Filed to story: Owned by the Alphas Novel
I frowned and tried to do what she asked. I scoured the trinkets until one stood out more than the rest.
It took a minute, but finally, a braided leather piece with blue fabric and a bead at the end caught my eye. The blue reminded me of the water of the lake. And Atticus.
I looked back at Catori, who had her eyes closed.
“I found one,” I said, not sure where this was going. I looked at Atticus, who grinned.
“Trust her process.”
I trusted him, and that was enough. I waited until Catori opened her eyes slowly. She smiled and looked over the table.
“Hmmm. Something to aid in a hard decision coming to you. Pressure rests on your shoulders–something to relieve that. Hmmm,” she murmured under her breath.
I was tense, the way she read me made me nervous. Was she a witch?
“Intuition is a powerful thing, deary. I am observant, listen to my instincts, and sometimes the water whispers to me. This time it tells me that you are going to need something to help you grow, be courageous.” She kept looking at her trinkets, running her fingers over them.
Then she smiled wide and picked up the exact piece I had looked at.
She held it out to me.
“This was the one,” I whispered, accepting the dangling trinket.
“I know,” she smiled, then looked to Atticus. He nodded once and opened his hand to her. She placed her palm in it and took a deep breath.
When she did, her eyes flung open and she yanked her arm back. “Powerful magic follows you, Alpha Atticus. Please be careful,” she warned in a darker tone.
Atticus nodded once and I swallowed.
Atticus led us away then, and I tried to hesitate, but he pulled me along anyway.
“What was she talking about? What was she?” I asked.
“She is one of our elders and stopped shifting a long time ago. Once she did, the realm took to her, offering her magic to stay and be a guide for me and the wolves.”
“And she didn’t want us to pay for her trinket?” I wondered, looking over my shoulder. Zachariah and Dorian followed lazily behind. They watched the rest of the stalls, looking over everything. But I knew they were listening.
“She takes another form of payment. Skin-to-skin with an alpha lends her body power. So her aging slows now that she has stopped shifting. A trinket like that, direct skin to skin, would have given her another year at least.”
I frowned, trying to process that. “And she sensed a dark power?”
He nodded. “Usually I get warned that two of my lovers are going to meet and cause me a headache,” he snickered, then sobered when I gave him an unimpressed look. “It could be that the witches are watching, waiting for the decision.”
“Or it could be Silas,” I sighed, realizing without him saying it. He didn’t confirm it.
Instead, he pulled me against him and walked with his arm in mine. He took me along the sandy paths, some with wooden planks where water ran through the township.
He showed me the werewolf homes that were made of clay and wood. Some stone. He showed me where the kids attended school, learning to read and write so they could scribe their own parchments.
He showed me the infirmary building, refusing to take me in.
“But werewolves heal, how bad can it be?”
He scoffed. “Werewolves can heal. But there are a lot of exceptions. That’s where they are sent.”
“Give me an example,” I begged, striding along well into the afternoon, taking everything in, loving the serenity of the place he called home.
“One of the werewolves got a hook stuck in his foot. He can’t heal until it is removed, but he was in wolf form. He can’t shift back with it in his foot, so he keeps attacking the healers who try to take the hook out. They are trying out some sleeping agents to keep him out long enough. It’s not going very well,” Atticus explained.
Hmm. That didn’t sound like something I wanted to see after all. I didn’t admit that, though. I kept walking until we came back to the markets at the front of the lake. We strode down the other aisles we had missed, and I soaked it all in.
The smells of warm baked bread, hot tea–an apothecary stall was at the end and sold a range of oils and scents.
I smiled and went over.
“Oils?” Atticus asked.
“They smell nice, and maybe we can use them for later,” I grinned up at him so he knew I meant that in a dirty way.
He smirked and pulled some coin out of his pocket. He dumped three gold coins into the vendor’s hand. The vendor grinned and nodded. “Very gracious, Alpha Atticus.”
He smirked and turned to Zachariah and Dorian. “Pick the scent you want to lather the Fox in, Alphas.”
They did, moving fast. After smelling them all, we walked away with vanilla, berry, cinnamon, and mint.
I wasn’t putting that one anywhere near my pussy–much to their chagrin.
We stayed in the markets until the sun was setting. I filled my stomach with all the delicacies–fish, bread, and stew–before sighing contentedly.
“Ready to return to the palace, Fox?” Atticus asked.
“Uh-huh. My feet are killing me,” I said, leaning against him.
“Then you should’ve said,” he grinned, then lifted me into his arms.
“Oh my god, Atticus, put me down–no, I don’t need to be carried,” I whispered harshly, mortified that he was carrying me in front of everyone. Zachariah stood on one side of us, Dorian on the other.
“You said your feet hurt,” he frowned, looking genuinely confused.
“Yeah, but this seems excessive,” I said, knowing how flushed my cheeks were by now.
“Not to me,” he shrugged.
I didn’t argue–just buried my face in his neck and hid the rest of the way to the palace.
When we got there, Atticus didn’t take us downstairs like I expected.
He led us to another room around a slight bend and into a sitting area.
It looked out on the entire expanse of the lake over to where the stone villages on the other side sat. They looked much less lively, but the smoke from their huts was already billowing as the glow of sunset beamed on the horizon.
Atticus sat me down on one of the two couches. He sat next to me and brought my foot up to massage it, leaving the other two to sit in the other chair.
Both seats faced the view–the lake in its beauty.
I sighed and relaxed as tea was brought in by a woman. She nodded to Atticus, putting the board down on the small table in front of us.
But it wasn’t the fact that she was a woman that had me tensing right back up. It was the fact that she was naked, her long hair covering her breasts but not much else.
Atticus growled and the girl jumped.
“Dress yourself from now on, Petra,” he said gruffly.
She frowned for a moment before looking at me. Then she nodded once and left.
“She was the owner of the panties, wasn’t she?” I guessed, teasing him with a smile.
He shrugged. “I had a life before the blood moon, Fox. I’m not ashamed of it, but I am not sad to lose it.”
I smiled at that, then turned to the other two, looking over my shoulder as Atticus kept my feet, rubbing them.
“You two have been so quiet,” I said, not sure whether that was normal or not.
“We’re giving you the time with Atticus while we are in his territory,” Dorian said tightly, as if the idea pissed him off.
But I appreciated it.
“Thank you,” I smiled. That seemed to make it better.
“Have you enjoyed your afternoon, Little Red?” Zach asked, picking up one of the cups and sipping the tea.
I nodded quickly. “Very much. The territories are more beautiful than I thought. Especially this side of them, not the human one,” I admitted. It was a sad division between races, but one that kept everyone safe.
I hoped that was still true once Silas got done doing whatever he had planned.
New Book: Veiled Desires of the Alpha King Novel
Dayson was the alpha of the largest pack in North America. Powerful figures from other packs sought to offer gorgeous girls as potential mates for Dayson. He steadfastly rejected these advances, he was not a pawn to be manipulated. But eventually there came a mysterious girl he could hardly say No. Who was she?