Chapter 6 - Arthur
By the time the last light had bled out of the sky, they’d led Arthur into the trees.
The priest walked ahead, lantern swinging, wolves watching his journey from a distance, their eyes catching what little moonlight there was. Every step took Arthur further from the compound, further from humanity, and deeper into the stillness of old Nordan land.
The clearing opened suddenly. A scooped-out basin of snow and stone. Candles ringed the rock at its center, flames stubborn against the wind. Lunarion’s sigil, carved long before any living record, glimmered under a dusting of frost.
Dani was already there.
He stopped breathing.
Someone had braided her hair back, leaving the rest to tumble down her back in the unruly curls he remembered far too well. The gown she wore was plain Nordan white, with long sleeves, a laced bodice, and skirts brushing the snow. It should have looked soft, pure, and glowing under Lunarion’s moon.
It didn’t.
It made her look like a woman walking toward execution.
The priest bowed to her before turning to Arthur.
“Alpha,” he murmured, “we’re ready for you.”
Arthur stepped onto the stone. Cold crept instantly up his legs. The air thinned. The hair at the base of his neck lifted.
He stopped two paces from her.
Too close. Not nearly close enough.
“Arthur Wells,” the priest said, voice carrying cleanly through the dark, “do you come here of your own will, to bind your life to this female, in the sight of Lunarion?”
Dani’s face was icy, her brow creasing slightly at the word. Female. She wasn’t a shifter anymore, after all.
She was a witch.
He swallowed thickly, meeting her gaze. “Aye. I do.”
His wolf growled approval beneath his skin.
The priest turned. “Daniella Taylor of Salem. Do you come here of your own will, to bind your life to this alpha?”
The silence stretched long enough to hurt.
Then she lifted her chin. “Yes. I do.”
Arthur’s heart lodged somewhere behind his ribs.
“Join hands,” the priest said.
Arthur held his out. She hesitated, barely, then placed her palm in his.
Heat shot up his arm. Not her magic. Deeper. Older. Lunarion-old. His wolf surged, a growl of mine vibrating through every bone.
Her fingers were cold. Her pulse raced. She didn’t squeeze, didn’t soften. She simply endured his touch.
The priest wrapped their wrists with a narrow band of white cloth, murmuring the old prayers. Arthur barely heard them. He was too aware of her breath, her scent, the memory of her mouth beneath his ten years ago when he’d been too young and too stupid to see.
“In Lunarion’s sight,” the priest continued, “do you swear to stand for each other, to bleed for each other?”
“I swear,” Arthur said, the words pulled from his chest.
“I swear,” Dani echoed, voice high and thin. Her cheeks were flushed now, her eyes narrowed in concentration. Suddenly, he scented it.
Her. But not just her. Something wilder, headier, something he’d scented before, but never had it had it sparked the stampede of pure instinct like it did now.
She was aroused.
Her face might not betray it, lips pressed thin, anger weighing her down, but her body could not lie to him.
Through the thin shift, he saw the sudden peaking of her swollen nipples, jutting out from trembling breasts.
His eyes tracked the curves of her waist, the swell of her hips, the tremble of her thighs.
Her blood raced in her veins, violent as a storm, and his skin prickled as his wolf sensed the waiting warmth between her legs.
In return, his own skin began to heat, his muscles twitching with the urge to stride forward, to take her in his arms, priest be damned.
But he didn’t. With a soft growl, he held himself back, fists clenching. He could not scare her. Especially not with what was to come.
“It is time,” the priest said. “Seal the bond.”
Arthur’s shoulders tensed as Dani fixed him with a wide-eyed stare. The anger was melting away now, and he could read her wide green eyes clearly. Fear and hunger. Fire and challenge. And something else. Something he couldn’t quite catch, and was therefore all the more desperate to chase.
He lifted a hand to her shoulder, right at the base of her neck. Her skin prickled beneath his touch, so faintly he might have imagined it. She knew the Nordan way. The old way. His thumb brushed the line where her mark would sit.
“This will hurt,” he warned.
“Good,” she said, “we’ll be even.”
He had no defense against that, so instead he let instinct take over. He bent his head, breath hot against her skin. She was just there, her trembling body brushing his lips. Something in him changed, snapped into place, like a broken bone being set.
She shivered beneath him, and his wolf roiled and thrashed. He was sinking into himself, the wildness taking over.
He lunged forward, teeth sinking into her neck.
Her blood hit his tongue.
The bond hit him like a tidal wave.
It felt like the mountain itself reared up inside him, like the wolf had been unchained after ten years of pacing. Her emotions bled through fear, fury, something warm that vanished the second she felt it.
He pulled back before he lost himself.
“Your turn,” he murmured.
She stepped into his space without hesitation, hand gripping his shoulder hard enough to bruise. Her body brushed his. His breath caught.
Then she bit him.
Pain flared hot. The bond snapped tight. The world shuddered.
For a heartbeat, he saw them the way Lunarion did: two small figures in an ancient clearing, threads of fate tangled too deeply to separate.
Then it was done.
Dani stepped away at once, breathing hard. A smear of red stained the white of her collar. She wouldn’t look at him.
“It is done,” the priest said. “May this union bring strength to the pack.”
Arthur didn’t like the hesitation in his voice.
The priest retreated into the trees, leaving them alone.
Silence pooled thick around them. Dani’s hand still bore the stain of his blood. Her braid had fallen apart, curls wild. Her mark peeked over the neckline of her gown, already darkening.
She looked wrecked.
She looked perfect.
“Dani,” he said quietly.
“Don’t.” Her voice was a blade. “Don’t say you’re sorry. Don’t pretend this was for me.”
He swallowed. “We need to talk.”
Her laugh was brittle. “About which part? The fact that I didn’t have a choice in this? Or…or everything that happened before.”
“I did it to protect you.”
“You did it to protect your pack,” she snapped. “You always do, Arthur. That’s the problem.”
He stepped closer, the bond tugging like a tether. He stopped a breath away, afraid of what might happen if he didn’t.
“You’re my mate,” he said. “Nothing comes before that now.”
She flinched. “You don’t get to say that. Not after ten years.” Her voice shook, tears pooling in her eyes.
He bit back the memories with a snarl, fists clenching. “Dani,” he said, “this bond will give me strength. Strength I need to defend us against the hybrids. To defend you. And Aurelia.”
Her eyes closed for a moment at the name. “You can tell yourself you’re doing this for me. For my daughter. But you’re doing it for the pack. Otherwise, I would have had a choice.”
“You had a choice,” he growled, her words lashing against him. “You didn’t have to accept this.”
Her eyes burned bright, her voice laced with bitterness as she spat, “Oh, but I did. For the good of all of us.”
Then she turned.
Fire flickered in her palm, flames licking her fingers, and she swept it in a single, clean arc, extinguishing half the candles in a line.
And then she walked into the trees.
The bond tugged, sharp and protesting.
His wolf snarled, begging to follow.
He stayed still.
If he went after her now, instinct would take over, and they would consume each other before they even had a chance to speak.
So he let her go.
For now.
***
The Chilkat Inn smelled exactly as it always had, of old timber and beer. Members of his pack filled most of the booths, with a few trusted humans scattered among them, voices low. No one dared look at Arthur, hunched in the back corner with a beer he hadn’t touched.
Dani’s scent still clung to him. Warm, sharp, wild. The bond wouldn’t quiet. It pulsed beneath his skin like a second heartbeat.
The door opened. A blast of cold wind swept in along with four strangers.
Arthur’s head lifted instantly.
Not locals, not Volkhov, not Nordan.
Severney.
The tall male at the front moved with quiet, predatory ease.
Broad-shouldered, but not as heavily built as Arthur.
Dark auburn hair brushed his shoulders. His eyes were clear green, startlingly bright in the dim light.
He scanned the room once, then walked toward Arthur with the measured confidence of someone who knew exactly how dangerous he was.
Rory Byrne. Alpha of the Severney.
There was a woman beside him, moving like smoke, alert and graceful, chin high. Her dark hair framed a clever, pretty face. Witch, Arthur realized grimly as he scented the air. Not wolf.
“Arthur Wells,” Rory said with a faint smile, slipping into the seat opposite him.
Arthur grunted, leaning back with a scowl. Chase, who had been hovering at the bar, immediately crossed to Arthur’s booth and slid in beside him.
“Forgive me,” Rory said with a dimpled smile and a curved grin, “I probably should have requested formal rights to enter your territory. I just figured, what with this big meeting Volkhov’s called…”
Arthur didn’t rise to the bait. He stared down the alpha, jaw tight. Chase fidgeted next to him, clearly irritated at his lack of motivation to speak, before fixing the newcomers with his signature dazzling smile. “We don’t tend to go in for all that paperwork stuff here. We’re all wolves, eh?”
Arthur chuffed out a bitter laugh, his attention turning to the petite woman standing sentinel behind Rory. “Aye, all wolves, are we?”
If anything, Rory’s smile widened. “This is Kiara, my second.”
Kiara nodded once, studying Arthur openly. Not hostile. Assessing.