blood, or worse. Pascal was sniffing my fingers, and Agnes… I didn’t know what Agnes was doing, but I thought I had felt something brush my leg.
“Oh, fine,” I laughed, giving up. Dewormers and antibiotics existed for a reason. There was soap and water, and clothes could be replaced.
“Love, Love, Love, Love, Love.”
Duncan licked and licked my chin and temple, his tail a flutter of emotion and happiness as he jumped and pounced. Little paws pressed down on sensitive places of my body, but it didn’t matter. If joy caused some bruises, it was a small price I was more than willing to pay. And then Pascal must have joined in because someone was pressing a bigger body against my back and sides, and I opened my arms and hugged the puppy bodies that were… yeah, they were both wet and I still really hoped they’d found a creek in the last hour.
“YES, LOVE, YES, LOVE, YES, YES, YES, LOVE, LOVE,” Duncan pretty much shouted, he was that pumped.
“Did you have the time of your life?” I asked, still laughing, soaking up his excitement.
I scruffed up their sides. I hugged them. One body then another. Then I did it again, affection and happiness making me smile. No wonder these puppies were raised by everyone. How could you not love their love?
And I kept on smiling as a reddish-brown wolf trotted over, his snout nudging one pup, then another, Agnes—who at that point was hanging out off to the side—getting one too. Familiar eyes met mine, and I squinted, “Randall?” I asked.
One of its ears twitched, and I grinned.
There was a low woof as a dark wolf lumbered over on ridiculously long legs, and I watched Randall edge away. Wolf Henri’s amber gaze was bright and glowing as he came up to us, a skyscraper in a village. His head dipped, and that long snout nudged at my arm.
“You want a scratch?” I asked slowly, surprised.
A face that would have made Little Red Riding Hood wet her pants stretched close until his warm nose grazed my cheek in the gentlest brush.
I didn’t move. “Yes?” I asked, making sure.
That soft, warm nose edged back toward me, going right for my neck. He was snuffling. Soft puffs of breath had me almost shivering as he smelled me.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” I warned him.
Wolf Henri’s nose grazed my neck a little more, and it wasn’t fear that made me tense up exactly, but it was one thing to let human Henri smell one of the vulnerable spots on my body, and it was a different thing to let His Royal Wolfiness do it. For one, because I’d seen his teeth. I had survived Duncan’s teething stage, but just barely. I could only imagine what adult wolf teeth could do. Then there was the other reason—it tickled.