The Alpha's Oracle

by Merry Ravenell

  “So was Romero strong?” I snapped. “Was Gabel strong when he ripped these marks into my arm? Was he strong when he humiliated me with Gardenia in front of Anders just to prove he could?”

  “Those are different things.”

  “No, they’re not.” I shoved past him.

  In the middle of the sixth row of obsidian chunks was a sharp-edged, square shaped chunk that drew my attention. I dropped to my knees and grabbed it in both hands, felt a shiver course through my bones.

  I turned the chunk over in my hands, marveling at how it would soon be a shallow bowl, and I could already see the form it would take under the excess rock. Even sleeping and sun-burned it shone. I flipped open the satchel on my shoulder and slipped it inside without hesitation.

  “How much time do I have?”

  Hix checked his watch. “Just over an hour.”

  I went over to where the Rock Farmer sat, content to chew on his gum and watch me. He grinned. “You find the one you want?”

  “Yes. I would like to see the quartz and malachite before we settle up.”

  “Sure, sure.”

  “Lady Gianna, we should leave if you have found—”

  I glared at Hix. “We came all this way. I want to see the other stones.”

  “Lady, eh? Got him well trained, eh?” Rock Farmer grinned at me. He clucked his tongue and winked at Hix, then hobbled off toward the quartz fields.

  Hix growled to himself. “Disrespectful—”

  “You’re going to pick a fight over protocol with an old human who thinks aliens are in his rock crops? I’ve always wanted a clear quartz bowl. Don’t ruin this for me by pissing him off.”

  The RockFarmer had a large selection of quartz spears and chunks and beautiful clusters. But it was something the next row over that caught my eye. A couple of chunks of something blue.

  The stones were raw, unpolished, and uncut, the color of the ocean. One large column about the diameter of a pancake and the length of my forearm ranged from tropical green-tinged sea blue, moving to a pure blue at the other end. I clutched the blue-gradient one in both hands, hardly able to breathe at how exquisite it was.

  “What is this?” I managed to ask.

  “Indicolinte. Blue tourmaline.”

  I turned the chunk over in my trembling hands.

  “It’s fairly rare. That’s not a true blue tourmaline. The true blue stuff with no green will cost an arm and a leg. I’ve got a jeweler with a standing order for that stuff. Those have too much green. Pretty, though.”

  “A jeweler? Not a mystic?” I asked.

  “Jeweler. Makes gorgeous necklaces. Real pretty. Got some pictures in my phone if you want to see.”

  “How hard is it?” Soft stones flaked or shattered or cracked during the carving process.

  “About like quartz. Could make a bowl out of it if you wanted, but it’d be a waste. Small little salt bowl, I guess, but would waste a lot of the spear. Most folks don’t want it. Too expensive even with all that green,” he mused.

  I’d never heard of this stone before, or anything like it. Nobody used it for scrying, or runestones, or anything as far as I knew. But it was like the Tides. I wasn’t going to leave the best pieces. If anything they’d make pretty paperweights, or maybe candle holders.

  “Might want to ask the price on all that,” Rock Farmer suggested.

  “She doesn’t,” Hix said.

  “Okay then. Your money, and I’m glad to take it.” He hobbled back toward the house. “You still want to see the quartz?”

  “We do not have time.” Hix shot me a warning look. “Give me the bag.”

  “No.” I clutched the strap. “I’ve got it.”

  “It must weight fifty pounds. Give me the bag.”

  “And you have stitches!”

  “Give me the bag,” he growled.

  I surrendered the bag but scowled at him.

  “It is not about whether or not you can do it,” Hix put the bag over his good shoulder, “but should you. And no decent male would not insist. Stitches are meaningless.”

  “They mean something to me.”

  His face softened just a little bit.

  The Rock Farmer was still writing up the invoice for the rocks when we arrived. He handed Hix the yellow carbon. “Cash only.”

  Hix pulled out his wallet, counted the bills for the stones, and handed them over.

  “If you get a chunk of the tourmaline big enough for a bowl, contact Hix. We’ll pay you better than the jeweler for it,” I said as he counted the bills a second time.

  He gave me a long look. “I’ll think on it.”

  “You will be happy that—” Hix started to growl.

  I grabbed his arm and told the Rock Warden. “Thank you. If it helps, I’ll be happy to take flawed blue-green. I like it better.”

  Still twisting Hix’s sleeve around in my hand, I glanced to the south. “You probably don’t want to go into town for a few days. Just stay here with your rocks.”

  “Why you figure that?” Rock Farmer inquired.

  Hix grinned at him, flashing bright white teeth. “Her future husband is conducting business here. The local mongrels may never return to deal with your field varmints.”

  I closed my eyes for a heartbeat, then told them we were leaving.

  The Other Side of an Iron Moon

  Gabel >> Are you on the plane yet?

  Gianna >> Not yet.

  Gabel >> Did you find what you were looking for?

  Gianna >> Yes.

  I did not ask him where he was. He would not tell me. It was better he didn’t tell me.

  Gabel was far away, the Bond stretched across a distance. I nudged my satchel with my foot, aware of the sharp, cutting obsidian lump and the mysterious blue column.

  Gabel >> Buttercup

  Gabel >> I have a confession.

  Gabel >> You are far away. It is not right.

  Gabel >> I miss you.

  * * *

  We returned to IronMoon later than expected.

  “Seems tense.” Donovan rolled down the window and sniffed the cold air as the cars meandered up the drive. “Wolves out tonight. More than usual.”

  “Gabel is gone. Flint is always wary,” Hix said.

  Donovan grunted, but his scent unnerved me. He shoved a cigar between his lips and champed down. “That’s not wary I smell out there, First Beta.”

  He leaned over and tapped the driver. “I’ll get out here. I’ll walk into town and find my own trouble.”

  “Hunters,” Hix muttered as Donovan slammed the door behind him.

  Flint greeted us on the front terrace. He took one sniff of Hix and insisted he summon the doctor to deal with his injuries—there was blood on his shirt and dark circles under his eyes. Hix grumbled something and headed down the hallway to his rooms.

  Dinner was long over, but I knew how to shove some meat between two slices of bread. I was halfway through gobbling it down when I noticed Flint was still there. He also was in a kilt. Flint normally was in jeans and a shirt after dinner, and in his rooms by ten. “You’re on edge.”

  “I am responsible in the absence of both Betas, the Alpha, the and Luna,” Flint said. “What have I said about always being ready?”

  “This have anything to do with the trouble Donovan said he smelled in the woods?”

  “It may. Things came to my ear. There are wolves who are not pleased with how the tone of the pack has changed.” He shrugged.

  I was not even slightly fooled. I forced myself to eat the rest of my food.

  “Threats will come and go, Lady,” Flint added. “You will have to trust your lieutenants to—”

  “Given that it is you, myself and Hix here, Flint, just tell me what caught your ear. Unless you don’t think my womanly ears can bear it.” After dealing with Hix all day, I had had my fill of male “protective” instincts.

  Flint huffed a laugh. “No, not that. It’s that many here embraced Romero’s thinking.”

 
; And with Romero dead, Gabel gone, and me the Luna in all but name... if they were going to strike... “Are you talking revolt?”

  Flint shrugged. “Revolt would be a compliment. Lady Gianna, this is IronMoon. Alpha Gabel gives the flawed and violent a place here if they aren’t cowards. That doesn’t mean they aren’t idiots. You’ve seen that for yourself.”

  “I have,” I agreed, hesitating.

  “Shadowless never had scuffles?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Many packs do. Especially young bachelor packs like this one.”

  I ate the crust I had just peeled. “Should I sleep tonight?”

  “I’d tell you if you needed to stay awake.”

  Right. Because I could go to sleep after being told that. But I suppose it’s something that rulers had to deal with for thousands of years: rebellion, revolt, treachery, betrayal. I finished my food and bid Flint goodnight. I had been up a day and a half, my body ached all over, and if Flint assured me I could go to sleep, I’d go to sleep.

  “It’s not a promise, Lady Gianna,” Flint advised me, “but I’ll keep watch.”

  “Have you told Hix?” I asked.

  “I have, but he needs to rest more than you or I. He can’t keep ripping open that gash on his belly.”

  “How badly hurt is he?”

  “If he keeps ripping open that gash? Bad enough. Stupid way to die. I’ve told him that.”

  I smiled. “Thank you. He is a mule.”

  “The best warriors generally are.”

  “Goodnight, Flint.”

  “Goodnight, Lady Gianna.”

  The bed felt empty and too large without Gabel. In the darkness I picked at his pillow, thinking about his scent that clung to the sheets and would be gone next wash day. It wasn’t the first time Gabel had left, but I felt it more that night.

  I miss you.

  Perhaps he had just been trying on the confession for size, to see what it felt like.

  A shattering sound tore me out of sleep.

  Shouting. Male voices shouting, bodies crashing.

  More things crashed, splintered, shattered. I reached for the nightstand light, realized that the glow under the door might be a bad idea, and instead snatched my phone. The racket tumbled louder, barks, shouts, a howl of fury, and a howl to wake the whole house.

  Was it just a brawl, a scuffle... did I go out there? Wait for Hix or Flint to retrieve me? Hide in the closet? Under the bed? I’d be underfoot in a brawl and an obvious target.

  I dropped my phone and melted into wolf-form. More wood shattered. Then glass shattered. Bodies tumbled.

  And the howls.

  Male howls summoning the enemy to face them.

  My hackles rose.

  Hix’s song answered the challenge.

  I nosed open the bedroom door. Three dark forms tumbled into the moonlit-hallway. They unfolded from their crouches and snarled at me.

  “Feeeemallle...” One managed to growl. The others giggled.

  I bared my own fangs. Their war-forms weren’t familiar, nor their scents, but it didn’t matter. I knew what they were. Little Romeros. Little Romeros who had waited to hatch their plan and came at a female like cowards. Just like their damned master had.

  I crouched, growling, as they advanced. Below me more bodies smashed and tumbled, roars, barks, the scent of blood, fur, spit, urine, broken wood, pain.

  I backed across the threshold into our bedroom. No doors, no windows, no way out except through these flesh bags. They came slowly. They liked this. This feeling of power. The scent of my terror. The clacking of my claws on the varnish from my trembling.

  The Bond swelled and swam into my awareness, latching onto my terror, and offered me something else: violence, darkness, death, cruelty, and sick pleasure from it all. It flooded my system like adrenaline and braced me, cleared the blizzard of fear from my brain, and replaced it with a familiar thrum.

  My Mark pulsed.

  They wanted fear. I’d offer them fear.

  I lowered my tail and crouched with each backward step.

  “Feeeemallleee...” the one who still had something resembling human speech growled. “Hollldddd still...”

  Just one chance to get this right. Flint was always yelling at me explode! in training. I pressed the tips of my rear claws into the floor varnish and feigned terror until one of them had his claw extended toward me.

  My claws dug into the varnish and launched me forward. I shot through the middle one’s legs.

  They grabbed at me, their claws raking hot fire lines down my back and sides. But I slipped through.

  I barked something mocking at them as I swerved around the corner to the main landing. In wolf form I was nimbler and smaller in the hallways than their bulky war-forms, and they tripped and stumbled over each other in their effort to get after me.

  I shot down the ruined stairwell into a fray of fur and bodies. If I could find loyal IronMoon warriors I could make my stand with them. If I could identify any of them through the writhing, thrashing tangle of bodies.

  Claws raked my haunch.

  They were faster and more nimble than I’d thought.

  The Bond surged, howling uselessly.

  I didn’t look back.

  A gold war-form wolf sailed over my head and tackled the three wolves behind me.

  Flint.

  Now I looked back. Just in time to see him grab the first war-form by the neck and arm and rip. A dark geyser of blood shot up to the ceiling. Flesh tore, and bones snapped.

  He threw the two pieces of the wolf away, grabbed the next and bit down onto his neck.

  Intestines flowed under my paws. The two halves of the first wolf flipped onto the first floor.

  My paws slipped in the offal, and I tumbled tail over head down the remaining stairs.

  Another howl. Hix’s voice, a howl of triumph.

  I stood up, panting, covered in blood and sticky things that come out of dead bodies. The howl came again: the song of triumph, the song offering victory to the Alpha’s glory.

  Or Luna.

  Flint stomped down the steps, dragging the last war-form by his head.

  I threw my head back and howled the Luna’s song to honor her warriors.

  Okay, presumptuous, but given the circumstances, time to assert myself.

  The loyal members of IronMoon answered with howls of their own.

  The Master of Arms was tawny-gold, the shafts of his fur catching the moonlight in a way that gave him an exquisite luminescence. He growled something guttural at me. His war-form did not allow him to shape human speech. The rage that fueled the form did not permit words.

  Only deeds.

  Without pause he stomped toward the mudroom with his grisly prisoner.

  Donovan slid through the ruined front doors and almost collided with me. His timber-wolf grey form was soaked with blood. Hix limped into the foyer, clutching the re-opened gash on his belly. Blood slid through his fingers. “Are you hurt?”

  I was soaked in blood but it wasn’t mine. I slipped into human-form. “No, but you are.”

  “I’m fine.” He grunted at Donovan and jerked his head. “Run down the ones who are fleeing. Bring them back.”

  Flint returned, this time in human-form. He was still covered in gore. “Are there any other survivors?”

  “For now,” Hix grunted. Then, to me. “What should we do with the injured ones?”

  “How many are there?” It was tempting to tie them to trees and cover them in suet and let the birds peck them until Gabel returned home, but in the bitter cold they’d die of exposure too quickly. Only one real option: the basement. Which was unoriginal, considering I had banished Platinum to it as well.

  “Three or four. The rest are dead.”

  I looked at the blood seeping out from between his fingers. “Go deal with that.”

  “I am fine, Lady.”

  “Go.”

  Hix stomped off like an insulted child.

  Fuc
king bloodbath and rebellion and Gabel was in the south and Hix was mad because I told him he needed stitches.

  “And maybe some a kilt?” I asked after the bloody buttcheeks, but then I looked down at myself and sighed. I looked at the blood-soaked body-part-decorated foyer and swallowed as the scent and gore hit me.

  Now that my heart wasn’t racing, and all the endorphins leaked out of my system, I started to quiver and grow cold.

  Holy hell, those three war-forms had planned on ripping open the door to my room and doing who knew what to me. They had broken into the house, turned on their own pack...

  I gulped down bile.

  I could not show weakness. Not for an instant.

  The Bond offered a shoulder to lean on again.

  I took it.

  Counting

  From what Donovan and I could piece together, the IronMoon rebels had snuck up from their barracks about two miles from the main house, broken in through the library windows, and headed up the stairs to find me.

  This plan was rather flawed considering the library windows were at the far end of the house. It also alerted the night guards. By the time they’d gotten halfway to their goal the loyal warriors were on their way.

  No wolves loyal to IronMoon had been killed, and there were no serious injuries. The mess in the hallway and the foyer was... extensive. The stairs were in one piece, but the banisters and railings splintered, the koi pond trashed, the marble shattered, the wood in the main hallway gouged, windows shattered, walls broken, and of course, the downstairs was littered with blood, body parts, and entrails.

  It took a surprisingly long time to account for everyone and sort out the traitors from the troublemakers. I expected that kind of thing to take an hour, tops, but somehow it took hours.

  Flint didn’t let the filth linger. Body parts had to be scraped off walls, and the whole house had to be doused in bleach. Debris and dust had to be cleaned up, and some basic repairs done, like a few ruined steps. A more skilled craftsmen would have to repair the floor tiles and doors. We’d already had the front doors replaced once that year.