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The call ended and Ronan leaned against the brick wall of the gym. For the first time in a long time, he felt like there was a light at the end of the tunnel. He didn’t mind joining up with the NWFA. He could take on anyone in a fight, and so could Sylas. Their shifts were deadly, but they were equally dangerous in their human forms too.
His beast let out an approving purr.
The NWFA and Belle Terra were the keys to finding his truemate, he could just feel it in his bones.
Wherever she was, he was coming for her.
Chapter Two
Alanah Fontaine stared at her reflection in one of the mirrors hung magically in the opulent gardens belonging to Orpheus, king of their fairy commune. She didn’t like what she saw: a head full of fat, blonde curls, a glittering emerald crown on her head, and a dress that was so full of crystals that it weighed a ton and made her bones ache.
It wasn’t just the face of makeup, sparkling dress, and crown that made her unhappy, it was the fact that she was here tonight, in the king’s garden, at a party thrown in her honor for her mating the following day.
Mating a male she didn’t love or even like a little bit.
Cenrik, chosen by the king and an all-around putz.
He was such a terrible person that the king had resorted to threatening council members if no one mated him. But the only male on the council who had daughters of marrying age was her father. Her sister Serena, as eldest, had been set up to mate Cenrik, but she’d refused and fled, building a life for herself in Belle Terra at a supernatural hotel owned by a vampire coven.
A bird twittered nearby and Alanah turned from her depressing reflection to locate the little creature. Her fairy power was over small animals, allowing her to communicate with them. She’d sent field mice with letters for Serena, which was why she knew her only sister was now pregnant with a sabertooth tiger’s baby and deliriously happy.
The last note she’d received from her sister had been filled with pleading that Alanah not go through with the arranged mating simply because her parents didn’t want to be exiled from their commune.
The king had let Serena choose exile rather than enter into the arranged mating with Cenrik, but he’d made it clear that if Alanah didn’t go through with it, exile wouldn’t be available for her, that her punishment would involve the royal jail.
And her parents would be there with her.
She hated the position she was in right now. If she’d left when Serena did, she might have found her truemate and gotten pregnant like her sister, which they’d always dreamed of happening—the two of them having children who would grow up close with their cousins.
That was not a dream that was going to come true if she married Cenrik.
Not if. When.
Because she didn’t want to spend the rest of her life in prison or for her parents to be imprisoned, too.
And maybe Cenrik would die young.
She could always hope for that.
She reached out with her power and coaxed the bird forward. It flew to her, landing on her outstretched hand, its pretty blue feathers ruffled with the light breeze.
“You’re very cute, hello,” she said.
The bird tilted its head and blinked golden eyes at her, then let out a series of tweets.
“Oh, thank you, yes the dress is very sparkly,” she said, accepting the bird’s compliment of her gown.
“I’ve been calling you,” Cenrik said angrily, his heavy footfalls filling the air. She looked over her shoulder at him.
He was wearing an officer’s uniform for the royal fairy army, but he was a figurehead and had never been through any sort of training. Seeing his chest filled with ribbons and awards made him look foolish, but no one would tell him that.
“I didn’t hear you,” she said.
He reached her and scoffed. “I instructed you to stay by my side all night, and the first opportunity you have, you come out here to use your low power to speak to filthy creatures.”
The bird, who could understand what Cenrik said even if he couldn’t understand it, chirped angrily at him.
Cenrik’s dark eyes flashed, and he slapped the bird away, sending it careening into the shrubs.
