Page 39 of The Howling (Monsters of the Yeavering #2)
I f my mother wasn’t already dead, I think I might be getting close to throttling her. She’s making the whole marriage situation a circus I don’t want.
Not only is there to be a cake about the size of one of the castle’s towers, she wants to invite the living . Despite all my protestations that the more of the Yeavering which knows about my mate, the riskier it is, she is prepared to ignore me.
Like she always did.
Death has not changed her at all. And my guilt at not being dead means I’m currently sat to one side in the great hall, chin on my fist, trying not to growl as she instructs the Duegar on the wedding breakfast and the damned cake.
My sweet Wynter has been given a free pass to avoid these meetings, although she doesn’t normally do so, but my sisters have taken her in hand, and apparently there’s something needed when it comes to the dress and Bessie has been called to the castle to deal with it.
I do not want to interfere. Or rather I don’t want to end up in a room with my sisters and Bessie, even if I don’t want to leave Wynter’s side.
Instead I’m here, watching my spirit mother take over the entire thing and make it into a spectacle literally no living person other than the bride and groom will see.
If I have my way.
Which is looking less and less likely. All I can hope at this stage is she doesn’t want to put me in some starchy outfit which has more frills than a Faerie court.
“Reavely? Reavely? Are you listening at all ?”
She might be a spirit, but my mother has retained her ability to be heard from one end of the castle to the other.
“Yes, Mother.”
“Then what do you think of this?” She points to something on the table.
It has more frills than a Faerie court.
“No,” I say, my voice raspin through the air.
“No?” she responds. “What do you mean no? Your father wore this the day he was trothed to me.”
“I am not wearing that on my wedding day or any other day,” I say, quietly.
“It’s what he would have wanted.”
“What about what I want?” I growl, knowing I sound like a petulant pup, the one I will always be in my mother’s mind, spectral or not.
I stand, and the heavy chair goes skittering away behind me. My mother puts her hands on her hips, or where they should be.
“Reavely,” she says in a warning tone which used to stop me in my tracks.
“Don’t, Mother,” I rasp. “This isn’t about you.”
“I think you’ll find the curse binding you is absolutely about me,” she retorts.
With a roar, I’m halfway across the great hall in my hound form before I even realise it. I need to run. I need to get away from the castle.
But I want Wynter with me. I need her more than ever. My hound changes direction before I can stop myself. I’m bounding up the stairs, up to her room, to our room, and through the door.
She’s there, surrounded by my spirit sisters and Bessie, her mouth open in a perfect ‘o’ at my entrance.
Before she can protest, I am beside her, tossing her onto my back with my nose, snarling at the rest of the company, and we’re away, outside, into the courtyard, out through the gate, down the rolling meadows filled with spring flowers and away towards the far moors, purple misty streaks on the horizon.
“Reavely.” Wynter’s voice is in my ear. “What’s wrong?”
It’s enough, just enough to get me to slow my pace.
“Too much,” I hear myself growl.
Her body relaxes over my fur, and I didn’t know it was what I needed. The feel of her, her scent, everything about her—it makes all my cares become nothing at all.
Wynter’s fingers delve into my fur, and I feel myself wanting to roll over and kick my paws in the air. The noise I make is not a growl. In fact, I’m not sure what it is.
“It is too much, but it is what we need to do,” she says, her hand cupping my ear, pulling gently on it and making my eyes roll in my head.
“You don’t.”
This time she pulls sharply, pain spiking through me and causing my prick to weep pre-cum. I’d like to stay in my hound form, but it’s too hard to talk. Instead I shift to my were-form and tip her into my arms.
“We’re in this together, Reavely,” she says firmly, bright eyes gazing into mine. “If I wanted out, I’d tell you, but I don’t. I…I care for you.” She puts a long, slim finger at her mouth and nods, not to me, but to herself. “I love you. It’s about time I admitted it.”
“You love me ?”
“Don’t say it like that, Reavely. As if you don’t know what it means,” she grumbles.
“You are my mate, little deer. I loved you from the moment I caught your scent on the wind. It is how I am made, the only way I can be.”
She puts her hand on my face, warm, scented, soft.
“I wouldn’t want you any other way.”
“But I am king now.”
“So?”
“I have to do…I don’t know. Save the Barghest, rid myself of the Reaper, mate, produce pups, all these things,” I growl. “So many things.”
“I’ve always found it best,” Wynter says, “to do one thing at a time. What do you want to do most?”
I can’t help the grin which spreads over my face as I look around the small copse of trees we’ve stopped in. Wynter watches me, a smile hitching the corner of her mouth too.
“Let me guess,” she says as I carry her to a bed of soft moss. It’s dry to the touch and as comfortable as my bed back at the castle.
“There’s only one thing I want to do when I have you all to myself.” I nip at the skin on her neck, and I’m rewarded by the delicious scent of her arousal. “Fill you to the brim and then go all over again.”