The North

Chapter 16

How do you bring yourself to believe in the impossible?

Chapter 16
***

Alone in the dark, the walls began to crush in, dark thoughts twisted by guilt and grief eating away at me.

It wasn’t too late to leave. To run out the door while nobody was watching and let the wilderness take me. That was one sure way of keeping the pack safe. That was one sure way of finding out if I’d ever see Mànas again. So I could apologise. So I could explain it should have been me dead, and him here, taking his place on a council where he would have thrived. Others would have loved him. Aonghas deserved an my gratitude too. My Alpha had died so I could remain ignorant of the horrors I was unleashing on my own family.

Yet, even as I thought it, I knew I couldn’t leave. I had to bear the responsibility given to me; I owed my brother and uncle that much if I could do nothing else.

I just had to be patient. Hati had promised me I could ask questions later, had promised me everything would be alright. . .but that was before his visceral reaction to the name I’d offered up from a dream.

“Narfi,” I whispered into the dark, looking around as if I might see his skulking shape in the shadows, then squeezed my eyes shut and rubbed my face, frightened that it would happen.

A dream it might have been, but it held meaning, though not to me. Did that mean it was a vision? Like those that Oighrig had? I’d seen the toll they took on her.

On and on for hours my thoughts rushed, faster than the rapids of the South flowing river.

And I’d kissed Hati. My Alpha. One of the Vargr. Or had he kissed me?
It had happened so fast I didn’t even remember what had started it.

Gods, he had the ability to overpower every other thought when he was in my head. I remembered how spiced his scent had been, the roughness of his fingers gripping my jaw, the bright lava heat in his gaze. Even the timbre of his growl but an echo in my ears made my insides flutter.

I kicked the tangled sheets free of my legs and fanned myself, my body flushed and beaded with sweat. I barely felt the sting of my palm anymore. Back were the primal instincts that told me Hati was right; he was unmated, unclaimed, and willing. My fingers trailed over my hip, hand fisting between my legs to ease the ache, a feeling I’d only ever had when I went into season. Even then, I’d always resisted the urge to find a male. Of course, I’d seen the act before, had smelt the arousal in the air at summer hunts when a pair might trail behind to couple, knew the flush in one’s cheeks when they returned.

There was no shame in unmated wolves having sex with no commitment, but no male had ever inspired my body to react like this.
Rolling onto my stomach, I pressed my face into the pillow and let out a muffled whimper.

How could I want him? Of all the males in the world, why the one that continued to tear down walls, revealing secrets that saw that my life would forever remain as unsettled as snowflakes in a raging storm? A male who was older than I could even guess for him to be the son of The Great Wolf, the grandson of Loki, of all things. An Alpha so far above my station. . .and promised to another female.

How could I be so torn with jealousy and want when I was the reason at least three wolves were dead?

“Have you been up all night?”

Astrid’s voice came from the doorway, but I was too exhausted to lift my face from the pillow. 

“Is it morning?”

She chuckled. “Yes.”

Turning my head and peeling an eye open, I saw light filtering in from the windows to confirm her answer. I sighed and pushed myself to sit up, wondering if I’d managed to catch more than a few minutes sleep at a time between my fretting.