Chapter 1: Kodi the Wanderer

*A/N: This story takes place two and a half years after the events of “Loving the Rogue Ex-Alpha.”*

Thessalia POV

Princess Thessalia Bearpoplar would give a hundred years of her long life to find a safe tree for shelter.

But the wood elf in her thanked the spirits of the Brighmere Grove that the vast rolling plain in the Evenhide Pack territory had no trees. Otherwise, they’d be devoured by the flames of the wildfire in her path.

Although her eyes didn’t water and her nose didn’t run with all the smoke and ash in the air, her stomach churned at breathing in the burning grass and plants. She tucked her long blonde hair, which had come loose from its normal tight, perfect topknot, back into her brown jerkin, then shielded her green-haired best friend, Calyx Hopsage, from the billowing smoke choking the very air and sunlight. 

“Remind me again why we left home?” she said in a calm but edgy tone. “Why did we leave our safe forest?”

“You’re helping me conduct vital research to benefit all wood-elf kind, Thessi,” Calyx answered, looking appalled at the flames, but facing them with courage. “AND helping your brother get out of quicksand by running away from a fiance who makes your tree sad. By the way, if you married High Lord Ilbryen Blacklocust, my tree would never let yours hear the end of it because a best friend is supposed to protect you from those kinds of mistakes.”

“And to protect you from wildfires,” Thessalia noted dryly, her green eyes scanning the wave of wildfire rushing toward them in slow motion. “Especially since you invented this trip largely to help me get away.”

There had to be a clear path somewhere. Elves could withstand extreme heat and flames and were fleet of foot, but they weren’t invulnerable to wildfires. If only their onyx deer mounts hadn’t run away from the flames and left them stranded. 

Calyx huffed. “Do you know me? Have we met? I would go to the frozen lands of the north or to the Wintertail Pack lands to do my research! Saving you and your idiot brother from someone that makes my skin crawl, no matter how charming and handsome he appears–”

“My brother is not an idiot just because his tree got sick!”

“Agree to disagree, Your Highness. Who’s the plant researcher among our people?”

Thessalia dragged Calyx towards a mossy boulder that the fire hadn’t reached. “You.”

“Exactly. I would have helped him if he only ASKED and I wouldn’t have made him promise to grant me a royal boon without telling him what it was!”

Another reason Thessalia had to protect Calyx. Despite what her loyal best friend said, Thessalia was the reason Calyx had thought up this research trip in the land of their wolf-shifter allies. It was one of the safest places in the world for a wood elf and close to home so they could come back when High Lord Blacklocust lost interest and chose another bride. Her beloved brother, Prince Narbeth Bronzewillow, wouldn’t lose his honor or their kingdom. 

Calyx’s secret research project had consumed her thoughts and she could talk of nothing else, but still, preparing for a journey like this took time to do it right. Calyx had fled with Thessalia into shifter lands with not even a day’s notice–if they had more time, they might have at least known it was wildfire season in shifter lands!

Because of that selfless act, Calyx might get hurt. 

Thessalia sprinted for the mossy boulder, dragging the lanky, willowy Calyx along. In front of her, she held an enchanted copper shield that would repel most anything. Streaks of flame sizzled when they struck the round bronze shield. As Thessalia ran, the quiver with her arrows and her bow slung across her back kept hitting her spine. Calyx had the harder burden, because she had to run with both their packs on her back–no problem normally for elves who could lift loads that would flatten humans, but inconvenient when running for one’s life.

Besides, Calyx’s pack had all her notes and research journals, and she would die rather than see them burned. 

“Do you hear that?” Calyx said, panting as she ran.

“What?”

“Listen!”

Tapping her pointed ears, Thessalia listened. Nothing except the crackling of hungry flames.

Wait.

Was that a child crying?

Her sharp vision picked out the small pink child huddled beside the boulder, wailing its heart out. Why, it was so tiny!

“A shifter baby,” she gasped. “Out here all alone, away from the pack!”

Calyx responded with a warrior’s fury. “I always thought wolf shifters were better parents than this! Quick! Use your shield to get us there as fast as we can.”

Her best friend’s ferocity made Thessalia smile. “I’m sure the parents didn’t mean–”

“Your Highness! Stop making excuses and start saving this lost pup!”

Thessalia charged straight for the small pink shape sheltering in the shadow of the boulder. For such a tiny thing, he made a huge racket, wailing and howling for help. She understood the shifter tongue.

“Ma! Da! Gaga! Dee! ‘Ska! Annie! ‘Ro! Kee! Za! HELP!”

She shook her head, wondering if it was just toddler babble or if the words meant something. Other than “Help,” of course.

“Hang on, little one. We’re coming,” she called out reassuringly. 

Calyx called out, “We’re nearly there!”

With the boulder directly ahead and looming like a big mossy thumb sticking out of the meadow, Thessalia dropped down so she knelt beside the shifter toddler.

Wide purple eyes stared at her from underneath messy black hair. The face looked familiar. The shifter child stood up. Thessalia reached out for it. “Come to me.”

He cried, his little face red. “Can’t!”

“Of course you can. I won’t hurt you.”

She tried to hoist him up in her arms but his wails made her ears ache. He wouldn’t budge.

Calyx cried out, “His foot is stuck beneath the boulder.”

Thessalia and Calyx could possibly lift the boulder with their magic and strength, but it would take time and a lot of energy. Calyx tossed her a spade from her pack and Thessalia began digging around the shifter child’s foot, sending dirt and grass flying. Calyx put her hand on the grass and parted it with her forest powers.

A shout echoed close by. “KODI! KODI! I’m coming.”

“DEE,” Kodi shouted.

Thessalia brightened. She knew that voice! “Prince Dirge,” she shouted. “Over there! Hurry!”

The “Dee” that Kodi cried out for was Prince Dirge Cresta of Evenhide. What were the odds she would encounter one of the ruling Cresta family and the Evenhide Pack Alpha Dane’s youngest brother Dirge so soon, not to mention Prince Kodi, one of Alpha Dane’s and Luna Lilia’s children?

Dirge’s brown head bobbed as he made his way toward them at a fast clip, moving on all fours to stay below the heat of the flames. Even as a wood elf surrounded by geniuses and warriors, she’d never seen anything so brave or clever in all her life. 

* * * * *

Dirge POV

He was never going to let his nephew out of his sight again. And even as the Pack Alpha and Pack Luna, his brother Dane and sister-in-law Lilia were going to have to keep better track of the little imp! Not even the demands of working with the newly formed alliance of packs, the Shifter Federation, excused Kodi being left to wander.

With the wall of fire headed his way, Dirge Cresta had been on the verge of shifting to his wolf form but his wolf, Shepard, directed him to yell one more time for Kodi.

Kodi answered, and so did a faintly familiar feminine voice. Not one from the pack. The smell was all wrong. Not a wolf smell, no. A wood elf. And whoever she was, she smelled like goldenberries, his favorite.

He dropped on all fours to the grass and crab-crawled across the dry, crisp green to the moss-covered boulder. A month without rain had turned the meadow into a fire zone, and someone had obviously dropped a hot coal. The hungry blaze was spreading fast.

Once he reached the boulder, he spotted two female wood elves in brown jerkins and trousers, digging his nephew out of trouble. Kodi sensed him and howled. “Dee!”

“Kodi! Thank the Moon Goddess you’re safe!”

One of the wood elves, a blonde woman with striking green eyes, looked up with a small smile. “You’re a cool shade tree in a blazing desert!”

His mouth went dry. He recognized her from a handful of encounters over the last two and a half years. “Princess Thessalia! We didn’t know you were coming.”

“Neither did we, but we don’t have time to discuss it now,” Princess Thessalia Bearpoplar replied. “We’ll have this little pup’s foot free in a second.”

He’d first met her when she came to fight his family’s former enemy Cyran Sinsworth of the Crimsontail Shadows Pack, now Dirge’s brother-in-law, and Cyran’s master Hades Ombra as well as the demonic Dark Goddess, who wanted to rule the earth and watch it burn like this meadow. Princess Thessalia and her brother Prince Narbeth had been fierce allies in battle, and they remained friends of the Evenhide and Crimsontail Shadows packs, keeping a watchful eye out for the return of Hades, whom Cyran had destroyed … for now. The Shifter Federation flourished thanks to great pack leaders as well as allies like Princess Thessalia.

Although Dirge had been impressed with the beautiful and brilliant Thessalia before, he never felt the awe and gratitude that he did now, seeing her and a green-haired wood elf girl pull a squirming Kodi away from the boulder. And he’d never noticed that she smelled of goldenberries–the way he’d always known his fated mate would.

He rushed over to hold and comfort his nephew. “Kodi, how many times has your mama told you not to stick your foot where it doesn’t belong?”

“Don’t tell,” Kodi whined plaintively.

“Sorry. This isn’t just you spilling your porridge on the floor..” Dirge cuddled Kodi, who inherited his mother’s eyes, his father’s black hair and their daring hearts. “I’ll have to tell them, but first we have to get out of here safely. I don’t suppose either of you can teleport?”

“We can, but it might not work,” Thessalia replied. 

Dirge’s eyes opened wide. “That’s right! Some of your spells are stronger inside your grove, close to the trees you’re linked to.”

The other wood elf grunted in approval. “This one knows a twig from a dagger. And we’re still novices in magic.”

The heat of the fire threatened to melt Dirge. He looked up and saw the flames encircling the boulder like an ocean inferno. Fenrir’s guts!

He put Kodi on his back. The pup was clingier than a limpet and would stick to him.

“Climb on the boulder,” he shouted, scaling the side of the boulder that had handholds. Thessalia and her companion climbed behind them until they reached the top, which was flat, thank the Moon Goddess. They stood on top of the boulder and gazed out at the sea of flame flickering around them as far as the eye could see. 

Thessalia’s breath came out in a whoosh. “That was quick thinking.”

“Let me guess. Levitation was out of the question,” he said.

Thessalia grimaced. “We can levitate but I didn’t think of it.”The other elf looked shamefaced. “I was too worried about little Kodi, the princess, and my research notes, in that order. Maybe we can levitate and hope this fire burns itself out?”

“Not as dry as this grass is, Calyx,” Thessalia told her. “I think we’re stuck!”

Kodi howled softly and Dirge howled soothingly in reply. “We’ll get out of this, Kodi. We’re Crestas! We always find a way.”

But what were they going to do?