Page 8

Cloudy with a Chance of Alban

After that disaster of a “courting walk,” I practically collapsed into bed and slept for what turned out to be literal days.

Yet, when I woke up the morning of Tara’s wedding to King Magnus, I was still exhausted—and ravenous.

Muffled voices of chattering Wolfennites and the smell of freshly baked bread and savory breakfast meats drifting up through the floorboards of the second floor room I shared with Naomi let me know breakfast was already well on its way.

Along with the Winter Sloth.

Yes, it was easy for a wolf to turn off their need to eat.

I could only guess that Amanda had never used this particular ability or else she wouldn’t have been so baffled when I brought it up.

But for some reason, I always felt hungrier and sleepier as fall wound down.

My mother had derisively called it my Winter Curse and had often shaken me awake with greetings like, “None of this sloth business, Sadie girl. Do I look like an alarm clock? Next wake up call’s going to be a bucket of water, you gluttonous, sleepy, good-for-nothing but causing me extra work.”

Mama…

A picture of her at the stove, warning me not to indulge my Winter Curse, even while making triple the usual portion for breakfast, drifted into my mind as I got dressed to join the others downstairs.

Would she ever forgive me?

Understand why I did what I did?

Ever be willing to talk to me again, even if I had to return to St. Ailbe at the end of the exchange year because none of the wolves in Faoiltiarn wanted me, either?

All versions of my future hung like a dark cloud above my head as I made my way down the wooden stairs.

Then were promptly forgotten when I saw the breakfast buffet of baked breads, meats, and fried potatoes waiting for me.

It had been days since I last ate.

I doubt I could have turned off my hunger switch if I’d wanted to.

And I definitely didn’t want to.

Something grumbled happily inside of me as I stacked a plate high with scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, fluffy pancakes, and heaps of fried potatoes.

The food would probably be cold after being left out for so long, but I didn’t care.

I all but skipped to the communal table with my overflowing plate…

until I saw Naomi and most of the other Wolfennites were gone.

Only Amanda, Priscilla, and the Schmidt sisters remained.

A glance toward the communal room’s front windows revealed that many of the other Wolfennites had already left for a pre-wedding ceremony game of baseball.

I’d been politely asked not to participate in baseball games for the crimes of hitting the ball too hard yet running too slow.

And Naomi had stopped playing with the other Wolfennites as soon as the would-be Scottish grooms had started coming around to watch the games like it was, in her words, “some kind of bridal pageant.”

Unfortunately, Naomi must have decided to head over to the castle early to assist her sister.

She was nowhere to be seen, and that meant there was no shadow for me to sit in.

No buffer between me and the other four Wolfennites when I sat down at the communal table.

Thankfully, Amanda was in the middle of one of her lectures and didn’t even seem to notice my arrival.

“Oh, my goodness. There are just so many males who wish to take me to wife here. I’m not sure what to do. But of course, I will judge them on the quality of their devotion, and I’ll only accept a proposal from a wolf who agrees to come back with me to the real St. Ailbe and live under our much stricter Ordnung. I promised my father that was what I’d do. And I encourage all of you to think about making that a condition of your marriage agreements, too. Oh, goodness, Sadie Schaduw, do you truly need so much food?”

Amanda broke off her lecture after catching a glimpse of my plate, piled high with as much food as I could fit on it.

“You know gluttony goes against the original St. Ailbe Ordnung, which we should really still be adhering to—even Naomi insisted on making the new one unnecessarily less restrictive. Perhaps showing more restraint would help the males of Faoiltiarn overcome your many...” She paused, probably nixing several words that would have made her come off like a non-pious she-wolf before settling on “...differences.”

I paused with the first piece of bacon halfway to my mouth.

That low grumble-growl was back.

The one that always came with the finger-tingling, decidedly non-either-Ordnung sanctioned desire to do violence.

Was she seriously lecturing me about food after the confidence-killing trick she pulled on me yesterday?

For both Amanda’s and my sake, I grabbed my plate and stood up with the intention of eating outside.

“Do not be cross, Sadie Schaduw,” Amanda called after me.

“I am your sister in piety, and I’m only trying to encourage you toward making wiser choices where eating is concerned so you might actually attract…”

I closed the Exchange House’s door on the rest of her words, but they rang in my head as I found another place to hide.

This time, it was a rock located behind the cow barn.

Hunched over where no one else could see me, I miserably ate my now very cold food as fast as I could in the even colder Scottish morning air.

And it still wasn’t enough to slake my hunger.

My stomach continued to growl for more food after I cleared the plate of every crumb.

Maybe my mother had been right.

There was something inherently wrong with me.

No wolf would ever want me.

Even here in Scotland.

A terrible hopelessness made me set the plate aside so I wouldn’t give in to the temptation to lick it clean.

And that was when I saw the male on the castle’s roof.

Is that…?

I rose from my hideout, leaving the plate behind, to rack all my focus onto the shirtless male on top of the royal residence.

It was a rather gray day, yet his hard muscles somehow managed to ripple under the sun as he hefted what appeared to be a large, upturned black glass panel onto the roof.

Yes, it was him! Alban.

Alban Scotswolf was back!

I clasped my hands in front of me, and the hope that had almost completely abandoned me refilled my chest like a glass bottle being replenished with freshly pulled milk.

A few weeks ago, when Tara’s fiancé, King Magnus, had introduced his cousin Alban as the Kingdom Defender, I’d perked up a bit at the sight of him.

Alban was giant! Brawny, with a bushy red beard and wild, unkempt hair to match.

Looking at him, I’d suddenly understood what the other Wolfennite school children had meant by hulking when they’d referred to me.

He was the only male I’d ever encountered who was both wider and taller than me.

The Kingdom Defender towered over every other person on the royal welcoming committee, including the former rugby player king!

And I couldn’t say I disliked it.

Also, there was no ring on his finger.

Sure, he appeared a bit rough around the edges.

He could have bothered to run a comb through his hair before coming to the castle to meet us, and his gray eyes held more contempt than welcome for a group of she-wolves who’d crossed an ocean to help his kingdom solve their dismal birth-rate issue.

But I had a feeling he looked at everybody that contemptuously, not just us.

And maybe—most importantly when it came to a male wolf—not just me, for once.

He reminded me of the cranky tanner back in the original St. Ailbe.

He was about ten years older than Naomi and me and had shocked the village by choosing one of the homeliest and stoutest of the unclaimed females to wolf mate after turning twenty-five.

His stated reason? “Tannery is hard work. I need a she-wolf capable of true help—not beauty or a sparkling personality.”

Even back then, at the age of 15, I had been jealous that the only male in town who appeared to value strength and fortitude—two qualities I happened to possess in abundance outside of the winter months—would already be married and most likely a father by the time I was old enough to become a wife.

But Alban struck me the same as that tanner.

Maybe he won’t mind my height or my size , I’d thought to myself, or the odd smell the St. Ailbe males hadn’t been able to get past.

However, before I could gather the courage to talk to him, Naomi crushed my hopes when she told me that Tara and Magnus were upset Alban had abruptly moved to a homestead cabin in the mountains.

“Something about it getting too crowded here in town and wanting to be alone.”

But now he was back.

Perhaps for Tara’s wedding, where it was rumored that many of the males would make their interest known, and maybe even propose!

A chance… that’s what this Alban sighting was.

A chance to approach him at the wedding reception and show him my worth.

My heart sped up as the church bells began to ring in the distance.

Just like that, my prospects for finding a husband here in Faoiltiarn shot back up…

…only to plummet again a few hours later.

I did finally get my chance to speak with Alban at the reception after the royal wedding.

Unfortunately, that came courtesy of Amanda shoving me into his path with an “Oh, look, there’s that one wolf who’s always glowering at us as if we’re criminals. Perhaps you can tame him, Sadie Schaduw!”

Suddenly, there I was, standing like a rabbit in the path of the huge Kingdom Defender bearing down on me.

But then Alban’s face lit up, as if he recognized me.

As if I were exactly the person he was looking for at this reception.

Oh, my goodness!

He continued straight toward me, his gaze intent, and stopped right in front of me.

A towering wall of black t-shirt and red hair.

Oh, my goodness! Oh, my goodness!

This was my chance!

I opened my mouth.

And then it hit me, belatedly, after putting all my eggs into this Bridal Exchange basket, that I truly was Naomi’s shadow, and I had no idea how to be my own person.

Eep .

All those reasonable arguments about how I could be a she-wolf of use to a male like him slipped right out of my head.

I could not come up with one word—not even one word to say to this huge specimen of a wolf.

Until, without warning, all the words came spilling out like a brook flooded by an excessive amount of rain.

“I’m not good at talking,” I blurted.

“I mean, maybe I am. But I’m pretty sure I’m not. I’ve only been talked to once at a social. And I’m pretty sure that was only out of charity. It was the son of Abel Flosswulf, our pack leader. Before he married, he used to talk to every she-wolf at every social gathering. He was really nice. But anyway, I’m not good at talking. So, you should know that before you ask me to… um, talk.”

Alban squinted at me and said, “Excuse me.”

Oh no.

He didn’t understand anything I said?

I opened my mouth to try again, with way, way fewer words this time.

But before I could, the Kingdom Defender said, “I need to get by ye, lass, to speak with the queen.”

I realized then that, in the new position Amanda had pushed me into, I was now the only thing standing between him and Tara, who was at that moment hosting a receiving line of well-wishers beside her new husband.

The Kingdom Defender clasped me by both shoulders and set me aside so he could get to the she-wolf he actually wanted to talk to at that moment.

Leaving me standing there all by myself in a crowded reception hall filled with townspeople and would-be Scottish Grooms, eager to marry.

Anyone but me.

I glanced back at Amanda and the other St. Ailbe she-wolves to find them practically falling over with laughter.

I’d told Naomi I’d stay for at least an hour before leaving the reception to join her upstairs, where she’d chosen to babysit Iain and Milly’s baby daughter because, as she’d put it, “I’ve reached my upper limit of putting up with courting offers from guys who only want to mate me because my facial features are symmetrically aligned.”

I had the opposite problem, and suddenly, I couldn’t just keep shoving everything down, like I always did.

I didn’t just walk away from Amanda and her cronies this time, I ran.

Ran out of the reception that had been my best chance to meet a male willing to take me on as a mate.

I’d held on to hope for so long.

I’d kept gathering and regathering it, even though it was always slipping through my hands like sand.

But there was no more sand in the fragile hourglass I’d built around my hopes for this Bride Exchange.

It had all run out.

While Amanda and the other Wolfennites laughed, tears filled my eyes as I fled up the grand staircase toward Prince Iain and his American wife Millie’s suite of rooms, where Naomi would be.

Where I should’ve been all along.

Sadie Schaduw. That was all I was, and at that moment, in Naomi’s shadow was the only place I wanted to be.

On my own wasn’t safe.

I needed the comfort of trailing behind my best friend.

“Naomi! Naomi!” I called out as I ran into the empty front room of the minor royal’s official suite.

I frowned when I picked up the scent of several wolves along with Naomi’s maple leaves smell.

How many pups had she agreed to babysit?

I thought it was only supposed to be Millie’s baby daughter.

Cheering a bit at the prospect of being able to both hide out in here with my best friend and offer her some help, I headed in the direction of the smells behind a closed door.

“Naomi? Are you in here?”

“Sadie, don’t—” Naomi called out from the other side of the door.

“I know it hasn’t been an hour,” I explained as I barged through the door.

“But you won’t believe what…”

I trailed off, the word “happened” dying in my throat when I saw the scene in front of me.

Naomi holding a baby in one hand and a knife in the other, facing off against two large and scary wolves.

Males I would soon learn were the Irish Wolves—the ones Amanda had been assured wouldn’t dare to attack a royal wedding again.