Eero's perspective
“Let's go and meet the Alpha King. He must be very worried about my safety,” I initiated, dragging Aelice away from Claudius.
For a short period of time, it was just the clacking of our heels echoing in the empty, silent corridors, until she halted and turned to me, giving into her curiosity.
“Claudius Cormac was the one who brought you to safety?” Aelice inquired in disbelief.
"Yes, it's him." I admitted honestly as she had saw me and Claudius coming out of the same room. There was no point lying to her now.
“We were dancing when the attack happened. Everything just happened in a blur, and the next thing I knew was that I was in the study with him.”
"Oh, how lucky! This is really gentlemanlike of him!" Aelice nodded her head, smiling. But from Aelice's eyes, I could tell that she didn't buy my story completely.
After meeting the Alpha King and assuring him that everything was all right with me, I excused myself and retreated to my room.
*****
On my way to the dining hall the next morning, I noticed not big difference in the manor, only a few more deltas and epsilons in the corners.
“Good morning, your grace,” Aelice greeted me cheerfully as I entered the dining hall.
“Huh?” I chuckled. “There's just the two of us here. You can just call me by my name.”
But her eyes were cautious of our surroundings.
When a servant came forward and prepared me a chair, I was called to mind why she behaved this way.
“Thank you.” I whispered to her ears after taking my seat.
“For what?” Aelice threw me a confused look.
“For you didn't tell the Alpha King who I was with last night. You even lied to your father Beta Octavio just to protect me.” I expressed gratitude from the bottom of my heart.
"Shhh." Aelice put a finger in front of her mouth as she leaned closer to me. “We shouldn't talk about that here. On the second thought—”
She stopped suddenly as our fathers' voices sounded outside the dining hall.
“We shouldn't talk about it at all,” Aelice finished, rearing from her chair.
My body followed her lead as we flitted our eyes to the entrance, expectant to see the Alpha King and his beta.
“Good morning, Alpha,” I said. And to his beta, I gave nothing but a caviled dash of eyes.
“Morning, Eero. Hope the mayhem last night didn't steal much sleep from you.” Codrus joked before lugging his eyes to Aelice. “Same goes to you, Lady Aelice.”
“Not the best sleep that I've ever had, but it was a decent one, Alpha,” Aelice replied while I simply curled up a smile at the Alpha King.
As we all took our seats at the dining table, I noticed that the Alpha King was dipping his eyes in my direction for the nth time.
Just as I was about to ask him why, a question slipped out of his lips. “Did I tell you that I'll be touring you to RGC today?”
“RGC?”
“It's Regulus Group of Companies, a corporation owned by our pack, princess.” Beta Octavio explained to me scornfully, putting me into an awkard position.
Under the dining table, Aelice reached for my hand secretly, asking me to let her father's sarcasm off the hook.
“You didn't, Alpha,” I responded shortly after composing myself from Octavio's mockery.
“Oh, I must have forgot it. Are you ready for a tour now? I'm gonna introduce you to the board, and show you your office—”
The Alpha King's words were interrupted abruptly as Claudius beetled into the dining hall directly, taking a seat next to Aelice.
His presence ruined everyone's moods, especially Beta Octavio's.
“You are not supposed to be here, Claudius.” Beta Octavio tried to voice out his rejection calmly. But the smug and snobbish smile on Claudius lips simply made the atmosphere even denser.
“Why? It's time for breakfast.” Claudius was acting shamelessly, and then bore his eyes to Aelice.
“Are you gonna take that sausage? If not, can I have it?”
Saying nothing in response, Aelice simply handed Claudius the plate with the food he was referring to.
After getting what he wanted, Claudius took a bite of the sausage and chewed loudly, vexing the beta on purpose.
“Know your place, Claudius. You're not part of this family. You were simply granted the right to live here. Some matters here are exclusive to—”
“Ah, how classist!” Claudius retorted, which completely ticked off the beta.
“It's fine, Octavio. Let him be. It's just breakfast,” Codrus intervened, stopping them from bickering.
“There's no way you can get rid of me, Beta Octavio. If I were you, I'd start considering me a family.” Claudius mumbled, eyeing me to send out a cryptic message.
“Eero?” The Alpha King called out my name, attempting to change the subject. “You haven't found your mate yet, have you?”
Caught off guard, I choked on Codrus' inquiry and glanced at Claudius out the corner of my eye subconsciously.
“Actually I have. His name is Cohen. But I rejected him after he cheated on me with Serra, the girl whom I once took as my sister.”
Everyone at the table, except for Claudius of course, was shocked, taking a halt from breakfast. All eyes were fixated on me now.
“But don't worry. My wolf has made a recovery from Cohen's betrayal. We're stronger now.” I winked at them as Codrus heaved a sigh of relief.
"Good. Then it's time to move on, you know, to mate with someone of your choice, a second chance mate. You know what that is, don't you?”