Her Alpha Warlord

Episode 7

Cahir woke up with a pounding headache. He had indeed drunk himself to stupor the night before.

How much mead had he had to drink? He did not even know. Had lost count at the fourth? Fifth? ...dozen. He had a lot on his mind already and his interaction ...if you could call it that... with his son only made it worse.

He was in a sea of anguish and his only thought was to drink it all down. To drown himself in so much alcohol till he could no longer remember his own name talk less of what he had to do the next day.

He was going to get married to another wife. He was going to be a husband again. Another thing he was going to fail at for the second time.

Why think too much about it when he was only going to fail again. He was only going to be like the one he hated the most.

The man who had murdered his mother.

His good for nothing, son of a gargan Father.

He saw it all yesterday. How his son had looked at his aunt before talking to him, as though he was a random stranger the kid had met on the street.

How his son had looked at him in fear while having what should have been a simple conversation.

And worst of all was how his son had burst into tears just from the gaze of his father.

That brought back memories. A lot of them.

Cahir remembered it like it was just yesterday, how he had grown up under the iron fist authority of his father.

His father had raised him like he was raising a mercenary and not a son, and his mother had not a single say.

How could she, when she was not his beloved ...or even his wife. Yes, Cahir was a bastard, his sister being the legitimate child of the former queen of the Willulf clan.

He remembered the exact day he made a vow to himself to be unbreakable especially in the presence of his father. He remembered the day when he lost his heart.

The day his father killed his mother.

Cahir had not cried that day. Or ever after that. Not in the presence of his father, not in the presence of anyone. Not even in the presence of his best friend, Vlod.

That day, Cahir had experienced an untamable quest for vengeance. He lost every bit of humanity in him.

The only emotion he ever felt was anger hot raging anger, the occasional anxiety and longing for something he could never have.

Love!

Every thing he had thought he had felt all his life, the smirks, or laughs, were merely superficial.

He realized that after Frida, his first wife died giving birth to their son.

His marriage to Frida had been arranged by his father.

Cahir had let himself be a pawn in the hands of his father one last time, not because he feared the man, not because he wanted power, but because it was convenient.

Marriage was a nuisance he had to get out of the way at some point in his life so why not with his best friend's little sister who he knew had a huge crush on him?

For the sake of the friendship between himself and Vlod, Cahir had tried his best to make himself feel love for her, he really did try and even thought that he was succeeding,

...until he caught her climbing out of their bed at night, her whole pregnant self, to go cry in the arms of another.

She cheated on him, not physically, but emotionally. And that had hurt Cahir way more than it would have if Cahir had found out that Bjørn wasn't his son.

After that, Cahir became stone cold.

He forgot how to feel. He forgot how to communicate with others and most of all he forgot how to love.

He forgot how to love anyone, even his son. Afraid of failure, afraid of never being enough.

*****

Blair sat through the process of being preened for the wedding, the picture of frustration.

Her mind spun with how fast she was thinking through plans to get out of the wedding but nothing seemed tangible enough to work. She was fresh out of ideas.

She had faked illness and subsequently "fainted" but she had simply being doused with water until she decided it was about time to wake up.

She complained of constipation, but once she heard the head of servants calling for needles for blood letting, she decided to stop her shenanigans.

She could not dream of escaping anyway. Not with everyone else watching her as though they were waiting for her to try to do just that ...try to escape.

Which meant that she could do nothing other than sulk and quietly let herself be bath and shaved and dolled up for a wedding that she most definitely didn't want to be a part of.

A wedding she knew nothing about before last night.

Blair had been wrapped up in several under dresses that she didn't really pay attention to. The wedding gown though, demanded her attention, and those of anyone who saw her.

It was a rich white and gold dress with tulle, frills, puffs... The whole works. It indeed made Blair feel like a princess and she would have definitely been more than excited to be putting it on if not of her current situation.

On her own hand, Violet had been ordered to join the servants in getting the princess ready for her marriage and afterwards, she was sent to help in the kitchen so Blair could not get any time alone with her until she was ushered to the chapel where the marriage was supposed to take place.

Blair got out of the carriage, a footman already holding his hand out for her as she came out into the sun.

Blair glanced bitterly at the sky. The sky was blue and clear, the sun shone brightly but not so much that it was unbearably hot.

It was indeed a perfect day for a wedding.

How she wished a storm would come accompanied by thunder and lightening and ruin this wedding.

Or preferably, a tornado that would spin her and return her to her world, much like in Dorothy and the wizard of Oz.

Blair wanted to cry as her predicament finally began to dawn on her the close she got to the chapel doors. She was about to get married to the most ruthless man she had ever created.

She clutched at the bouquet of flowers that had being shoved into her hands to avoid the urge to pinch herself.

It was no use, she had done that all day yesterday and what had that solved?

*****

Cahir stood in front of the altar in the tightest piece of clothing that he had ever worn in his life. A gift from his father in-law to be.

It was a starched piece of white shirt, a pair of black trousers that was at least a size or two too small and a long black jacket like over-garment.

Cahir clutched at the button of the starched cloth and hoped they could be done soon so that he could be out of that village and out of the itchy clothing soon.

The sound of the choir starting a music brought his mind to the present. They were about to begin.

Just like he was expecting, he was not nervous, or sad or angry anymore. His mind had been resignant to the fact and he was currently thinking of the ways to make the chief of West Creek and his daughter regret ever thinking of trapping him through marriage.

Something caught his nose, a light scent, of something really good.

It was there one second and gone and it really got him curious, and surprisingly, Ulf too, as the wolf seemed to unfurl within him.

However, he could not look back to check as he had been instructed by the priest to face the altar until his bride had been handed over to him by her father.

The scent came again though, this time getting stronger and stronger but with a slight acidic tinge.

Cahir's nose twitched twice, an urge to sneeze almost taking a hold of him. What was soiling that marvelous scent?

He heard footsteps behind him and he turned in time for Henry to put his daughter's dainty hands in Cahir's rougher and bigger ones.

The princess raised her head. Her unsmiling and cold expression surprising Cahir for two reasons.

One, she was in no way smiling and blushing like she was the day before. Her eyes held a fire and surprise that he hadn't imagine they could...

The second reason being Ulf's response to the sight of the princess after seeing her just the day before and not in any way moved.

"Mate... My little Mate." Ulf whispered through Cahir's mouth.

How the hell was this possible?