The Alpha's Betrothed

‎The first thing Wren Halloway learned about love was that it had a price. ‎She learned it at nine years old, crouched behind the cracked kitchen door of their cottage in Marrow Hollow, her knees pulled to her chest and her ear pressed to the wood. ‎"Three winters of grain," her father said. His voice was thick, the way it always was after he'd spent coin they didn't have on drink they couldn't afford. "Forty silver on top of that. The Ashfords won't wait another season, Mirela." ‎"Then we give them something else." ‎Her mother's voice was flat and tired, like a woman counting out change. "We give them the girl." ‎Wren stopped breathing. ‎On the other side of the door, a chair scraped across the floor. Her father laughed, a short, ugly sound. "That one? She has no wolf. What would an Alpha want with a wolfless child?" ‎"She doesn't need a wolf to be a pledge, Garrick. She only needs a pulse." ‎A pulse. ‎Wren pressed her hand over her mouth so they wouldn't hear her. It didn't matter. They never listened for her anyway. ‎At eight, the pack healer had come through Marrow Hollow with a silver bell, holding it over each child's head to wake the first spark of their wolf. The bell had hummed for every other child in the village. Every single one. ‎Over Wren's head, it had stayed silent. ‎Since that day, she had been "the quiet one" to the kind people and "the dead weight" to everyone else. Her mother had stopped braiding her hair. Her father had stopped looking at her at all. And Wren, who was smaller than the other children and quieter, too, had learned to make herself so still that a person could forget she was in the room. ‎It was the only magic she had. Being forgotten. ‎Now, crouched in the dark, she understood that being forgotten had a price, too. It could be paid in silver. ‎She slipped out the back door before they could find her and ran to the woodpile at the edge of the yard. The wind off the pines bit straight through her thin dress. Marrow Hollow was a poor place, a scatter of leaning cottages at the edge of the Ashford lands, where the roofs leaked and the wells ran sour by summer. Beyond the fence, the forest stood black and enormous, and somewhere inside it a wolf howled, long and low, like a question no one would answer. ‎She wondered what it would feel like to belong to something that howled for her. ‎"There you are." ‎Wren flinched. Her mother stood at the edge of the yard with her arms folded, breath fogging in the cold. For one foolish moment, Wren hoped. She didn't even know what for. An apology, maybe. A hand against her cheek. ‎Instead her mother took her by the shoulder, marched her into the cottage, and sat her on a stool by the dying fire. Then, for the first time in months, she picked up a comb. ‎The teeth dragged through Wren's tangled hair, rough and hurried. It hurt. Wren held perfectly still and let it, because it was the closest thing to being touched that she'd had in so long. ‎"You will sit straight," her mother said. "You will speak only when you're spoken to. And you will not give the Ashfords any reason to regret taking you." ‎"Taking me where?" Wren's voice came out small. ‎Her mother's hands paused. Only for a heartbeat. Then the comb moved again. ‎"Somewhere with food." ‎That was all. That was the whole of the goodbye. ‎The riders came at dusk. ‎There were three of them, tall figures on dark horses, and every door in Marrow Hollow suddenly had someone standing in it. A pack didn't ride into a poor village unless something was being collected. ‎The man in front swung down from his saddle without a sound. He was broad and weathered, with silver threaded through his dark beard, and he moved like a closed door: solid, silent, impossible to push. Every wolf in the yard lowered its eyes without being told. ‎Alpha Dorian Ashford. ‎Wren had heard the name her whole life. She had never imagined it would belong to a man who would look at her. ‎He did. His gaze moved over the cottage, over her father swaying in the doorway, over her mother's too-straight spine, and finally came to rest on Wren. ‎And stayed. ‎It was a long look. Longer than it should have been. His gray eyes narrowed, as if he were trying to read something written very small, and something crossed his face too fast to name. Surprise, maybe. Or recognition. ‎Then it was gone, and he unrolled a parchment. ‎"The debt of the Halloway household to the Ashford pack," he read, in a voice like gravel, "is forgiven in full. In exchange, the child Wren Halloway is pledged in betrothal to the Ashford heir, to be wed at eighteen under the old law." ‎Betrothal. ‎Wren turned the word over slowly, like a stone she didn't know how to hold. She was nine. She did not know the heir. She did not know anything, except that an hour ago she had been a daughter, and now she was a line on a page. ‎"Do you understand what this means, girl?" Dorian asked. ‎She lifted her chin. It was the only thing she had left to lift. ‎"I'm the payment," she said. ‎Her father made a small sound. Her mother studied the floor. ‎And Dorian Ashford's jaw tightened. It was barely a flicker, but Wren saw it, because seeing was the one thing she had always been good at. For one strange second, he looked like a man who had been handed something heavier than he'd expected. ‎He didn't deny it, though. He only rolled up the parchment and said, "Bring your things." ‎She had one bundle. It held a spare dress, a moth-eaten blanket, and a single gray wren's feather she had found in the snow when she was six. Her mother had named her after that bird, once, back when she still told stories. ‎The smallest, plainest thing in the forest, and the only one that doesn't leave when winter comes. ‎Wren had thought it was a compliment. She was only beginning to understand that it had been a warning. ‎Her father didn't say goodbye. He stood in the doorway with the signed contract still shaking in his hand, and he looked relieved. ‎That was what broke something small inside her. Not the sale. The relief. ‎Her mother followed her out to the horse. For a moment Wren thought, She'll hold me. She'll finally hold me. Her mother crouched, and her hands settled on Wren's shoulders, and Wren held her breath. ‎"Don't cry," her mother whispered. "Crying is for the girls who are missed." ‎Then she let go. ‎Dorian lifted Wren onto the saddle in front of him as easily as if she weighed nothing, which was very nearly true. The horse turned. The cottage, the woodpile, the cracked kitchen door, all of it began to shrink. ‎She didn't look back at first. Then she did. ‎Her parents were already inside. The door was already closed. ‎Wren turned to face the road, and her fingers curled around the gray feather until the quill bit into her palm. ‎She would not cry. Not for them. Not now and not ever again, because no one was coming to wipe the tears away, and a girl who couldn't be missed had no use for them. ‎The pines closed behind her like a curtain. Ahead, past the dark hills, a great stone house waited with a family she had never met and a boy she had been promised to without ever being asked. ‎I am the payment, Wren thought. ‎Then, smaller and fiercer, a thought she hadn't known she was capable of: ‎But I won't stay one. ‎