KennaI knew something was up with Sydney several months ago when he sat in my sitting room looking so stern and withdrawn after our battle with Gabriel.Now, I see why he was acting that way. Now, I finally understand.He’s standing next to Sarah’s bedside holding his son. I almost can’t believe it, but I always knew the Goddess was going to bless Sydney with all the riches he tried to avoid.A radiantly beautiful mate. A perfect, golden child. A boy. His heir. Healthy and strong.The image of them together as I walk into the room is flawless. But there’s a crack in the perfect picture. I can see it in Sarah’s violet eyes–such a strange color. I can see it written all over Sydney’s face as he places a protective hand on Sarah’s shoulders.They’re afraid of what comes next.Sasha. I remind myself her name is Sasha. This woman is Att
SarahI look at the women in the sitting room, wondering if I should pinch myself to make sure this is real, and I’m not cooking this vision up in my muddled brain.I have no idea where Cosette went, but Isla remains in her wingback chair, her legs crossed as she balances a steaming cup of coffee on her knee. Her head is slightly bowed as she speaks in low tones to Maddy, who is fluttering around a low lying coffee table, arranging cookies and pastries on a little tray.Two queens. A mother and daughter by love and marriage with a bond forged by hard times.My stomach does a little flip as I sink to the white carpeted floor with Blake babbling incoherently in my arms as he reaches for the hazel eyed baby sitting only a few feet away.“Careful, she’s crawling now,” Kenna says with some effort as she sinks to her knees, then stretches her legs out with her back resting against the couch. B
SydneyI stayed out all day. I didn’t come home until the sun faded and the sky turned an inky, endless black dotted with stars.Admittedly, I stayed at my office until nearly 10:00 PM just to piss Cosette off, thinking she’d be waiting by the door to cuff my ears even though she was the one who bullied me out of my own home this morning.Being alone, thrust into a somewhat normal routine again, felt right. It felt good. I feel somewhat like myself again after a day working and several hours spent shifting and running through the woods.But I also didn’t stop thinking about Sarah all day long. I replayed those memories she returned to me over and over again until the night we spent together after the ball was so clear I could taste the vanilla chapstick she was wearing and smell the floral perfume scenting her skin.Now I’m home, walking through the garage door, and the house is quiet and dark
SarahThis feels like the very first time. There’s nothing frantic about this. Each touch, every stroke of his fingers, is calculated and meticulous, honed to my pleasure.Sydney’s hands graze up my back as I continue to straddle him, my thighs locked against his hips. I grind against him, growing desperate with need.His fingertips drag down my spine in a touch that sends chills cascading over my body, like he’s hitting every nerve and setting them aflame.There’s nothing in my head. My mind is blissfully quiet as every ounce of my energy focuses on the way he’s touching me and how he tastes when I kiss him again and again.“Sarah.” He growls low in his throat when I bite down on his lip. I grind against his cock, nothing but my leggings and the towel he’s wearing around his waist to separate us.“Please,” I whimper. “Please, Sydney
Sarah“This is humiliating!” I whisper, trying to cover my naked body with my hands. The cold night air bites into my skin, numbing the pain of the fresh mark, yes, but stinging everywhere else. Sydney, in his wolf form several feet away, paces back across the patio and says into my mind, ‘If you shift, you’ll be warm.’He did this on purpose. He didn’t so much as offer me a robe, probably to enjoy the sight of me in just my skin, shivering and at his mercy.“I know,” I bite out, annoyed. “I don’t know how!”‘You’ll feel it. Just tell your body what you want it to do.’ He comes to a stop, and in a glimmer of movement and faint light, shifts back into his human form. “See?”I frown at him before squeezing my eyes shut. All right, body. Shift. Turn my hands into paws, or whatever. Nothing. I run my tongue over my canine teeth, testing. He’d noticed they’d sharpened after I marked him, but they feel normal to me. “Sydney, I can’t do it.”He shifts back into a wolf like it’s nothing f
SydneyI pull my truck through the gates of Silverhide thirty minutes after leaving my own territory. Tall pines rise up all around me as the road leading out of the city center, and the NZ, narrows, and turns to finely packed gravel dusted with snow.Ryan’s house is the first building visible in the dense forest. It rises above the trees, stately and modern despite being a log home. The windows reflect the snow as I drive past his private driveway and dip down into the village.Silverhide is a small, exclusive pack. After the war twenty-two years ago, several of the rogue villages along the base of the mountains that border Eastonia moved inward, trying to integrate into the packs in Crescent Falls. When Ryan and I came of age and started our own packs, he chose this old, undeveloped territory and opened his gates to whoever wanted to follow his lead then promptly shut them again.His numbers are small even compared
SarahBlake lifts his head from the carpet in the sitting room off the foyer, his chubby fingers gripping the carpet fibers as he whines, his mouth pulled in a frown.“This is supposed to be good for you, honey,” I urge when he starts to fuss. Dalia, on her knees beside me, nods in silent agreement. “See? You’re learning how to push up with your arms. Soon you’ll be rolling over onto your back if you want it bad enough.”In response, Blake turns purple with rage and lets out a howl that I’m sure can be heard in the village.Dalia and I exchange looks, but she chuckles softly and promptly scoops him into her arms. “Bath time, then bed, I think,” she says, meeting my eyes for confirmation.I nod, shrugging. I watch them walk away and feel a pang of guilt ghost through my chest. My milk dried up. It was my fault for being so stupid and reckless. Blake doesn’t n
Sarah“You look fine,” Sydney assures me, resting his hand on my thigh as he drives us toward the castle the next afternoon. Rain patters against the windshield, and the frigid landscape is suddenly changed–the silver glow replaced by deeper shades of brown, black, and red. Spring is nearly here.A few months ago, I was pacing in my apartment wondering how’d I’d survive alone, with an infant, with an empty refrigerator and barely any money left. Now I’m sitting beside my mate on our way to break the news to his family.I squeeze Sydney’s hand and look over at him. His blue eyes soften, but his brows are still pinched with a glimmer of anxiety. Last night, lying in bed together, we talked about what tonight needed to look like. Sydney is going to take the lead, making an announcement sometime during the dinner proceedings that we’re mates. He was excited as he talked about it, and I realized that this–me–was all he ever wanted–and all he told himself he could never have. I didn’t r
MistyTwo white wolves in a clearing.Their bodies made of mist and aether, standing side by side.Mates. A marvel of second chances and extraordinary fate.Two white wolves turn toward the sunrise knowing what they must leave behind; what he sacrificed for those he loved and her refusal to let him go into death alone.Two white wolves stand over their earthly bodies. He, battered and still.She, going into death with eyes open, cupping her mate's face between her graceful hands, her eyes locked on his at the moment of her dying breath.Their last words had been simple. I love you.They always had.They’d promised this instance in stolen moments, in private corners, when there was nothing but the stars to light their way.I will not stay here without you.I will not leave you behind.And so, it was.Two
AvivaThe first flakes of snow fall from the sky as I watch Ryan trying to herd everyone in position. Bundled against the cold in a wool coat Freya and I worked tirelessly on for the last three weeks, I step to the side, finding myself in the center of the crowd standing in the middle of the village of Silverhide. I watch my mate and his Beta, James, nudge families together and run back and forth toward a tripod where Ryan’s camera rests, facing us, to gauge whether all one-hundred and fifty people are in view of the lens.Ryan stands behind the camera with his hands up, his hair dusted with snow. “Okay. Nobody move!”A few excited giggles whisper through the front of the crowd where the numerous children are arranged. I glance around, watching as James joins Dahlia’s side, their baby on her hip. The baby girl finally has a name. Cosette, named after a friend of Dahlia, but they call her Cossie for short. Other babies
Two months later…RyanThe Harvest Festival has been held at the festival grounds between Endova, Teshka, and Navvan for centuries. When we arrived two days ago, leaving only a few people behind in Silverhide to make sure the animals are tended to in our absence, the wide, open space had been nothing but rolling plains.Now, it’s a city of canvas tents and twinkling lights, the air spiced with smoke and the smells of meals being cooked at each fire. Songs mingle as I walk through the festival with Aviva on my arm. I’m wearing a normal outfit. Well, not normal, actually. Mom forced me into a suit and tie with the Crescent Falls royal banner and all of my metals from my years as a warrior draped over my shoulders. Aviva is wearing that white, fur-lined dress again and a pair of new sheep-skin boots Freya and Mercy made for her, but instead of freshwater clam shells and pearls decorating her hair, her curls are w
RyanAn hour earlier…I can’t scrub the image of Aviva dead in my arms out of my head. It’s been several days since the battle, since the moment I put her in my uncle's arms and turned back to the ravaged scene, not knowing whether or not she survived the journey all the way to Maatua.Three days. It was three entire days before Sydney arrived in Silverhide with news about my mate. I’d just arrived back at my territory, exhausted and in tatters, when he clapped a hand on my shoulder and used his powers to spirit us to Moonrise, then to Veiled Valley, then to Maatua. He’s not as strong as Ryatt. Jumping took a toll on us both, and when we finally arrived at my grandparents’ beach house, I collapsed before I even made it up their driveway.Everything since the battle is a blur. Navvan is just… gone. The few survivors were mostly women and children who’d left the villag
AvivaI wake with a start to bright, warm sunshine and the smell of salty air. I grope white sheets, blinking several times to clear my vision as an unfamiliar bedroom fades to life around me. Warm white walls. Pale wood finishes and sleek furniture in soft browns and creams. White curtains drift in a salty breeze coming through several open windows, and a glass door opens to a deck with a view of… a view of the ocean.I’ve never seen the ocean before. From where I lie, I can hear the waves crashing on a white sand beach. Music I don’t recognize drifts toward me, carrying two voices with it, one male, and one female.“Your parents worry about you endlessly, Misty.”“They have nothing to worry about. It’s not like I’m ten anymore, Grandpa. I can make my own way in the world now. Plus, where was their worry when they shipped me here four years ago, huh?”“You
RyanI’ve been dreaming about tying Aviva to my bed, but I’m going to make it a reality for entirely different reasons. Now, I’ll be tying her to keep her there, forever. No more hunting. No more fighting. No more killing rogues barefoot in the woods.No more putting herself in situations like this. I will do her dirty work. I will gladly do it. I roll with Hardan in his… hellhound form? Whatever the fuck he is now. I wish, Goddess, I wish I could have faced him man to man instead of beast to beast. I would have loved to see the look on his face when I ripped out his heart for even thinking for a second he had some kind of claim to my mate, even before I found her. We roll down a decline. I sink my talons into his belly, ripping hard, but I already know hellhounds aren’t that easy to kill. We crash into an oak tree. Leaves shower over us as he tries to claw free of my grasp. He’s calling out, bellowing strange, high-pitched howls. The forest floor rumbles as I sink my claws into hi
AvivaI’m having the time of my life.I zigzag through the woods in my wolf form after three rogues who’ve decided they want nothing to do with me. In fact, the rogues have stopped hunting me over the past several hours and instead are trying to get as far away from me as possible. Their prey has become their biggest predator.I did my best to lead the horde away from Endova. That was my goal–the reason I made the snap decision to leave my mate behind and race into the jaws of death itself. Now, I have the horde moving away from the tribal packlands all together, herding them back into the open plains like a shepherd, and they’re my sheep–if a shepherd killed their sheep, that is.I’ve lost count of how many there are. My red fur is completely black with their blood. I catch my reflection in another small, burbling creek as I leap, seeing only my eyes shining like polished amber against a
Ryan“She’s not here, Ryan,” Mercy hisses as I run through the village. She’s hot on my heels, grabbing my fur to try to pull me to a stop but I’m not in my right mind.It’s been five hours since I last saw Aviva. Andrew and I have been scouring the forest and plains for any sign of her, but I lost her scent, and my desperate attempts to mind-link with her have come up empty and silent.I shift into my human form the second I cross into the pack house and immediately crash into one of the tables, tripping over the bench and landing on my side with a crunch. I’ve been in my wolf form since last night. Exhaustion sings through my bones as my vision spins. I hear Andrew similarly falling to the ground with a choked groan before hurried footsteps reach the pack house. Someone throws a blanket over me with a scoff, followed by Mercy’s sharp, soprano voice ripping through the air as she starts s
RyanIt’s barely dawn. Four hours ago, I was taking a deep breath as I tucked my mate into our bed, and now we’re here, lying low in the grasslands ten miles from Silver, with twenty of my best warriors scattered behind me. Stars still fill the sky, shining under a blanket of deep navy and vibrant violet. It's kind of hard to stay focused when the sunrise looks like this, the first echoes of gold casting Aviva, in wolf form, in a halo of light. She’s crouched in the swaying grass just a few feet below where the rest of us are lying, hiding in the scant brush and scorched trees. I watch her edge forward a few inches, her body covered in weapons and leather–one of her special dresses from Endova. A half dozen whispers ghost through my head, mingling with the thundering of my heartbeat in my ears as we watch, and watch, the dozen or so rogues passing by, moving in a lazy formation toward the forests we, and the tribal packs, call home. ‘What are they doing?’ Andrew lies on my left sid