LOGINCatriona's POVFrom the last time I saw him to now, Arnold looks like he has obviously gone through a lot. The stench of the sewers has permeated the room, making it obvious where exactly he has spent the last twenty four. Gone is the confident businessman smile, he tries to hide it but his terror is obvious. It doesn't look like he has been roughened up yet but if there was ever an alpha not to double-cross, Alpha Kael is way up on that list. Alpha Kael turns to us as we enter. "What is she doing here?" He snarls. "I would have come down on my own is Lucian didnt bring me." I reply, hiding my wince of pain as I limp forward and drop into the seat opposite Arnold. Such a deceptively formal arrangement, Arnold is sitting too and this could be a normal meeting if the walls weren't steeped with petrification, if the very air here didn't emit a terrible misery from all the torture and suffering that has happened in here and if the walls on my far right weren’t decorated with terrifyin
Catriona’s POVA scream rips from my throat and then the world tilts- up is down and I’m rolling until my head hits something hard and I black out.When I wake up, I’m disoriented for a second but the entire world has gone to shit. Something hit our carriage at full force and we have been rammed off the road. I’m on my back, a little disoriented and the afternoon sun is on my face. “Hela?” I call and she stirs beside me. “What the fuck was that?” She asks and glances at me then her eyes widen. “Oh goddess, you’re bleeding.”“What?” I ask and pull myself up to a sitting position and that’s when I see my leg. A sharp metal is now lodged in my thigh and my blood is everywhere. My vision swoops and I’m suddenly swamped with pain.“Fuck.” I grit out. “It’s okay.” She says hurriedly. “You’ll be fine, I’ve got you.”Peony stirs from inside the carriage while Hela carries me off the floor. “Oh goddess, is she fine?” Peony asks which is a rhetorical question but I give her a smile anyway.
Catriona’s POV“You really don’t have to.” Peony says for the umpteenth time. “Oh shush, I’m coming with you and that’s final.” I reply. “I’ve been cooped up for way too long.”“Well, what does that have to do with me?” Hela grumbles dourly. “You know I hate going to the market.”“Well, you need alot of things for starters. Change of clothes, change of shoes, a perfume won’t be bad either. The change of environment will be good for you.”“Did you just casually put it out there that I reek?” Hela asks. “Well, not reek particularly.” I reply. “But a softer scent won’t be a bad look on you at all.” I correct. “You impertinent rascal.” She tries to punch my arm and I dance away from her reach thanks to years of practice. A casual punch from Hela can take my arm out for days. “Get back here.” She snarls and chases after me and I grab Peony, shoving her between us as we run circles around her. “Girls, decorum.” She calls and I hide behind her. “Tell her that. She’s the one chasing me
Catriona’s POV“Catriona!” Alpha Kael’s voice pierces through the sound of our screams and we both freeze. “What are you doing?”I release Nyra’s hair and have to take a moment to untangle my fingers from them. She scrambles up as soon as she is free, looking disheveled as hell as she runs to stand beside him. “She has gone mad!” Nyra accuses. “She just attacked me. Kael! She’s trying to fucking kill me!” She says and I laugh. “If you’re going to lie, at least make it believable.” I say, climbing to my feet. “I’m wolfless and you’re not. Which of us has the capacity to kill the other?”“Catriona, you know she’s sick.” Alpha Kael’s growls, his hand on her elbow as he pulls her closer as if to shield her with his body. “She’s still recovering. How could you?”The sight of his hand on her elbow and his words send me into such a rage that my vision darkens. “She is sick?” I ask. “So what? I’m automatically at fault because I’m the trouble maker? Are you just going to take her side wit
Catriona's POV“We cannot allow this to go unanswered.” Irona, one of the Council women says passionately, practically vibrating with anger. “We must retaliate and we must do it now.”“I agree with Irona.” Fenix, another council member says. “This is a test of our strength and we have showed them that we are not invincible.”“I heard the traitor has not mentioned accomplices. What are the odds that he is the only man that that wretched alpha somehow recruited to working for him?” Irons asks. “No doubt there are many more.” The others mutter. It has been like this for the most part of the hour-long meeting, each person taking time to express their displeasure over the recent happenings. Alpha Kael sits at the head of the table with Lucian beside him as usual, and he listens quietly as everyone takes turns dropping their hot-takes. “He has gotten too bold.” Council-man Walder agrees. “If we don’t relaliate, then they will do something like this again. They were here in the keep for
Catriona's POVThe touch of his lips on mine is what I imagine it will feel like if another world crashes into ours. It is chaos, unbridled energy that snatches my senses out of me and throws it into the wind. I sink my nails into his corded shoulders and kiss him back like he's water and I'm a whole fucking desert. His lips are shockingly soft, his tongue a velvet stroke that coaxes a yawning hunger wide in the pit of my stomach. As suddenly as he started, he pulls back and I cry out in protest. He takes a step back like I may have burned him. "Kael." I whisper, needing his taste and his touch back but he shakes his head to clear it and looks around. "We must head back." He says. "I'll send a crew to clean this up."He's pulling back, I can feel it. It's like there is a tall fucking wall he has shoved between us once again, and that rare ungraded moment between us is being buried under tons of denial. "I didn’t imagine it right?" I ask and he glances at me. "I'm your mate, your







