Page 62 of With Fangs and Claws (The Wolf Queen 1)

Chapter 27

"Well, don’t you look fetching?” Axe said, tugging at one of Weyland’s braids when we made it back to the inn. Weyland brushed his hand away with a scowl and I saw that Dane sported the same stern expression.

“I said one of us would find Darcy at the end of the day,” Dane said. “Not leave the meeting we were in to go and spar with our mate and then…”

“And then go to the top of the tor and talk,” Weyland replied, lifting his chin as he spoke to his brother. “Easy way of making sure we’re not wandering off is to bring Darcy into the meetings.”

Dane’s eyes swivelled around to land on me, a curious light within them.

“Ah, we didn’t discuss that,” I said.

“You want to have an impact on people’s lives, have a say about how they are treated,” Weyland said, obviously warming to the topic. “I’d love to tell you it’s all fascinating, but a hell of a lot of the time is spent discussing where latrines should be dug. Although.” He smiled then. “Father expects Dane to take over the throne when he steps down and for us to support him, and as you are our mate…”

“He’s not wrong,” Dane said, stroking his chin, “for once. You are our queen, but you must train to be Strelae’s queen if our bid for the throne is to be successful. You’ve obviously got a keen mind and are capable of handling yourself.”

“If you want me to sit at your feet and do needlepoint, I’d rather stick said needle in my eye,” I replied.

“That’s not how Strelae works. If you’ve fought your way into a position of authority, you can exercise it, whether you are man or woman. Many would say you’ve already battled your way to a place by our side,” Dane said. “But you don’t have to make a decision yet. Our business in Bayard is complete. In the morning, we’ll be travelling for the capital. There’ll be a contingent of soldiers and their mates coming with us. Nordred and Pepin have agreed to travel with us to form part of your retinue. Does this please you?”

Did it? My eyes flicked nervously from one man’s face to the next and only Gael’s seemed to reflect my own ambivalence. He’d gone very pale, his one visible eye glowing fiercely against his milk white skin, and that concerned me.

“Please me?” I forced myself to smile. “That I can’t say, but having Nordred and Pep along for the ride? That I would like.”

“There will be many opportunities for you to learn statecraft in the capital, to have a hand in shaping policy that will change people’s lives,” Dane said.

“Oh yes,” Axe said, clapping his brother on the shoulder. “Please talk to our mate about policy development. It’s guaranteed to get her wet between the thighs.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” I said with a grin. “Perhaps if I’m sitting through a meeting perched on your brother’s lap, his arms around me…?”

I’d only meant to joke along with him, but every single one of them went still at that, leading my attempt to fall very, very flat.

“Anyway, I haven’t eaten all day and could chew the hind leg off a cow,” I said, patting my stomach and turning to leave, when a hand grabbed my collar and hauled me back into the room we shared.

“Your hungers are for us to satisfy,” Dane said in a low rasp before wrapping his arm around me and directing me to the rough dining setting. It was my own fault, but I was pulled onto his lap as Gael went down to order, he and a serving man returning not long afterwards, with trays laden with food. Bread with yellow butter, warm soup thick with vegetables and a joint of roast meat had me leaning forward but Weyland snatched my plate even as Axe reached for it, both men working to fill it as Gael sighed and handed me a bowl of soup.

“It would be much more efficient if I sat in my own chair,” I murmured to Dane.

“Efficient?” He pushed my hair away, revealing the sensitive skin of my neck which tingled as his breath brushed against it. “Perhaps. But not more pleasurable. Now, tell me what my brother had you doing this afternoon. It was to be my turn to spend some time with our mate, in compensation for all the hours I had to deal with your bastard father.”

My spoon froze halfway to my mouth, even though my stomach rumbled in complaint. Father, Dane, the two men warred in my head for attention, but I consciously shoved Father to one side. He didn’t deserve a place in my mind, or in my memory and so he wouldn’t have one. I swallowed my spoonful of soup and then grabbed my slice of buttered bread, leaning back into Dane, his arms tightening around me, nestling me in the crook of his arm.

“We talked,” I told Dane, “about my future. What it might have looked like if I was free to choose anything. If I’d been born here, perhaps.”

“You would’ve been a Wolf Maiden,” Dane replied, “if the tales the men told today were to be believed, so for once I am glad you were not born Strelan. Resigned to a chaste life, devoted to protecting my parents, unable to bear children of your own.”

His hand moved slowly, covering my stomach, that burning feeling beginning again, though this time it was a slow rolling thing rather than a rapidly intensifying pulse.

“The poets speak of star-crossed lovers, of princes falling for Wolf Maidens and betraying their crown, our gods, in pursuit of an unsanctioned love.”

“Young girls swoon with distressing regularity over the idea of being a Wolf Maiden,” Axe said drily. “Until they actually meet them. They’re not the slender moon-struck maidens of the stories. Those ladies are tough enough to scare even me.”

“I instantly want to meet all of them,” I said before setting my bread down and attacking my soup. My body didn’t care about any of this. Instead, it demanded sustenance.

A strangely companionableair settled across the room as we sat and ate. Dane finally set me aside to eat his own food before his brothers demolished the lot, Weyland and Axe having particularly voracious appetites.

“In more ways than one,” Axe said with a wink when I remarked upon it.

Gael was much more circumspect. He was slower to reach for food and ate considerably less, contributing rarely to the conversation, seeming like a silent stone in the rapid flow of banter going on around him. And that itself caught at my attention more than anything the others said.

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