The Warrior King's Mate

Chapter 13

Malcolm P.O.V.

Today didn’t quite go as planned. I had wanted to tell Nova about my departure date all week but it just wasn’t the priority. I had to press her on this statement before dad waged an all-out pack war between us and Silver Shore. The rogues grew in numbers every day, drawn by the coming and going of so many people in and out of River Moon, we were at breaking point. Two rogues broke through the barrier in broad daylight when Nova and I were in my office, and it took a painful level of restraint not to run off to find and kill them myself. The fact that rogues would risk such a thing with so many powerful warrior wolves in the pack right now concerned me – but not half as much as the knowledge that in two months time the pack would have a skeleton level of protection and dad would be managing the pack business, the estate, the money all without help of any kind. This inquisition had to go ahead, and fast, or we were all well and truly f****d. Dad was too trigger ready to start a war with Silver Shore, and the longer we waited for a response, the angrier he became.

It almost slipped my mind, telling her. I knew I was leaving, but I guess between the constant appointments and making sure she was always with someone and being fed, that she was talking and, more importantly, that we had her statement ready – the part where I told her I was leaving just never actualised. I hadn’t been sleeping well, either, ever since Nova’s little…whatever it was. At my mother’s request, we kept that part of the night to ourselves when Nova was taken back to see Doctor Henderson. Until we could figure out how the f**k she had managed that, we needed to keep the people who knew she COULD do that to a bare minimum. Dad wanted her to do it for the Elders and then for the Inquisition team. It made me shiver thinking about the feeling of my head being cleaved open, totally blinded by pain and then – as if by magic – landing in the black tiled bathroom with a much younger looking Nova. I couldn’t get the thoughts out of my head. I couldn’t unsee what I’d seen. Sometimes, whenever I had to touch her for whatever reason, I felt Nova’s pain and panic as she tried not to flinch away from me, and I felt disgust so overwhelming that more than once, I found myself standing over the toilet in my bathroom retching.

Then, there were the nightmares. Every morning I awoke in the pitch black, convinced the room was on fire. The smoke still caught in my mouth, I was choking and gagging. I had no idea what the dream was, but I was convinced it came from Nova. Every night until she showed me what Logan did to her, I would hear her screaming in her room in the early hours of the morning. Now, I would snap awake, my heart pounding in my chest – but only silence. Last night, I crept along to her bedroom door and sure enough she was awake, but she wasn’t screaming. Her light was on and the sound of her pacing footsteps reassured me she was in there – but instinct told me not to knock.

Well, instinct and Blade.

You should not have let her get so attached to you. You will have to leave her here with someone she can talk to.

‘I know, I know. She won’t even look at mom,’ I answered him.

She’s Grace’s sister. I watch her tremble when Margot is in the room. She wishes to escape.

‘Grandma, then? They do talk, kind of…’

Blade grunted in my head and we both knew that Grandma couldn’t be there for Nova the way we had been recently. Listening to the things that had happened….she couldn’t bear it.

‘What about that girl? The one who gave Nova the map – she’s still floating around?’

The one who nearly got cousin killed? Too comfortable to leave, especially since you provide such nice eye candy for her.

‘Can’t leave,’ I reminded him, smirking. ‘Her and her lunatic mate are stuck here because he failed his assessment.'

Puny warrior, Blade chuckled.

The fact that he had failed his assessment was another headache. White Fang were a bunch of contentious bastards at the best of the times. Everyone knew their reputation, but their supposedly lead warrior took great offense to having failed his assessment with Marcus. He was strong and huge, but he lost his temper too easily – at everyone, not just his opponent. So far, in basic training, he had badly injured two of his teammates and we refused to push him through. As much as he was blaming his assessment on some sort of nepotistic revenge for how Nova was found – apparently, he refused to drive her with the rest of their group – that was far from the case. King Fallon’s staff had sent very clear and very precise instructions on who was fit for selection, and we ‘house packs’ were told to continue with these guidelines when the circumstances changed. He wasn’t getting through to the army with a temper like that, Joe was dangerous.

I sighed and rubbed my tired eyes, closing the laptop. Sick of sitting in my office, mother had kindly offered me the use of her tearoom as a cosy change of pace. When I was little, I used to sit there sometimes, when the winter nights crept in due to it having the largest fireplace. Sitting there, warm and comfortable, was like a security blanket I didn’t know I’d been needing so badly since finding out about my younger cousin.

That was another thing - not telling her WHY the family didn't know about her. We knew some, we knew enough to know we should have done more, been better. Dad wanted this war with Silver Shore nearly two decades earlier after what happened to Beta Gavin. Gavin had been his best friend at school, and would have been my uncle no matter who he mated. I remember him quite well - he was funny. Funny in that goofy happy way, where he always got involved with us pups and was always first to throw a snowball. He was at my birthday parties, he was at my school plays. Grace was there too, although she didn't play with us like Uncle Gavin did. I was 8 when he died and I remember that quite well as well, better than my parents think I do. The thing is, no one talks about Gavin or Grace - or Simon and Hailey, and so obviously not Nova. No one talks about how Grace's pregnancy and Gavin's death suspiciously coincided. No one talks about how Gavin was given the message about a rogue attack at our borders, no one talks about how my father never made that call. No one talks about how Gavin arrived, gashed open, chewed on, wolfsbane in his system. His lips were already blue when they brought him up to the packhouse, I remember the red stains where he'd been dragged, and his thin blue lips as I hid behind the staircase. That was the day the rogues came, too. For the last twenty years, surprisingly well organized rogues have bombarded the borders of River Moon, but, until Nova arrived, no one has talked about reasons why they might have chosen to live in our woods, or their particular interests in being here.

When that girl and her mate arrived and asked after a girl on the ferry asking where Nova was, Dad and I had the same thought at the same time. Someone from Silver Shore was sent to River Moon at the request of help that River Moon didn't know about. Then we receive a call telling us they are coming and they are both mysteriously attacked by rogues and on death's door by the time we find them surrounded in the woods? After Gavin's death, my dad's suspicion and anger overtook him and he put the accusation to Grace. She left us all without a name and vowed to never see any of us again, and, true to her word, we never heard from her until a few weeks ago. We know she was pregnant, we assumed the baby had been born but could never have suspected anything like THIS could be happening. Dad was convinced Grace had a hand in Gavin's death, and that she had sent Nova to us to suffer the same fate, Grace left word that Nova, my grandmother's youngest grandchild, would be coming to stay with us, and when she didn't arrive on time,I guess it felt like history repeating itself. He needed to know why, and was quick to send out the patrol teams as soon as we found out about the map. His vows to make Grace answer him on the stand or in the torture chambers were filled with more and more vitriol, In truth, I was scared to leave for Selinis Castle without knowing for sure the Inquisition was underway - I agreed with him that justice needed to be served, but I wanted it done right.

Standing from my chair, I went to close the thick curtains of the tearoom when a flash of movement caught my eye and my instincts sharpened – rogues. They were on my mind and now in my garden.

I dashed from the tearoom, mindlinking the patrol teams as I went, as I tore out of the packhouse and into the garden. Out here, it was darker than dark, so Blade took over my senses as we searched for the rogue. Ducking low, I moved quickly through the garden, my muscles tense and ready for a fight, Blade sniffing the air intently the entire time. Then, instead of rotting flesh, the subtle hints of something herbal and floral hit my nose – Nova?!

Stand down, false alarm. I sent down the mindlink. Return to your stations, remember – they are forcing themselves through the smallest of gaps.

Furious I had called them away from their posts without need, I followed Nova’s scent through the orchard and towards the Dome – What was she doing? She never left her room unless she had someone at her side. She barely moved or made a sound and now – what? Sneaking out in the middle of the night? The sudden departure from the picture of Nova I was creating in my head rattled me, and as I tried to keep hold of the scent, I heard the loud voice of Joe, booming out from the training grounds a mile away, followed by the roar of a small crowd.

I felt a foreign jolt of fear whip through me like an electric current – Nova.

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Flora P.O.V.

I picked the bones up again and dropped them, this time from a greater height but the answer was the same - Nova was in River Moon. I had used up most of my supplies on this darned locator spell and I needed what was left in case she moved on from there. It didn't make sense, Grace sending her there. What was she up to?

I should have understood when Nova mentioned her grandmother, but to be honest, I was too thrown from seeing her in Port George in the first place. The little fishing town had been my little haven for twenty years now, and I couldn't risk him finding me here - she was a wandering target and she was moving my way. I'm ashamed to admit that my first instinct was to poison her, but after seeing her slumped in the chair at the shop...that little girl was a risk to no one. She was dangerously thin, it caused a near-visceral reaction to watch her walk about on what was essentially bone. At that moment I realized the horror of my own anger, what I had done to an innocent little...

Never mind that now, that's done. I need to find her. I need to tell her what we did to her and that she is in very real danger.

Grace had been no help. After I awoke to find Nova gone, I immediately made my way to Silver Shore. Shifters are mindlessly protective of their lands and don't suffer intrusions lightly, but I made sure they suffered me. Two of their so-called warriors left with particularly nasty curses after they attempted to remove me from their pack house, and their friends were not quick to follow suit. Even then, she refused to see me - refused to open her mouth. Well, we'll see what her sister thinks of her after I get my hands on some powdered wolf fangs, I'd be able to teleport right inside their heavily guarded little packhouse.

I warned Grace, as soon as I left. I warned her - I was lifting the spell we'd cast on Nova. I tried my best but knew deep down that I would need Nova's blood to undo the damage I'd inflicted on her - but if Grace suspected Nova might right now know the truth, then well, there's no knowing what she'd do.

Grace came to me afraid she'd created a monster - and I left her pack three weeks ago knowing that no, we'd created a monster by tying that little girl down and allowing that pack to do whatever it is they did to her to land her in the state she found me in. No more. I was a mother, wasn't I? Well, it's high time I acted like it.

He might already know where I am. She might already have told him....?

No. Grace was too scared and too clever for that. She enjoyed her head firmly attached to her neck and even the pain that man put her through would not allow her to give away her location. Or mine.

Still, my heart jumped into my throat when a rapid knock on the door sounded. Waving my hand through the air once, the lock slid open and I yelled "come in!"

Otille, my friend, scurried inside the small apartment, shutting and locking the door beside her. "Got it," she breathed, her long braids tied in a salt and pepper knot on the top of her head, which wobbled slightly as she threw the little black bag of powder across to me. "How long you gone?"

"As long as it takes - I need to - you need to keep a low profile. If they find me here they'll sniff you out quick and-"

"Don' worry 'bout me," she shook her head, her hair wobbling again. "I have a flight to Ocho Rios tomorrow morning - I'll be gone before the sun rises."

Good, I nodded. Otille left my apartment.

I grabbed the bones and threw them high in the air this time, and read them as they landed in my chalk circle on the floor. Nova was in River Moon - but something was wrong. Unable to leave the circle, I thanked myself for packing the herbs in my bags and bringing them here with me. Grabbing the thyme, I asked the bones "where" and, my stomach sinking, I rubbed the herb viciously along the insides of both of my wrists, chanting her name over the lock of hair I cut from her while she slept.

Fearing I was already too late, I gathered the wolfs' fang in both hands, my bags hanging from my arms, and took one last look around my little apartment, my little nest. No more hiding. I threw the powder in into the air, watching it glitter in the moonlight as I chanted "discede, discede, discede...."

Like falling asleep, my body fell away from me, I fell away from the world, praying to the goddesses that I would find myself again in River Moon.