Page 2 of Forbid Me

My body heeded his command. Because it wasn't of my own free will, and because I was out of practice, the shift hurt. Four limbs collapsed as paws turned to fingers. My maw shortened into a broken nose, fur turned to soft flesh. I lay vulnerable on the forest floor, naked and shivering.

"I beg a quick death, your highness." My voice was barely a whisper, strained and filled with a short lifetime of doubt and hurt. Unused from years of neglect and solitude.

"I saw you. Inside my mind." The young prince pointed to his head. But those dark eyes looked through me.

Prince Dion was the son of the panther god. But the god of Arcadia, Pan, had lost his mind and trapped us all in his hell. Most in the realm were struggling with their sanity. Many in this world were caught in a partial shift. Stuck between human and animal, unable to transform fully into either. It was a disease known as the Call of the Wild.

I had heard that the prince was a seer, like his mother. But the Call must have finally caught hold of me to think the Panther Prince had a vision of a pitiful creature like me.

"Today isn't the day you die."

Prince Dion's words washed over me, stirring something deep within. My mother had turned her back on me, casting me out for a sin I couldn't undo. Now here was the prince, seeing worth in me where I saw none.

I felt a shift within, a flicker of hope igniting in the darkness of my despair.

I felt the damp earth beneath me, the coolness seeping through my skin, grounding me. The sounds of the forest hushed in reverence to his words. I felt an overwhelming urge to dedicate myself to this man, this prince who saw value in a life I had deemed worthless.

For the prince to come out and save my life, it must mean my life would be worth something. Perhaps I was meant to play some part in Panthera's future. Perhaps I was destined to be in service to the future king of my kind.

"What's your name?"

"Oz, sire."

"Oz, I had a vision about you."

Here it came; my true grand purpose in life. The reason I’d run instead of letting my mother claw my heart out and bury me next to my brother. Any second now, the prince would announce the reason for my redemption from the ugliness that had cast a shadow over me since the day I was born.

"I had a vision we'd be hunting squirrels today."

Managing to get my feet under me, I locked my knees and stood. "Squirrels, your highness?"

"If we hurry, we might be able to bust into their nut stash." The force of the young prince's laughter was so great that he bent over and slapped his knee. "Get it? Nut stash."

When I didn't laugh, he cocked his head and looked at me. His gaze narrowed, as though assessing me anew.

"Get it?"

I pushed past the lump in my throat. "I get it."

His grin rematerialized. "Then let's go."

And with that, the Prince of Panthers shifted and took off running. I stared after him, bewildered. Before he could toss me another of those assessing gazes, I shifted and raced after him. It was a job I'd be doing for the next twenty years.

Not just chasing after the prince, but also protecting his nut stash. But hey, there were worse things. I knew that firsthand.

CHAPTER ONE

Stella

"It's not what it looks like."

What it looked like was my boyfriend's dick inside another woman's unshaven poonanny while her finger was lodged in his ass. I don't know what shocked me more, her lack of grooming or the back door entrance.

The door to Ken's apartment was ajar when I arrived. There'd been a sliver of light cutting through the dim hallway. I'd thought he'd anticipated my arrival. My heart had raced with anticipation, eager for the comfort of his embrace. I needed some cuddles after the day I'd had.

Lately, my visions had become clouded. My foresight had gone murky like a fogged mirror. Ken's touch, his affection always cleared the haze, sharpening my foresight. But the scene that greeted me was a gut punch, a brutal unraveling of my naïve hopes.

"You're in bed with another woman, Ken." My voicewas sharp, a blade forged in the fire of betrayal. The room spun, a whirlpool of emotions—anger, hurt, disbelief.

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