Chapter One
Tawny
“Take off your robe.”
I jerked my head to face the female attendant who spoke. “I can’t. I’m not wearing anything under it.” Not my idea, either. I’d been prepared for the ceremony by several of the older females who explained nothing, just walked me through the required steps.
“That’s how it works,” the other attendant who’d come with me this far put in. “Everyone does it.”
“I’ve already put up with all the humiliating shit I intend to,” I spat.
Cleansing, hair removal from armpits to ankles, perfuming places no perfume belonged, and even an examination to prove I was virginal enough to suit the pack I’d been promised to.
Not sold, quite, since my pack had already deposited the dowry in the bank account they’d opened for me—ready for me to “gift” to my new mates after the ceremony. “I didn’t want any of this.”
“None of us do,” hissed the first female. “That’s not how it works.”
“At what point was anyone supposed to inform me of how things ‘work,’” I demanded, arms crossed, fingers gripping the sleeves of the shimmery, see-through garment they’d dressed me in while piling my hair on my head and applying layers of thick makeup to my face.
The other female shook her head. “If any of us knew in advance what this was all about, do you think we’d have gone through it?” She patted my hair, although it had enough spray on it to keep it in its towering beehive style for the next century. How many shampoos would it take to clean it out?
“Yet, you’ll do the same to others?” Shameful. “What is it like where you come from anyway? Do females have any rights?”
“We have our ways of getting around things,” the first one said. Since I’d be going to their lands, I should probably ask their names. But I didn’t care. “You’ll learn soon enough. Now. Let. Go.” She tugged on the robe, but I held on tighter until the delicate fabric shredded away.
“Oh no,” the other female said. “You have to wear this later. Now I don’t know what we’ll do.” She paled, breath speeding up.
“You’re going to be punished for this?”
They both insisted they would not, but I’d learned to recognize a lie a long time ago.
I stopped fighting, recognizing the pointlessness.
All my efforts accomplished was more pain for these two whose gaunt visages, despite a relatively young age, reflected their lives.
A reflection of how I’d appear in five or ten years?
“Okay, now you look very nice,” one of them said. I didn’t even look to see which. They sounded very alike. “And they are waiting for you out there. Stand proud. Don’t slump and let them see what you really feel like.”
“Why not?” Hypocrisy was not my favorite mode. “I’m supposed to be happy about leaving my family and everything I’ve ever known to join this pack? I haven’t even met the males. Do you know them?”
Silence.
I turned to where they’d both moved behind me while trying to get me to enter the ceremony. “What is it? Do you or don’t you know them?”
“We do,” mumbled female number one.
“And? Are they nice? Handsome? Kind to children and animals? And women?”
“Just go,” she said. “It’s not going to help you to know more. It will just make what’s about to happen harder.”
“And that would be?” My heart rate increased, closing throat making it harder to get the words out. “What aren’t you telling me?” Besides everything. “Wait. Are you also their mates?”
“No,” whispered female number two. “That’s not how it—”
“Works, yeah, I get it. So, what are you? Sisters? Friends? Lovers? Concubines?”
“The last one.”
Before I could react to what she said, her friend and fellow concubine gave me a push through the hanging draperies and into the area where the ceremony would take place.
I’d been in the gathering area before. Plenty of times.
For all sort of events, but never a mating ceremony.
Only those who were already mated were allowed to experience whatever went on in here.
Girls were kept in the dark until their “special day.” I was starting to see why.
No females were present except me.
Males lined the walls, standing or seated in cushioned chairs.
They all faced the center where a low, backless couch stood, draped in fabric similar to what had just shredded from my body.
I could smell their arousal. All of them, even though I’d have said I wouldn’t recognize it before now.
And they were all sniffing as well, expressions of expectation being replaced by disappointment, discontent, anger?
“She’s not in heat.” The growl circled the room, along with other, similar remarks. By the time the males by the doorway spoke, it got much more frightening. An elderly beta snarled, “It’s all right. She should learn to bear pain.”
What the unholy…
I froze, standing just inside the doorway, the drapes moving in a breeze from somewhere, the soft cloth caressing my bare buttocks, my calves.
They all stared at me, as if I should know what to do. I didn’t, and I was sure even if I did, I did not want to do whatever it was. Then an alpha pointed to the couch. “Take your position. Your alphas are waiting.”
Gaze flicking around the room, I wondered which of the seated or standing males were mine. Or to which I belonged, as it would be more proper to say. Even with my lack of knowledge, I understood alphas ruled omegas.
“The couch!” he barked. “They cannot enter until you are ready.”
“Uh…okay.” Taking tentative steps forward, I managed to cross the floor to the center of the room. I’d been naked around others before, when shifting, for pack runs. But it had never felt so…purposeful. Finally arriving, I perched on the edge, hoping it would be enough.
“Lie down and spread your legs!” the alpha growled. “You are wasting all our time.”
“What? No!” Fear crawled up my spine. Why would they want that? I’d already been certified worthy/virginal. “I can’t do that. I won’t!”
“If you don’t, female, we will assist you.”
Three males stood, bulging muscles showing they’d have no trouble doing what he threatened.
Go now. My wolf, who rarely participated in anything when not in her fur bristled under my skin. They mean us harm. And insult.
We can’t. Where would we go?
Anywhere.
Frozen in terror, the males approaching, I closed my eyes and waited for the worst to happen. Not even able to define what that might be. Rape…by the pack taking me? By all the males present? Or just being laid out like a display to be looked at. Just?
Trembling so hard, my teeth chattered, I didn’t realize what was happening until my wolf took over.
Shifting had never been unpleasant before, but this time, it was violent and fast, and I could feel every bit of it.
Fur sprouting all over me, my face extending, fangs snapping into place.
Bones twisting, muscles stretching. My scream became a howl and then we leapt over the couch and tore across the room toward the far side.
Three males in shirts open to the waist and baggy cotton pants with a curiously fastened opening, entered, their eyes widening as we barreled into them and sent them tumbling to the floor.
You’d better run fast, I warned. If they catch us, they may kill us after they do…what they planned.