Chapter 49 Thane
Thane
“My beast is strong this eve,” he grated from his cage. “It claws me from the inside.”
“Tonight proves grueling,” Lowell muttered absently, almost as if he spoke about himself.
His mind might be elsewhere, but he’d done the preparations well.
He’d briefed the two dozen warlairds on what was at stake—an enemy queen’s refusal of her fate—and he’d situated Thane’s cage atop the roof, as far from the belowground dungeon as possible.
With visible distaste, he’d scattered Ditch’s hexed grains around both cages, Straegan’s and Thane’s, each speck vibrating with magic.
“Try the bars again,” Lowell said.
The warlairds kept hands on weapons as Thane pulled. Metal groaned but didn’t budge. As promised, Thane felt Ditch in every inch of that cage, her magic threaded through steel.
He still couldn’t believe they were trusting a spell. Thane’s Instinct practically snarled: —The fuck are you doing?—
Lowell gave a nod. “Your beast might be strong, but it’s contained.”
“Barely.” It prowled just beneath his skin, close enough that Thane felt its hunger and its thoughts: dark, fixated on one thing.
A delectable witch beneath it.
Though his beast hadn’t risen on the Mount, it’d gotten a hint of Thane’s meal of her, of feeding on Ditch’s orgasms as if they were sustenance. It had well liked its meal and demanded more.
Claim. Possess.
Yet even with the moon climbing higher, the beast didn’t break through. “But I believe it will no’ rise.”
Several warlairds exhaled, relieved. They stood fast anyway. Everyone knew the stakes. This night would end in triumph. Or in war.
“Verra well,” Lowell said. “Seems the spell will work.” His tone didn’t match his words. He kept cocking his head as if listening to something far off, unease twitching through him.
“What is wrong with you?” Thane demanded.
“Nothing that will no’ keep until tomorrow.”
The first lie Lowell has ever told me?
His right hand continued, “We’ll focus on Straegan now, since his beast is at the fore.”
Straegan had been battering his own cage, his howls carrying through the kingdom. Could Ditch feel that aggression? Was she draining herself to handle a burden that should be Thane’s?
“Aye,” he growled. “Do it.”
Lowell dispatched all but two warlairds down to the dungeon for even more support.
Straegan’s howls escalated—wild, seductive, promising freedom from control. Instead of men possessed by wolves, they would become wolves possessed by the shadow of men.
From the far edges of the kingdom—lands where the most feral Lykae roamed—answering howls rose. That dark, calling chorus. Would Thane be able to hold the pack together when the ferocity swelled like a tide?
Even Lowell, ever-steady Lowell, started pacing. Kept glancing toward the Witchwood. A suspicion arose, but Straegan’s howls quelled critical thought. Why wouldn’t he shut up?
If not for Straegan, the pack might not even be enemies with the witches. They wouldn’t be allies but not adversaries either. No Red Riders at all…
As the moon climbed and Straegan’s howls only worsened, Thane’s wild thoughts circled back to one thing: her.
Her scent. Her taste.
He felt her magic caging him, and it made him even more crazed.
When the bell tower tolled the hour, Lowell said, “I’ll check on Straegan’s guards. Ensure they’re sharp.”
A reasonable statement. Yet the flicker in his eyes before he turned away set Thane’s hackles up.
Did my right hand just tell his second lie?