A Twitch of Tail by R. E. Butler Read Free Book Online Page B

understanding that the were-groups are getting together next month for a meet and greet so the lions can introduce themselves officially.”
    Melo put his arm around Tera.  “We’ll be fine, Lorene, but I ask that you not expect Tera to interact with them, especially so soon after our mating.  Our instincts to keep her safe are running very high right now, and Tahlon is not used to this sort of thing.”
    Lorene nodded.  “As soon as the casting is done, Tera can slip away, and I’ll excuse her absence.  The lions will understand.”
    Lorene left them alone, and Tera turned in Melo’s arms and hugged him, placing her head on his chest.  “You’re not going to try to bite anyone’s head off, right?”
    Melo hugged her, his big hands spanning her back.  “Promise.  Just stay as close to us as you can, and then come right to us as soon as possible.”
    She reached for Tahlon, sliding into his arms, making him promise the same thing.
    She stayed with them both, away from the crowd surrounding the new alliance.
    “I didn’t know there were lion prides in the states,” she said, leaning against Melo as Tahlon stood just slightly in front of her, his arms crossed over his chest.
    Melo rested his chin on top of her head.  “There aren’t many.  But these guys are a group of rare white lions.  They’re the only group of their kind on this side of the world.  Midas has met with their leader.  They settled first in Michigan but decided that it would be better to settle with a larger population of were-animals than where they were, which were mostly wolves.”
    “White lions?” she mused.  “I’ve heard of them in nature but not in the supernatural world.”
    Tahlon looked down at her.  “White anything is rare in the supernatural world — wolf, tiger, lion, or whatever.  In a normal group, you might have one or two rare ones in each generation, so this group is extremely rare because the white color for their group isn’t recessive like it is in other were-groups.  It’s dominant.  So even if they have cubs with natural-colored lion females, they’ll be white.”
    “Tahl and I are white,” Melo whispered into her ear.  “The only ones in our family line back for five generations, and in our entire ambush.”
    “So our kids?”  She looked up at Melo.
    “Whatever color they are, sweetheart, we’ll love them,” Melo promised, kissing her nose.
    The time had come for the equinox ceremony to start, and she reluctantly stepped from the warm shelter of Melo’s arms and shimmied out of her dress.  After kissing them both, she joined her coven.
    Tera had participated in many equinox ceremonies since she came into her Wiccan powers at the age of eighteen.  The universe aligned in a most magnificent way on the equinox, and the fall equinox was considered a time of thankfulness.
    The coven arranged themselves in three circles:  the four Corners stood facing each other around a bonfire pit that was laden with wood, the natural witches stood a few feet away in a circle facing the Corners, and the unnatural witches formed a circle around the natural witches.  Behind the natural witches, the were-animal guards faced outwards, a silent promise to keep watch for any danger that might come.
    Slightly away from everyone stood the white lion pride.  Tera was facing their direction, and she took the opportunity to look them over.  Jantha, the leader of the lions, stood in the center of the group.  He was tall and broad shouldered, with a huge mane of graying blonde hair.  She had heard that two of the males in the group were his sons and that his mate had been killed by a hunter many years ago.  The lions were watching the coven with varying degrees of curiosity.  Tera supposed that for a group who had never been around a Wiccan coven, the ceremonies could seem bizarre.
    The Corners called their powers, and Tera and the other natural witches added their powers as the protective circle around the