I’d learned many things in the past eight months.
The first was that Warrick and Bastian were rarely here at the same time. In all my previous interactions with the Alphas before moving to their stronghold, I’d never picked up on the fact that those two seemed to hate each other. Granted, they acted differently whenever someone from outside the pack was here. And when I’d first arrived, they’d put on a show of being friends until they’d either gotten tired of doing it or figured it wasn’t worth keeping up since I was part of their pack now.
I had no idea what their deal was, and asking seemed like a bad idea. Because Warrick still called me a traitor to my face on a regular basis, though he had never given me the specifics as to why he thought that. I assumed it was because of my friendship with Samara and her mates. Which, to be fair, made me a very unpopular person in the Velesian realm right now.
If any of the other Alphas knew why Warrick felt this way, they weren’t sharing that information with me. Any time I asked, they just brushed off my question. It was frustrating. Almost as frustrating as that fucking glass ball hitting the wall.
Nope. Ignore him. Do not engage any further.
Bastian had been a bit of a surprise. Most people thought of him as quite charming. And he was—on some days. On others, it felt like he hated me, with his cutting remarks and back-handed compliments. Only occasionally did he seem to enjoy my company or at least find me tolerable. I was trying to accept that he just had a mercurial personality and I’d eventually get used to it.
Cade . . . wasn’t terrible. Dare I say, we even had a good working relationship at this point. We weren’t friends and there was still a lot of distance between us, but I thought things were getting better. It probably just took time for pack bonds to settle in.
At least that was what I was telling myself. It’d been a long time since I’d truly belonged to a pack, so I didn’t exactly remember what they felt like.
And then there was the bane of my existence.
I raised my gaze from the page I was trying and failing to read and looked straight ahead, focusing on the view out the window and not that damn glass orb bouncing off the stone wall next to it. Or the incredibly frustrating lycanthrope sitting in the chair to my right.
In old Fae stories, they often talked about fate as if it was some all-powerful entity guiding our lives. But if fate truly existed, they were an asshole for putting an unhinged, possessive, and stubborn man in my life.
I didn’t care how gorgeous he was with his stupid silver hair, wintery blue eyes, and a ridiculously toned body.
Don’t think about him or his abs, moonsdamn it.
Easier said than done. As gorgeous as the view of a snowy forest was, after eight months, I was officially over it. The Alpha stronghold was about as far north as you could get in the Velesian realm before you hit the mountains that stretched coast to coast above us. Winter hit early here, and according to Cade, the snow wouldn’t melt until well after the spring equinox, which was still a month away.
Ryker’s scent drifted to me. He smelled like the forest I was looking at. If I were to close my eyes, I could almost imagine myself surrounded by pine trees and crisp winter air. It’d taken a few weeks, but he’d finally given up on trying to get me to wear his clothes.
Probably because I’d tackled him the third week and we’d brawled across the hallway in front of my room. Cade had come up to investigate what the noise was but then had just shrugged and walked away, muttering something about wolves needing their playtime.
“Go for a run with me,” Ryker pushed.
“No,” I said firmly, looking away from the window and back to the ledger. “I’ve got work to do.”
“We need to hunt something up for dinner. Unless you want to have cheese and bread again.”
I really didn’t. But going for a run with Ryker was a bad idea, and after the last time, I’d sworn I wouldn’t do it again. Besides, Cade would be back in two days and I really wanted to have several proposals ready to go over with him.
“You’re perfectly capable of hunting on your own.” I leaned forward, setting the ledger onto the table so I could sift through some notes I’d taken yesterday. While my friendship with Samara wasn’t exactly winning me any popularity contests amongst Velesians, it did have some perks they were benefiting from. My best friend had sent me a very detailed letter about which Houses were in desperate need of gems to power the wards.
Gems several packs had plenty of. I just needed to get everyone to play nicely.
“Come with me and I’ll let you use the mirror when we get back,” Ryker offered, still tossing the glass orb against the wall. It was a wonder the damn thing hadn’t broken yet. Somehow I doubted this was what the Fae had intended for it when they’d infused it with magic.
My fingers flipping through the papers went still, and I chewed on my bottom lip. I hadn’t seen Samara in person since Cade and Bastian had left weeks ago because the Fae mirror that allowed me to travel to her had been moved from the secret room in the lower level of the stronghold to the first floor, where it was locked in a room I didn’t have a key for.
According to the Alphas, it was a safety precaution, because we didn’t know how to block people from using the mirrors. The Fae traveling mirrors seemed to always come in pairs. The match for our mirror here was in a temple in the badlands. Cade didn’t like the idea of anyone stepping through the mirror and coming here unannounced.
While I understood his concerns there, it didn’t explain why I couldn’t have a key to that room. Cade’s excuse was that they only had four keys and since I was the newest member of the pack, I didn’t get one.
I knew a bullshit reason when I heard one.
It was frustrating and I hated not being able to see my best friend more often. Despite my annoyance, I understood why Cade and the others had reservations about giving me free access to the mirror. Not just because they didn’t trust the Moroi, but they had trust issues with me as well.
I mean, I had spent most of the last few years delaying coming here or outright running away from them.
Given enough time, I was confident they’d believe that I’d meant it when I’d said I’d stay here and be a member of their pack. Until then, I’d be patient and use the mirror as they allowed.
