*Ella*
I used to bring myself to tears to get what I wanted. It never worked on my mom, not once. But my dad… he was a sucker for my tears and always bent to my will if I let them flow.
But I was a different person before I left my kingdom behind to come here. Now, my tears are real, and I do, in fact, feel like I’m falling to pieces. Since Hannah is still in a coma, Amanda is my only friend in this place, if I can even call her that. And right now, she’s on house arrest, or whatever the equivalent of grounding is in this Goddess forsaken place.
Ryatt slowly turns around, his face shrouded in shadows. Rain patters on the top of his head, making his dark hair twist into curls. His gray eyes are sharp and focused on mine. “Go back inside.”
“Are you coming with me?” I ask, hating how desperate I sound, but I am desperate. Desperate for anything from him, despite the walls I’ve built around my heart.
He exhales through his nose and glances at the cottage over the top of my head. “For a moment.”
I nod and reach down between us to take his hand. He flinches away from my touch, but I hold firm on my intentions. We may hate each other, but we are mates. There’s a reason for that, even if I can’t see it yet, I can admit I am here, with him, for a reason.
Now, we need to figure out why.
I press my thumb into the palm of his hand. He locks his eyes on mine, his hand completely rigid and flexed against my touch. I hold his gaze for a moment longer before leading him back into the cottage with a firm grip on his hand.
I can feel his power in that touch. It’s a writhing, snaking sensation that makes my skin so cold it aches to the bone. What is he? What can he do with those powers? Is he more than a wolf, like I am?
I let go of his hand to shut the door behind us, locking it. I lean against it and face him, my palms pressed behind me against the door.
“Are you holding me prisoner?” he asks flatly, walking across the darkened living area and sitting in a high backed chair. It’s chilly in here, the warmth of the woodstove in the bedroom not reaching the living space whatsoever. The thin nightgown I’d been given to sleep in does little to keep me warm. In fact, it’s thin enough I’m sure he can see the silhouette of my body through the fabric, illuminated by the warm firelight in the room behind us. It doesn’t help that I’m damp from the rain.
Yes, he can see. His gaze slowly drifts down my body, lingering on the curves of my hips and thighs, and back up again. My breath hitches as my body reacts to his cool, predatory gaze.
He asked me something, but I’ve already forgotten the question. Frustrated, he looks out the window beside my head where the sky is turning from a dark, angry black to a deep gray as the first hints of early morning start streaming through the rain-soaked clouds.
“What do you want to know, Ella?”
“Where is home to you?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“You told your men I was your Luna. Where exactly do I rule, then?”
“I have a castle, Princess. Don’t worry.” He gives me a casual smirk. “You’ll know soon enough. We’re going there after we hand over your maid to the witches.”
“The same witches who sent their–their hellhounds, or whatever they’re called, after Gemma?”
Ryatt exhales deeply, that devilish smirk dissolving. His jaw tightens as he nods, “The same ones, yes, but they shouldn’t have done that, just like you women shouldn’t have set out for them on your own.”
“You’re their king, then?”
“I am, much to their chagrin, I’m afraid.” He looks down at his battered and bruised hands, flexing them wide and then curling his fingers into his palms. “I may have to remind them of that tomorrow night when we arrive.”
“And Hannah will be safe with them? They’ll be able to get her home?”
“She’ll be safe.”
“And the other thing?” I ask, kicking off the door to approach him. “They’ll see her home–”
“There’s one person who can do that, and I…” He trails off, taking a ragged breath. His eyes meet mine as I came to a stop in front of him, my nightgown brushing against my bare calves. His eyes drop to my ankles, then slowly drift back up again, as if taking me in for the first time. “I can’t do it again, not for a while.”
“Why not? Haven’t you been spying on me for years?”
He leans back in his chair and tilts his head, his tongue trailing over the inside of his lower lip. “That’s different.”
“Explain it to me,” I demand, but my voice is calm and collected. It’s a simple request, at least in my mind. “What are you, exactly?”
“A wolf, but extra.”
“Obviously.”
“Like you.”
“Unfortunately,” I bite out, growing impatient. “You’d better start talking now, Ryatt. Like you said, we have to leave at daybreak.”
“Hmm,” he hums, chuckling darkly. “Are you always this willful and defiant?”
“You know me much better than I know you. You’ve been watching me for years.”
“I wasn’t watching you–”
“Stalking, then.”
His eyes narrow on mine. “Do you think it’s been easy for me to know my mate was in another realm? That my mate had powers that rivaled my own and had no idea how to use them, or what she was, or what would become of her if anyone found out?”
“Well, no, I suppose not,” I say, leaning my hip against the wobbly side table next to his chair. “But why worry about someone you dislike so much?”
“I never said I disliked you–”
“It radiates off you like your own powers–”
“Having you here is absolutely terrifying, Ella,” he says, standing abruptly. So abruptly, in fact, that I startle and take a step away from him. A vase with wilting flowers nearly topples off the table as I graze it with my hip, but he grabs it right before it falls over and sets it right. “The mate bond isn’t something anyone can just ignore. Its effects are primal, instinctual. It’s why you feel suddenly softened to me now that I’ve been nearly shredded apart by my father’s warriors and why you worried yourself into a near fit over the past three days.”
I glare at him, but he continues, “It’s why I put my sword through the Magpie’s chest after he dared to touch you.” His voice drops to something low and dangerous as he steps closer to me. “It’s why I can’t sleep at night, why I can’t think straight, and why I went into your realm to try to stop you from finding out about us, but it was too late.”
My lips part in surprise at his last words. “You wanted Isaac to think you were the enemy, didn’t you? You were never trying to get him to side with you against your father–”
“I couldn’t take you from your family, but I couldn’t protect you any longer, not when your existence became known by my father.”
Something shatters in my chest. It’s my heart, I realize. I reach out on impulse, brushing my fingertips over his shoulder. I don’t know why. “You were willing to die by Isaac’s hand instead of me coming here.” I pull my hand back. “What difference would that have made?”
“You would have been useless to my father without me.”
“What about your people?”
His eyes, once cold and sharp, now soften, giving away a buried emotion I haven’t seen from him before. “There was a plan in place.”
“What plan?”
“It’s not important now–”
“It is important. You said it yourself. I am your mate. I am the Luna, despite the status of our–our relationship.” My mouth goes dry as he takes a single, shallow step forward into my touch until my hand is flat on his chest. I can feel his heart beating as I curl my fingers into his jacket and look at him. “You announced it, Ryatt. That I am the Luna of these people. So what happens if you–you die?”
“Do you care?”
“I don’t want to ever hear you ask that again,” I say sharply, but my eyes sting with unshed tears. I’m so confused. Confused by this world, this situation, and the feeling in my body that's begging me to walk into his arms and never let him go.
But I hate him.
Right?
His heartbeat under my hand quickens. I look up at him, finding him looking down at me with a heated gaze behind his eyes. They seem sharper, brighter. My own heart bounces around my chest. “It’s just the mate bond,” I say with a trembling voice. “That’s why I feel like this.”
“It’s just the mate bond,” he rasps, and I close my eyes as he leans down, his next words brushing over my ear, “that’s all.”
“We hate each other.”
“I never wanted you.”
“I never–” my breath hitches as his lips brush over my cheekbone, “I never wanted you–”
Then my arms are around his neck, and he’s crushing his lips against mine. He lifts me up, setting me on the wobbly table that I know will break under my weight, but my mind goes blissfully blank for the first time in what feels like ages. Like I can finally think with a clear head, the same feeling I only get while painting.
It’s been so long since I’ve painted anything.
I wrap my legs around his waist as he leans into me, one of his hands cradling the back of my head, the other pressed to the wall behind us to steady us. His tongue slides over my lower lip, and in answer, I part my lips, my breath drawn out in a moan. His tongue glides over mine, then my teeth, the roof of my mouth. He kisses me like he’s starved. It’s like nothing I’ve experienced. My entire body tightens with anticipation as his hand travels from my head down my spine, pressing me closer to him.
‘It’s just the mate bond,’ he says into my mind.
‘It’s just the mate bond,’ I say, and then he’s pulling me off the table and carrying me into the bedroom.
I know we should stop, but that silver thread binding us together sings with satisfaction as he roughly lowers me to the bed. My mouth is still on his. I can’t get enough of him, his taste, his scent. His calloused hands travel down my thighs beneath the nightgown, making my skin erupt in prickles of gooseflesh. Shivers of pleasure lick down my spine and settle deep between my legs.
He pulls only slightly to undo his belt.
I can barely breathe. My heart is hammering against my ribs to the point I feel like I’ve run a marathon. My head begins to spin as I try to make sense of what’s happening right now and how we got here, to this point.
“Wait!” I cry out, placing a hand on his chest.