Max shook his head. “No one has resisted the call.”
“No one has tried.” She reached out and held his hand, pulling it into her lap reverently. She stared at it for a long time, using one perfectly shaped fingernail to trace the lines of his large palm. When she looked at him again, her eyes were swimming pools of pale blue. “You’re my mate. What do think will happen to me if you kill yourself?”
His shoulders slumped in defeat. “I dunno, Sue.”
“Yes, you do.” She smiled at him sadly, as if knowing an escape was nothing but a fantasy anyway. “We’re a pair, Max.”
Max could never kill himself. His destiny was tied firmly to Susie’s. Survival was impossible for them individually. As inconvenient as it was, if he died, she’d have to follow him in death.
“I’ll resist the call,” he told her, squeezing her hand softly.
“Really?” She frowned. “How?”
“I guess we’ll just have to figure it out.”
She gave him a brilliant smile, one that lit up her whole face, making Max realize she truly was radiant. “Thanks, Max.”
Max nodded, knowing she didn’t want him to have the call any more than he did. “Sure, Susie Bee.”
“Come here.” She grabbed the lapels of his tuxedo and pulled him forward. “You’re a mess.”
Susie got on her knees and started buttoning his shirt and then worked at retying his tie. When she was done she brushed at his shoulders and ran her fingers through his hair, pushing the thick, midnight strands away from his face.
“You look dashing,” she announced once she finished.
He snorted. “Like you know.”
“Oh, well, excuse me,” she said haughtily. “You get a few hormones and suddenly you’re cocky. I have a perfectly good pair of eyes that are fully capable of determining if something or someone is visually pleasing.”
“Really?”
She smiled. “You’re very handsome. You’re the tallest male here. Your shoulders are broader than Uncle Doug’s. You’ve got beautiful, shiny black hair and a stunning set of eyes, if I do say so myself.”
“I think they look better on you.” He studied her eyes again, finding that they were much more enchanting when she smiled.
“No, you’ve got the contrast,” she argued. “They stand out more on you, because you’ve got color in your face.”
He snorted, looking at his pale hand. While his father was tan as a black wolf, Max had never been able to get more than a hint of color in the summer, but that could have more to do with his despising the heat than anything. “I’d hardly say I have color.”
“More than me.” She arched an eyebrow. “I’m so pale I’m practically translucent.”
“Nah, Susie Bee.” He ran the back of his hand against her smooth cheek that was flushed light pink. Her skin was so soft it was startling. How had he missed how wonderful it felt to touch her? “You’ve got beautiful skin.”
She bit her lip and returned the gesture. She caressed his face for a second before she used her finger to lift his chin, forcing him to look up from where his gaze had drifted back to the low neckline of her dress and the rounded curves of her breasts.
“You flashed again.”
“Yeah.” He pushed her away from him and finally stood. On instinct he held out his hand and helped her up, but the feel of her small, smooth hand in his larger one pulsed through him and he let go once she was standing. “Maybe we shouldn’t touch anymore.”
Susie looked stricken. “Ever?”
“Just during the full moon.”
“Where on Earth have you two been?”
Max and Susie both turned as his father came through the large terrace doors. He looked furious. His huge frame was stiff and commanding, though Max realized he was larger in height and build than his father now. He goggled that this was the type of imposing figure he presented – tall, with broad shoulders, cut muscles and hair as black as midnight that fell into his eyes when he was angry.
His father looked older than other adult werewolves, probably closer to thirty, as opposed to the rest who usually stopped showing signs of aging past their early twenties. Max hoped he would also have some signs of maturity in his face before he stopped aging. As it was, kids at school had a hard time believing Douglas Wellington was really his father. He appeared too young to have a teenage child. Aunt Emma was always being confused as his sister, with hair as black as Max’s and a strikingly beautiful face with features that were similar to his.
“Were you hiding?” his father asked as he approached them. He eyed all the empty glasses and shook his head. “Hiding and drinking. This is a terrible example that you are setting for your people, Maxwell.”
“We were hot.” Max’s voice threatened of violence. “There is no air in there and Susie was feeling faint.”
“I’m sure the twenty glasses of brandy you fetched her didn’t help her equilibrium,” Douglas snapped and Max saw his eyes flash, going from dark brown to glowing silver then back to brown again. “You are taking poor care of your queen.”
“At least I don’t parade her around like acquired treasure,” Max snarled at him. “We’re nothing to you but trophies, breeding horses that if you’re lucky, will produce more trophies to be tortured.”
Douglas drew himself up to his full height. His eyes flashed again, this time more noticeably as he issued a low, purely animalist growl. “I lost my sister to bring your queen into the world!”
Max snorted, turning to Susie, whose eyes were round in horror. “Notice he never mentions my mother. Your mother we hear about endlessly. My mother was nothing but human, easily sacrificed.” He turned back to his father and issued his own growl, one far fiercer than his father had managed. “You are no better than the rogue werewolves. Killing humans for your own gain.”
His father lunged at him, baring sharp, canine fangs. Max was shocked at just how easy it was to overcome him and throw such a powerful werewolf against the wall. He wrapped his fingers around his father’s throat, squeezing hard enough to cut off his air supply and still the effort required very little strength from Max. He held his father, a werewolf he had always feared, by the neck with one hand.
“Maxwell!” Aunt Emma screamed as she ran out the terrace doors towards them. She pulled at the arm that held her mate against the wall with little effect. “Please, he can’t breathe.”
“I don’t even have a picture of her.” Max refused to let his father loose. “She died for me and I don’t even have a picture!”
“We’ll find you a picture!” Emma promised and then sobbed, “You’re going to kill him.”
“Max.”
Max turned to Susie, seeing the horror and concern on her face as she walked up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. “Let him go.”
Max shook his head. “He doesn’t love me.”
“I love you.” She ran her fingers down his arm until they rested over the hand squeezing his father’s throat. “Come on, Max. Let him go. For me.”
Susie easily pried his fingers away. If it had to do with her own imposing strength or Max’s will bending to hers, he didn’t know. Realizing Susie was not going to let him do any more harm, he stepped back willingly and ran a hand through his hair as his father leaned down, choking and gasping.
“Don’t yell at me anymore.” Max took a deep breath to clear his head. “And don’t attack me. You attacked me. Don’t attack me again.”
“He won’t.” Susie leaned into him, wrapping her arm around his waist. “He didn’t mean to, Max.”
“It’s the running. The moon has risen.” Emma finally looked up at Max from where she was crouched next to his father. “You know it makes him confrontational.”
“He needs to pick someone else to be confrontational with.”
Max noticed they had an audience. Werewolves stared from the large glass windows and past the open terrace door, but no one moved, none dared make a sound. It was as if they were all afraid to breathe.
“I am a good wolf,” he said defensively as he glared at the intruders on their private family argument. “I just don’t like being yelled at. No one should yell at me.”
“They won’t, Max.”
Susie led him through the open doors and everyone parted for them, taking several hushed steps back.
“I think I need more whiskey,” he whispered to her.
Susie nodded. “We’ll get you some.”
“Where are you taking him?” Douglas asked, coughing once more before he stood to his full height and followed them back into the ballroom.
“I’m taking him to our rooms,” Susie said firmly. “He needs sleep.”
“He’s coming to the running.”
Max could feel the excitement that pulsed through the room. This was what they had all been waiting for since the day Susie had sealed their fate by coming into the world on the Winter Solstice, three years after his own birth on the same sacred occasion, effectively crowning them head king and queen without their permission.
The death of the royal alpha line had slowly drained most of their magic. No wolf pack was fully functional without a mated alpha pair. In the case of werewolves, four pairs were required for true order, one pair for each season to complete the cycle. He and Susie were winter, just one part of the four, yet it was only through them that the rest of the monarchy could be born. Typically only an alpha pair could produce more alpha pairs. It was their job to bring the autumn and spring pairs into the world. Summer would be impossible for them because summer could not be born of winter. They would have to come from either the autumn or spring pairs.
It was a heavy duty on their shoulders. The fate of an entire people rested in their hands. Without the monarchy, the beta and omega werewolves would never be able to start having puppies again. Their magic would be minimal, confined to immortality, small amounts of hypnotism to keep humans from revealing their secrets and their ability to shape shift once they reached maturity. An existence devoid of magic and offspring had become nearly unbearable for all of them. It was why so many went rogue and hunted humans instead of animals.
Max understood it. Sometimes he was even willing to be a participant in it, but right then he didn’t care about their suffering. He only knew his own pain. He was just eighteen and he was fully selfish in his youth.
“I’m not ready for the running,” he said without turning to look back at his father.
“Maxwell, you’ve got the call. We all saw evidence of it.”
“He’s not ready, Uncle Doug,” Susie pleaded.
“I’m not mad at you, son.” Douglas approached Max cautiously. He reached out, putting a hand gently on his shoulder. “We all have issues with our tempers when we first get the call. It was to be expected. I just underestimated the gravity of it.”
“I’m not ready,” Max growled as lightning struck the grounds, frighteningly close to the palace.
His father turned to look out the window, watching as lightning continued to strike and thunder rolled in the sky. Ice would come soon, making the running far more challenging than any save the few arctic wolves in attendance wanted to endure.
His father held up his hands in defeat.
“Fine, Maxwell, until you are ready,” he said in a pacifying voice. “But, it’s impossible to resist the call to roam once it starts. No one can defy nature, not even you. Fighting it will only hurt you.”
“I want to wait for Susie,” he proclaimed, not knowing why he said it, other than the fact it felt right.
It must have been the right thing to say. The tension in the room released instantly, replaced by the sound of female sighs, all of them already hormonal and humming in near desperate sexual arousal as the full moon brought them into full heat.
“Take him to bed, Susan.”
“Yes, Uncle Doug.”
Susie once again resumed her slow work of leading him out of the ballroom, heeded now by the interruption of well-wishers.
“The Gods blessed you, Your Highness.”
Susie nodded, her arm still firmly holding Max up as she clutched at his waist. “Thank you.”
“The king is such a treasure. My Darwin would have never fought the call for me.”
“He is strong. He will resist for you, Your Highness.”
“Gods’ blessings that your cycle will come to you soon, Your Highness. May you be in heat by the next full moon and full mated.”
The whole room intoned. “Gods’ blessings, may the spring and autumn pairs come early to the radiant queen and her powerful king.”
Max groaned. “I need huge, enormous amounts of whiskey. Bottles and bottles of it.”
“You and me both,” Susie whispered. “By Gods, I have no idea where you came up with that, but it was brilliant. The love in the room is strangling me.”
Max actually laughed and stopped his flight from the ballroom to lean down and place a chaste kiss on Susie’s full lips. “I love you.”
All the females in the room sighed once more. If they didn’t hear Max’s proclamation of love, they heard word of it as frantic whispers spread like wildfire.
“You already made your point, Romeo.” Susie smiled warmly at him anyway. “No need to kick a dead dog.”
“That was heartfelt.”
Susie rolled her eyes. “Come on, you big ball of hormones. We’ll get you to our rooms and then finally figure out how much whiskey it takes to make an alpha wolf officially drunk.”