Marianna
“I think the couch looks fine right there,” Mom says, kicking an empty moving box into a growing pile of dinged up cardboard. “But an armchair would be nice, don’t you think?”
“One of those big, fluffy monstrosities?” I laugh, arranging framed photos on the mantle, my fingers gliding over an image of me, Skye, and my mom a few months after my daughter was born.
“I’d love something cozy to sit in while you’re at work and I’m watching Skye do her homework. I’ll start the hunt for one. I was just talking to our neighbor about a flea market held during the upcoming mating festival. I bet I’ll find something there.” She giggles, but her voice fades when she turns back into the kitchen to continue unpacking.
Skye is asleep upstairs, long tucked in for the night. Moonlight beams through the bare windows. I haven’t put up the curtains yet. It’s a beautiful, warm night with a soft, only slightly chilly breeze coming off the mountains. The moonlight calls to me, beckoning.
“Hey, Mom?” I round the corner into the kitchen. “I’m going to go out for a run. I’ll be back in like… two hours. I want to explore a bit. There’re tons of wolf trails all over the place here.”
“I think you could use it. I won’t wait up for you, but I put the spare key under the purple flowerpot on the porch.”
I feel the shift before I’ve even walked back downstairs, now wearing just a robe to cover my bare skin. The early spring air might be unseasonably warm, but as my wolf powers submit to the moonlight, I can smell a hint of snow and ice coming in with the mountain breeze.
I shift in the front yard, leaving my robe in a heap on the steps, and zoom through the quiet streets near Wisteria Way. I’m not the only one shifting tonight. I pass a few neighbors in their wolf forms and the guards at the gate don’t pay me any mind as I follow no set trail, no direction, and weave through the narrow cobblestone alleys of the inner city before reaching a bridge toward an older part of town.
The forest blooms ahead of me. I take a well-laid trail, picking up my pace until I’m panting, nearly out of breath. The trail splits into tighter wolf trails that weave through the woods, but I continue going up into the mountains until I lose the trail altogether, and it’s just me and the breeze through my thick, black fur.
I’m about as average as a wolf can get. I’m not a trained warrior. I’ve never been hunting and don’t have any skills when it comes to wolf-on-wolf combat.
But I like being out here in nothing but my fur, the moonlight guiding me until the forest thins, and the ground becomes soft grass and boulders.
In the shadow of a cliff, a large mountain pool of crystal clear water reflects the moonlight. The humidity in Moonrise is insane, even in the earliest days of spring. Back in Crescent Falls, this time of year? Goddess, it would still be freezing even as the winter grass fades into shades of bright green and soft yellow. I’ve heard Eastonia has hotter summers and more mild winters than Crescent Falls, too, which I’m looking forward to immensely.
But right now, I’m hot. My fur feels too thick for the warmth bleeding through the air. The breeze is below me now, not even touching the clearing and the perfectly calm water. It’s… perfect.
I shift back into my human form, glancing around to make sure I’m alone, and then dive in. The water is still pretty cold, and I gasp as I resurface, then blow out a breath, smoothing my wet hair away from my face. My skin tingles as the heat in my body reacts to the sudden burst of chill, but the water feels amazing, smooth and silky against my naked skin. I swim into the shadow of the cliff and find a few large rocks resting below the surface of the water where I perch.
I lean my head against the rocks behind me, listening to the snow melt trickling down the cliff and into the pool, and watch the moonlight drift over the center of the alpine lake. It’s not very deep, but deep enough my toes don’t scrape the bottom unless I’m totally submerged.
My mind wanders over the day I had. The temple, the Mystics, seeing Blake.
The thought of him curls through me, painful, but warm. It was like ripping off a bandaid, I suppose, but the wound beneath isn’t close to being healed.
Blake broke up with me. That’s the truth of it. He shattered my heart into pieces a few days before my eighteenth birthday. Then, two months later, I found out I was pregnant, and… I refused to tell him. My mom was the one who relayed the news.
So much happened between our breakup and her birth. So much that… wrecked me, and him, beyond repair. We were so young. So stupidly in love.
And when I found out about his powers?
I was scared of him, to be honest.
I think I still am, and it’s why… it’s why seeing Skye suffer is opening those old wounds again.
I don’t know how to help her.
I didn’t know how to help him.
I slip back into the water, sinking until it’s up to my chin, but then movement catches my eye in the shadows, and another wolf approaches the pool. I slip back, silent, praying I’m shielded by the darkness as the dark wolf sniffs the water and jumps in.
Fuck. What do I do now?
A man appears, gasping just like I had as he breaches the surface, his dark hair glued to his head. His back is to me, but the water only touches his shoulders as he stands, swiping his hair back, murmuring a curse about the cold temperature under his breath, and his voice is…
I yelp in surprise, choking on the sound.
Blake slowly turns to face me, his eyes lit from within as he peers into the shadows.
“What are you doing here?” he asks.
“That’s the fourth time in… twelve hours you’ve asked me that question,” I bite out, shivering but not from the cold.
He looks down his nose at me. “Technically, it’s the second,” he corrects. “And this place is on property owned by the royal family.”
“I didn’t know. I lost the trail.”
He scans my face. I take a risk and step back into the moonlight. I doubt it’s light enough that he can see the outline of my body beneath the surface of the water, but still. We’re both naked. Totally, completely exposed to each other. It’s ironic in a way.
He moves closer, stopping a few feet away. I can’t move any closer to him, however. If I do, I’ll fall into the deep end where he can clearly touch the bottom without an issue, but not me.
I feel my skin heating under his gaze despite the chill of the water lapping my breasts, the surface gliding just below my collarbones.
After several moments of appraising silence, he says quietly, “You’re welcome to come here when you shift. I didn’t mean–I didn’t mean it wasn’t allowed.”
“I’m not royal, so it isn’t allowed,” I argue, surprising myself with the teasing glint in my tone.
He catches it, and the corner of his mouth ticks upward before falling flat just as quickly as it began.
I used to be able to get under his skin. It was my favorite thing to do when we were young, and he was still trying his hardest to get me to grasp any kind of mathematical concept. I’d bug him, pester him until he finally had enough, and that expression of indifference cracked, showing me who he really was.
But he’s different now. More relaxed. Maybe it’s his age. Maybe it’s being in Eastonia.
Maybe it’s me.
He drags his tongue along his lower lip before biting it–a motion I catch and shiver with the consequences. “Today was unexpected. I apologize if I was stern with you.”
“You met your daughter today. I wouldn’t have expected anything less.”
“It wasn’t Skye,” he cuts in, slightly breathless. “Marianna, I haven’t seen you in seven years other than briefly at the concert. You caught me off guard. I didn’t know how to react. I still don’t.”
“I don’t expect anything from you, just so you know. Skye doesn’t know–”
“You’ve told me that already.” There’s the softest hint of pain in his voice, and it rakes through me, festering with guilt.
“I just… she hasn’t asked. It’s just me, my mom, and her. She hasn’t asked about a dad… yet. And when she does, if she’s old enough to understand, I have a plan.”
“What is it?”
I honestly can’t tell by his tone if he’s even interested or not. His expression is guarded, but his eyes are withdrawn, hooded, and dark.
“The truth,” I whisper with a shrug of my shoulder. “That me and… her dad couldn’t be together.”
He moves closer. I don’t move back.
“I’d tell her,” I continue, my voice wobbling as his proximity invades my space, “that it was a decision we made. It was a good thing. No one–no one got their heart broken.”
“That’s not even remotely close to the truth,” he says in a near whisper.
I hold his gaze, forgetting how to breathe. There’s barely a foot of space between us now. I can feel his warmth. I could easily reach out and touch his chest, run my fingertips over the smooth, taut muscle of his pecs, his shoulders.
The moonlight is overwhelming, reaching a peak, illuminating us in a soft, silver glow.
Maybe it’s the moonlight. Maybe it’s my tired, calm brain after running in my wolf form, my thoughts finally untangled, but I ask, “Do you want to know her, Blake?”
Whatever haze there was between us fades, and the chill creeps in again, but he doesn’t move away. His face turns serious, shadowed, when he asks, “Is that wise?”
“I don’t know. I have no idea. But she’s yours as much as she’s mine–”
“That isn’t true, Anna.”
Anna. The nickname funnels through me, turning me inside out. It leaves his lips in a whisper, a tone I remember so clearly even though years have passed since he last tangled his fingers in my hair, his body bent against mine in the too-snug backseat of his car, the windows fogged as he whispered my name, and…
“I’m a stranger to her. You’ve raised her on your own.”
“You’re her father, and you’re here, in the same place as us–”
“I was in the same place as you for years–”
“We never ran into each other in Crescent Falls,” I argue over the top of him. “Things were different there. You’re the prince, and we never… we could never have crossed paths without guards or people taking pictures of you…” I feel my toes sliding off the rock keeping my head above the surface as I lean forward. “But we’ve run into each other twice today. If you’re here, and I’m here, it’s bound to keep happening.”
He scans my face, trying to read my expression, trying to make sense of it. It brings back more memories of getting to know him, of those early days on the couch with math textbooks between us.
“I’d be okay with it. If you want to spend some time with her…. I think… it’d be good for her to be with someone like her.”
He moves away, and I know I’ve crossed a line. The moonlit spell breaks, and my toes slide off the rock. I submerge before I can stop myself, and then his hands are clutching my waist, hauling me out of the cool water and back into the shadows.
I blink past the droplets hanging from my eyelashes, reaching up to smooth my hand over the planes of my face to wipe the water away, but his hands… remain. Just for a moment. Long enough for us to lock eyes while his thumbs rest against my hipbones.
He releases me and takes several steps away, turning into the moonlight, giving me his back.
“Blake–”
“We need to talk about this in a different way. A different place,” he says low in his throat. His voice is tight, almost pained as he asks, “Can you come to the castle? I have an office there.”
“I didn’t–if you’re not comfortable with this, with us–me and Skye–”
“No,” he says firmly, shaking his head, looking at me over his shoulder. “That’s not what this is. I’m not saying I don’t–that I’m not accepting what you just offered, but we’ve had a contract in place for seven years. The terms are–”
“Well laid out. I know. You made everything perfectly clear when it was written.” There’s ice in my tone. He hears it, knows exactly what it means.
He grits his teeth, frustrated. “I can’t talk to you about renegotiating those terms while you’re naked,” he says with force, like he’s on the verge of losing control.
I shouldn’t want him to, should I?
“My office would be more appropriate. We need to discuss the idea of her attending the academy, anyway.”
“I’ll think about it.” I let the distance sink between us, growing heavy as he turns to face me again. I pushed him away once. I had good reasons to. I told myself it was for the best, that I could do this on my own. That I wasn’t just punishing him for breaking my heart to pieces and…and… stomping it into dust.
“I’ll make sure you’re allowed entrance to the castle grounds. I’ll be there when, and if, you’re ready to talk.”
I close my eyes and turn away when he pulls himself out of the water and shifts then stalks through the forest until he’s out of sight, and the water becomes so cold it’s unbearable.