Chapter 6
Lambda told her to keep quiet about them leaving and that if anyone asked where they were going, it was to have a picnic in the woods to get to know each other.
If Vallie was being honest with herself, a picnic in the woods with this gorgeous wolf sounded like a nice way to spend a spring afternoon. She could stare at that beautiful face for hours. Hell, after touching his chest, she couldn’t wait to have her hands on him again.
Focus, she chided herself. Verona was still in hell. There would be time for frolicking naked in the woods after her sister was safe in Luven.
“Is she younger?” Lambda’s voice broke into her thoughts.
“Hm?”
“Is Verona younger than you?”
“Oh. No. Two years older. But we’ve always felt the same age, at least the last decade or so.”
You two are partners now. Always together. You keep each other safe. My two wildflowers standing against the wind. Verona and Vallie. As long as you’re together, you can handle anything.
“You were taken together?”
“Yup.” Vallie didn’t like to think about that day. She definitely didn’t want to talk about it, especially with this man who was now her mate, and probably the person she was going to live with for the rest of her life. What was there to say? She had lost a lot more than her freedom when the dragons took her. She’d watched the love of her life die in front of her, his goal of keeping her safe smashed before his eyes.
Eight years later, it could still hurt like hell. It surprised her now. She could go weeks without that sharp pain, and then suddenly, it was back.
Poor Elias. A good man in a dark world.
“You got any siblings?” Vallie asked, changing the subject. They walked through sparse trees now, shadows dancing over them as they went.
Lambda shrugged. “Probably. Don’t know any of them, though.”
“You weren’t raised with your family?”
“Hell, no. Um.” He paused and looked at her. “It’s not really a happy story.”
“Does anyone our age have a happy story?” Vallie countered.
“Fair enough. When I was about three, my mom dumped me here. My dad was not her mate, just a roaming wolf who forced himself on her one night. She straight up murdered him in retribution but didn’t want to kill me. Tried the motherhood thing for a few years and then realized it didn’t suit her. But, you know, I’m thankful she didn’t leave me to starve in the woods. Gave me a chance by dropping me in Luven.”
“Fuck. You weren’t kidding.” Vallie had a lot of shit happen to her, but as far as she knew, her mom did not murder her dad.
“Sorry.”
“No, I’m glad you told me. My story doesn’t seem so sad anymore.” Vallie took a deep breath. “It was my mom, Verona, and I. When we were twelve and fourteen, Mom died. After that, we were just figuring out how to survive in Maidenhead until it switched to trying to survive in Balaur.”
“But Verona wasn’t one of Cade’s?” Vallie looked up sharply at the mention of the asshole’s name. “Sorry. Alpha told us all of Cade’s prisoners were given in retribution. I guessed you were one of his.”
“Verona is the pet of Bedek. He’s an older dragon. Doesn’t go to parties as much. Her life was quieter than mine, but that also meant I rarely got to see her. Eelia used to help us send messages.”
“Who’s Eelia?”
“Oh. She’s in the hospital right now. She wasn’t a pet, a servant.”
“Oh. Maybe she’ll end up with Iota. He’s one of my single friends. Really hoping to find a mate soon.”
“Eelia is in her late forties.”
Lambda shrugged. “Doesn’t mean anything. The Moon Goddess picks whoever is best.” He paused. “Though I do think Iota wants children.”
“Then probably not his perfect match,” she pointed out. “Though who knows. I’m a terrible judge of age. Maybe Eelia is twenty-two, but it’s been a rough twenty-two.”
They crossed out of the city’s border woods and into the lands between Luven and the wall. It was beautiful here: hilly, with small copses of evergreens. The birdsong alone was enough to make anyone sit down for a picnic. Even the sky played along, a crisp blue with fat, white clouds.
“Tell me when you need to rest,” Lambda said.
“We’ve been walking for less than an hour. I’m made of sterner stuff than that.”
“I know, I know. But when you get tired, tell me. We can have that picnic that we created in case we needed to lie.”
Vallie hummed a laugh. Lambda wasn’t bad company, as it turned out. He was a little more reserved, but fine enough. She could have done worse when it came to partners to storm Dragon’s Keep with.
She glanced down, trying to get an eye on what he was working with between his legs. She knew all about wolf physiology. His cock was hard right now. Once a wolf smelled his mate, his cock went hard and didn’t go soft again until after the mating frenzy, a few days long fuck-fest that culminated with the wolf shifter fucking his mate while in his humanoid wolf form. Tella had been very forthcoming in the hospital. She didn’t want anyone going in blind. Tella had also added some fun information about how wolves basically worship their mates and feed them a lot.
Vallie was looking forward to being fed like a fucking queen and, now that she had laid her eyes on the glorious form that was Lambda, she was really looking forward to the mating frenzy. It had been a long time since she’d wrapped her arms around someone she was genuinely excited to sleep with.
No. She wasn’t thinking about Elias. Not while she had a hot new mate next to her, not while she needed to stay focused for Verona’s sake. It wasn’t the time to be wandering down memory lane and get all weepy. That’s what the week before her moon bleeding was for.
“Who raised you?” she asked after a few moments of silence. “If your mother dropped you off after she killed your father, who took care of baby Lambda?”
“Mm. I lived with an older pair of werewolves. Psi and his mate, Aula. They were both wolves. Their own kids were grown, and they took me in.”
“They were both wolves?”
“Yes. Psi died ten years ago, and then Aula a year after that. They were elderly at that point, in their eighties. But they were very good to me. Took care of me, treated me like their own. I had a relatively nice childhood, in that sense.”
“Do you still see their children?”
“Sometimes. None of them live in Luven, but one lives in the same settlement that Sigma grew up in. Oh. Did you know Millonia?”
“Yup. Cellmate. She was tethered to Tella, and I was with Domitia, so I wasn’t on top of her all day, but on nights when the dragons forgot we existed, the four of us became quite close. It was almost fun, if we hadn’t been starving and freezing.”
“What happened to Domitia?”
“She’s in the hospital right now. Few more weeks for her. She made me promise I wouldn’t do anything stupid while rescuing Verona. And that I wouldn’t die.”
Lambda nodded. “Well, let’s do our best to keep that promise.”