Chapter Text
The bench was old, worn, comfortable. The park was empty save for you, most people reluctant to be out during a full moon. Despite the relative safety, old superstitions ran deep. You were more than content to have the whole place to yourself. The moon was bright and revitalizing. You tipped your face up as you enjoyed the sensation of the moon humming through you like a current. It buzzed along your bones and pricked your skin.
As a witch you had an intimate relationship with the phases of the moon. Some good for one thing, others for another. But the full moon was your favorite. It was when you recharged your batteries so to speak. When you felt at peace with the world.
The night was quiet, the noises of the city fading into the background. The breeze carried a chill and you shoved your hands into the pockets of your jacket to keep them warm. Then you felt it. A presence intruding on the perimeter you’d set in your mind. Behind you, moving closer. A steady, silent approach. But no sense of danger came with it.
You didn’t look right away. If magic had taught you anything, it was patience. You sat perfectly still, tracking the movement until a huff of breath came from directly behind the bench. Only then did you turn.
The wolf was enormous, easily twice the size of any natural animal. His coat was dark with flecks of gray scattered throughout. His shoulders were broad and muscled, his head massive. He stared for a moment before moving around the bench to stand in front of you. His ears were forward, his tail low and swinging in a slow, measured rhythm. Not aggressive. Not even cautious. If you had to pinpoint the behavior, you’d call it attentive.
You kept your hands in your lap now instead of your pockets and watched him. He stood close enough you could feel the heat radiating off of him, could smell the clean, wild scent of him. He held your gaze. His eyes were dark brown, almost black in the moonlight and full of awareness and assessment that told you this was no mere animal. There was no threat, simply…recognition.
You stared at one another for one beat, then two. Then he lowered his head and laid the full weight of it in your lap. He was solid, warm. The whine that accompanied the action was a low, plaintive sound that vibrated through you. He watched you with those soft brown eyes. Waiting.
Your hands hovered for a moment before sinking in the thick fur. In that second, you felt something slide into place inside of you with a deep, instinctive knowing. You shifted your hold and began to scratch behind his ears.
He exhaled, a full body release that softened every line of his body. His weight settled more firmly against your legs, his eyes half closing. As your attention continued, he made a small satisfied noise in the back of his throat. His eyes held a human quality in them that was unmistakable. Intelligence and a focus that didn’t belong on anything living solely on instinct.
He had been looking for you, you were almost certain. He’d crossed the park with a single-minded determination and had found you sitting on the bench. Then he’d put his head in your lap like he was coming home.
You knew what this was. Felt it the moment you touched him and the universe suddenly seemed right, complete. You tilted your head. “You’re my mate.”
The wolf lifted his head from your lap. For a moment he just looked at you, his dark eyes steady and intent. And then he whined again, louder this time, with a hint of desperation that wasn’t there before. Before you had time to attempt to figure out what he wanted, he lowered his muzzle and closed his teeth around your wrist.
Your breath caught. His jaws were enormous, capable of crushing bone. But his teeth didn’t press, settling against you with extraordinary gentleness. The pressure was so light it was almost absent. It was just the faint weight of his mouth and the light scrape of a canine against your pulse. Then he tugged.
Not hard. Just enough to say come with me.
“Okay, okay,” you said as you stood.
He released you immediately, leaving not a mark behind. He turned away from the bench and took three steps before he stopped and looked over his shoulder, those dark eyes finding yours. Checking.
You followed.
He led you out of the park and into the city. He moved with purpose, keeping a steady pace that had you taking wide strides to match it. Every half-block or so he would glance back, making sure you were still there. Still following. At crosswalks he paused, waiting for the light even when the street was empty. His nose constantly twitched as he picked up scents from the air. He stopped at lampposts and fire hydrants, sniffing, tracing whatever trail led him on.
You walked past closed storefronts with their security gates pulled down, past a bar with sound spilling from inside. A man stood just past the door nodded at you as you passed, did a double-take at the wolf, then shrugged and went back to his cigarette.
The wolf led you through blocks you didn’t know, turning corners and leading you down questionable alleyways, though you didn’t fear. Between your own abilities and your wolf tour guide, you figured you were safe enough. Then, suddenly, the hospital rose into the night sky in front of you.
Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center. The building was massive. The wolf led you around to the ambulance bay. He stopped at the edge of the pavement, right where driveway turns to walkway and turned to you.
The he shoved his head hard against your hip. The push was insistent, not rough as he nudged you toward the glass doors of the ambulance bay. You put a hand flat on top of his head. “Do you know someone here?”
He let out a frustrated whine and shoved harder. His entire weight leaned into your hip now, steering you toward the doors.
“We can’t just walk into the hospital. I’m pretty sure there are rules about wolves roaming the halls.”
The wolf sat down and stared up at you. His dark eyes were unblinking. You looked down at him. He looked up at you. The standoff lasted a good minute.
“Fine,” you said, finally.
You walked up to the doors and they slid open. A man in black scrubs with a Dunkin cup in one hand glanced over at the sound. He frowned as he saw you standing there. He moved closer. “Can I help you?”
You pointed at your companion, who was still sitting on the concrete right where you’d left him, watching the exchange with what you would have sworn was amusement.
“Does anyone here belong to him?” you asked.
The man’s brows raised and he grinned as he looked at the wolf. “This is fantastic. Just hold on one second.” And with that, the man who never introduced himself disappeared into the halls of the hospital.
You turned back to the wolf. He was still watching you, his tail wagging in slow arcs.
“Well, that was not helpful in the least.”
He blinked at you and you could have sworn he was laughing.
A low concrete wall ran along the edge of the ambulance bay, keeping the minimal landscaping at bay. You settled onto it, the cold seeping through your jeans and the wolf was there before you even fully found your balance. His head dropped into your lap with the certainty of a creature that had decided your lap belonged to him now. You didn’t question it as one hand found the soft fur under his chin and began to scratch.
A low, rumbling vibration of contentment came from him. One of his massive paws joined his head in your lap. You scratched under his chin and waited. The night had grown colder and the warmth of the wolf against your legs was welcome. “Would you like to see a trick?” you asked after a moment.
His ears flicked forward and his gaze met yours. You held out the hand that wasn’t occupied with running through his fur and produced a small ball of blue light you ran over fingers and back again. His tail wagged enthusiastically as he huffed out a breath. High praise, you were sure.
The door slid open and a man in scrubs stepped outside. His gaze found you and you waved a hand through the air to dismiss the light. He took in the scene before him. You on the wall, the enormous wolf with his head in your lap, your hand scratching under the chin before occasionally drifting up to get the spot behind his ears. His face split into a grin wide enough to show teeth and crinkle the skin by his eyes. The laugh that came from him was part surprise and part pure delight.
He walked over to stand in front of you and the wolf lifted his head from your lap just enough to look at the man who reached out and ruffled the fur between his ears with a casual affection.
“Hey, brother,” he said to the wolf. Then he looked at you, still grinning and extended a hand. “Jack Abbot. Night shift attending.” You shook his hand and he said, “Might I ask who you are and how you know our friend here?”
You told him your name before you explained everything. The park. The moon. The wolf finding you on that bench and declaring you were his in the most fundamental way possible. Then you explained about the bond between the two of you.
Jack’s grin grew impossibly wider with every sentence. By the time you finished, he was practically vibrating, his eyes bright with something that looked suspiciously like triumph.
“He led you here?” Jack asked. “Just…follow me human, we’re going to the hospital?”
“Basically.”
Jack looked the wolf. The wolf looked back at Jack and you could have sworn they were silently communicating about something. “This is incredible,” Jack said, and he wasn’t talking to you. He was talking to the wolf who lowered his head back into your lap with what could only be described as smug satisfaction. “Absolutely incredible. I’ve been working with this man for years and I never—” He stopped, shook his head, and the grin came back full force. “Never mind. This is perfect. This is absolutely perfect.”
He watched you for another moment before leaning forward and dropping his voice. “So, you up for a little fun?”
The wolf in your lap made a small curious sound, his ears flicking forward.
Jack’s grin didn’t waver as he waited for your answer. The anticipation on his face was infectious and entirely terrifying.
***
Robby walked through the doors of the ED at ten the next morning, three hours into day shift as was the routine when he was scheduled the night after a full moon. Jack always covering the extra time without complaint. Robby was exhausted as he always was after a run, but he felt oddly invigorated.
Jack was at the nurses’ station, sitting as he typed at the computer. He looked up as Robby dropped his bag beside him and a grin spread across his face.
“Morning,” Robby said with a lifted brow. “You seem in oddly good spirits. How was the shift?”
Jack’s grin didn’t budge as he shrugged one shoulder. “Same as always. Nothing remarkable.” He paused, his head tilting slightly, the amusement in his expression increasing. “How was your run?”
Robby ran a hand through his hair, feeling the residual stiffness in his shoulders, the soreness in his muscles that came from a night spent as something other than human. “Good. Really good, I think.”
He remembered fragments. The park. A rabbit. Moving through the city. The feeling of something pressing, urgent. He tapped his temple with one finger. “Nothing. The usual black hole. But I feel like…something happened. Something important but I can’t fucking place it.”
Jack’s mouth twitched, his eyes crinkling at the corners as that grin somehow got wider. He reached out and clapped Robby on the shoulder. “Langdon’s been holding down the fort. Have a fantastic day, brother. I’m out.” Jack grabbed the bag that Robby hadn’t noticed at his feet and headed toward the doors without a backward glance.
Robby frowned after him. That was…odd. Jack Abbot was many things. Subtle was not one of them. Whatever had that expression on his face was something he was savoring and Robby was almost certain it was going to somehow bite him in the ass.
***
You arrived at PTMC just before noon, checking in at the front and giving your name before being let through. A blonde glanced up as you moved through the chaos toward the central hub. “Dana?” you asked, making an educated guess based on what Jack had told you.
Her gaze flicked over you from head to toe and one side of her mouth curled up as she said your name. With a nod, you confirmed your identity and she smiled wide. “Jack filled me in, said you’re here as part of Gloria’s new initiative to increase the presence of magical healing in the hospital, right?”
You nodded again. It was Jack’s idea. The program was real enough and you actually were a witch trained in healing magic. He’d submitted your name himself this morning and texted you when he got approval. The best cover stories were the most truthful ones, after all.
Jack convinced you to spend a day with Robby as a human before telling him who you were to him. Something about driving his best friend crazy before letting him in on the secret. He’d seemed so giddy at the idea you’d agreed without much argument. It was unlikely Robby would remember anything about the night before, anyway. Getting to know him this way seemed infinitely preferable to just showing up with a wave and saying, “Hey, I’m your mate. How are you doing?”
***
Robby stood in North Four with a med student and a third-year resident, watching as the student conducted a neuro exam. His arms were crossed over his chest as he observed. The resident was correcting a small error the student had made when Robby’s spine straightened.
A scent drifted to him. Warm and layered and completely out of place in an emergency department. Something rich and complex that smelled like rain, the earth and a note he couldn’t name but that pulled at him all the same.
His chin lifted and his nostrils flared. His focus narrowed to a single point, that scent and the direction it had come from. “Finish the assessment. Let me know if you have any questions,” he announced to the room in general.
He didn’t wait for a response. He was already moving, following the scent through the department before he had fully processed what he was doing. The scent led him past staff and countless patients until finally, there you were.
You stood beside Dana, one hip leaning against the counter. You were saying something while Dana listened intently.
Robby stopped when he was maybe fifteen feet from you. Close enough his eyes registered little details about your appearance, about the way you held your hands. Close enough that the scent swamped him.
He knew you.
The certainty was bone deep and inexplicable. He had never seen you before in his life, yet every instinct he possessed insisted that he knew you as well as he knew his own name. There was no memory attached to the recognition, just the raw, incontrovertible fact that he knew you.
Dana glanced over and saw him standing there. Her eyebrow lifted along with the corner of her lips. “Robby.” He stepped closer and she introduced you by a name that meant nothing to him. “She’s part of Gloria’s new program. Here to observe only today.”
You turned to fully face him and your eyes met. “Hi.”
He opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. “Hi.”
He was still trying to figure this out, this familiarity, this pull when you lifted your left hand. A flick of your fingers and a small ball of blue light appeared. You let it run over your fingers and back again before another flick had it vanishing from sight. It was the kind of thing a witch did without thinking, the magical equivalent of clicking a pen.
For a moment, Robby was completely lost to you. A feeling of security that he didn’t understand at all flowed through him. He was all the more certain that he knew you. That you were important. This was driving him insane.
Realizing that he’d been staring in silence for far too long, he cleared his throat. “I should…Patients. I have patients.”
He made himself turn around. Made himself walk through the halls and find another resident to observe, another med student with a question. Anything he could focus on besides you.
He failed miserably.
For the rest of the afternoon, he found reasons to be wherever you were. When you were at the hub, he appeared with a question for Dana he already knew the answer to. Each time, his eyes found you, watching you make notes or talk to some of the staff. He slowed his pace as he passed a bay where you were holding the hand of a small fae child that was awaiting the arrival of her parents. When you were in the break room, he had a sudden need for coffee despite the four cups he’d already had that day. When work pulled him away, he immediately sought you out when he finished, needing to know where you were and if you were safe.
The department continued around the two of you. Traumas came in. Labs were ordered. Consults were called for. Students were taught. And through it all, that scent pulled at him. It was mouth watering and maddeningly familiar. But every moment spent in your presence brought him no closer to understanding.
***
Jack arrived ten minutes before his shift was due to start. The rest of the night shift was filtering in as well, day shift starting their handoffs. He found Robby at the hub, a tablet laying on the counter in front of him that he was absolutely ignoring. In fact, he hadn’t looked at it in ten minutes. He leaned against he counter, arms crossed as he watched you talk with one of the nurses, hands moving. Perlah was laughing and you were smiling, the expression making Robby’s chest feel tight.
Jack stopped beside him. He looked at you, then to Robby and back to you. Then he laughed, the sound drawing Robby’s attention away from his staring. “You are so far gone,” Jack said. He still had that stupid grin on his face.
Robby shook his head and huffed in irritation. “I can’t focus. I feel like I know her from somewhere. I’ve been like this all day. It doesn’t make any sense.” He ran a hand over his beard, smoothing it down. “I should introduce the two of you. Maybe you can place her.”
Jack’s grin turned smug. “Oh, I already met her. You introduced us.”
Robby turned to look at him, the movement slow and deliberate. His body orienting with the same focused intent his wolf used when tracking a scent. “What?”
“Last night.” Jack leaned against the counter, mirroring Robby’s posture. “Found her in the ambulance bay just before midnight. Sitting on the wall with a very large wolf’s head in her lap.”
Robby went perfectly, utterly still.
“She was scratching under his chin, behind his ears. Like she’d known him for years. Like it was the most natural thing in the world. And he was letting her. Head right there in her lap, eyes half-closed, making these little content noises. You know the ones.” His voice had dropped to a lower register, almost gentle though the mischief was still present.
Robby knew the sounds he was referring to, the satisfied rumbling sounds his wolf made at his happiest. When he felt safe.
“He led her all the way here from some park downtown. Said he put his head in her lap then whined at her until she got up and followed him here.” Jack paused, searching his friend’s face. “He brought her right to the doors and then sat down until she got Shen’s attention. He got me and there you have it.”
Robby’s mouth had gone dry. The pieces assembled themselves in his head with a slow certainty. The scent that had pulled him across the department, the recognition with no context.
“I’d only go to someone like that if…” he trailed off, the words hanging there for a beat before he said, “Oh.”
His gaze shifted back to where your conversation with Perlah had been joined by Princess. A warmth settled over him as he realized the scent he had been chasing all day had been following him first. From a park through the city under a full moon to the feet of his best friend.
You looked up, your eyes meeting across an emergency department filled with a scent he could finally, definitively name. Your gaze flicked to Jack and back to Robby and you smiled, warm and welcoming.
He did not look away.