Chapter 19 Stark
STARK
The sun is too fucking bright on the snow this afternoon, glinting in sharp rays that make my eyes burn. The fog of the morning, appropriate for the funeral, finally drifted off. But it left something damp and restless inside me, something I need to work out of my body with movement and wind.
I lift my hand over my brow and squint at the wolf terraces. Noemi is finally leading Ephyse down toward us. Took them long enough. Noemi’s been quiet and dazed ever since seeing off the Eisenfall party.
“She’s not the only one,” Cratos says, nudging my side with his large black muzzle. I shove him away.
“Can you blame me? Be prepared to run hard. I want my muscles screaming.” Meryn’s state over the past couple of days has been excruciating, especially after what happened with Tomison this morning.
Maybe her trauma is bleeding through the bond.
Or, more disturbingly, maybe I give a shit if she feels bad.
I’m culpable, after all, for the way she lost control at her coronation. Once again, I felt her on the cusp of her power and once again, I led her astray—to disastrous effect.
I need to keep my distance from her. She needs that.
“Ready?” Noemi says impatiently as she approaches, her hand on her hip. As if I were the one holding us up this whole time.
Before I can respond, there’s a sharp, dizzying twist in my brain.
I grit my teeth and lean against Cratos. The sensation is so strange and distracting and wrong, it takes a split second before I see it.
Noemi’s collapsed.
Her hair is a shock of red against the snow like spilled blood. She’s curled up on the ground with both hands over her ears, eyes screwed up tight.
She’s hurt.
Panic pulses in my veins, and I race to her side, reaching down.
Before my hand connects, Noemi lashes up to push me away. She straightens and stands. My throat tightens, and I take a step back, disconcerted. There’s something strange about her movements as she turns to Ephyse, seeming to communicate mentally with him.
What the fuck is happening right now? “Noemi?”
“I have to go,” she says sharply. Her usual open expression is tight—hard and unrecognizable.
She quickly mounts Ephyse, and they turn toward me and Cratos. We’re blocking the fastest way down from this part of the wolf terraces; to leave, they’ll have to go through us.
Alarm rings through me.
“Where are you going, Noemi?” She might wear my childhood friend’s face, but I don’t recognize the woman atop Ephyse.
“Phylax is joining King Killian.” Her voice is flat and colorless. She and Ephyse move to the right, aiming to skirt by us.
In one sharp movement, I cut them off. Grabbing Noemi by the wrist, I pull her off Ephyse and onto the ground. We hit icy rock, and I use our momentum to roll us.
Cratos steps forward, shielding us with his body and growling a threat at Ephyse.
“Like fuck you are,” I snarl at Noemi, using my knee to pin her to the ground.
She thrashes to the side and aims a punch at my head. But she doesn’t have a chance against the Daemos Alpha. I grab the other hand and wrench her wrists down so that she’s incapacitated.
“You can fight this, Noemi,” I say. In the background, Ephyse nips at Cratos, who lets out a ground-rumbling growl of warning. “You can fight this. Resist.”
I’ve failed her before. The knowledge of it lives buried in my marrow, flooding my veins with grief when I’m least expecting it.
I won’t fail her today.
Noemi pulls uselessly against my grasp, eyes wild, and doesn’t respond.
Fuck.
Cratos and Ephyse have moved away from us now, circling each other and snarling. Cratos lets out a warning bark, a sound I know well. It’s the bark he makes before he strikes to maim.
“Cratos, Ephyse doesn’t know what he’s doing. Don’t harm him.”
In the moment of distraction, Noemi pulls a hand out of my grip with force I didn’t know she possessed, slapping me viciously across the face.
I grab the offending hand again, pulling her toward me until our faces are nearly touching.
“Remember, Mimi,” I snap, praying that the harsh tone of my voice gets through. “Alistair Brightbane is inside of Killian now. You cannot go to him.”
A flicker of distress moves across Noemi’s face. Some piece of her can hear me.
I grind my teeth in frustration.
It’s rare, almost unthought of, for a pack member to resist their Alpha’s command. Still, recent events have shown that it’s possible—either due to the corruption in our magic or the Dire Blade’s shattering. That shit stain Jonah and his lackeys managed to close me out.
What could break through to her? What could make her listen?
It might take someone whose authority outranks Tormun’s, I realize.
Someone like our queen.
“Come quickly,” I say along that bond I’ve sought so hard to avoid. “And bring Anassa with you.”
There’s silence for a moment, two. Then, no questions asked: “Okay.”
Sighing in relief, I refocus on holding Noemi down. Her hands are turning white from my viselike grip. I’m hurting her.
But to let her go—that would hurt her more.
The minutes stretch painfully, but finally, Meryn and Anassa burst out of the castle.
Meryn’s astride her wolf, skipping the stairs to reach us in three huge leaps. She quickly slides down from Anassa’s side. Anassa races off to help Cratos contain Ephyse.
“Force her to resist the command,” I demand, and then soften my tone at the shock in her eyes. “Please. Help her.”
A storm of emotions crosses Meryn’s face, but she nods. She kneels next to us, grabbing Noemi’s cheeks in both hands. Noemi continues to struggle against my hold.
“I am your queen,” Meryn says sternly, steel in her voice. “I command you to resist your Alpha. You are to remain here, in Sturmfrost, by my side.”
While Meryn speaks, Anassa streaks forward and tackles Ephyse. He attempts to toss her off. Anassa gets her jaws around Ephyse’s throat, but holds, not biting yet. Just making the threat apparent.
The fight goes out of Ephyse at the same time Noemi relaxes in my grip. I wait an extra minute to be sure it’s not a feint and then release her wrists and stand, holding out a hand to help her up.
Her look of devastation as she rises is like a punch to the gut.
Not much can scare me. But the idea of Noemi leaving, of being forced to Killian’s side, after everything her father put her through?
I’d never forgive myself.
Noemi’s eyes water with distress, and she averts her gaze as if ashamed. She yanks her hand away from mine and stumbles back, breathing hard.
“I am so sorry,” Meryn says, moving to Noemi’s side. “I hate the idea of forcing a command on anyone. I would never, in any other circumstances. I only did that because I thought I had to—”
Noemi holds up a hand, cutting Meryn off. Her face is more composed, but her hand still shakes with a slight tremor.
“It’s fine,” she says softly. “Thank you.”
Noemi looks pale and almost breakable. Her years at the front have helped rebuild her confidence and fortitude. But suddenly, she looks dangerously close to the person she was when she emerged from the Trials.
“We’ll have to take our wolves out for that run another time, Valstark,” she says, speaking to the snow more than to me. “I think I need to lie down for a while.”
Ephyse comes up behind her, nosing at her hair, and Noemi turns and sinks her face into his shaggy fur, winding her arms around his neck. Familial protectiveness still burns in my chest as I watch the two of them head into the castle.
What must it be like to be cut off from your pack, your Alpha?
“Barely any Phylax from the front resisted the order,” Cratos growls, his burning indignation matching mine. “The wolves of our Gammas report that whole units of Phylax have just… left.”
I turn to Meryn, who is also watching Noemi depart, an unreadable expression on her face. “I appreciate your help,” I tell her gruffly. “Noemi… she’s like family to me.”
Meryn’s hazel eyes meet mine. “Just family?”
There’s a deeper question there. I know how it must look to her. But better she thinks that Noemi and I are involved. Better to shut any doors that might be perilous if left open.
“I love her,” I tell Meryn truthfully, feeling my heart clench. She makes a small noise of acknowledgment in the back of her throat. “What’s happened?”
She sighs. Anassa has padded back over now, and Meryn leans against her for support. “I don’t know. I don’t understand. Alpha Tormun was so confident he was going to capture Killian. How did Killian and Alistair manage to sway him? To tear an entire pack from us?”
My fingers itch to reach out to her, to smooth the worry from her brow. What an irritating urge.
Instead, I grab her wrist, touching the sliver of skin that peeks out from under her jacket. She startles at the contact. The warmth of her skin sears my fingertips, coursing through me until a heat builds low in my gut.
I use it to fuel my rage. “When we eventually capture Tormun—and we will,” I growl, getting worked up, “I’m going to decapitate him and put his head on a spike outside the Bonded City.
It’ll serve as a warning to all the other Bonded: You don’t go against pack rule.
We answer to one authority alone: Queen Meryn Sturmfrost.”
Her mouth drops open in surprise, and then she lets out a light laugh, her cheeks coloring. “Wow. I hate to say it, but that kind of turned me on. Does Noemi enjoy it when you talk dirty like that?”
Her words shoot straight to my cock, and I drop her wrist, swallowing hard. It fucking stings that she thinks Noemi and I are together.
But it needs to stay that way.
“Stark,” Meryn says, and the sound of my name on her lips imprints itself on my mind. It takes me a moment before I hear what she’s saying. “Your mother has called a war council, of all the Alphas. The… remaining Alphas.”
Sighing, I follow her back into the castle.