Page 18 of With Fangs and Claws (The Wolf Queen 1)

“Gods above, we have some work to do,” Axe burst in, ruining my speech entirely. “Mind, body and soul? How does one possess that? A person’s soul is their own, and the joining of them…”

He let out a sigh then and I frowned as I tried to ascertain the expression. Was that pity? I found myself stiffening, just as Dane said, but in a quite different way. Anger throbbed strong and true and as a result I went to get to my feet…

Only to be yanked down again onto Dane’s lap.

“Ignore my brother,” he said against the skin of my neck. “We do. He is honest as the day is long, but that is a liability of sorts. He has no idea how to modulate his thoughts or words.”

Axe’s massive arms folded then, his eyes narrowing.

“What he means to say,” Dane continued, “is that a mating between warg and woman is quite a different thing than your Granian marriage. It’s not indentured servitude, with multiple husbands to pander to rather than one. From what I understand, Granian men are raised to expect sacrifices from women the moment they are born and never more so than when taking a wife. Her thoughts, her feelings, her needs are nothing compared to her husband’s. She puts it all aside to serve him.”

What happened next was a strange thing. I was sitting in a most inappropriate position, hearing an accurate description of the life sentence that was before me and… Each man, even Gael, frowned in disgust at the idea. I felt a flare of irritation then, that they were given permission to screw their faces up at our notions of wifehood and I…?

No matter what I did, no matter where I went, I had to at least pay lip service to those ideals. Father never really bothered with me, ever, so what I did in the training yard was not his concern. But if one of the other border lords arrived without notice? Well, I’d be shoved away and into the barracks to hide, until they walked into the keep, then left to scurry back to my rooms and make myself presentable before appearing at my father’s table.

When the odious men of my father’s acquaintance had made similarly coarse jokes about who would be the one to deflower me and the cries I might make as they did, I’d had to stay silent, smile sweetly and clamp down on my riotous feelings. Because if I sneered at the idea like these wargen did, my father would’ve bent me over the table and belted me there and then, much to the delight of his friends.

“We’ll never ask that of you, Darcy,” Dane said in a much gentler tone. “A warg is not an undemanding mate. We will want everything you have to give and more, but…” His fingers teased the small hairs at the back of my neck, until I tossed his hand off with a shake of my head, resulting in the others laughing. “In our world, it must be freely given. A warg must earn his mate’s love, devotion and surrender, and he does that by giving her the same.”

“Then if I am not required to obey you…” I jerked myself to my feet and then looked over my shoulder to where Dane stared up at me. “Then I needn’t now. Thank you for healing me.” I dropped a quick curtsey to Gael and his lips twisted slightly into something that could perhaps be described as a smile. Then right as I was about to sweep out of the room, I realised I did have a question for them.

“When?”

“When will we take you from here and make you our mate?” Dane asked. “We could do it now, if we liked. We could rouse your father from his stupor and have the documents signed and be riding for Strelae in the morning.”

“Gods, how I wish that was the case,” Axe said with a sigh.

“But it’s customary for wargen to woo their mate before they take her to their home, so we will do that for as long as it takes for you to realise you belong with us,” Weyland said. “We also need to try and salvage as much of the deal as we possibly can,” he flicked a look at Axe, “after our brother’s stupid outburst.”

“You would have minced words and danced around the issue until we ended up walking away with a few donkeys and that harridan that was escorting Darcy to her room as our mate,” Axe replied dismissively. “Better to be blunt about things and ensure our little huntress doesn’t get away.”

I almost took a step backwards as those intense blue eyes came to rest on me.

“So really, the date we depart is up to you,” Dane said. “When you are ready, we will leave.”

“And what if I’m never ready?” I asked, plans formulating in my mind.

The three of them smiled then as one, slow dark expressions, but Gael, he just shook his head slowly.

“You want to lead us on a merry chase?” Weyland said, his teeth glinting in the lamp light. “Remember what I said, Darcy?”

His words, describing me as the deer and him as the wolf, of him hunting me down and sinking his fangs into—

“Wolves don’t let prey go,” Gael said then, his mouth twisted into a bitter approximation of a smile. “It’s not in our nature. You want to find a way to dissuade them? Don’t run. The harder you fight, the more they’ll come after you.”

“You’ve given me much to think about,” I said, dropping them a cursory curtsey, and all but Gael laughed in response. It was as if he could hear my dissenting thoughts. I’d heard strange things about the wargen before, but never the ability to read minds.

“And you’ll use every single skerrick of information to fight us.” Weyland treated me to a lazy smile. “I think I’m going to enjoy this.”

I didn’t dignify that with an answer, turning on my heel and walking out the door, their laughter ringing in my ears as I went, but that soon faded as I ran down the stairs. Down, down, down until I appeared out in the courtyard, the moon full above me. I blinked, letting my eyes adjust to the darkness and then I walked over to the stables.

“Darcy.”

That’s all the warning I got, just a harsh whisper of my name as he reached out and dragged me into an alley beside the building.

“Kris?

I stared up at my knight, my hands going to his, as if I needed to touch him to make sure he was real. I’d never dared do anything like this, but when I did, his grip tightened, making sure I’d never let him go. He pushed me backwards until my body hit the stone wall and his pressed mine against it. His hands moved then, rubbing his thumb across my knuckle, then cupping my face.

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