Page 4 of Those That Defy the Realm

That might hurt more when it ends.

The truth is, I might be crushing on her a little bit. But with the distance between us there is no way we could be more. Her life is in Froan and I have a career here. I’m safe here too, as the vampire pack in Froan does not tolerate rogues like myself—a fact I know for certain with being friends with one of its members.

Ty and I served together in the same unit during the war. His family used to run the Froan pack, before they were entirely wiped out in one of the last massacres the Fae orchestrated to take the win. Ty was understandably distraught, and has blamed himself ever since. I swear he only joined the prick that took over his parents’ lands as some sort of self-destructive punishment.

Anyway, it means that I know it’s not safe for me to travel to Froan. And thus, I have to keep a lid on the buzzing feeling that fills my veins each time my phone pings with a new message from Clara.

She’s human too, can’t forget that fact. We absolutely would not work for many, many reasons. It's for the best that we could never meet.

Truly.

CHAPTER 2

ASH

“What should I cook tonight?” I ask the pots and pans, pulling a few of them out of the cupboards. I nearly drop the heavy cast-iron casserole dish when I get a reply.

“Can we have dumplings please? I love your dumplings.”

Re-stabilising the stack of cookware, I spin to find my older brother leaning back against one of the many chairs that fill the room. We’re in our communal lodge that was built as a space where we could hold pack meetings. The room can accommodate one hundred of us at a push, although with the table and chairs set out it's about half that. But it’s where my family also convenes for dinner most evenings, seeing as we are one of the largest, and my parents are two of the eight alphas that rule over our community.

There are almost three hundred of us now, if you include the pups. But it’s still a small population when you consider we are the only wolf shifters left after the war. It was a miracle that my mother managed to persuade the Fae to let us live at all, but that is my mother for you. She has ways of making the impossible happen.

“Well?” Rune asks again. He is one of my three older brothers. I also have two younger brothers, and a little sister, the only girl amongst us seven siblings. Like I said, we’re a big family, especially when you add in Colton’s mate, Luna and Joey’s mates, Altair and Neo.

“Yes, we can have dumplings. There’s some reindeer meat left, I was planning on stewing it or putting it in a pie. So I guess it’s stew.” I love cooking, so naturally I’ve become the chef for most of these family dinners. “But you have to help me prepare the vegetables so I can get on the mixing.”

“Sure,” Rune replies, stepping into the kitchen area to wash up so he can assist.

“How’s the plans for the gym extension going?” I ask as we work. Rune owns the only fitness centre in our small village. He teaches several classes, along with a couple other instructors he employs.

“Yeah, great. They’re nearly done and all the supplies have been delivered. But we’ll have to wait for the spring now to start the work. The snow is already too deep.”

He wasn’t exaggerating. We live in one of the most northern settlements on the continent. Our village is on one of hundreds of small islands that make up the arpeggio known as the Northern Isles. The winters are brutal and the summers are short. It’s not a huge pain seeing as we’re wolf shifters, but we got zero say in the matter. In fact, the treaty that allowed us to survive the war was only accepted by the Fae because it stated our place of residence to be in the one place the Fae couldn’t stand, the snowy peaks of the Isles.

We can’t leave, ever. But at least we can live. And we’ve built a good community here.

I was only in my teenage years when the war broke out. I was old enough to understand what was happening, and to be angry enough about the injustice of it all but I wasn’t old enough to join the fighting effort. Seeing as my family were close to one of the vampire packs, naturally we joined the effort to try and save them, my older brothers went into active service, although both did intelligence work rather than being on the front. My younger siblings weren’t born until way after the war, so it was just me and my parents, and they were busy trying to hold the pack together and keep us safe, for we lived on the mainland back then. I learned a lot regarding pack politics through those years, helping as much as I could. And then it took all of us to ensure as many members of the pack escaped to the Northern Isles as possible.

Just as I’m about to start on the requested dumplings, my ears prick to the sounds of howling from outside. It's not unusual to hear wolves, we’re a rather vocal lot, but this is one of the males on patrol.

Rune stops chopping as he picks up on it too. “Are we expecting any visitors?”

“No, not this late in the year.” The last outsiders we’d seen were the humans that delivered some of the building materials for the gym extension. Now, with the Winter Solstice approaching, nobody travelled around the northern most parts of the isles.

Another howl erupts, followed by a third. It's a warning, and a call for back up.

Immediately, my brother and I are downing our tools and diving from the room, heading towards the main exit. We run into our mother in the corridor as she comes out of her office.

“There’s three of them. Two males and one female,” she informs us, “Becker has eyes on them. They’re just southeast of here, in the valley.”

We’re out the door and shifting before our human feet get a chance to sink into the snow that blankets the entire village.

Rune lets off a series of barks, and gets more howls in return, the updated exact locations of the strangers, who seem to be heading this way. I release a growl as we pick up the pace, a few more of our enforcers joining us as we head down the main streets, heading for the south side to meet the newcomers head on.

Running in my wolf form is always freeing, paws crunching the snow and ice as we bound into the forest. It’s not a big forest but it provides enough cover to hide our buildings from sight to anybody approaching. Our village is hard to find for a reason. For protection.

The strangers stop before hitting the trees, and they seem in no rush, with no particular destination. At least, this is what we’re told as we approach. My mother, a rare white wolf, slows somewhat and pulls us into a formation. We’d naturally done so anyway, the instinct to protect our alpha strong. She barks our orders and we lower our heads to show our agreement.