Moments of the Adept Universe (Moments of the Adept Universe 1)

By Meghan Ciana Doidge

A collection of stories featuring characters from the Adept Universe by Meghan Ciana Doidge in a pivotal moment of their life, or possibly a playful interlude.

The collection contains the following shorts/novelettes:

1.In But a Moment – Kandy
2.In Less Than a Moment – Kandy
3.At Just the Right Moment – Gabby
4.From One Moment to the Next – Kandy
5.Anchored in the Moment – Audrey
6.Momentary Misunderstanding – Burgundy
7.A Momentary Retrieval (Archivist 1.5) – Dusk

Content warnings: language, sexual situations, violence, and childhood abuse.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Meghan Ciana Doidge
• Release date: Jan 27, 2022
• ISBN: 9781989571361

Meghan Ciana Doidge

Meghan Ciana Doidge writes tales of true love conquering all, even death. Though sometimes the love is elusive, the vampires and werewolves come out to play in the daylight, and bloody mayhem ensues.

Book preview

Moments of the Adept Universe 1

Moments of the Adept Universe 1

COLLECTED STORIES

MEGHAN CIANA DOIDGE

OLD MAN IN THE CROSSWALK

Contents

Author’s Note: Adept Universe

Introduction

Illustration: In But A Moment

In But A Moment

KANDY

Illustration: In Less Than A Moment

In Less Than A Moment

KANDY

Illustration: At Just the Right Moment

At Just the Right Moment

GABBY

Illustration: From One Moment to the Next

From One Moment to the Next

KANDY

Illustration: Anchored in the Moment

Anchored in the Moment

AUDREY

Illustration: A Momentary Misunderstanding

A Momentary Misunderstanding

BURGUNDY

Illustration: A Momentary Retrieval

A Momentary Retrieval

DUSK

End Notes

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Meghan Ciana Doidge

The Adept Universe by MCD

Moments of the Adept Universe 1 is a collection of shorts and novelettes set in the same universe as the Dowser, Oracle, Reconstructionist, Amplifier, and Misfits of the Adept Universe series. While it is not necessary to read all the series, in order to avoid spoilers the ideal reading order of the Adept Universe is as follows:

Please note: the stories found in this volume are marked in bold.

---

Novelette: In But A Moment (Moments of the Adept Universe 0.1)

Novelette: In Less Than a Moment (Moments of the Adept Universe 0.2)

Novelette: At Just the Right Moment (Moments of the Adept Universe 0.3)

Short: From One Moment to the Next (Moments of the Adept Universe 0.4)

Cupcakes, Trinkets, and Other Deadly Magic (Dowser 1)

Short: Anchored in the Moment (Moments of the Adept Universe 0.5)

Short: A Difficult Funeral (Dowser 1.5) ¹

Trinkets, Treasures, and Other Bloody Magic (Dowser 2)

Treasures, Demons, and Other Black Magic (Dowser 3)

I See Me (Oracle 1)

Shadows, Maps, and Other Ancient Magic (Dowser 4)

Maps, Artifacts, and Other Arcane Magic (Dowser 5)

I See You (Oracle 2)

Artifacts, Dragons, and Other Lethal Magic (Dowser 6)

I See Us (Oracle 3)

Novelette: The Graveyard Kiss (Reconstructionist 0.5) ²

Catching Echoes (Reconstructionist 1)

Short: Dawn Bytes (Reconstructionist 1.5)

Tangled Echoes (Reconstructionist 2)

Short: An Uncut Key (Reconstructionist 2.5)

Unleashing Echoes (Reconstructionist 3)

Champagne, Misfits, and Other Shady Magic (Dowser 7)

Misfits, Gemstones, and Other Shattered Magic (Dowser 8)

Novelettes (collection): Graveyards, Visions, and Other Things that Byte (Dowser 8.5)

Gemstones, Elves, and Other Insidious Magic (Dowser 9)

The Amplifier Protocol (Amplifier 0)

Novelette: Close to Home (Archivist 0.5) ³

Demons and DNA (Amplifier 1)

Bonds and Broken Dreams (Amplifier 2)

Mystics and Mental Blocks (Amplifier 3)

Idols and Enemies (Amplifier 4)

Short: The Music Box (Amplifier 4.5) ⁴

Misplaced Souls (Misfits 1)

Novelette: A Momentary Misunderstanding (Moments of the Adept Universe 0.6)

Awakening Infinity (Archivist 0)

Invoking Infinity (Archivist 1)

Short: A Momentary Retrieval (Archivist 1.5)

Compelling Infinity (Archivist 2)

More books in the Amplifier, Archivist, and Misfits series to follow. More information can be found at www.madebymeghan.ca/novels

Introduction

A collection of stories featuring characters from the Adept Universe by Meghan Ciana Doidge in a pivotal moment of their life, or possibly a playful interlude.

The collection contains the following shorts/novelettes:

In But a Moment – Kandy

In Less Than a Moment – Kandy

At Just the Right Moment – Gabby

From One Moment to the Next – Kandy

Anchored in the Moment – Audrey

Momentary Misunderstanding – Burgundy

A Momentary Retrieval (Archivist 1.5) – Dusk

More information on the main characters can be found in the End Notes.

a silhouette of a naked woman in an open doorway, gazing at the full moon

In But A Moment

Moments of the Adept Universe 0.1

(Kandy 0.25) ¹

In But A Moment

KANDY

January 2007.

At Rothhouse Estate in Manchester, New Hampshire.

Beer in hand, I grabbed the arm of the beat-up recliner and dragged it closer to the sliding doors on the far side of the living room, angling it so I had a view of the back patio — and more specifically, the full moon. Curling my legs under me, I lounged back, taking in the cool, dark night along with a sip of the beer. It was still too warm. And bitter. Which was fine, because the bottle was really only cover. If I didn’t have it in hand, I’d be asked incessantly if I needed a drink by the other werewolves slowly filtering into the lakeside cabin from our evening hunt. Some of them still wearing their fur, incapable of changing back to human form with the moon so high in the sky.

I’d arrived early, hanging out in the woods that occupied the bulk of the acreage surrounding the estate of the current alpha of the East Coast pack just long enough to witness the deer slaughter, but feeling no need to participate myself. Not that I was antiviolence when it was called for — which honestly was almost perpetually in a pack as large as ours. But I wasn’t big on tearing the throat out of an innocent creature that never had a chance against me. In wolf or human form.

I wiggled my bare toes under the overly plush arm of the recliner, catching the sound of another car winding along the long drive to the little-used lake house. Little-used by everyone except the younger set of the pack, at least. Yeah, we were supposed to be sleeping off the hunt in fluffy, adorable piles of teeth and claws and ridiculously loud snoring, but our alpha would turn a blind eye to us breaking that tradition as long as we didn’t seriously maim or kill anyone.

And even then, as long as the injured soul wasn’t a pack member, our alpha would probably just clean up our mess and give us a tap on the nose. Arthur was like that. Except he’d then assign some sort of horribly boring duty for a month or two, like rebuilding the estate fence or volunteering at a local charity. Being around mundanes — people without magic — for longer than a few hours was a surefire way to make a werewolf beg for forgiveness.

I, fortunately, was currently slightly out of reach of the pack’s smothering tendencies, thanks to suffering through my first year of college on the path to a physiotherapist specialty. I didn’t have the attention span to become a full medical doctor, but werewolves were impervious to most magic and healed quickly, making a physio degree both pragmatic and a somewhat interesting way to waste my time.

Limiting the messes we got into — and therefore the need for the intervention of any sort of medical professional — was why the entire pack was forced up to New Hampshire for the first full moon of the year. Every damn year. A smaller number of unlucky pack wolves were forced to attend every full moon run. And an even smaller, more dangerous subset of wolves were forbidden from living more than an hour from Rothhouse Estate and Arthur’s calming influence.

I’d been able to control my changes from a precociously young age, though. I’d been transforming multiple times a day since my early teens without exhausting myself. Only the alpha’s eldest progeny, Justin and Audrey, could boast the same.

Not that I boasted about it. Because who really cared? My position in the pack was already firmly set. It had been since before I’d been born. Sure, if I’d been a weak-ass whelp, it would have confused and possibly upset the pack elders. But I wasn’t.

In fact, I was so powerful, so … not intelligent, exactly, but perceptive, that I was a threat. Or I would be, if I were interested in climbing the ranks any higher than I was already positioned.

I wasn’t, though.

I was just seriously bored.

All. Of. The. Time.

College helped a bit. Screwing around with Justin occasionally filled the darkest hours of the night — both in and out of clothing. I’d gotten happily lost among the California pack for a couple of months last fall.

I took another swig of beer, instantly regretting it. Who bought this garbage? I howled, not speaking to anyone in particular.

All movement in the tiny house … paused. For just a moment.

Sorry, Kandy! Allie squeaked from the region of the kitchen. It gets better chilled. Promise.

Yeah, I’d put too much punch into the complaint, forgetting that even I was still affected by the bright moon overhead. I usually stuffed all the robust magic I carried down deep — a continual stifling — but it was all too near the surface during this particular phase of the moon. Which was why I usually avoided the pack gatherings when I could. Which was why I avoided my mother, perpetually.

Occasionally, she looked at me. My mother. And she saw far too deeply. Occasionally, she thought about the things she’d left behind when she bent her knee to our current alpha, when she consumed his flesh and became one of his. For him to protect, yes. But also to command.

I could almost see her thoughts in those moments when she tried to stare me down and failed. Thoughts of how only a generation had passed since a Tate had headed the East Coast pack. My mother knew she wasn’t strong enough to take the position, not on her own. But with me at her side …

Never mind! I snarled in response to Allie, to the icky beer, shoving away thoughts of my mother’s possible machinations at the same time.

Before anyone else could respond, the front door slammed open and Justin strode into the living room, carrying a tower of pizzas like he was a conquering hero.

He was backed by Cody and Paul, both similarly burdened.

A chorus of squeals erupted from the direction of the kitchen and farther into the house. Even the small gray wolf who’d been trying to sink into the depths of the sofa since I’d entered yipped, then buried her face in a cushion. Leesa. Justin’s younger sister.

Unlike the others, Leesa’s involuntary reaction to the pizza was more about the fact that it was being carried by her brother, rather than calling too much attention to herself over food. She didn’t want to get kicked back to the main house on the estate. Which was currently the Rothchild family home. Leesa was too young to transform back from her wolf form while under the call of the moon. Which meant she was also too young to be at the lake house, where beer, pizza, and sex were certain to fill the hours before sunrise.

Justin would one day take the position of alpha from Arthur. His father. Most likely by abdication, not violence. The same couldn’t be said for how my mother’s father had been deposed. Technically, Justin was the most dominant of our generation. Technically, because I could still kick his ass and brush off his commands. As could his elder sister, Audrey.

We just let him be boss when it counted.

Cold air billowed into the living room.

Close the door, shitstain, I snarled at the blond bruiser nearest the door in question.

Cody kicked the door shut, his lip curled in response to my command. He couldn’t ignore me, no matter how much he wanted to. None of them could. Not even Justin or Audrey.

I was really going to have to watch myself for the rest of the evening. I wasn’t interested in inciting any dominance fights.

A wide grin swamped Justin’s face, and he flashed his teeth in my direction, playfully biting at the air. Seemingly chiding me — but I knew he was secretly delighted to have the opportunity to do so. At just over six feet and still filling out, Justin Rothchild was every inch an ideal werewolf. Dark haired and pale skinned, he was easygoing, even charming. Right up to, and occasionally at the same time as, the point when he’d rip someone’s face off. He’d thrown on the gray sweatpants that most of us were also wearing — the pack bought them in bulk — but wore a too-tight T-shirt instead of a matching sweatshirt.

Not that I minded the view.

Shucking off his runners, he padded barefoot across the worn hardwood floor toward me, dark-eyed gaze still locked to mine. It was a game now. A test of wills. And I couldn’t be the one to look away, no matter how much games bored me.

If I looked away, even if just to make it clear he was boring me, Justin might get the wrong impression. And when Justin got the wrong impression, it always took some effort to put him back in his place. Most recently, that effort had involved me pinning him to the floor and riding him until he snarled my name and left fingerprint bruises on my hips. But he came too fast for my liking during those particular sessions, therefore forcing me to maintain eye contact now to keep things perfectly clear between us.

Pack life was exhausting. And not in a good way, like running hard and fast, then falling into a deep, dreamless slumber. More like being constantly wakeful. Not out of fear of being attacked, but of accidentally shifting position and suddenly being … responsible for everyone else.

Though maybe that was just my weird worry.

Audrey popped her head out from the kitchen, opening her mouth to speak, only to have Justin shove the boxes of pizza he was carrying into her arms.

The twenty-one-year-old’s silky dark hair was a perfect wave around her head and shoulders. Justin’s marginally older sister was beautiful, practically perfectly proportioned, and with slightly wide-spaced eyes like Justin. No matter how I felt about the importance placed on stupid things such as physical beauty, even I had to begrudgingly admit that Audrey was sleek and strong in both wolf and human form. The pack princess.

Justin took the top pizza box off the pile his sister now held, stepping past her without a word. He still hadn’t dropped eye contact with me.

In the kitchen, Audrey snapped to Cody and Paul. The oven is warming. She stepped back into the kitchen herself.

Paul, the slightest of the brutish trio, though not by much, followed Audrey dutifully. His light-brown hair was unusually shaggy from what had probably been a hasty transformation from wolf to human. He also needed a shave. Cody hesitated, watching Justin’s back with narrowed wolf-green eyes just in case I attacked.

Always a possibility, of course.

Paul’s too-shaggy hair and Cody’s magic-tinted eyes hinted at their own thinly held control over their wolves. I wasn’t the only one affected. I just hid it better than Justin’s self-appointed enforcers, both of them already vying for a beta position that wouldn’t be available for dozens of years.

A position that wouldn’t even be available then, actually. Because no matter how unvoiced the expectation was, it would be me backing Justin, all the way to the top. Including filling his mother’s and my mother’s spots on the shapeshifter Assembly. The governing body that oversaw all the packs.

Almost imperceptibly, Leesa shimmied deeper into the couch as her brother passed.

I see you, little wolf, he said, playfully ominous. But he didn’t pause until he was looming over me.

I hated cranking my head up, exposing my neck. But I maintained eye contact through and through.

Magic flaring to edge his eyes, Justin inhaled deeply. Scenting me. Possessively. His grin turned self-satisfied. I looked for you in the hunt.

You saw me, I said dismissively. And with that rejection, I was able to look away, through the window toward the enchanting moon.

Justin huffed. Then he kneeled beside me, sliding the pizza box into my lap. It was warm. I tucked my hands under it, luxuriating in it without otherwise acknowledging the offering.

Meat lovers. Your favorite, Justin murmured. His gaze was still pinned to my face. Share with me?

No, I said, lifting the lid and grabbing a piece of pizza. It was my favorite. And from my favorite pizza joint. There was no way they were open at this early-morning hour, so Justin had thrown a lot of money around to get his hands on it. Which probably accounted for the size of the order. Werewolves were always hungry after a run, but there weren’t that many of us at the lake house.

He watched as I bit off the tip of my slice, his grin fading into an intense regard. At least thank me, wolf.

Still eating, I locked my gaze to Justin’s, straightening my leg until I could press my bare foot against his right shoulder. He radiated heat. We stayed like that, with me simply enjoying his warmth while eating his tasty offering.

He reached up to caress my foot, slipping his fingers into the cuff of my sweatpants to wrap around my ankle.

I applied pressure against his shoulder, little by little, forcing him to push back against me. He cupped his warm hand over my foot. Why are you so cold? He cocked his head thoughtfully, as if he weren’t straining to hold himself in place.

I laughed. Quietly, but I couldn’t help it.

That cool question — under actual physical pressure, and after a bout of extreme belligerence from a lower-ranked wolf — was why Justin would be a great alpha.

He wanted me by his side. I hadn’t managed to disabuse him of that notion yet.

And having sex with him — for almost a year now — wasn’t helping my argument.

Before I could prove I was stronger than him — in human form while he was trying to maintain an unbalanced kneeling position — Leesa finally gave in and launched herself off the sofa. The twelve-year-old propped her wolf form up on the arm of my recliner, begging for pizza with a lolling tongue and a wiggling butt.

Laughing, Justin bumped her playfully with his shoulder. You’re going to get us all in huge shit when Mom does a bed check and doesn’t find you.

An unlikely scenario, I knew, since Lady Edith would be too busy bedding our alpha. Her mate. In a wolf pack, dominance came in many forms, and Edith wielded every form of it expertly, even over Arthur.

I freed another piece of pizza from the box and dangled it over Leesa’s head. She snapped for it, but I was quicker, pulling it out of reach.

Manners, I said mildly.

Leesa settled her chin on her paws, claws gouging the arm of the recliner, then tried to be patient. She didn’t quite manage to stop wiggling her butt, though.

I offered her the piece of pizza again, and this time she took it politely, returning to the sofa to gorge herself.

Chew, Justin said, laughing.

Then, before I could protest, he stood, swooped forward to press a hard kiss to my lips, then stepped away.

He was holding a piece of pizza.

My half-eaten slice.

He took another step back, then another, holding the purloined food aloft and grinning gleefully.

I narrowed my eyes at him.

He laughed.

Then I took another piece of pizza, carefully closed the box, and turned my back on the offensive werewolf. I ate my second piece.

Justin threw his head back and laughed. A joyful, triumphant chuckle that reverberated through the house.

I ignored him.

Why isn’t there any heat on? he suddenly snarled, mood changing on a dime.

Still broken, Allie called back, her voice light and almost singsong. Meant to be pleasant and charming, though only when speaking to Justin.

Blond and pertly pretty, Allie was Audrey’s current best friend, aka tagalong. And I knew she also wouldn’t have minded getting