Chapter Four

Devlin's POV

The sobs had started to die down. Only the redhead had continued to cry for days on end.

 I wasn't the only one captured. There were others from the five chiefdoms, men and women who had ended up here the same way I had, through bad luck or bad timing or, in my case, jumping over a wall recklessly.

 I had always thought werewolves capturing humans to use or sell off as slaves were myths parents told their children so they wouldn't wander past the walls of Edevane after dark.

 I had been so wrong. 

Eric entered the tent. He walked straight to me and picked me off the floor, turning me around, running his eyes over my arms and legs the way you'd assess an animal before market day.

 "Your wounds have healed." He said. "You'll fetch me a good price at the auction square."

 "You're making a big mistake." I seethed.

 He looked at me with something that felt more like pity than amusement.

 "It's been a week and no one has looked for you." He said.

 "That tells me more than enough, human." I looked away. 

He was right and I hated him for saying it out loud. I had been turning that thought over for days, quietly, in the hours when the tent was dark and everyone around me was either sleeping or crying.

 I wondered how long it took my parents to realize I wasn't in Edevane.

 I wondered if they even looked at all, or if they had simply noted my absence and moved on with their lives, relieved in a way they would never admit out loud.

 Probably the latter. "Grab the rest of them." Eric signalled to the hunters standing at the entrance.

 "We're heading to the auction square. Screams erupted in the tent again.

 Crying and begging rang out behind me as I struggled to match Eric's long strides with my feet still bound.

 The rope had worn the skin raw over the past week and every rock on the path found the same tender spots.

 "Slow down." I said through my teeth as my foot caught another one. He chuckled.

 "Thought you loved running so much." Before I could respond he picked me up and balanced me over his shoulder. I let out a breath.

 My feet throbbed with relief and I was too tired and too sore to feel any particular way about the indignity of it.

 We waited for the rest of the group to be brought out, then they arranged us in a line based on what Eric deemed valuable, saving the best of the batch for last.

 I was placed near the back.

 The auction square was already full when we arrived. The redhead went first. Her crying and kicking drew laughter from the crowd and she went for fifty coins.

 After that the rest of our group seemed to understand that resistance was entertainment and nothing more.

 They went quietly, one after the other, the bids climbing slowly. By the time it got to my turn the highest offer made all day was two hundred coins.

The crowd's reaction when they saw me was immediate.

The crowd roared with excitement, bodies pressing forward. I stood at the pillar and stared them all down.

 The smell hit me first, the smell of wolves packed together in the afternoon heat.

 They were from different packs, different sizes and ranks, but they all had the same look in their eyes when they stared up at me.

I lifted my chin and stared back at them defiantly.

 Before Eric could open his mouth a pot bellied man near the front thrust his hand up.

 "Five hundred coins." He announced.

 The crowd erupted. The man beside him laughed and clapped him on the back.

 "Belafair, she's a pretty little thing but five hundred coins is a bit much for a human."

 Belafair made a show of spreading his fingers wide, his gold rings catching the light. "Money is not an issue."

 He said proudly and the crowd around him laughed and hollered. Eric opened his mouth.

 "Five thousand coins." The voice came from somewhere in the crowd. It wasn't loud.

 It didn't need to be. It cut straight through the noise without effort and the auction square went completely silent.

 Everyone started looking around.

 Belafair spotted him first, a figure standing toward the back with a purple hood pulled low.

 Belafair pushed through the crowd and grabbed him by the collar, hauling him forward.

 "The auction square is no place for jokes." He spat. I watched from the pillar.

 Something about the stranger snagged my attention in a way I couldn't explain.

 The stranger looked down at Belafair's hand on his collar.

 Then he reached up and closed his fingers around Belafair's wrist tightly earning help from him.

 "Who said I was joking?" He asked, loud enough for the whole square to hear. Belafair's face contorted.

 He writhed, twisting his arm trying to free his wrist from the stranger's grip, and in his struggle his free hand caught the stranger's hood and pulled it off.

 The square gasped. Belafair went completely pale.

 His mouth opened and closed.

 The hand that had grabbed the collar dropped to his side immediately.

 "King Ronan." He sputtered.

 The king turned away from him like he was already forgotten.

 His eyes moved through the crowd and found me at the pillar.

 As our eyes met, a single word echoed in my head. "Mate."