The Party

Cassie looked at her sisters, “You know Dad would want us to mingle. You know…show that we’re a good ally, make friends?” Evelyn nodded grimly, “Alright. We’ll split up and smile like the good, obedient daughters we are (Cassie rolled her eyes), but 15 minutes tops, and then we meet up again by the food. Not to be crass, but I’m hungry enough to eat one of these wolves, and not in any way they’d enjoy.” “Don’t be gross, Evie,” Nora grumbled while averting her eyes, as if by not looking at her sister, she could pretend that she hadn’t said anything offensive at all. “We’ll meet by the food in 15 minutes. Go pretend to be charming, surely you can manage that for such a short amount of time.”  Evelyn grumbled something under her breath, but grudgingly agreed, and they all went their separate ways with Nora floating over to a group of men from MoonValley, while Cassie and Evelyn moved with less purpose in another direction.

Cassie had barely taken 5 steps when something hard jolted her from the side, sending her stumbling forward. She whipped around, frustrated and ready to unleash her anger on whoever it was that was clumsy enough to run into her. She was met, however, with the smirking face of a man who was both very unfamiliar, and yet gave the impression that they had already spent their lives running into each other. “Easy there,” the statement came with a wink that already filled Cassie with regret for agreeing to mingle within this ridiculous crowd. “Excuse me,” she said, “But you are the one who ran into me. Should you be apologizing rather than trying to antagonize me?” “My apologies, princess,” laughed the man, as Cassie grew more infuriated by the second. “Don’t call me that. Who are you?” “My name is James,” he said, “I came here with WinterCrown - my brother Titan is the new Alpha”

“James and Titan are two very different names,” she mused, “Very different expectations. When you’re the second born, after the first son of the Alpha, there’s a lot less fanfare regarding everything, including your name.” Cassie nodded, “I suppose that’s inevitable in a lot of packs. I myself don’t really have that problem, my sisters and I are triplets and we have no other siblings. No brothers to carry on the family line, just a bunch of grabby, power-hungry men in our pack, hoping to be mated to one of us and take over from our father.” “Those are rather foolish goals,” chuckled James, “Though not nearly as infamously wild as where I come from, Alpha Brahm isn’t known for his weakness. I hardly believe he’d let someone unworthy take one of his precious daughters.”

Cassie raised an eyebrow at this. She was hardly a prize to be won, though some treated her as such. She definitely didn’t appreciate this stranger making such odd and probing comments about her and her sisters. “I don’t plan on being ‘taken’ by anyone” the glare in her eye, and forcefulness of her tone being enough to make the usual sycophants wince. James on the other hand, merely chuckled, as if she was an amusing play thing for him to make a fool of. “No doubts there, princess, but maybe your plans and your desires will be quite different in the future.” “Stop calling me that,” she scowled, “and don’t think that you know anything about my desires, which right now are nothing more than to get out of this conversation.” “Don’t hurt yourself jumping around now,” James said, his smile spreading incorrigibly across his face. Cassie could admit he was handsome, with chestnut colored hair and eyes as green as the darker parts of the forest, where she would rather be right now, thank you very much. His attitude, however, left a lot to be desired.

She started to turn around, aiming to get as far away from the man from WinterCrown as possible, when she heard an entirely familiar shriek that sent her immediately running through the tent, with James keeping pace behind her.