The Complete Fenris Series Read online

  The Complete Fenris Series

  Samantha MacLeod

  Published by Samantha MacLeod, 2019.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  THE COMPLETE FENRIS SERIES

  First edition. June 9, 2019.

  Copyright © 2019 Samantha MacLeod.

  Written by Samantha MacLeod.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  FAIR WARNING

  TEMPTING FENRIS WOLF: CHAPTER ONE

  TEMPTING FENRIS WOLF: CHAPTER TWO

  TEMPTING FENRIS WOLF: CHAPTER THREE

  TEMPTING FENRIS WOLF: CHAPTER FOUR

  TEMPTING FENRIS WOLF: CHAPTER FIVE

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER ONE

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER TWO

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER THREE

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER FOUR

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER FIVE

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER SIX

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER NINE

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER TEN

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  THE MONSTER’S LOVER: CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER ONE

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER TWO

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER THREE

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER FOUR

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER FIVE

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER SIX

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER NINE

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER TEN

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER ONE

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER TWO

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER THREE

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER FOUR

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER FIVE

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER SIX

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER NINE

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER TEN

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE MONSTER AND THE PRISONER: CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER ONE

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWO

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER THREE

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER FOUR

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER FIVE

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER SIX

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER NINE

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER NINETEEN

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWENTY

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  THE MONSTER CHAINED: CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER ONE

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER TWO

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER THREE

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER FOUR

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER FIVE

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER SIX

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER EIGHT

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER NINE

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER TEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER NINETEEN

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER TWENTY

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  THE MONSTER FREED: CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

  EPILOGUE

  EXCERPT FROM THE TRICKSTER’S SONG

  THANK YOU

  MORE FROM SAMANTHA MACLEOD

  To Peter

  Don't read it

  FAIR WARNING

  Welcome, reader!

  I’m delighted you’ve chosen to join Sol and Fenris on their many dark adventures.

  This collection contains the entire five-book Fenris Series — The Monster’s Lover, The Monster’s Wife, The Monster and the Prisoner, The Monster Chained, and The Monster Freed — as well as the bonus short story Tempting Fenris Wolf.

  Before we begin, however, let me issue a note of warning. These stories contain graphic depictions of sexual encounters, violence, and attempted sexual assault. Like the Norse myths which have inspired them, the books in the Fenris Series are far from tame.

  Still interested?

  Then, dear reader, please do join me. The Ironwood Forest is waiting.

  TEMPTING FENRIS WOLF: CHAPTER ONE

  Please note this bonus short story takes place before the events of The Monster’s Lover and is told from the perspective of Týr.

  “You’re feeding the monster tonight?”

  I jumped. As usual, Óðinn had managed to sneak up on me. Not that I’d been doing anything suspicious, just filling a bag with loaves of bread in the middle of Val-hall’s expansive kitchens, but still. My father always made me feel like I’d been caught in the middle of something humiliating.

  “I am,” I replied.

  Carefully, I settled a thick, dark round of rye on top of the pile of bread in the sack. Only once I’d knotted the top together did I turn to face Óðinn.

  “We’re still bringing him mead?” Óðinn asked. His one pale blue eye glinted like flint in the torchlight.

  “Yes. Of course.”

  Óðinn grunted. That low rumble was the closest he ever came to approval.

  “He’s quite a drinker,” Óðinn said. “You bring him a big barrel?”

  I nodded. We’d started with the bread, after I’d reached out and established a relationship with the legendary monster wolf of the Ironwood forest. After a few years, Óðinn told me to start pushing the mead. It’s easier to control a man with mead than with bread, Óðinn insisted. I knew better than to disagree. Óðinn
was, after all, an expert in controlling men.

  So, once a month when the moon was full, I traveled alone to the Ironwood forest with a sack of bread and a big barrel of Val-hall’s mead. And, once a month, I collected the previous month’s barrel from Fenris.

  It was always full. Perhaps Fenris had been a drinker in his previous life, before he ran away from his mother’s castle to live by himself among the trees of the Ironwood, but I’d never seen him drink more than one horn when we shared our meals, and that was frequently much less than what I drank when we got together. Before I returned to Asgard each month, I opened the tap on the big barrel and poured the golden mead of Val-hall into the swirling darkness of the Körmt river.

  My father didn’t need to know everything.

  “His wolf shape is getting bigger?” Óðinn pushed.

  At this, an entirely inappropriate image of Fenris’s lean, muscular torso flashed through my mind. I shoved it away.

  “Slowly,” I said, watching my father closely.

  Óðinn has had a lifetime of guarding his emotions. Still, I thought I saw his lone eye widen slightly as I spoke. He still feared the monster of the Ironwood, then. I stifled a sigh. They all feared the monster wolf Fenris.

  That’s how I’d ended up with this job, after all. It was my own damn fault. Many years ago, as we talked about the Fenris wolf from the safety of Val-hall, I laughed at my father and brothers’ fear. I wasn’t afraid, I told them all. In fact, I’d prove it.

  That night I drank enough mead to drown a horse and marched into the Ironwood alone, calling the name of the legendary monster wolf of Jötunheimr. It wasn’t the stupidest thing I’d ever done in my long life, but it was probably in the top ten.

  Looking back, I’m not sure what I’d expected to find when I staggered down the Bifröst and into the forest, drunk off my ass, waving my sword around and screaming at the top of my lungs. I spent almost an entire night stumbling beneath the trees, throwing rocks into the bushes, and screaming “Fenris! Show yourself, monster!”

  Finally, when the mead’s warmth had started to wane and the growing realization of what an ass I’d made of myself had grown as inexorably as my hangover, something crashed in the woods behind me. I’d staggered into a warrior’s pose and pulled my sword from its scabbard. A moment later, a man had walked out of the trees, as naked as the day he was born, with both hands empty and upraised.

  “Yes?” he’d said.

  “Who the fuck are you?” I’d demanded.

  An entire night wasted in the Ironwood with nothing to show for it, and the beginnings of yet another brutal hangover biting at my temples, had done nothing to sweeten my disposition.

  The strange, naked man had run his fingers through a tangle of long, auburn hair as he’d grinned at me. “Well, you’ve been yelling my name all night. Was there something in particular you wanted, or do you just like screaming?”

  I’d blinked as I tried to decide if he’d just insulted me. Yes, damn it, now that he stood in front of me in the thin, green-tinged light of the Ironwood’s canopy, I could see the man’s resemblance to Loki, Fenris’s sire. And it made sense that the monstrous Fenris wolf would have a man shape. He’d lived his entire childhood in Angrboða’s fortress, after all, and we’d never even heard rumors of any magical inclinations.

  The naked man had rubbed the back of his neck as he tilted his head, examining me. An entirely inappropriate shiver of arousal had trickled down my spine, the first of many I’d try to supress around Fenris; Loki was damned handsome, after all, despite his oily personality. His son seemed to have inherited those incendiary good looks.

  “You’re a little smaller than I expected,” I’d said.

  The naked man had shrugged. If I’d offended him, he didn’t let it show.

  “And I thought an envoy from my mother would be a bit more dignified,” he’d replied.

  “Your mother?” I’d frowned, processing that one. “I’m not here for Angrboða.”

  His eyes had widened. “Really? Then who are you here for?”

  I’d laughed at that one. After hours of staggering drunkenly through the Ironwood, someone had finally asked me what the fuck I was doing.

  “Trying to be a badass, I suppose,” I’d sighed. My sword had given a satisfying hiss as I sheathed it.

  Our eyes had met just as dawn stretched its first golden fingers through the feathery branches of the Ironwood’s pines.

  “Would you like something to eat?” he’d asked.

  I’d wiped my hand across my mouth, which had begun to feel papery and thick. “Yeah. I would.”

  A shadow had passed across his face, and he’d hesitated. “You’re truly not from Angrboða? If you are, I’ll give you a head start before running you out of the woods.”

  I’d held my hands up in front of my chest, showing my open palms. “No, I’m not. I’m Týr Óðinnsen, of the Æsir.”

  He’d whistled, and I’d felt absurdly flattered. “The Æsir don’t usually come to the Ironwood.”

  “Yeah. I know. I’m...” I’d hesitated, but the truth of it had spilled out before I could stop myself. “I’m a fucking idiot.”

  He’d laughed again, and I’d found myself smiling in response. The rest of the story had came so easily I might as well have been confiding in a friend.

  “So, you got drunk and decided to hunt the Fenris wolf? Alone?” he’d finally asked, once I’d finished.

  By this time he’d led me to a clearing next to a stream, where I’d washed and drank cold water to quench my headache while he’d built a fire and set a haunch of venison to roast.

  “Pretty much,” I’d admitted.

  “That does sound rather stupid.” He’d grinned as he’d twirled the venison spit above the fire. Grease dripped into the flames, crackling and hissing.

  “They call me Týr the Brave,” I’d replied. “Not Týr the Clever.”

  We’d both laughed again, and the scent of roasting meat filled the night. For a moment it was all so damned pleasant it had made my chest ache. For all the warriors in Asgard, at that moment it had occurred to me that I couldn’t remember the last time I’d laughed this much without being drunk.

  “Well, you found me,” Fenris had said as he pulled the spit closer to examine the meat.

  He’d sunk his teeth into the meat and pulled off a strip before handing the wooden spit to me.

  “Yes, but I was looking for a monster,” I’d replied.

  His eyes had flashed, and for a moment I’d worried I’d said the wrong thing.

  “Watch,” he’d said.

  He had stood and stepped away from the firelight. A helpless sort of panic had risen in my throat. Damn it all, I’d liked him. What in the Nine Realms had I done to fuck things up this time?

  “Wait—” I’d said, but my words had evaporated as a swirl of golden sparks began to obscure his tall, muscular body.

  Inside the sparks, something grew. Something dark. I’d dropped the spit of venison and staggered to my feet, my heart hammering wildly between my ribs. By the time my sword was free of its scabbard, the thing had grown to half the height of the trees.

  “Holy fuck,” I’d muttered.

  The beast’s head had swung down, and pale eyes the size of cannonballs narrowed as they found me. Dark lips curled back to reveal jagged white teeth the length of my broadsword.

  It was horrific.

  I’d laughed at the cowardice of the Æsir and Vanir, those brave warriors who were too scared to venture into the Ironwood, but I hadn’t laughed then, as the monster stared at me beneath the trees. The numbed, calm detachment of the battlefield had settled over me, and I’d realized that I may have been staring at my own death.

  “This monster?” the thing had growled.

  Its voice was like a dark echo of the handsome, naked man’s. I’d straightened my back and stood tall before the monster. If I was about to die, I’d wanted to die as Týr the Brave. The beast stretched its neck to the sky, and I’d p
ulled in a deep breath, steadying my sword arm.

  But, instead of lunging toward me, the monster’s body had shivered with another flurry of golden light. Tiny, dancing sparks had filled the air, drifting upward to join the pale stars. I’d narrowed my eyes, trying to focus on the creature behind the glimmering lights, but the looming darkness above the trees had emptied.

  “What did you think?”

  I’d snapped my attention to the far side of the fire. The naked man stood there, wearing a smile that was almost apologetic as he tilted his head to one side.

  “It’s gotten a lot bigger since Angrboða’s castle,” he’d said. “But was it... I don’t know. Did it look like you expected?”

  I’d let the breath out of my lungs in a huff. “Oh, fuck! I thought you were going to kill me!”

  He’d frowned, then glanced at my feet. “What? Because you dropped the meat in the fire?”

  I had laughed. The whole fucking thing was just so absurd, I couldn’t stop myself. I’d laughed until tears rolled down my cheeks, and then I’d slapped Fenris on the back and told him his monster wolf was the most terrifying thing I’d ever seen in my life. He’d told me they might need to stop calling me Týr the Brave then, and we’d both laughed together.

  That night, after we’d roasted a second leg of venison but before I pulled myself together enough to use my meager magical talents to summon the Bifröst, I had asked if I could see him again. He’d said of course, that I’d always be welcome in the Ironwood. That one night was the foundation of my monthly visits. Not the bread I brought with me, or the mead of Val-hall. One night spent around a fire, laughing like old friends.

  Yet another thing I saw no reason to share with my father.

  “How big is he?” Óðinn asked suddenly, interrupting my thoughts.

  I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. Another image of Fenris’s handsome face, his long, auburn hair and high cheekbones, flickered across my consciousness, followed by the curve of his back, the way his hips—

  I sank my teeth into my bottom lip and tried to force myself to concentrate. Fenris’s wolf form had grown larger and stronger, and my burgeoning attraction to Fenris’s wry sense of humor and brutal honesty only made it more difficult to ignore the way his lean, muscular body looked as he moved in the firelight before me.