by Sam Crescent
“Aniya,” a female, the mate of the patrol guard who’d been wounded on the night of the poacher attack, spoke up. “Think about what you’re saying. That’s … that’s asking a lot.”
“I know,” Aniya said. “I know it is. That’s why I’ve taken the time to talk to everyone about this individually over the past week.” She drew a breath and looked around. What was left of her father’s clan had gathered, at her request, in the open backyard of the now-empty house. After the attack that had killed her parents, and the fight with the poachers, she’d returned and exiled the cat who’d sold out the wolves. Surprisingly, when she’d explained her reasoning, none of the others hesitated to support her.
This, however, was entirely different.
What she and Maddox were proposing was an unheard of change in lifestyle. Nothing would be the same. And he’d admitted he expected pushback on his end too. That, at least, made her feel better. Because at the end of the day, her father had asked her to look after their people. She didn’t know a better way to do it than this, as ridiculous as it was. By the very nature of being born female, she could never be Alpha, and without a leader, even if they tried to stay together, they were vulnerable. If they scattered, in search of clans that might take new faces in, they risked unknown dangers.
She desperately hoped she could convince them to recognize that too.
“This forest is our home,” Aniya said, projecting her voice. She’d told them all this already, but they needed to hear it again. “I’m not asking anyone to move. But we all know it’s only a matter of time before something happens if we ignore the problem we face without an Alpha.” Her throat threatened to choke on the word, so she took a breath. “We need an Alpha. You know it. I know it. My father knew it.”
Another guard interrupted her. “Your father would throw you out if he heard this!”
Aniya cut a glare at him even as a couple of others gave him their own looks of displeasure. “My father asked me to take care of you,” she said. “This is the best way for me to honor that wish.”
“The wolves?” another voice exclaimed.
Looking around again, Aniya repeated, “I trust Maddox. He’s more than willing to take us all in.”
“Of course,” the guard from earlier said bitingly. “More territory for them.”
Aniya opened her mouth, but another cat beat her to it. “If they’re as bad as you think, won’t they just take our land by force, then? So wouldn’t this be smarter?”
Aniya wanted to say Maddox wouldn’t do such a thing, but she recognized the woman’s point. So she kept silent. Letting someone else offer even a spark of favor in her direction couldn’t hurt.
“Smarter? They’re dogs!”
“Please don’t tell me that’s what this is,” Aniya interrupted. She couldn’t stop herself. “Who cares about that? We’re not incompatible. We’ve been neighbors for centuries. This feud has been in our heads for as long as any of us can remember, but have any of us seen any bloodshed?”
No one had an answer to that.
Their eldest member finally spoke up from the back of the small crowd. “Why?” she asked. “Why do you trust this wolf so much? Why should we?”
Silence reigned as the group waited for Aniya’s answer.
She swallowed her nerves and dared to bare her secret. “Because I love him. Because he’s asked me to be his mate, but neither of us feels it’s right to take that step until our people are unified.”
Aniya swore the shocked gasp that carried over the gathered group was louder than a group their size should have been able to produce. It took all her courage to keep from looking away, but she needed them to see that she wasn’t ashamed. She’d never once been ashamed of her heart. If her heart told her Maddox was the answer, then Maddox was the answer. Sure, it was crazy for a werecougar to be in love with a werewolf. But she’d crossed that line two years earlier, when she’d first laid eyes on that flawless male body and known she couldn’t leave the clearing until she’d wrung it dry.
Now, finally, for the first time, her wild ways just might be coming in handy.
****
“Here?” Aniya asked, surprise in her voice, when Maddox pulled her to him after they stepped into a familiar clearing.
“Here,” he murmured, his lips brushing the skin beneath her ear. “It’s appropriate.”
She shivered in his arms and tilted her head, granting him access. “It is. I think you might have claimed me that day, actually, and I just didn’t know it.”
Maddox vibrated with a silent laugh. Sometimes he felt the same way. But they were both going to know it after tonight. Here, in this clearing where they’d first met, he was finally going to claim his chosen mate. This beautiful, vivacious werecougar who always kept him on his toes.
It had been nearly two months now since the night the poachers attacked their forest. Since her father, her Alpha, had been murdered. It hadn’t taken Maddox long to have the groundbreaking—and controversial—idea of merging their groups into one tribe. “Tribe” being the term they’d decided to use since neither could agree on abandoning or adopting the other’s. Implementing that idea, however, had taken some work. Lots of work. He suspected it would be years still before everyone was really settled, but for now, they’d made good headway.
The cougars and the wolves were no longer at war. They were two species, united under one Alpha, living side-by-side in one shared territory. Learning to get along as allies, where he hoped in time they would be friends. But this was a good start.
Second, however, to the start of the life he would be leading from this night forward with Aniya. He’d never imagined he would love a woman as much as he loved her. From the crown of her head to the soles of her feet, and every delectable inch in between. Which he intended to spend his time indulging in tonight, he decided as he rolled her beneath him on the grass and pumped his aching, starving cock into her tight, hot center.
Aniya moaned and wrapped herself around him, ankles locked behind his ass, nails digging into his back. He growled and wedged an arm behind her back to hold her tighter as he drove himself deeper.
“Yes!” Aniya cried with a gasp, jerking her hips up to meet his thrusts. She was close. That was good.
Maddox kicked up the pace, not afraid to be a little rough since he knew she liked it, and was rewarded with another, louder outcry of pleasure. He felt his own body tense, the release building, and buried his face in the crook of her throat. Her body pulsed around his dick as he pounded into her, his rhythm slipping in favor of satisfaction, and as she grabbed a fistful of his hair, her walls clamping tight, Maddox sank his teeth into her neck.
His release tore through him with a force he’d never known, causing his entire body to surge against her, and Aniya muffled her outcry by leaning up and sinking her own teeth into his neck in return. Another wave of ecstasy ripped over his body, and hers, and they held each other tight, their hips blindly grinding and rolling on a seemingly endless orgasm.
Only when it finally subsided, the tension in their bodies finally fading, did Maddox and Aniya retract their fangs from each other’s throats. Maddox ran his tongue over the wound that was already bruising on her skin, knowing it would scar, and he nearly shuddered when she did the same.
Fuck… He’d never felt anything so deliriously fantastic in his life. He’d never dreamed the mating process was actually that powerful, even though he’d heard rumors it was unlike anything else.
“It really was … amazing.”
He lifted his head, removing his arm from her back in order to balance himself above her, and grinned. “Amazing, huh?”
Her eyes widened. “I-how—” She frowned. “I thought that. And yes. But still. How did you—?”
The breath rushed from his lungs as he realized what she’d said. Moreover, as he realized her point. Was that possible? In human form? And across species lines? Making sure to hold her gaze, Maddox kept his lips locked as he said, “Baby, we’re making
history.”
Her lips twitched before the realization dawned in her eyes. “Oh, my God,” she mumbled. “I heard that…” Then she smiled. “We made history in this clearing two years ago, wolf. Catch up.”
He laughed, rolled off her, and tugged her onto his chest. “I fucking love you, Aniya,” he rumbled before capturing her lips in another wet, lingering kiss.
She moaned and melted against him, her hands splayed over his shoulders. “Never let me go, Maddox.”
Maddox wrapped his arms around her as he deepened the kiss, a wordless promise to do exactly as she asked. Because she was his, finally and forever.
The End
www.evernightpublishing.com/rose-wulf
GUARDING WHAT’S HERS
Kait Gamble
Chapter One
Merlin’s Cave, Tintagel, England
Saengdao ‘Cammi’ Willows picked a path along the wall of the cavern, listening to the echoing voices being carried along with the gentle gusts of wind. The scent of the sea air should have been invigorating.
Instead, all that rushed through her veins was burning annoyance.
Impatience had her drumming her fingers along the stone.
Bloody tourists.
Trembling with anticipation, she circled the little space again, trying to look natural. Like just another random visitor to the mythical location.
The place where Merlin legendarily brought Arthur up as a child. While others might have been entranced by the beauty of the landscape or the ruined remains of the castle, Cammi was focused on the cave.
The past decade of her life had led to this.
It had taken countless hours of plotting and literal blood, sweat, tears, getting around mind-boggling traps and deciphering incomprehensible clues and decayed maps. All to bring her here.
Now.
Surrounded by people soaking up the hype, pretending to feel the history there when they had no idea just how close they were to real magic.
How crazy would they go if they ever found out that everything so many of them dreamed of and feared lived among them all this time?
The thrum of magic through her veins always got worse around areas of power and at the moment, it didn’t help the excitement and anxiety already pinging around her system. And she was only half-human. Cammi couldn’t imagine what she’d be like if she’d been a full-blooded fae.
The magic here was so thick she could taste it.
This had to be it. The end of the long winding trail she’d followed that had been rife with dead ends, traps, and near-death experiences.
This had to be the place.
Cammi scratched the skin being rubbed by the coarse rope circling her neck. As if her Seeker nature wasn’t bad enough, she had this damned thing to deal with.
Just had to get involved with a sorceress.
Not that she’d had much choice. Lavinia had shown up one day and before Cammi knew it, gold had crossed palms, an actual noose was around her neck, and she was stuck. The witch hadn’t believed that her impulse to seek and find would be enough to make her follow through with the quest and thought a proper motivator would help.
With the way it had been tightening lately, Cammi knew the spell caster’s patience was growing thin.
Because it was just that easy to go about searching out a dragon’s hoard and then breaking into it.
It wasn’t that she never had before. Three times before, four if one counted the instance she’d been lucky enough to practically fall into one. Based on her reputation as a relentless treasure hunter, Lavinia had darkened Cammi’s door.
She walked the same circle around the cave. What she had to do next had been planned to the minutest detail and she itched to just get it over with. Who would have thought there would still be so many people milling around late in the day?
Needing to break up the monotony and trying to keep her gaze from locking on the points she’d have to concentrate on as soon as it could be afforded, she took a deep breath and shuffled along behind an elderly couple.
Cammi nearly tripped on a rock when a deep, melodious voice echoed around her. The chamber nearly pulsated with the low tones. Softly at first. The notes were comforting, almost cajoling. The tune carried on in words she didn’t understand but wanted to hear more of.
Who was singing?
She knew humans liked to sing and play instruments within the stone walls as an experiment, perhaps? It seemed odd to her but there were some among them that were sensitive to magic and this place would certainly draw them in. Tease them with a taste. Inspire them to reach out. Taunt them to try to find it.
But this, this was different.
The voice wasn’t mortal. It couldn’t be.
Cammi, and everyone else, stopped in place to simply listen. Or was it more than that?
Looking at the humans, she saw they seemed to be frozen. Mid-smile, part way through a comment, breath stilled in their lungs, it was as if time had simply stopped. At least, for them. Mimicking their inertness, she searched for the source and found it to be coming from the other entrance to the cave.
With the blinding sun behind him, she couldn’t see much more than a misshapen silhouette. But she could discern enough to know he was tall and broad besides having the most incredible voice she’d ever heard.
Curious that another non-human should be there…
Unless they knew this was the only time the hoard could be opened. Without the right tools, however, they would never be able to get in. But if word had gotten out that she was prepared, they could hope to usurp her prize. An irritating possibility that had happened to her before.
Even without the sorceress’s noose around her neck, she couldn’t allow it. Couldn’t afford to. Her integrity as a Seeker demanded successful retrieval. As did her sanity.
But did any of that really matter with her life on the line?
Cammi slowed her breathing and kept her eyes focused on the silhouette while doing her utmost to seem petrified like the rest. Thank goodness for the charms she carried around with her. In her line of work, it never hurt to have a little extra protection.
Especially when dealing with the tasks and beings she encountered daily.
Rings bearing stones etched with warding runes, bracelets of unicorn hair, even tattoos of dragon blood. Cammi possessed them all, making her a walking good luck charm if there ever was one.
But why was she thinking about them now?
Her gaze darted to a slight figure on the other side of the cave. Training her eyes on the ‘tourist,’ she watched. Her vigil didn’t take long to warrant success. Even if he hadn’t fidgeted, who carried a Discman in this day and age? It did make her laugh when they tried so hard to figure out the culture of the human world and just got it so very wrong. It was what made half-bloods like her invaluable for moving between worlds.
And this one wanted to know what she had.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Stay out of my head.”
His eyes widened before lifting his eyebrow just enough for her to notice. “Try and stop me.”
Moron.
Cammi wasn’t going to play games with him. Not when a dragon’s hoard was waiting for her.
She could deal with him when she had to. At the moment, she had other things to focus on.
Like whoever was singing everyone into a trance. Or Lavinia and the stranglehold she had on her. Or getting past the wards that were sure to be up to keep everyone and everything away from the treasure.
Thank goodness dragons were extinct or that would be another colossal hurdle to leap.
Sweat trickled down her forehead, inching ever closer to her eyes. Cammi willed it to stop before it started to inhibit her vision.
Chances were if these two were here, there were more. And since she couldn’t detect them immediately, they were likely to be more dangerous than the joker with the Discman.
It was the upcoming Cull. It was driving everyone crazy looking for any advantage to escape obliterat
ion.
The cycle of destruction and rebirth was elegant, in its way. Eons could pass without a Cull. There would be tension between the different races and clans, but for the most part, there would be peace. But then, when populations grew large and power built too high, a sensation would start to niggle at the gut. Instinct would whisper at the back of the mind to look for ways of surviving, be it by collecting artifacts and therefore power or by making alliances. The urge grew daily until either oblivion or the impulse faded. With the power held by their kind and long lives, it was the only way to keep the balance.
For beings like her, slipping through the cracks came quite easy. Like gravitated toward like. Witches and warlocks built covens of mind-boggling might. Vampires, werewolves, and others like them banded together before hurling themselves into war in the hopes of a few surviving.
It didn’t always work. The extinction of the most powerful—dragons—had proven that.
But for halflings, who belonged on neither side of the veil, things were less defined. For her part, Cammi stayed out of politics and alliances and just did what she could to survive.
Which meant doing the odd job for unsavory types to bring in the gold just to eke out a living.
And, unsurprisingly, a Seeker wasn’t exactly in demand unless it was for something like this.
It was an all-or-nothing kind of life.
And these … frauds … thought they would just jump in at the last second of a decade-long search and steal the prize?
Not while she still breathed.
The singer had walked inside the cave and Cammi had to force herself not to flinch when he stepped in front of her.
He still sang his entrancing tune as he studied her. The words caressed her skin and whispered to her mind as he tried to figure her out.
Cammi knew what he saw. A lowly half-elf. Her mother was an Asian human and had named her Saengdao, starlight in her language. Probably because of her pale-silver hair and eyes. She more than likely had no idea that names meant something to the fae. They defined who they were. And not just metaphorically. The name had cursed her to seek best by the light of the stars.
