Page 81 of With Fangs and Claws (The Wolf Queen 1)

“You’ll meet me in the throne room, human,” Malia growled. “And you’ll answer for your trickery. A human being the fated mate of our princes?” As she went to splutter her disgust at that idea, I lifted my hand and let the claws that now ached come through. She frowned, just a tiny little bit, but then shook her head and kept on. “No weapons, just what strength the gods have given us.” Damn, I didn’t like that. “Whoever manages to incapacitate the other is deemed to have the right of it.”

“Whatever you believe, whatever you think is going to happen,” Gael growled. “If you harm a hair on Darcy’s head—”

“Threatening a lady of my court, bastard?” Queen Aurora snapped.

“Peace, peace,” the priestess said wearily. “These old bones are not made for standing around on stairs. Let’s go into the throne room and resolve this mess, see how the gods feel about this matter.”

And at that, everyone filed inside the room, the chatter that had been going on around us beforehand only getting louder as we moved towards the throne.

“Malia has challenged Darcy, my king,” the queen said as she swept over to provide a chair for the priestess, then returned to her spot by the throne.

“Has she indeed? On what charge?”

“This ‘true mate’ business has to be the result of human witchcraft, Your Majesty,” Malia said. “For who has been a truer mate to your son than I?”

The girl threw a look over her shoulder then, maybe to make sure I was listening.

“And you are happy to officiate this challenge, Holy Mother?” the king asked.

“Happy?” She slung one leg over the other knee, then gripped the top knee with her interlaced fingers. “Happy has little to do with the lot of a priestess. But the challenge has been agreed to by both parties, so I will watch to ensure the gods’ work is done.” She then nodded to the both of us.

“A moment, Your Majesty,” Nordred said with a bow. “Holy Mother. I need to inform my charge of the process. She was not raised in a world where challenges are fought between women.”

A chuckle went around the room at that, no doubt at my expense, but I was strangely untouched by any of this. I just was: my breath sucking in and then exhaling out, the fine tremor in my body, the muscles taut and ready to be deployed. It felt like I had achieved the perfect state of readiness that Nordred was always going on about, something that was only slightly ruined by him coming to my side.

“You can’t kill the girl,” he told me. The others had also clustered in close, hiding me from the crowd beyond, but Axe blinked in surprise, then snorted in response. “The wargen are like all civilisations, savage and genteel by turns. You need to incapacitate her decisively, make it apparent to all that she cannot continue.”

“You’ve trained her to duel?” Dane asked aghast.

“Darcy fought hand to hand with the men at different times, but mostly with the boys. She hadn’t found her strength then, so she was put on her arse more times than not, but…” Nordred’s eyes went paler and paler. “Not now. Not when what you truly are is right at your fingertips. Fate is reaching out its claws for you now, my girl, and only you will know whether that’s to raise you up or slap you down.”

He shook his head then, his eyes returning back to their usual steely blue.

“Wolves don’t fight like this,” he told me, a kind of sadness colouring his words. “They live in extended family groups up until such point they’re old enough to go it alone and find their own mate. Positions in the family are dictated by the parents and they have many ways to resolve a dispute without blood or death.”

Nordred looked over his shoulder for a second.

“This kind of thing happens only when strange wolves are forced in together, penned up tight with those not of their choosing. That’s when their natures twist into something entirely unnatural.”

“So, this isn’t the way of things?” Weyland asked, frowning slightly.

“Not in the past, but it is now. You know what to do, girl?”

I nodded then, my head feeling like it floated on my shoulders and that’s when everyone stepped back.

“Don’t fucking die,” Pep hissed at me as I moved forward, tossing aside all weapons, each one landing with a dull thud on the thick carpet. “You’re actually alright for a… whatever you are and missing out on Kelly’s pies? No one wants that.”

I just nodded to her, feeling the compulsion to smile, but unable to honour it.

As I stepped forward, I saw the girl, Malia talking furiously with a bunch of richly clad people. Her family, her allies, I assumed. Their position, close to the throne and the size of the faction made clear their importance in the court, but none of that would matter here.

“Each of you bow to the other.” The priestess’ creaky voice cut through the chatter, and both of us did as she asked, while keeping our eyes trained on the other. “The gods hear your challenge, they see your fight and they will bless the arm of she who is true.” She let out a raspy little breath and then with an alpha whip the kind I’d never heard before, she snapped, “BEGIN.”

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