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“An interesting treatment of the Old Testament tale,” Felicity said.
“Oh, well, don’t know much about art, me.” Shaddock gurgled an awkward laugh. “I’d be in deep water did I try to turn my thoughts to culture and suchlike. Ha ha.” He darted down to the next landing, and Felicity followed decorously behind.
* * *
“Come,” Alfred called, at the knock on his study door. He, who should have been ensconced behind his desk familiarizing himself with yet more paperwork or possibly relaxing in one of the large, comfortable chairs by the fire, was prowling the edges of the room. It was clear his wolf was on the brink of revolt, if Bates’s expression was any indication. His Beta had paused in the doorway as if afraid his own creature would be set off by Alfred’s.
“Another missive to be posted for Miss Templeton,” he announced, and Alfred waved him in. Bates handed the letter over; Alfred was tempted to read it but refrained. He would not betray Felicity’s confidence in such a craven way. Its address, a solicitor in St. Giles, was all the information he required. He franked it and put it in a small canvas sack that had straps affixed to it.
“I’ll send Brindle, if that suits,” said Bates, taking the sack, and Alfred nodded.
“He seems in need of the exercise,” he said. “All are excitable because she is here.”
“And due to the fact that none of us have shifted today.”
“Yes, yes.” Alfred resumed stalking around the room. “Devise a schedule so everyone can take it in turn. Surely the small creatures have had the opportunity?”
“It’s not the small creatures who will cause concern. A bird, a mouse, a cat…if seen, they would be of no consequence…” Bates trailed off. He cleared his throat. “If I may. It occurs that this will be the way things are for the foreseeable future unless you tell Miss Templeton our secret. The longer it is left unsaid, the more difficult it will be for the pack.”
“I cannot risk her rejection of the bond.” Alfred’s pace became more frenetic. “Nor can I lie to her. I cannot settle, I cannot decide, for better or worse…” He barked a bitter laugh. “How like the human vows they make. For better or worse…” He turned to move in an anti-clockwise direction. “The pack members are handling it well.” He would have known, thanks to thesentio, if anyone were in difficulty.
“Far better than I thought possible,” Bates allowed. “It is helpful that you have not named her, ceremonially, as yourvera amoris. Were you to invoke thecognominatio, the pack would be compelled to demonstrate their loyalty in their animal forms. Even now they are eager to welcome your mate with their complete selves, no matter the risk.”
Alfred paused and turned to face his Second. “You do not agree with me. On any level.”
“It is not my place.” Bates looked as though he were bracing himself for suppression.
“It is exactly your place, Matthias.” Alfred’s intense energy increased, but not to the debilitating degree his Second had clearly expected. “What am I, what is the pack, without the insight you provide, without your strength and focus?”
“I cannot argue with the facts,” Bates said, hesitant. “She does not fear you, she is already inspiring adoration in your people—”
“Almost all.”
“—but there is the issue of O’Mara’s inability to glamour her, which I do not understand and which worries me, and she is human, which unsettles me above all things. I cannot think on what happened in France during the Revolution, what happened to our kind at the guillotine, and fail to be concerned. They were betrayed by humans, sent to their deaths by humans. We do not know what her stance is concerning those who are unlike her. We risk all.”
“It is time to risk all. After years of searching, I have found my mate here, close to home. She is not one of us. If she and the pack do not accept each other, then the pack will die out. I cannot allow that to happen, not after all the work we’ve done to build the community my parents would have destroyed with their lies.
“Matthias, I have never…” Alfred dropped into a chair, weary. “It is my strength that is drawn upon by all here, it is my wish that this be so, it is my responsibility. I do not show weakness because I do not have weakness, or have not had, until now. I am compelled to align myself with her desires, whether or not I desire to do so. Am I explaining this clearly? I cannot progress this with brute force. She is mine, and thus she matches me, regardless of her humanity. I find that I must give her power, make myself…open to her?”
“Eh, become vulnerable?” Bates looked dubious.
“Yes, and at the same time give her sufficient incentive to wish to make herself vulnerable to me.” They looked at each other, baffled.
“Is this courtship?” Matthias asked.
“Perhaps?” Alfred rose and straightened his waistcoat. “My wolf is as out of patience as you are, my friend. He is clawing at me, howling to mate, and does not understand why my humanity is at the forefront of this undertaking. He cannot be made to wait much longer, and she cannot be forced into acceptance. I will begin, perhaps, to drop hints into conversation? I need to somehow wed animal urges with honeyed speech or all will be lost.”
“I will do my best to divine a solution.” Matthias showed his neck, not out of compulsion but out of respect and a masculine camaraderie.
“Should you discover one,” Alfred said, “the male of every species will honor your name for all eternity.” He strode from the room, and Bates set off to see a man about a wolf.
* * *
“Will there be many at the meal?” Should she ask this of a footman? They’d had very few at Templeton House at the best of times, and fewer still in the worst of times following her uncle’s culling of the staff. She didn’t know how to behave around servants, never mind ducal attendants.
“Many, but not all,” Shaddock replied and did not elaborate. For galoshes sake, had everyone in Lowell Hall been schooled in equivocation, in elusiveness of response? She wouldn’t surrender, but she would choose her battles, and this was an evasion she could overlook. It was unfair to pester the servants; it wasn’t their responsibility to answer her queries, and she would be doodled—damned—if she’d be too much of a coward to go straight to the duke.
“Your Grace.” A slightly barrel-chested man with incongruously slim legs stood at attention in the foyer, unprepossessing but for the great swath of hair that erupted from his pate like a coxcomb. “I am Coburn, the butler, and I must apologize for not greeting you in private.”
