Placing the large, ceramic bowl on the hood of my Tahoe, I fill it from a jug of water gathered from the stream that flows through pack lands. The pledge is more than just binding them to me, it’s a promise to protect the lands that are as much a part of them as their wolves.
I close my eyes and exhale a slow, careful breath. There are proper words for this ceremony, but since I fundamentally plan to change what this all means, those words are useless. My stomach feels like it’s in a constant free fall as I pick up the dagger, and turn to face Callie and the pack.
Knowing I should make a big speech before starting, but so fucking tired of explaining, I simply take Callie’s hand into mine with her wrist turned toward the sky. The wind has settled through the trees, but her skin still vibrates with all the magic inside her that has nowhere to go.
In my normal speaking voice, confident that the surrounding crowd can hear me, I ask, “Do you promise to protect my pack from all those that would harm it?”
Uncertainty pulls at her brow—furrowing as she attempts to understand the layers of what I’m asking her. Standing tall, her spine lined with the steel that marks myreinaas much a warrior as a queen, Callie finally answers, “I promise to protect all that are loyal to you.”
Close enough. Hope the pack paid attention to the difference.
I nod and drop to one knee, the asphalt of the road hard underneath me. Shock overtakes her face and the energy of the pack thickens the air, their conflicting emotions humming around us. No one knows what I’m going to say next.
Gazing into her eyes, I block out all those around me, then, as if the words have been waiting on my tongue, I vow, “Everything that I am is yours. My pack. My body. My very soul is yours to do with as you will. I promise you this from now until I take my last breath.”
My grip tightens on the dagger in the hand that isn’t cradling Callie’s. Fighting against the adrenaline pumping through my veins, I place the blade flat against the base of her palm and prepare myself for the moment of truth.
With a hoarse voice, I question, “Do you accept?”
Callie’s lips part, her eyes shine bright, and light tremors quake from her to me. She’s rendered speechless, and all my fears that I’m too much race through my mind. It’s all necessary to protect her, but this pledge is like a boulder attempting to be held aloft with string. It’s too late to take it back, so I wait, hoping she’ll want what I offer.
She swallows heavily, her gaze sweeping the crowd that surrounds us—who, for all I know, are ready to swipe my head from my shoulders—before returning to meet mine. Like a door opened wide in haunting invitation, she bares all that she is, darkness and light, within the shifting greys of her irises—revealing all that I’m pledging my life to. But her shadows and monsters don’t frighten me. Not when they also live within me.
Realizing it’s her own fear that holds her back—her fear that I will regret my promise—my shoulders relax, and I sink into the peace that fills me when I’m near her. Careful not to cut her, I lean forward and place a gentle kiss to her wrist.
When our eyes meet again, her mouth wobbles, her smile lopsided, and with her own vow, declared within conviction in her voice, she answers, “I accept,mi lobo.”
Under her breath, Callie adds, “Why is it always the hand? I need this hand.”
I swallow my smile. Sam snorts then covers it with a delicate cough.
The blade, freshly sharpened, only requires a subtle shift against Callie’s flesh for a line of blood to begin to bead into her palm. Her scent is even more potent with her blood exposed to the air, and there are sounds of deep inhales. The crowd breathing her in like their first taste of heaven. At least some of them.
The ground also seems to rumble with the growls of those that oppose my actions, but the ceremony is sacred. heir turn to speak soon. Their outrage is palatable when they inevitably choose expulsion from pack grounds instead of pledging to me, but they will have that, or the celebrations will be less celebratory and more along the lines of a long night fighting for my life. Assuming Callie doesn’t blast them into nothing but ozone and ash first.
Hating that they’ve distracted me from this moment with Callie, I hold out the knife for anyone to take from me. The flower patterned fabric that dances in the corner of my eye tells me it’s Sam that retrieves the dagger.
I fill myself with the precious memories of Callie and I together in the back of my Tahoe before the Alpha interrupted. The almost holy sensation that encircled us when I relinquished my unwavering loyalty to her.
With both hands, I cradle hers, then with a sweep of my tongue, I lick up the blood in her palm and seal my mouth over her wound. She tastes like pure life. A tingling electricity burns through me as I seal my spoken vows with her blood, her very being now coursing through me.
Except something isn’t right. My wolf surges up within me, so close to the surface that my gums ache with his teeth fighting to break through. His mind and mine snap together. Our will one, and I can no longer hide from the truth. Despite my intentions for this to be a pledge of protection, as a knight to his queen, my wolf isn’t fooled.
He knows I love her. It’s not the Call. It’s me. And he agrees. We’ve found our mate.
This isn’t supposed to happen for decades, and it’ssupposedto be to another wolf. A shifter can have relationships with other people. They can even grow to care for them. But we only have one mate. One true love for the entirety of our lives.
Shaken to my core, I pull away and curl her hand into a fist as I stand. It takes everything in me not to slash a claw against my wrist and feed her my blood, finishing the mate bond, but she didn’t agree to this. Instead, I very carefully hold her fisted hand over the bowl of water, my wolf growling over daring to share the blood of our mate with others. But this is the only way I can assure her protection on pack grounds. They must accept her as much as me as their leader and protector.
Sam looks like she’s ready to claw out my eyes when she hands me back the knife so I can add my blood to the water. Her fingernails lengthen when I shrug apologetically in return. It is what it is, and I hope she’ll still stand at my side, but I’ll understand if this is too big of an ask. After slicing into the meat of my palm, my blood swirling with Callie’s, I put the knife down on the hood of my Tahoe, pick up the bowl with both hands, and turn to the crowd.
It may not have been how I planned it, but I’m glad the ceremony is out here among the homes and forest that belong to the pack, instead of within the cramped great hall of the Alpha house. This pledge is as much a promise from me to them as it is from them to me, and it should happen surrounded with what we share.
A large portion of the crowd is in stages of partial shift, the depth of their human side’s disfavor so profound, their wolves fight to the surface to escape it. Wolves want family. They want pack. Hate and prejudice are not part of who they are. Especially when it threatens home. I am their Alpha. If I trust Callie, they will too, until a day she provides a reason not to. Even not sensing the Call, they recognize she is something different and want to trust their Alpha to show them the path.
My wolf has settled further back in my mind, grumbling that we should be dragging Callie somewhere private instead of all of this business, but he’s temporarily appeased that I can no longer deny what she is to us and lets me continue the ceremony.
Rand and the wolves from school are first to gather in a line to pledge themselves, their gazes unsurprisingly eager as they rest on Callie, who stands quietly to my right. Her hands are clasped in front of her. She must have healed the cut, because no blood drips from her hands.
