Page 8 of Wolf's Gambit

As I quickly went down the elaborate staircase, I heard their voices rising and knew I had made my escape at the right time. The door opening to the pack leader’s office had me slow my steps when the pack leader emerged and looked up past me to the room where his children were now in a heated argument.

“Kezia,” he greeted as he continued to look past me, his head tilting slightly to the side as he listened.

“Pack Leader Bale,” I murmured as I dipped my head in reverence as was befitting his station.

“What’s the problem this time?” he asked me with amusement as his attention fixed on the upper level again.

“Landon is offering to…” I stalled. I did not want to tell the pack leader why I may not be attending the ball, especially in the hallway of his home, where every wolf in our pack could walk through. Grant was still hovering, and Landon knowing was bad enough.

“Offering what?” Kris asked as he opened the door wider, revealing himself standing behind Bale.

“I didn’t know you were here,” I said as I met his hard stare.

“What is Landon offering?” Bale asked me.

“To, um…guard me during…” I floundered and looked at my brother. “Well, you know.”

Bale turned to Kris in confusion, but my brother was smirking in amusement.

“During the ball?” Kris asked me.

“Yes.” I knew my cheeks were warming, and I wanted to leave or return upstairs, and if that were the case, I really was feeling out of my depth.

“Kezia’s first heat is near,” Kris explained to Bale. “It may fall during the festivities. It seems your son is offering to sacrifice his enjoyment of the ball to guard my sister’s innocence.”

It would have been so much more believable if he wasn’t openly laughing at the idea, and as Bale turned back to me, his smile was wide.

“Good fortune on you, Kezia…adulthood awaits,” he said with a dip of his head. “But I think my son will be better placed elsewhere that night.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” I told him truthfully. I had no wish to be guarded by anyone. What if I were one of the unfortunate shifters who cried all night? Landon would never let me live it down. “Looks like it will just be me and Kris missing the ball.” They both stared at me, and I faltered slightly at their hard looks. “If it happens then, I mean,” I added hastily.

“Kris will do his duty as my security and as a brother,” Bale told me smoothly.

He would? How? He couldn’t be in two places at once, no matter how much skill he said he had. “Really?”

“We’ll talk about this at home,” Kris told me, and I knew I was being dismissed.

“Okay,” I replied, knowing it was better not to argue with him in front of Bale. We could have our own sibling fight when he was home. “I’ll see you later,” I told him, and I saw the tightening around his eyes at my tone. “Pack Leader Bale.” I bowed my head as I said farewell and left the house. I could feel my brother’s attention on my back, landing right between my shoulder blades, like an itch I couldn’t reach to scratch.

The walk home was quiet. When Kris sought refuge with this pack and they agreed we could join them, the elders had chosen a house on the outskirts of town.

We were coming into the pack as nomads, and it was obvious we liked our own space. They thought that because of my age and how we’d been living until we got here, our wildness needed to be kept from the more civilized of the pack, especially as I adapted to being in my human form all the time. The shaman and an older female in the pack had cared for us until I was more in control of my wolf.

We had tutors come to us, and then Bale had me taught alongside his children, choosing to introduce me to children my age and not overwhelm me with more than a handful of people at a time.

As we got older, Cass campaigned to get her father to agree to the three of us attending the communal school for the last two years of our education. It was something I could have done without, but we were wolves, and wolves thrived in a pack community.

I think I was living proof that this was a misconception, but as always, I did what I was told and kept most of my complaints to my brother’s ears only. He would then remind me how lucky we were to be here.

I didn’t feel lucky. Sometimes, I felt as lost and confused as I had on the very first day they required me to submit to the pack leader and had my shift forced on me.

Walking up the paved path to our cottage, I felt the knot in my chest loosen as it always did when I got closer to home. Our cottage was simple in its layout and design and suited us well. The small garden I had cultivated while being denied my chance to shift for so long bloomed with an abundance of flowers and hedgerows. The painted blue shutters gave the cottage a homey look, which I had done solely to piss off my brother, but to my annoyance, he had liked them and had refused to allow me to paint over them.

I put the pie in the refrigerator and wondered what to do with myself. Sometimes, we would eat in the communal hall, but since the shaman had told my brother about my heat, Kris had already told me he was keeping me close to home in case it came when I was with others.

Which made it all sound so much more elaborate and fanciful than it was. It wasn’t my first bleed—I was a shifter—but I was still human. I’d had human periods for years, but a full heat was something else entirely. It’s when a shifter’s body, my body, sent the green light to every eligible male in the vicinity that I was ready to breed.

My body primed me for the breeding process by ramping up my hormones, and in return, every eligible male nearby would be driven to distraction, knowing an unmatched female needed to be bred.

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