My father led us from the building in silence. I patted the pocket of my jeans where the paper with the directions to the Grimm society headquarters was tucked away. I was going to ask for help.
The rows of guards glared at us as we made our way from the building. I was tempted to glare back, but Rhys' elbow in my side pushed that thought away. Flipping diplomats.We paused at the fountain. "This is as far as I can go, Maddie." My father stood there in his ridiculous leather outfit. "I'm no longer allowed to leave the grounds of the Queen's compound."I threw my arms around him, squeezing him as tightly as I could. "I'm going to get help." my words were soft, barely a whisper."For your mother. I have to remain here to make sure you are both safe." He clung to me like I was a lifeline, his strong arms caging me.Tears tracked my cheeks. "I can't do that. You know me, Dad. You raised me." My words were choked asI stared up at the fae woman, blinking stupidly. "I would ask that the training class be dismissed." Her voice was amused. "There are details even Madame Reva does not need to be aware of." Callie, Camelia, and Trisha all shared one long look, then nodded imperiously. Reva squeezed my shoulder and Priscilla gave me a small smile as they all shuffled out the way we had entered. "What is this all about?" Xander stepped back into me, shielding me from view. While I appreciated the notion, I was very much capable of handling my own matters, thanks. "This is about a passing of the mantle, so to speak." The fae woman smirked past Xander. "I have been following Madison since her birth. Daughter of two noble war heroes, swimming in secrets. Goddess blessed and born from love. To be honest, she's any power hungry Supernatural's wet dream.""But why?" Rhys crowded closer to me. "She is pure powe
"You are my mate!" Xander's yell ended in a howl. His body shook, my rejection pounding through us both. "I am your Alpha! You can try to reject me, but I won't let you."Ridiculous man. Couldn't he see I didn't want to do this as much as he didn't want it done? Couldn't he see me breaking into pieces in front of him? The first love is self love. How could I love anyone if I didn't love myself enough to stand up for me? Being forced to just accept the decisions Xander wanted to make for my life was, at best, enabling his superiority complex, and at worst, spiraling into a toxic relationship. I had enough of men deciding they knew the way the course of my life should play out. "I am a person, not a doll that you can just play house with." My words were gritted out through my clenched teeth. The pain was overwhelming. I struggled to my feet. "We could have discussed this, like adults in an actual relationship. But instead you decided to take away my autonomy. And still you refuse my r
Three years was a long time. And not long enough. My chest ached again as I slid through the movements. Xander or Rhys was out there enjoying someone else's body. It's what I wanted. What I had asked for. And I hated every single moment of it. "Again!" Etna stood at the entrance to the training room, her blue eyes narrowed as she watched me move. I would be competing against Thunderbyrd later and needed to get my body ready. That wasn't the only thing I would be doing. My fight against the current reigning champion of Lilith's amazonians was a ruse. The real fight would be even later. When I finally pulled Tatiana's still beating heart from her frigid chest and made her watch as I crushed it in my hand. Finally freeing my father and mother. My mother who had endured three more years of 'hospitality' at the hands of Tatiana's guards. I slid low and lost my footing, tripping and falling flat on my face. "You're distracted Maddie. You have to get your head in the game. You can't los
Linnea's room was dark as I crashed inside. My toddler could sleep through anything, and I was thankful as I started shoving clothes into a bag. I had made friends, alliances. I wasn't alone. I had places I could run and be free. "Mommy crying?" Shitballs. Linnea stared at me with her wide blue eyes. I touched my cheek, dripping with salty tears. I hadn't even known. "It's okay baby. We are going on a little trip." "No, you're not." Mother effer! I whirled to the two hulking shadows darkening Linnea's doorway. Hellfire and damnation! "So this is where you've been hiding." They hadn't noticed Linnea yet. I sidled sideways. If I could keep their attention on me–"Tatiana has been taken care of." Xander crowded into the room. "How?" "We remembered. And we handled it." Rhys' voice was low. "Three years, Maddie?" The betrayal in Xander's voice made my heart ache. "You somehow made us forget you for three years?!" "What have you been doing?" Rhys reached out his hand. "Oh, y'know
I woke the next morning with a small bundle of warmth tucked into my side. I released a sigh that had been trapped in my chest. Xander and Rhys were back. Three years of being on my own, down the drain. I had questions. Lots of them. And it was time to get some answers. I carefully slid out of the bed. Linnea made a grumbling sleepy noise. I still couldn't figure out how she was making it into my room at night. When she was a year old, Lilith had announced it was time for her to have her own room.But once she got to walking good, every morning I woke with her curled into my side. It shouldn't have been possible. We locked her door, we even barricaded it. No one wanted a toddler running around a hold in the middle of the night. And yet, here she was. I suspected she had one of the imps on her side. The little beasties loved Linnea, and treated her like she was their queen. It was nothing to find my darling daughter holding court in her pink palace playroom with an entire fleet of i
Sweat poured off me as my muscles ached in that delicious way that meant I would be too sore to move later. Etna held the mitts, her fire stoked to a pleasant warmth. I stepped forward, delivering a solid punch to the middle of one mitt, and the skin on my knuckles split open. Finally. It had taken nearly an hour and a half this time. When I first started training with Etna as a way to beat depression, my knuckles split in five minutes. I had grown soft. An imp scampered into the room. This was a new one. I thought I had been introduced to every imp in the compound. His obsidian skin gleamed in the low light of the training room, ivory horns jutting from his brow proudly. His manhood dangled between his legs. Yep, must be new and hadn't been told the rule of clothes. All imps were now required to cover their nethers. He jumped onto Etna, wrapping himself around her body possessively. She had told me once that she preferred imps because they didn't talk, and had a mean tongue game.
"How do you lose a whole flipping person Aeryck?!" My voice shook as the line crackled with static. Service was spotty in Lilith's villa. She wasn't much on modern conveniences like cell phones. She preferred a good old fashioned summoning. "It wasn't like she wasn't under guard, Godmother." Aeryck was troubled, I could hear it. Hell, I was troubled. Heather had been in a stasis for the last three years. Again I wondered how Lilith's deal had affected Xander and Rhys, had they remembered where Heather was? Guilt twisted my stomach. "I'm not Godmother yet, Aeryck.""May as well be. Liz has all but stopped her duties while training you. It's chaos out here in the Territories. We need our Godmother." I sighed, scrubbing my hands across my face. He wasn't wrong. I hadn't really known the sheer amount of work a Godmother did until I was training to put together the Accords for their happily ever after. The Grimm society kept tabs on running tales for me, but it was still overwhelming wi
The Sure Wood pack land was probably the most gorgeous expanse of forest I'd ever seen. Not that I really saw much. My eyes skimmed over the trees with the hanging Spanish moss, while my mind slowly rolled my conundrum around. I had no right to be jealous, but honestly, knowing that my rejected mates had been intimate with Tatiana…well it kind of chapped my nerves. "So, how is it the Alpha and Beta of Wild Hearth pack became intimately acquainted with Tatiana?" The question burst from me in a flurry of jealousy. Dammit. Xander shifted uncomfortably, shaking his head. "It's not a simple tale, Maddie. And frankly, not really any of your business. It ceased to be your business when you rejected us." The words stung. As they should. "I didn't want to reject you!" Cool the defensiveness, Maddie. "You kept making my decisions for me." I was petulant. Wasn't I supposed to sound more grown up than this? I was twenty-one now. Couldn't I be a little less childish? "And look where your deci