Page 8 of Owned by Four Alphas (Silverthorn Alphas #2)
A few days had passed since the Winter’s End festival and Selena’s magical outburst. As she had requested, Malek and Ronan had left her alone in the library and returned some hours later to find her eagerly poring over several books in front of the fire with a male librarian.
While Malek certainly wasn’t happy to see his mate alone with a male, he at least managed to resist growling and snapping. Unlike Ronan. That the male was an omega was probably the only thing that saved him from the wolf’s jaws in Ronan’s already frustrated state. The librarian, a Fae named Castien, had taken one look at them both and scurried out of library with hardly a backwards glance.
He and Ronan wasted no further time in divesting their little mate of her clothes and taking her before the roaring fire.
Afterwards, Selena hadn’t wanted to sleep. She returned almost immediately to her books, her eyes bright with renewed vigor, and she had barely left the library since. She remained fairly cagey about her research, only mentioning trying to control any further magical outbursts, and Malek was content to let her keep her own council for the time being.
The sun was just starting to peek over the trees of the forest beyond the Marble Halls, the shadows swirling and hazy in the pale morning light. He had spent the night with a few fellow Nightwalkers, coaching them in restraint and control.
It had not been successful.
He sat in his true body, surrounded by the ravaged corpses of forest animals, the last of his kin slipping away further into the forest to await the return of night.
He had thought teaching them to speak might be the key to unlocking further humanity. He had been wrong. Instead, they had paced and snarled, their voices barely more than growls, their sentences distorted, as they repeated one request over and over again.
Give us more blood.
Loathing curled in his stomach. Not at his kind, but at himself. It had not been so long ago that he too had been single-minded in his desire for blood. Not so long since he had killed for it. The same blood that ran through Selena’s veins.
Quite against his will, a long, low whine escaped him. Ever since she had nearly been taken from him, ever since his own mind had been turned against his pack by Damien and Phaendar, his strength of will had only grown.
But her magic, unstable and unsteady, was beginning to throw him off. His very being was so innately tied to the magic of the Forest, and Selena, for all her efforts, could not yet control it. The land itself painted the picture quite clearly. Raging storms and blistering cold, tremors and rockfalls, the very trees groaning against the bucking, thrashing fight of the magic within Selena.
He, too, felt the strain.
Tensions within the pack were not helping, either. Both Elian and Kaelen had separately gone to the library to try and make peace with Selena, but she was not so easily swayed to forgive and forget. Kaelen had become almost unbearable, angry and volatile, spending more time as a dragon than a man. Elian’s worst tendencies only intensified, and he could normally be found with a band of Fae nobles wreaking havoc down the local tavern.
Malek remembered Kaelen’s words, his assertion that he was more than happy to let Selena hate him so long as she was safe. He wondered whether the dragon realized what that truly meant. He couldn’t imagine Selena hating him. His heart, or whatever lay within him, cracked in two just thinking about it.
He stood, shaking out his coat, his nose full of the stench of blood and viscera. He was more used to it now, but it still tugged on the edges of his monstrosity, reminding him that his true nature would always be there to haunt him.
Taking off in a sudden burst of speed, Malek left the destruction behind him. He would try again with his Nightwalkers in a few days. All he could do was try.
The weather had been more peaceful in the last few days, mild and clear. He enjoyed the breeze ruffling through his fur as he weaved through the trees, the softness of the earth beneath his paws. He didn’t often get to spend so much time in his true form, which in his mind was a nice blend of lion, bear, and stag. It was too distressing to the Fae, apparently.
He snorted, his breath visible in the cool air. If he had learned anything about the Fae, it was that they were much more prone to the pretense of distress than they were actual distress. He didn’t care. Sometimes, when he lay by the fire, Selena would curl into his side with a book. She said she liked leaning against him, or against Ronan’s wolf, as she read. And she was the only one whose opinion he actually cared about.
He wondered if it was love. He didn’t know if he was even capable of love. But he decided, with a firm nod of his head, that he wasn’t sure what else it could be.
Torn out of his musings, his ears twitched towards the distant sounds of snapping and growling. He briefly considered turning away, centuries of instinct to avoid conflict kicking in, but ultimately his curiosity won out and he slunk into the shadows to creep towards the noise.
Wolves. He could smell them. Aggressive, young, fighting .
His footfalls were silent as he padded closer, his form melting into the dark parts of the forest. He was still there. But they would not see him.
A loud snarl echoed through the trees and his ears pricked up. Ronan.
He sniffed the air. Ronan, his second-in-command Thyrius, and about six or seven young alphas, all in wolf form. Ronan had to be in the middle of a training session.
As he got closer, he could see his packmate surrounded by the young alphas. They were circling him, testing his defenses. Ronan’s ears were flat against his head, his yellow eyes narrowed and focused.
One by one, they launched at him. And despite their speed, their size, their strength, they were no match for Ronan.
As he threw the last one off his back and leapt up in victory, he barked out his appraisal, “That was good, but you moved too slowly. You need to attack in tighter formation. Vallin, your attempt to get behind me was decent, but next time, ensure I am sufficiently distracted.”
The young wolves growled their frustrations, especially a large gray wolf who snapped and snarled. Ronan’s chest rumbled. The gray wolf’s tail thrashed and he paced up and down in front of Ronan. For a split second, Malek wondered if he was considering attacking.
But then he stood down. And Ronan sighed.
“Thyrius, carry on without me, I have some business to attend to.”
“Business, Ronan?”
Ronan snarled in response, leaping away from the group, his teeth bared. His ears twitched in Malek’s direction and he changed course, heading for the trees where Malek hid. As he passed, he growled, “Are you coming with me?”
Malek allowed his form to materialize as he fell into line behind Ronan. He didn’t bother asking how Ronan knew he was there. Probably scent.
Ronan broke into a sprint and Malek followed, struggling somewhat to keep up with the enormous wolf. Malek didn’t know where they were going, as they were heading deeper into the forest, not back to the Marble Halls.
“What business do you have?”
“The business of clearing my head,” Ronan grumbled, his body a blur of dark fur and flashing teeth.
Malek paused before replying, ever cautious of the delicate relationship that had sprung up between him and the wolf over the past weeks. Especially in the last few days. He didn’t want to push Ronan, to risk incurring his ire. He was the closest thing to a friend Malek had, aside from Selena.
“I take it your wolves are…frustrating you.”
Ronan barked out a laugh. “The wolves, Kaelen, Elian, the whole bloody lot of them. Thyrius wants me to go back to our territory, to reassert dominance against the Northern pack, and I fear if I don’t, one of the younger ones is going to do something tremendously stupid like challenge me. I don’t relish the idea of killing one of my people.”
Ronan slowed to a halt in a small clearing, pacing back and forth, an unending growl reverberating from the twisting trunks of the trees.
“But if Ordovic challenges me, then Selena will lose the borderlands to the Northern pack. Ordovic won’t hesitate to launch a full-scale attack on the humans, and we’re not ready for that. We’re not strong enough, or united enough, to fight a war where hundreds, if not thousands, of innocents will die. And if the wolves turn against Selena, how long before other clans do as well?”
Malek let Ronan pace, let him vent, offering only silent support as Ronan got everything off his chest.
“Kaelen’s so bloody focused on trying to control everything and everyone that he doesn’t see the danger brewing. He thinks he can just announce Selena as queen and everyone will bow down, end of story. He’s too focused on putting out little fires amongst the nobles, he can’t even imagine any large-scale threats; he’s too arrogant. And Elian—sometimes it’s a real battle not to rip him limb from limb.”
“That I can agree with you on,” Malek said, tilting his head slightly.
Ronan huffed, “And in the middle of everything is Selena. I want to keep her safe, want to give her the life she deserves. I’m not sure we’re doing that right now. How are we supposed to raise a child in the midst of all this political bullshit?”
“Where else would we go?”
Ronan growled, his claws scraping against the earth in frustration. “I have no idea. She’s the daughter of a bloody god. We’re four of the most powerful beings in the five realms. We have a duty to unite the land and keep its people safe.”
He stopped, lifting his head up to the sky in something close to resignation. “How are we supposed to do it with things as they currently are?”
Malek crept forward to sit beside Ronan, lifting his head to the cool breeze of the morning air.
“I think we try and do it the best we can.”