Her Night Wolf (Fall Mountain Shifters Book 5), page 9
I frown when I see who is leaning against Dip’s door. Draycian straightens up, his eyes flickering from me to my daughter, and I narrow my eyes back at him. “Another time.”
I watch as he disappears into bright light, and I blow out a breath.
“That’s a problem,” Niall quietly says, and I can only nod. He opens the door for me, and I go into her small bedroom filled with teddies and toys and paintings she has made hanging on the wall. Her white sheets are now replaced, and there’s a light pink sheet, with white stitched stars at the bottom of the comforter. I softly tuck her into the bed and kiss her on her forehead before watching her for a bit and going back out to Niall. Five guards walk over from the other side of the room and make a line in front of the door.
“I’m waiting in bed, mate,” Ragnar whispers down our bond. It’s not sexual, but it’s a lure to get my ass to bed before he carries me to it and forces me to rest.
“Goodnight,” I tell Niall, feeling so tired. I give him a hug one more time before heading back to my room. My legs are aching, and every part of me feels tired. I barely remember climbing into bed, curling around Ragnar before falling straight to sleep.
Silas Fall
I wake up from a dream of Hades telling me repeatedly that something’s wrong, then not to hurt her, and I have no fucking idea what he was talking about. The room is warm and smells like my mate. I smile, stretching my hand across the sheet for her when something sharp presses against my neck, and I go deadly still. I look up into the darkness, my eyes slowly adjusting to make out Mai’s face as she leans over me, holding a dagger to my throat. It’s not Morganis, but my own dagger, and this is not Mai. Her eyes are nothing but pure blackness coated with edges of wicked green. Her hair looks brighter, but her skin has a dull colour to it, and she has such a strange look on her face, one that I’ve never seen my Mai have before. It’s cruel, ancient, and very, very immortal.
We must have been too exhausted today with the drain on our magic, and she has used that to slip into Mai’s mind. Persephone has taken control again. She’s naked on top of me, but my body doesn’t react at all, knowing damn well that this is not my mate.
“Persephone,” I growl. “Give me my mate back.”
She laughs as a response, leaning down closer. She presses the dagger more firmly against my neck, and I feel hot drops of my blood dripping down. Every instinct to fight is battling with my need to protect my mate. I don’t want to hurt her. I do want to hurt Persephone for taking over my mate’s body and mind, but while she’s in my mate, I can’t risk hurting her body either.
“How hard it must be for the protective one to have no control,” she teases.
“Give me my mate back!” I snarl.
“You really shouldn’t be making demands, and try thinking past those possessive tendencies of yours and see the bigger picture,” she all but coos, stroking her hand down my chest. It feels wrong, like I’m betraying Mai, and I’ve had enough. I slam red shadows out of my chest, right into her, and she flies across the room, slamming into the wall. My heart tears open at doing that to my mate, but it isn’t her. I need to remember that. I call my brothers, or try to, but everything is silent. The pack and mate bond is tinted with darkness.
Her darkness.
She is using her power to block us away from the world. The door handle jiggles before four guards rush in, shifted, and they all growl as they search the room for danger.
“Oh fun, toys to play with,” Persephone says, standing up.
“Get out,” I command them. They warily look between Mai and me, and they don’t know it’s not her. They do listen to me and leave, and I stand up off the bed, going to the door and shutting it to protect them from her. I pull the shadows in the room around us, blocking us away from the world as I deal with this goddess.
“I remember Hades doing that. It was one of his favourite tricks,” she sighs, running her hand through the shadows. “They never hurt me. They couldn’t. Like you will never hurt your mate, even with me in here.”
I growl.
She runs her finger over her cut lip and stares at the blood. “Oh, to be mortal and so breakable.”
“I don’t give a fuck who you are, Persephone. I want my mate back, and you need to piss off to wherever you came from. Hell, I suspect,” I bite out.
She sucks the blood off her finger and shrugs a shoulder as she laughs. Persephone’s laugh is nothing like the sweet laugh that I love to hear from Mai. I hate this. I hate that she can take over her body so easily, and we only have to slip up a little for this to happen. A tiny gap, that’s all she needed to take over. “There are rules, and some rules should not be broken, alpha. Hell or heaven is a place most can go to when they die. But not us. Not after what we did. Not after what the Wolven gods did to punish us.”
I frown at her, trying to figure out what she is talking about. “What did you do?”
She looks between me and the wall next to her before smiling. “We unlocked our leashes, and they punished us. All four of us. Seven with the souls spilt.”
Seven of them...seven weapons. The Wolven gods.
“Don’t think too much, alpha. It’s not for you to figure out, only she can. Make sure you tell her what I’ve told you when she is back,” she replies with a calculating smile. “I’ve never actually been against you or the idea of love you share. True mates are so very rare and special. Not even the gods can touch their connection. Zeus always did try, though.”
Cenwyn’s god. What a fucking lovely surprise.
“But Zeus had a weakness. He was always cursed with one,” she says. “Have you not figured it out yet, alpha?”
“No,” I snap.
She smirks. “My mate had a bit of wolf deep underneath the surface of his soul, even if he couldn’t shift into one himself. He did command wolves, like any alpha could do. It’s what alphas do, right?”
“As much as this conversation is interesting...I want my mate back.”
She laughs as she picks up a shirt from the cabinet near her and pulls it over her head. It’s one of mine, and it falls to her knees.
“I find it impressive that you don’t even seem remotely attracted to me.”
I glower. “You are not my mate. As much as my mate’s body is beautiful beyond anything I’ve ever seen, it’s her soul that I’m in love with. It’s her that makes me hard, and you never will.”
She hums to that. “I remember what love was once, but it has been many, many years since I’ve felt that. Sometimes it feels like a breeze, real but gone in a second. I’ve been trapped for so long, it almost becomes difficult to remember who I was before.”
Trapped? Does she mean soul bonded? She moves quickly while I’m slightly distracted and presses something on a plain wall. The floor spins with the wall until it’s the same wall but the other side, covered in cobwebs and dust, and Persephone is on the other side.
“Fuck,” I mutter. How long has this secret door been here? This castle is too damn secretive. I search around the wall, touching the grooves in the wallpaper before I feel an indent. I push into it, and the wall moves with the floor, spinning us into a new room. I use my power to light everything up in red energy, showing me an old corridor that hasn’t been used in a very long time. In the distance, I spot Persephone running from me, and I chase after her. I turn around two bends, through three empty cavern rooms before we come to the end, where she is clearly leading me.
I nearly bump into her as I come to a stop, and she is standing just inside the room, looking around. She raises her hands and lets out spheres of green light. Seven of them, to be exact, and they float to stone pillars, lighting them up the second they touch. The room is flooded with green light, and all I see is weapons everywhere and pedestals with soft green cushions on top.
“You may think I’m the villain, alpha, and I’ve done a lot of things that would suggest that, but perhaps giving me the benefit of the doubt would be best for you now. The Wolven Crown is the key, and the Wolven gods have the lock. The seven are needed too. We are linked by them, and you don’t have a lot of time to figure it all out.”
Persephone collapses to the ground, and I instinctively catch her and pull her up into my lap as I kneel on the damp stone, running my eyes over my mate.
I’m still running my eyes over her when she wakes up and her beautiful green gaze locks on mine. I groan in relief. “Thank fuck.”
“You’re hurt,” she softly says, sitting up and touching my neck near where the cut is.
“I’m fine, it’s nothing,” I tell her.
She frowns, looking around. “It really smells. Where are we? What happened? I was sleeping...”
“Persephone happened,” I tell her. I gently repeat everything that’s happened so far, her eyes widening at every bit of the story, and she touches her cut lip that I feel guilty for. She senses my guilt through our bond, even if it’s a little dampened still. I can feel my brothers trying to get through, and it won’t be long before they come looking for us.
She shakes her head, her eyes burning with anger and possibly jealousy. “You did the right thing. That bitch.”
I soothe her by stroking her back. “I’m yours, Mai. Only yours.”
She nods, but I can still feel the jealousy and anger riding her. I carry on talking to calm her wolf down a little before she shifts. “We let the barrier slip at the battle. I’m sure that’s when she got through and then just waited.”
“I felt her on the battlefield. It felt like she was pushing a hot poker into my mind.”
She shivers and I frown. My mate is cold, and I’m sitting here talking. “We should get you back to our room. It’s freezing down here.”
“Let’s just see what she led us to first, in case we struggle to find it again. I’m okay,” she tells me, and I sigh. She does have a point, but I still want to throw her over my shoulder, take her back to our bed, and remind her that I’m wholly hers.
We both stand up, and she looks at the pillars. “Didn’t know I could do that.”
I rub her back as we head further into the room. “It’s strange here...like it’s—”
“Hidden,” she interrupts. “There was a shield of sorts around this place, but what was it hiding?”
“There are seven cushioned pedestals,” I point out.
Seven. Always seven.
Mai holds out her hand and sends vines of magic to the pedestals. When each vine touches the pedestals, they begin to glow green, and something starts to appear on each one. We watch the nearest one to us as Morganis appears, Iris and Chaitala appearing on the other ones. The other four each have their own weapon on them.
I feel my mate’s shock as we both look at one of the pedestals. There’s a very familiar book sitting on it. I look around at the weapons, instantly recognising their power, and I know why we should have recognised that book in the first place. “The book is one of the seven. All of the seven are here.”
“A book isn’t a weapon like the others,” Mai replies.
I stare hard at the book. “Books are better than any weapon in the world, stronger than any wolf or angel could be. I’m sure it could destroy you by simply reading it.”
“Oh gods above, I did read it,” she mutters, and I kiss the side of her head.
“If it wanted to hurt you, it could have. So could have Morganis, Chaitala or Iris. There are myths of them sucking souls out of wolves, killing humans with one touch. They clearly don’t want you hurt.”
She nods in agreement. “But why?”
“I don’t know,” I frustratedly admit as we walk closer to look at the others. There is a silver arrow, a gold axe and a sharp-looking blue necklace.
I lift my gaze from the seven weapons to the rest of the room. Every inch of the walls is lined with magical weapons, and all of them feel powerful. They aren’t like the seven, but I definitely think they could help in this war, because Hades made them, and he has left tiny drops of his power here. I can sense it.
“This room could save a lot of lives,” I say.
“Definitely,” she agrees, her eyes looking at the armoured knights at the back of the room, rows and rows of knights’ armour. Black, shining armour with our symbol on the breastplate.
Mai wraps her arms around me, holding me tightly. I pick her up, and she wraps her legs around my waist. I watch her, holding her in my arms. I could look at her forever and never once get bored. It’s not just her beauty, it’s her. I start to spin us around, dancing to no music and just holding her.
Her smile lights up my chest. She brushes some stray wisps of hair behind my ear, reminding me I need a haircut.
The hint of desire in her scent makes any thought other than taking her back to our room disappear. “We should go back to bed, just a bit.”
I make sure that the others know we are fine and on our way, so I get her alone for a bit. It might make me selfish, but we don’t have forever, and I want this moment.
“That, my mate, is a very good idea.”
I carry her out of the room and enjoy the scent change as her skin presses against mine. I’m never letting her go again.
I punch Ragnar hard, sending him crashing across the mat, and my hand aches from the hit. He growls as he rolls to a stop, and I shrug, getting back into position. “Your right side was unprotected. Do better.”
“Bastard,” he replies, but he knows I’m right.
I look over to see Callahan talking with Breelyn and Mai. The bastard angel still hasn’t come to us about what happened with Mai, and I don’t like it. I’ve been debating with my brothers how much time we should give him to be a man and speak to us, but it’s gone on too long now. Mai is still worried about it, and even though we do understand, this is a problem between alphas and betas. He is my second-in-command, a male I do trust, and I need to teach him a lesson.
“Callahan, you’re up,” I shout over. Ragnar looks between us and shakes his head.
“Don’t break him,” Henderson suggests, walking past. “Too much.”
“I disagree with that,” Valentine says to us all in the bond. He sits behind the girls, working on riddles in his notebook for Mai.
I smile as Mai tries and fails to peek in the book.
Callahan pulls off his shirt and throws it to the side. I chuck a sword his way, and he catches it.
“You seem...mad,” he asks, starting to circle me. I stand still, waiting for him to attack. For a moment, I block out my mate through the bond. Callahan and I have unfinished business. He strikes and I smoothly sidestep, spinning on my foot and bringing my sword down. He blocks me, just like I expected him to do, and I smirk as our swords clash, the metal sound ringing through the room. He doesn’t pause, straight back to the attack. Only years of training let me block it and hit right back where he is weak. We are quite equally matched, and he is well trained, but I am not just a wolf. With a bit of my magic laced into my palms, only a little, I punch him hard in the chest. He slips backwards, and the room goes silent. He uses his wings to soften the blow and pants as he straightens up.
“What the fuck was that?”
“I’m your alpha. Careful,” I growl, walking over and attacking again. He blocks me, and I easily slip through his defences, predicting his moves and smacking him hard in the back. He stumbles and I knock him over. He picks himself up and frowns, wiping some blood off his cheek where my sword cut him.
“Silas!” Mai calls. Her voice is nothing short of a warning tone that I plan to completely ignore.
I walk over and pull Callahan closer, my sword pressed against his neck. “If you ever feed off my mate again, if you ever give her pleasure like that, I will fucking kill you. The only reason you aren’t dead right now is because you both didn’t have a choice. You are my beta, Callahan, and you should have told me. Told us.”
His eyes stay on mine. Guilt. Anger. But mostly, he knows he should have told me. “You’re right, I should have done, alpha.”
“A life for a life. You saved her, and this is me sparing you. I’ve killed for less,” I warn him and push him away.
“How could you?” I hear Breelyn quietly ask as I turn and see her standing in front of Mai.
“I’m sorry, it was—”
“I don’t want to hear it,” she snaps at my mate. A low growl echoes around my chest, and Mai turns her gaze to me, her eyes narrowed.
Fuck, she is pissed.
Double fuck, it’s making me hard.
She looks back at Breelyn, who has tears streaming down her cheeks. Callahan walks right past me and to her.
Breelyn looks sharply at him. That is a look that would scare most males, but Callahan doesn’t falter. That look, and how strong she is, is why she is our beta. “Breelyn, let me—”
The slap rings through the room as her hand clashes with his cheek. He snarls back at her and grabs her, throwing her over his shoulder. She screams and kicks at him, but he doesn’t let her go as they leave.
I clap my hands. “Well, now that is sorted—”
“Sorted?” Mai questions. Henderson, Valentine and Ragnar quickly find somewhere else to be. “Gods, you are a right bastard at times.”
I grin. “But I’m yours and you love me. My possessive wolf and all.”
She picks up Callahan’s fallen sword and walks into the training ring, her eyes flashing with fury. “Stop talking.”
“Yes, my alpha female,” I taunt, bowing my head, and when she strikes, her anger only has her underneath me quickly, and I say sorry in the best way I can.
By making her moan my name with her mates watching. Enjoying.
I walk down the corridor towards the room with the weapons, pulling a cart behind me. My muscles are stretching from the brief break I took to run with my wolf around the castle grounds, my alphas joining me in the forest. The forest isn’t the same anymore, not with how many angels are in the borders and how many fill the skies of our city. We are getting cramped, but no one is voicing that issue when war is so close. We all know we are outnumbered with the Levi, and my mates are spending every hour trying to figure out battle plans to give us an edge. We all know that there isn’t much we can do.
