Page 9 of The Alpha's Pregnant Mate

One part of Laurent’s mind was completely dedicated to the battle. The roar of blood in his ears, the flash of his blade in his hand, the familiar rhythm of slash and parry, advance and fall back—it was as familiar and all-consuming to him as breathing. But another part—a small, remote part that years of practice had helped him compartmentalize from his major focus—was furiously going over every detail of the situation, trying to work out how something like this could have happened. Why hadn’t he realized there was an attack coming? Why had his patrols missed it? Why had it taken the cry of a baby, woken from its sleep by the unrest, to stir him from his sleep at last? And what would have happened if there hadn’t been a couple of young families staying in his downstairs rooms, disturbing his sleep when they weren’t making him feel like a prisoner in his own office? Would he have simply slept through the entire attack?

As furious as he was about Rhietta’s flagrant disrespect for his authority, he had to admit, it had been her quick thinking alone that had ensured they were even half-ready to meet this attack. And that bothered him even more than his wolves taking orders from that woman in his absence. What else could they have done? Refused to leave their homes at her summons? Insisted on allowing the demons to overrun the town while they waited for the correct person to instruct them to ready themselves? No.

No, he realized as the battle wore on, his energies could be better spent elsewhere. Like in working out exactly where this army of demons had come from. Since they’d settled here, he’d gotten a reasonable sense of the rhythms of their attacks—there would be a lull while the monsters gathered their strength, then an attack once they’d reached a sufficient concentration, and then another lull. By his reckoning, they ought to have been midway through a lull. That didn’t mean an attack was impossible by any means, but the force that attacked certainly shouldn’t be as strong as this one was. This many demons didn’t simply turn up out of the blue. There had to be something that attracted them. And Laurent, as much as he hated to admit it, had a feeling he knew what it was. Demons were attracted to strong, turbulent emotions, especially en masse. The tensions between the packs, the simmering, hateful relationship between Laurent and Rhietta—it must have been enough to make the settlement irresistible to every demon in a ten-mile radius.

This was a demon-infested island, and it was a demon’s basic nature to attack a village of wolves—he couldn’t blame himself for the entire attack. But the unexpected size of it, the unusual timing…that much, he knew, was his fault.

It was with these thoughts still preying on his mind that Laurent saw out the rest of the battle, driving his sword with mounting fury through the swathes of demons that seemed to keep pouring out of the trees. It was almost dawn by the time their ranks began to thin, and though the mounting bodies had already begun to rot and decompose, he was still taken aback by how thickly the battlefield was littered with demon corpses.

And there was another surprise waiting for him, too—a much more pleasant one, all things considered—which was that their casualty rates were remarkably low. There had been half a dozen injuries, but nothing so serious that it wouldn’t be healed in a day or two; nothing, in fact, that even required his assistance as a healer. Laurent couldn’t remember the last battle that hadn’t ended with him stitching up wounds while swaying with exhaustion.

He’d have given anything for another explanation, but the more he thought about it, the more he couldn’t deny the truth. It was a simple numbers game. With Rhietta’s wolves fighting at their side, they’d been exponentially stronger against even an unusually powerful onslaught of demons.

The sun was just visible over the tree line when he sheathed his sword at last, the work of finishing off the surviving demons finally at an end. Most of the pack—the packs, he corrected himself sharply—had left the battlefield already, heading back home to wash the demon blood from their bodies and take some well-earned rest. He’d hoped to avoid her, but no such luck, it seemed—he turned to find a familiar face looking up at him. Despite the long night, her eyes were bright, that unstoppable smile still playing about her lips. It made a rather grim contrast to the demon blood that was splattered across her face and, it seemed, caked thickly in her curls, plastering them to her head.

“Not a bad outcome, all things considered,” she said brightly, gesturing at the carnage around them. “I was expecting more.”

Laurent opened his mouth to respond, then closed it again, feeling a sudden and almost overwhelming exhaustion strike him. All the anger he’d been saving up, the blistering remarks he’d been preparing to deliver to punish her for her insolence—it was all gone in a rush, leaving nothing but weariness in its place. And without a word, he turned on his heel and walked off across the battlefield, leaving her behind him. He heard her call his name once or twice, feeling a faint pang of satisfaction at the outrage in her voice. Good. Let her be the one who was infuriated by his poor conduct, for a change. He was going to bed. It was all he could do to stop by the river to rinse off the worst of the demon residue. Laurent reached his house on shaking legs, pausing just long enough to feel annoyed by the necessity of tiptoeing through his own front door to avoid waking the babies, then headed upstairs to let the oblivion of sleep claim him.

Some part of him hoped that he’d successfully avoided talking to Rhietta altogether. But he should have known better. He woke late and dressed slowly, wincing a little with his movements. Though he’d avoided injury, it had still been a long battle, and though his muscles were well-trained and as strong as they’d ever been, they still ached in the aftermath of all that exertion. He shuffled to his office once he’d dressed—then felt a shock of annoyance run through him when he realized he was far from the first to arrive.

Two of his lieutenants were standing in his office, midway through an altogether too friendly conversation with Rhietta. Reade and Camus were long-standing members of the pack, stoic and loyal to a fault, who possessed leadership skills of their own but none of the ambition necessary to make a real bid for the position of Alpha. They’d been worthy lieutenants to Lowell before him, and Laurent had always trusted them both—trusted them enough, at least, that his immediate reaction to seeing them in conversation with his enemy was irritation with her, not suspicion of them. At least they had the decency to leave his chair unoccupied, though the same respect hadn’t been extended to his desk. Rhietta looked fresh as a daisy, of course, for all the world as though she hadn’t been up past dawn fighting demons, leaning against his desk as though she owned the place. He was hardly surprised; at this point, it felt like she was spending more time in his office than he was. Jaw tight, trying to hide the anger that was seething through him and feeling even more annoyed when he realized he wasn’t succeeding, Laurent swept through his office and pulled out his chair with more force than he’d intended, the timber screeching discordantly against the floorboards. Then he sat, turning his gaze to his lieutenants, who at least had the good grace to look a little ashamed of themselves.

“Alpha Laurent, good afternoon. Good to see you’ve recovered enough from the battle to join us,” Rhietta said, and the cheer in her voice made him want to reach out and shake her. “We were just going over the aftermath.”

“It’s good news, Alpha,” said Reade, not quite hiding the unease in his voice behind his bravado. “Despite the size of the assault, they didn’t break our lines, so there’s no structural damage to speak of—just the residue of the demon bodies, which ought to be gone in a day or two. And only a few minor casualties on our side.”

“Camus was just telling me what a good result that is,” Rhietta said, that aggravating smile still playing about her lips. “Compared to other assaults, I mean, to have such minor injuries—”

“He was, was he?” Laurent interrupted, pinning his other lieutenant with a hard stare. “Sharing sensitive military information with another pack’s Alpha. We’ll discuss your decision-making later, Camus. As for you,” he continued, cutting across Rhietta, who had already opened her mouth to defend his hapless lieutenant, “I’d be well within my rights to expel you and your pack from this village this very moment. Don’t think I’ve forgotten the blatant disregard for my authority you displayed last night. Taking over the defense effort, giving my wolves orders—I had anticipated a certain amount of disrespect from you, knowing what I do about your leadership style, but this was utterly beyond the pale.”

It felt good to vent a little of the frustration that was building in him. He was surprised, though, when Rhietta didn’t seem to be rising to her usual heights of emotion in response. She was surveying him with a cool, thoughtful stare, and he didn’t miss the way her eyes darted, just briefly, to his lieutenants before they returned to his face. Then she nodded, and Laurent felt his frown deepen.

“Have you finished?” she asked pleasantly.

He could have struck her. Instead, he narrowed his eyes and gave her a tight little nod. Right now, he didn’t quite trust himself to speak.

“I apologize, Alpha Laurent, for readying your wolves for battle in your absence,” she said promptly, and for a moment she sounded so much like her father that he would have taken an involuntary step back if he’d been on his feet. “I had not intended to give offense or to issue orders, only to alert them to the dangers and have them ready themselves for your command, but I acknowledge that I overstepped and violated sacred territory. I make this apology unreservedly before these two well-regarded representatives of your pack, and will gladly do so before a larger gathering of your wolves if you so choose. Consider me in your debt, Alpha.”

It wasn’t a register he’d heard her use before; he realized now it had been foolish of him to assume that her refusal to handle their interactions formally indicated that she wouldn’t be capable of doing so. He could feel the curiosity of his lieutenants, even though they both knew better than to look at him. He could see the potential branches of this conversation spreading out before him like roads diverging, and in that moment, he knew that there was no course of action for him that didn’t end in embarrassment…save for this one.

“Apology accepted,” he said brusquely, noticing the way his lieutenants relaxed, just slightly. “On the grounds that nothing of its ilk happens again.”

“You have my word, and my gratitude,” Rhietta said, and this time there was the faintest hint of a sparkle in her eye—nothing he could have pressed her on, of course, but a hint of insouciance just strong enough to set his teeth on edge. It was exactly the kind of trick her father had been a master of, and it brought out in him such childish impulses to stomp his feet and yell insults at her that he had to steady his breathing.

“Will that be all?” he asked, biting back the names he’d liked to have called her instead.

“I had hoped to discuss the battle—”

“It seems you’ve done so already in my absence,” he said sharply. “I’d appreciate the opportunity to speak with my lieutenants in private. If you will,” he added, pinning her with his coldest look. She met his eyes, and he felt a faint brush of satisfaction at the annoyance he could see there. She might have scored a few points in this little skirmish between them, but that didn’t change her fundamental weakness. With a decidedly brittle smile, Rhietta turned on her heel and strode stiffly out of his office.

“Now then,” he said, once he’d given the chilling silence time to worm its way under their skin. “Why don’t you fill me in on the lovely little chat you were having with the enemy Alpha?”

“Enemy?” Camus looked like he wanted to protest further, but Laurent cut him dead with a look.

“Did I mispronounce the word?” he asked, keeping his tone pleasant. “Yes. Enemy. Are you so weary from the battle that you’ve forgotten the situation? The history that lies between our two packs? Let me remind you. That woman—that child—took almost half of our number on her reckless, sentimental, doomed mission to play at Alpha like her father. She’s a traitor, as are the wolves who followed her, and every last one of them is responsible for the magnitude of the danger we’ve been in for the past year. Perhaps it was a mistake to offer them refuge.”

“Alpha Laurent, please.” Reade had clearly summoned up all of his courage for this—Laurent could see him shaking, just a little. “I was there last night. There was nothing underhanded about what she did, waking us up, getting us ready. Hell, she even sent someone to fetch you. She just didn’t want the demons to catch us unaware.”

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