I was still pissed at... circumstances... and I wouldn’t have minded watching Hix rattle Gabel’s teeth. That wasn’t a very nice thing to think, and it wasn’t fair. Gabel had admitted his mistake. It was also hard to leave the past in the past when it didn’t stay dead.
Hopefully this would be the last time I had to deal with this in public. Gardenia, I meant. Not Gabel and Hix snarling at each other. That was going to continue.
Flint did not look the least bit comfortable in a tuxedo. He looked amazing, but not comfortable. I think it was also the first time I had ever seen him wear shoes. Patent leather opera flats with a folded velvet bow across the toe. Very old school. Although he wore no tie, no cummerbund, and his collar was not buttoned.
Alpha Anders’ Solstice gala was one of the most formal and well-attended events in our part of the country. Even the Shadowless had gone to it, and I prepared myself in case I ran into Alpha Jermain or my father.
It was not actually held at the heart of Gleaming Fang but at a rented opera hall in a modest-sized human city towards the edge of Gleaming Fang’s western border. It made getting to the party quite convenient. We were not the only wolves who chose to arrive by air. It also tended to keep hostilities down.
So one would hope.
The custom for mated females was to wear a dress that showed at least our Marked arm. Violet had chosen one of midnight purple silk with off the shoulder straps, and plunged very low on my back to show off my very pale skin. Unmated females wore something on their shoulders. Easy way to tell from a distance which females were off limits, and which ones weren’t. Males... well, males, if you were looking, you just had to guess.
Hix had opted not to shave and had a shadow along his jaw, which gave him an even more menacing look than usual. He was in a rotten mood.
My stomach knotted and unknotted as we walked up the marble steps to the entrance. Adrenaline pumped through my system. Just as well the invitation had only arrived a few days before the party. If I had had to sit and be nervous for two weeks I’d have gone crazy. Gabel’s forearm was tight, and his fingers clenched into a fist. He was not just an Alpha, he was the Alpha that had conquered and accepted the submission of the host Alpha, and probably a good number of other attendees there.
Scared the shit out of me, personally.
The hall was illuminated by massive overhead chandeliers, and absolutely everything was lit, from the corner where a small quintet played classical music for the people already dancing, to the tables of food off to one side. The room already hummed with chatter.
Gabel surveyed the party from the top of the stairs. He noted the faces of the wolves he already knew. His fingers flexed, causing the iron cables of his forearm to shift in my hand.
Just as he shifted to move off down the stairs, the conversation in the room quieted, and eyes moved toward us.
The IronMoon had arrived.
Gabel’s forearm tightened to a steel beam. The Bond slid into the darkness as he pushed everything aside and focused solely on the wolves below him. Many of them had bowed their heads to him, but some in the crowd were not under IronMoon’s control.
Yet.
It must be very surreal to be looking at your future conqueror and weighing if you dared to meet his gaze or not.
Gabel’s prestige and authority hung around him in an aura, summoned forth for just this moment. To me it was glorious: his strength and authority and resolve, and his willingness to prove all of them.
As his mate, I was probably the only one in the room who found it thrilling.
We descended the stairs as the silence deepened.
A man moved from the back of the crowd with a woman in tow. I recognized Alpha Anders immediately.
His face was burned into my memories, after all.
I clenched Gabel’s forearm. Hard.
Anger curled up inside me like steam building.
Anders’ had a look of polite confusion when he saw me, his eyes finding my Mark. I gripped Gabel’s arm tighter. Thankfully I wasn’t expected to smile.
By now it was absolutely silent except for the soft notes of the quintet. Even the caterers slicing delicate portions of exquisite beef had paused.
When Gabel spoke, his voice carried through the room with ease, pitched to a note of command. “Anders.”
Anders’ brief flash of authority faded. He averted his gaze to a slightly different angle, his neck bowed very slightly and his shoulders bent a degree. His Luna’s aura of composed command washed out under the heat of Gabel’s authority.
“Welcome, Gabel.” Anders dropped Gabel’s title, which indicted humans were present. He paused, mouth open a bit, struggling to find words when he looked at me. This had gone off-script.
“Gianna,” Gabel’s voice stepped into the chasm of silence. “This is Anders. I did not concern you with introductions before. Anders, the Lady Gianna.”
Anders made a sound in the back of his throat that might have been a word. His Luna, a willowy woman of my height, saved him. “Welcome, Gianna. I am Ura.”
I nodded to her. I also didn’t trust her.
“Yes,” Anders found his voice again. “I recall seeing you, Gianna. You are, I mean, were, the Oracle from Shadowless. Am I right? Rogan’s daughter.”
“Yes,” I answered, my insides twisting at my father’s name.
Anders hadn’t been expecting me on Gabel’s arm, but he seemed more flustered than I would have expected. Gabel noted it as well and bristled. The nearby wolves fidgeted and shifted, ducking heads and watching everything from the corner of their eyes. The musicians gave up trying to play.
Gabel’s eyes narrowed a degree, and he gestured with his left hand to the rest of IronMoon for the benefit of the room. “Hix, Flint, and Donovan.”
Anders recovered at this point and gestured to the party. He smiled for the crowds and graciously told us to enjoy his hospitality. The musicians picked up a tune, the people started chattering again, and the Gleaming Fang Alpha and Luna retreated to regroup.
I lifted my hand off his arm. Gabel caught it and clapped it back down, his fingers covering mine. The Bond jolted at the sudden touch. I had been neglecting him since the invitation had arrived. Somewhere between ‘could end horribly’ and ‘public humiliation’ I hadn’t been remotely in the mood. Now that the worst was over, it seemed the Bond had its own ideas again...
“Careful.” He brushed his lips along my ear and whispered to me.
I quivered all over at his touch.
“Buttercup, don’t remind me how alone I have been,” he whispered.
“Who’s fault is that?” I tugged on his grip.
Hix cleared his throat.
Gabel’s possessive heat mixed with concern, desire, power, authority. He released my hand.
I picked up a drink off one of the passing trays and moved into the crowd. I had never been to a party like this and had no idea what to do. I did not have to wait, though, because my father pushed his way through the crowds, with Alpha Jermain not far behind him.
I froze. My heart twisted, my gut burned.
“Gianna!” He reached out and grabbed my arm, then pulled me toward him. My drink sloshed.
His fingers slipped off me as Hix appeared from nowhere and slammed my father backward, sending him into Alpha Jermain.
My father was still the First Beta of Shadowless. He straightened, cricked his neck and curled his upper lip at Hix.
Hix snarled, “You do not touch her.”.
“I’m her father, not some errant male,” my father growled.
“I know who you are. You’re the father who didn’t shed one drop of blood for his daughter. I’ve shed more of my blood to honor her than you ever bothered. She—”
“Hix, enough.” I put my hand on his trembling bicep. I muttered to him, “Your temper is going to cause a scene.”
Hix growled and stepped aside.
Gabel, not far away, watched.
“Go on,” I told Hix under my breath.
“It’s fine.”
Hix stalked off into the crowd. So much for him working a party. I didn’t know how to do it, but he wasn’t even trying.
I stepped out of reach of my father’s embrace.
He couldn’t just hug me after I hadn’t seen or heard from him in months. Yes, IronMoon was powerful and strong, but not even growling at Gabel, and just lining us all up that way? It still stung. Deep.
“Gianna, it’s so good to see you,” he told me.
I had to say something. “You say that like you didn’t think I’d be here.”
“I didn’t know if you would. I hoped you would be, but—”
“But what?” I asked.
He looked at my Mark, then stepped closer. He lowered his tone, “We heard Gabel had taken another BondMate after you.”
Anger spiked within me, accompanied by another hot jolt of adrenaline. My father had heard, and he hadn’t reached out to me? He just let me rot in IronMoon? It was everything I could do to keep my voice composed and steady. “You mean after Alpha Anders visited IronMoon.”
My father explained the rumors that had been circulating in Gabel’s domain: he had taken an Oracle from Shadowless as his BondMate and tribute. Anders had subsequently been presented with Gardenia, and I had not been introduced, leading to gossip that I had been quickly discarded.
“Rumors,” I said shortly. “I’ve been his since the day you saw him Mark me. Our vows are at Solstice. Haven’t you gotten your invitation?”
“Gianna, listen—”
“You let it happen without a drop of blood. You left me with a monster!” I hissed under my breath. “You have no idea what he’s put me through, and you think I want to listen to anything you have to say about it? Or is this where you still try to tell me there are things I don’t understand?”
Jermain just loomed back there like a cardboard cutout. How could I have ever respected and feared him? I snorted in disgust.
My father whispered, “Gianna, I didn’t want to make things worse for you, and—”
“Not possible.” I cut him off again. The night Gabel had ripped my dress, made me undress for him, sleep naked next to him. Taunting me with Platinum. Mocking me. Degrading me. Using a divine gift as his personal toy because he was so damn arrogant he was bored with conquest.
I could come to love the thinking, cruel, brilliant Gabel no matter how brutal or savage he was, though, because, as I looked at my father, into the abyss itself... I was right there, too. I despised, still, with a passion, the weak, petty, worthless version of him that had sawed this Mark into my arm.
It could have been a beautiful Mark.
“Gianna, you don’t understand,” my father said.
“Playing the things you don’t understand card? Things you couldn’t tell me? I am about to be the Luna you will kneel to.” My heart hurt. It just hurt, hurt, hurt, and I’d have given anything for him to send me even a card to say he’d been thinking of me. My soul wept. It reached down into the Bond I shared with Gabel for comfort.
It was an instinct, and not a very useful one, because Gabel wasn’t exactly a comforter of souls.
“Will you listen to me for five minutes?!”
“No.” I was tired of this. “You have no idea what I’ve been through because of whatever this thing is you say I wouldn’t understand. Now you don’t understand. I will be the Luna of IronMoon, and you have only yourself to thank for it.”
I went to the other side of the party. I needed a bite of some food to get the rotten taste out of my mouth.
As I stood by the bar waiting for the bartender to pour my ginger ale, another form moved up to my side. I paid him no mind for a moment, until he said, “I was hoping to see you here, Lady Gianna.”
I knew that voice.
MeatMan.
Lure-Scent
The MeatMan smiled at me. He was very tall, like in the visions, and had the commanding presence of an Alpha. I put his age at somewhere around thirty. On the back of the hand holding his drink was a thick scar that ran from his knuckles to his cuff.
Instinct told me to back out of his immediate grasp. I held my ground, but my heart raced, and my blood shook.
The MeatMan.
The secret I kept from Gabel. The wolf who pulled the strings of the disloyal.
And I did not expect to feel something prickle over my Mark, under it, like it squirmed uncertainly against my soul.
“I was expecting you to be here, Lady Gianna. I wasn’t expecting you to be on Alpha Gabel’s arm.” He sipped his own drink.
I took my drink from the bartender. “Have we met?”
“No. I am Alpha Aaron of IceMaw.” He gestured for me to step toward the dance floor and away from the bar. I eyed him but decided to comply. I didn’t think he was being gracious or gallant (not exactly), but given we were taking up space at the bar, it was polite to move. I permitted him to usher me a little closer to the quintet, where it was a tad quieter and not as busy.
My Mark kept squirming. My fingers twitched. I seized a fold of my gown to hide it.
He looked at my Mark, clucked his tongue. “What a shame.”
“Excuse me?”
He stepped closer to me, coming exactly one step too close. He towered over me. “I came all this way to meet you. I had been told Gabel had traded you for something easier to handle.”
As sharp as a kick from Flint to my belly it hit me, and another rush of adrenaline plowed through my system. He saw through my composure, picking up on the tick of the pulse in my throat and the flutter of my eyelids, his eyes marking every small reaction.
His eyes were a rich brown flecked with amber. He leaned forward very slightly and inhaled. I shifted away, appalled.
“I would do more than merely catch your scent,” Aaron said, “but I see every IronMoon in this place watching me. That is surprising in itself. I thought Gabel would charge across this room and make a scene.”
I didn’t respond.
“No defense for your BondMate and Alpha?”
“I don’t take cheap bait.”
“But you did tolerate Gabel humiliating you in front of Anders. Twice,” Aaron prodded.
“And that’s a cheap shot,” I snapped. Dammit. Aaron got that much out of me, and I wasn’t giving him anything else. Especially not the ‘strategy’ lie. He’d press and press and push me into the lie so deep he’d bury me.
“You seem to think I have my mouth open waiting for a bite of food from your hand,” I said darkly.
He curled his upper lip. “And you haven’t told him.”
“That was cheap bait too,” I said as my heart raced in near-panic. The Petitioner Wolf had been a plant... sent by the IceMaw.
“Such a burden you must carry. Such a secret kept on behalf of... him,” his tone flicked concern for Gabel away like a little bug.
“Are you usually so petty?”
Aaron straightened. “Apologies. Rude of me to bring up both matters. Still, from your scent, I can’t let it be unsaid it is a shame he convinced you to forgive him. I would enjoy the chance to win you, not make off with you.”
“So you did know I’d be here.” I narrowed my eyes. “Even though you were expecting Gardenia, too.”
He smiled. “That is only simple logic. I assumed Gabel would want to parade his Oracle before all of us.” He gestured to the room. “I wanted to see what docile little puppy he’d selected to be Luna, and what woman was too dangerous for him to bed. That is a woman I would very much want to meet.”
He pulled his upper lips back just enough to show the whites of his teeth, and I saw his canines flashed a little longer and sharper.
He could partially shift. If he could just extend his fangs outside of the Mark-making, he... I focused on not gulping, because he’d see my throat move. My fingers clenched my drink. The ice rattled tink-tink-tink against the glass.
He shouldn’t even have been at this party. Anders had invited him just to parade it under Gabel’s unknowing snout... and i
n front of everyone who did know.
Did everyone here know what was really going on, and the joke was on us?
Tink-tink-tink.
“I am very disappointed, Lady Gianna, that Gabel found his courage. Unless... is that a glint of intrigue I perceive?”
“No.” I think I lied. I wasn’t exactly sure the way my Mark squirmed even though I was as frightened of Aaron as I’d ever been of Gabel.
“I’m not sure about that. Did I overhear your vows are in a few weeks? I don’t expect an invitation, of course.”
“They are, and you shouldn’t.”
“Reconsider. Taking the vows, I mean, not the invitation. Gabel has no idea what he has, and even less idea how to keep it.” He lowered his voice. “I can smell your scent. The scent of a cereus flower that blooms one night a year.”
I gasped. “You’re lying.”
“It shouldn’t be there, but it is,” he all but purred. “Gabel is only death and burning. His pack is garbage no other pack wants. They will betray him in time. It is their nature. When he howls for aid those who bowed before him will ignore him.”
He paused, glanced at Gabel, then returned his attention to me. “If it’s him you fear, don’t.”
“I’ve heard this don’t mate him demand before.” My voice trembled, my skin quivered, and my Mark seemed to slide around my skin like oil on water.
“Yes, I know. But I am not a SableFur.”
He half-bowed to me in a me in a manner like Flint and excused himself before I could even conjure a response.
My hand shook as I raised my glass to my lips and took a slow sip. My throat was so dry I almost gagged. I choked down the mouthful, then another.
Gabel had disappeared. Donovan stood in a center of a dozen wolves entertaining with stories and jokes. Hix dragged himself through the crowd like an unwilling boulder. Flint hadn’t moved from his spot under the second floor balcony. He had picked that spot from moment one and stood there, watching the crowd. No drink, just waiting. We could stuff him into a tux, push him onto a plane, but we couldn’t make him mingle.
The Alpha's Oracle Page 31
