Promised To The Pride

by Bonnie Burrows

  Kyle stepped up beside Natalie, took her hand, and laced their fingers together in a show of support. The Anastas leader stared at her, opened-mouthed, and then he looked up around the room. When his eyes landed back on his man, Dave, Kyle assumed Dave must have made some kind of gesture or face because the leader burst out laughing.

  “I’m sorry,” the leader spoke between his laughs, “this is a joke, right? I mean, a woman can’t be a pride leader.”

  Their whole pride let out growls of displeasure. This guy wasn’t just pissing off Kyle, he was getting the whole pride riled up. Kyle stepped forward, but Natalie squeezed his hand and got him to stop. She was definitely more level-headed than Kyle was because he was ready to pound this guy and anyone else in his pride who felt it was okay to talk to his mate that way.

  “Well, Raul, I assure you, I can and I am. If you must know all of the details, then I will tell you I became pride leader by decapitating several lions, including our last pride leader, without any assistance. So, sir, if I were you, I wouldn’t keep insulting me. I promise, your guards won’t be able to stop me before I have the chance to remove your head from your body.”

  The smile that spread across Kyle’s face was one of pride. His mate was a bit of a badass. He hadn’t noticed much of it before, but then again, they hadn’t been in many situations where she needed to fight for anything until recently. The look of shock on the Anastas leader’s face was priceless. There was no doubt in Kyle’s mind that he had never had a woman talk back to him, and definitely never had a woman threaten him in any way. After a minute, he seemed to pull himself together. He stood up and walked to the edge of his stage, and the expression on his face was pure anger.

  “I don’t know who you think you are, but I will not put up with you coming into my home and threatening me! Just what is your business here?”

  Natalie never flinched, despite the leader’s shouting or the fact that his lions moved in closer to her, clearly ready to take her out if they were instructed to do so. “Several of your people helped a traitor from our pride in an ambush attack on my home while we slept two nights ago. We came to find out if this is something you were aware of or if you might be able to make sure none of your people attempt such an attack again.”

  “My people would not engage in something so cowardly as to attack people in their homes while they were sleeping, and they would see no reason in fighting women, ever.”

  The leader sounded smug, but he also seemed sure of his words. Kyle detected no lies in what he said; he clearly believed he was telling the truth. Considering their obvious disrespect toward women, Kyle was inclined to believe their leader would see no reason to attack women, and no self-respecting werelion would ever sanction an attack on anyone while they were asleep. Lions believed in honor, and an honorable lion would attack the enemy face to face so they saw it coming. However, Kyle did believe it was this pride’s views on women that led to them following Cain so that he could make an attempt on Natalie and take her place as the Cervella pride leader. These were men who would never accept a woman in a leadership role, and that misogynistic thinking would make them easy for Cain to convince.

  “You might not have sanctioned such an attack on our people, but I assure you that some of your men were there,” Kyle addressed the Anastas leader. “Given your pride’s clearly negative views on women, it isn’t surprising that some of your people could be convinced to fight with someone who wanted to take a position of power away from a female leader.”

  “I don’t believe you,” the leader crossed his arms in defiance. “What proof do you have?”

  “I have one of your men locked up in my basement,” Natalie told him. “Feel free to come see for yourself. As for the other men from your pride, well, I’ll just say that there were very few survivors that managed to escape from my home that night. We don’t take kindly to such attacks where we are from.”

  He looked away from Natalie and looked back over to his lead man. “Dave, are there any members of our pride who have been missing the past couple of days?”

  “I couldn’t say off the top of my head, but I will have someone look into it right away.”

  “I want to know right away,” the leader said.

  Dave nodded, and Kyle saw him gesture to one of the Anastas lions who took off out of the castle.

  Kyle had a bad feeling settle in. He didn’t think that it was a good idea for them to hang around and wait for the lion Dave sent off to get back. The Anastas leader had calmed down too fast. He was willing to take Natalie seriously and check into things without much of an argument, and considering how difficult and rude he had been to Natalie since she’d mentioned being their pride leader, his sudden decision to check into her story without much coaxing seemed off.

  Kyle tugged on Natalie’s hand and waited for her to look at him. “Hey, I think we need to get out of here,” he told her. “Something just doesn’t feel right. I’ve got a bad feeling about all of this right now.”

  “Me too,” Natalie agreed quietly, “but what can we do? We are kind of surrounded right now, and definitely outnumbered.”

  “Sir,” Kyle addressed the Anastas leader, “all we need from you is your word that you’ll instruct the rest of your pride to stay out of our lands. If someone from within our pride wants to challenge our leader for her position, then they can do it properly and without the help of outsiders ambushing our homes while we sleep.”

  “My mate is right,” Natalie told the Anastas leader. “Once your man comes back, you will know we spoke the truth. Now, we have said what we came here to say, so we’ll be leaving for our pride lands now. Thank you for your time.”

  Natalie turned and motioned for them to leave. Before they made it to the door, Raul spoke up from behind them.

  “I’m afraid I cannot allow you to leave just yet. See, from what you just told me, it sounds like you and your pride might be responsible for the deaths of some of my people, and we don’t take things like that lightly around here.”

  “We are leaving,” Natalie told him. Kyle noticed her emphasis on the word “are” and saw her fists clench at her side.

  He readied himself, prepared for the fight he felt coming. Kyle saw one of the Anastas lions shift in Natalie’s direction out of the corner of his eye, and he shifted back into his lion form within a split second and pounced on the lion. All hell broke loose, and the lions from both prides were on the attack. Kyle made quick work of the first lion he went after and turned to make his way back to Natalie. He was surprised to see that she had not shifted, but she was making her way around the lions who were fighting each other and toward Raul, the Anastas leader. The guy had sat back down on his golden throne and was watching the fight with a wicked smile on his face. Kyle took off for him, but Natalie beat him there. She stood on the stage just in front of Raul, and Kyle ran up and stood beside her, allowing a menacing growl to escape while he bared his teeth at the other leader.

  “You need to let us leave, now,” Natalie demanded. Even in her human form, she bared her teeth, and she still had her fists clenched at her side. As her mate, Kyle was able to feel her anger, and it was steadily increasing, which only made his do the same.

  Raul chuckled. “Oh, honey, you are not in any position to make demands right now. Now, why don’t you call off your guard dog there and we can talk about what is really going to happen here?” He nodded toward Kyle when he mentioned her “guard dog,” and Kyle could feel his blood nearly boiling.

  Kyle growled loudly and snapped at the pompous ass. “This is your last chance, Raul,” Natalie said through gritted teeth. “Let us go back to our home or I promise you will regret it.”

  Again, the Anastas leader just laughed at Natalie. Kyle felt it the minute she decided to kill Raul. Rage boiled through her veins, and he could feel it burning within too. In that moment, it was like they were one, their emotions intertwined completely. Kyle even felt it when Natalie shifted. For the first time since he had seen her grow,
she immediately shifted into her larger form, and she stood over him, at least twice his size. Fear flashed across Raul’s face, and he pushed back in his throne as far as he could. Unfortunately for him, by remaining in his throne, he had essentially trapped himself between the chair and Kyle and Natalie; he had nowhere to go.

  “Shift and fight me, you coward,” Natalie was taunting Raul with her thoughts, but Kyle wanted to be the one to fight the bastard. It was his right as Natalie’s mate to defend her honor.

  “No,” Kyle said, “he’s mine.” Natalie glanced over at him in question. “You are my mate, and I will defend your honor. No one will treat you so poorly in front of me again.”

  Natalie understood the urge Kyle felt to protect her as her mate, and she offered him a slight nod and moved to the side. “He’s all yours.” Kyle kept his eyes on her while she leapt off of the stage and began taking out the Anastas lions left and right. None of them were a match for her size or sheer power.

  Once Natalie had her attention focused elsewhere, Raul was no longer cowering; Kyle knew that Raul didn’t see him as a threat like he had Natalie. Raul jumped up from his chair and shifted into his lion form while Kyle was watching Natalie. It was an attempt to catch Kyle off guard and get the upper hand, but Kyle wasn’t about to make things that easy for him. Kyle had only pretended to be paying attention to Natalie, and when Raul leaped at him, Kyle flipped over at the last second, extending both of his front claws and slamming them into Raul’s torso, ripping through his flesh and fur.

  Kyle used his strength and shoved Raul off of him with all four of his feet. The strength behind his thrust was so strong that Raul’s body slammed into his throne. Both Raul and his throne went sliding across the floor and slammed into the wall at the back of the stage hard enough for the throne to break into several large pieces. Kyle jumped up and pounced on Raul before he had the chance to fully recover. He got another solid hit into Raul’s side before the other lion was able to steady himself on his feet and back away from Kyle. They were circling each other, and Raul made several attempts for Kyle, swinging his front claws out and attempting to knock Kyle off of his feet. He was able to land a blow to Kyle’s right front leg, but Kyle moved to the left quickly and Raul’s claws only grazed his flesh. It merely resulted in a flesh wound, not enough to slow Kyle down, but it was good enough to piss him off even further. Kyle felt Natalie’s presence and knew she had her eyes on him. He spared a quick glance in her direction, and when their eyes locked, he felt a surge of power within him that he had never experienced before. Their joined anger and power flowed through his blood and ignited Kyle’s muscles. He felt his body shifting and growing. When he looked at Raul, he noticed that he was standing over him much higher than he had been before. Raul’s eyes were wide and his fear was so prominent that Kyle could smell it tainting Raul’s scent. Looking down at himself, Kyle was surprised to see that he was actually much larger than he had been a moment ago. Taking himself in, he looked at Natalie, and even though she was double the size of every other lion in the room, Kyle was sure he was even larger than her at that moment.

  He turned back to Raul, and the Anastas pride leader was cowering against the wall, trapped between it and Kyle’s oversized form. Kyle saw Raul tremble slightly when he first took him in before getting himself together enough to stand still.

  After a minute, Raul’s thoughts filled his mind. “Please, I think we got off on the wrong foot,” Raul pleaded. “I’m sure that we can find a way to put a stop to all of this. No one else has to get hurt or die.”

  Kyle wanted nothing more than to rip the asshole’s head off, but Natalie’s thoughts filled his mind before he had the chance to tell Raul where to stick it. Apparently, Raul hadn’t sent his message only to Kyle. Since he knew that Kyle and Natalie were mates, Raul was probably smart enough to figure out that there wasn’t anything he would be able to say that would convince Kyle not to kill him after the way he had treated his mate. He knew that the only person who would be able to get Kyle to stop what he was doing was Natalie.

  “Kyle, maybe we shouldn’t kill him.”

  “Natalie,” Kyle could hear the sound of irritation in his own thoughts, but he was sure that he was right about this, “we can’t let him live. If we do, then it sends the message that our pride doesn’t defend our pride leader and that I don’t defend my mate. We cannot allow that. It could be our downfall.”

  Raul took Kyle’s momentary distraction as an opportunity to attack and try to get away. While Kyle still had his eyes on Natalie, Raul sunk his teeth into Kyle’s leg, and Kyle felt the pain of the other lion’s teeth ripping through his flesh. Unfortunately for Raul, he still wasn’t fast enough to get away, even from an injured Kyle. On the plus side, in Kyle’s mind, Raul’s blindsided attack gave him just cause to take out the pompous pride leader despite Natalie’s momentary pause about killing him. Raul had barely made a few steps in his attempt to get away from Kyle before he came down on the back of Raul’s neck and bit clean through. Kyle let his jaw relax, and Raul’s lifeless body fell to the ground in a heap of blood and fur. Kyle turned to face the mass of lions from both prides fighting each other, and he let out an ear-splitting roar. For a moment, all of the lions stopped fighting and turned to face the stage where Kyle stood over Raul’s lifeless body. A couple of minutes passed by, and everyone just stared; Kyle stared at the mass of lions, waiting to see what the Anastas pride’s reaction would be to him killing their leader, and the lions all were just staring at Kyle as if they were waiting for him to say something.

  Dave, Raul’s head guard, was the first to break the stare down. He made his way from where he had been fighting to the front of the room, and he stopped just in front of the stage. A few of the other Anastas lions made their way up to stand beside him, and Kyle braced himself for the fight he felt coming, but it never did. After several lions took up a position on either side of Dave, they all did something that left Kyle speechless. Every one of the Anastas pride lions bowed their head to Kyle, beginning with Dave. He had no idea what they were doing. He expected them to attack him. At this point, he would have guessed that they would all take off and run away before they would bow down to him. He had no idea what was going on.

  “Why are they doing that?” Natalie’s voice filled his head.

  Still in shock from the sight before him, Kyle just shook his head. He didn’t have any answers for her.

  “You killed their pride leader, Son,” Kyle’s mother’s voice was in his head now, and he looked up and around the room until he saw her and their eyes locked.

  “That is exactly why I’m confused,” Kyle replied to his mother. “I would have expected them to attack me for that. Why would they be bowing to me?”

  As soon as the thoughts left Kyle’s brain when he communicated them to his mother, the realization of what he’d just done and what was happening hit him.

  “You already know what that means,” his mother’s voice was in his head again.

  When Kyle responded to his mother’s statement, his own thoughts were barely a whisper. “Holy shit. It can’t be. I am not a member of their pride. How can I become their pride leader?”

  His mother responded immediately. “Certain rules don’t apply strictly within an individual pride, Kyle. If a werelion kills a pride leader, then they automatically assume that role. It doesn’t make any difference which pride you are from.”

  Another thought penetrated the chaos that was swirling around inside of Kyle’s brain in that moment. Natalie. How was he supposed to lead the Anastas pride while his mate was leading the Cervella pride fifty miles away? It would never work. Kyle was never going to agree to live that far away from Natalie. He had waited for his opportunity to truly be with her his whole life, and he wasn’t about to give any part of that up right after he had finally gotten it.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Natalie

  Natalie felt panic settle in her heart. Even though they were not letting her in on their discuss
ion, the looks that Kyle and his mother were giving each other told her that they were communicating and that whatever they were discussing wasn’t making Kyle happy. However, she didn’t need to hear their thoughts to know that they must be talking about how Kyle had just killed the Anastas pride leader. Judging by the look on both his and his mom’s faces, Natalie was sure that it meant exactly what she had worried it was going to mean.

  She made her way over to Kyle and rubbed her head up against his. “Kyle, you look so upset. I know you were having a conversation with your mother and not letting me in. Please, don’t try to hide things from me.”

  Kyle nuzzled his head against hers and made a low purring sound before he took a deep breath and moved to look her in the eyes.

  “You know what this means, don’t you?” Kyle nodded to the body of the dead Anastas pride leader, then looked back up at Natalie, and she could see the sadness in his eyes.

  “I can make an educated guess,” Natalie told him. “You’re their new pride leader, aren’t you? That is what your mother was telling you.”

  “Yes,” Kyle admitted.

  When his voice filled her mind, she could hear the sadness through his projected thoughts. She couldn’t say she blamed him. She wasn’t thrilled about the idea of her mate being gone, leading another pride, instead of being by her side at home.

  “There has to be a way around this,” she said. “We can’t just accept things the way they are. We’re mates. We can’t be separated for long periods of time; we won’t survive it.”

  Kyle nuzzled her neck again. “We are not going to be separated,” Kyle assured her. “I will not allow it.”