Page 47 of Her Second-Hand Mate

“Good to see you again, Matthews,” Dominic said curtly. “This is my mate, Penelope.”

“Lovely to meet you, Luna,” Matthews bowed his head respectfully and even bared his neck slightly. What a confusing Alpha.

“Likewise,” I said and made a mental note to ask Dominic about him later.

There was a male with the King, a doctor, who Dominic later told me was the heir to the North Carolina pack – but he left it all behind for some reason and is now working as a doctor at the Royal Hospital. He’s probably the one treating the Spruce Mountain Luna.

Regina Haines is her name. I saw her in court today. She’s tall and graceful, very regal-looking even though her hair is cut short like a male’s. She seems calm and composed for someone who’s on trial for murder.

I couldn’t smell her since she's being given wolfsbane while she's on trial. Must feel awful to be cut off from your wolf like that. At least she’s not suffering her mate’s death. Small mercies.

They’re charging her both for killing her mate and for killing her Alpha, even though they’re the same person. Doesn’t seem fair, but I guess it was difficult to choose which of his roles was more important. Turns out, their pack allowed the Alpha to take a breeder since she hadn’t produced a pup in the four years they’ve been mated.

Can you imagine? How awful and how humiliating! I didn’t even know that was an option for mated Alphas. To desecrateyour mating and humiliate your Luna like that! And the Alpha decided everything with his Council behind her back.

Then the breeder got pregnant and said that the Luna pushed her down the stairs, for which the Alpha imprisoned her. For three months! Then the breeder gave birth, and it turned out that the pup wasn’t the Alpha’s!

I swear to you, Nana, I had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming up some soap opera in my sleep! So the Alpha killed the breeder and her lover in the most gruesome way. Just thinking about it turns my stomach. I’ll spare you the details on that one.

I remembered how I gasped and how my hand flew to my mouth. Dominic wasn’t unaffected either. I hadn’t seen him so tense since the early months of our mating.

His jaw was clenched so hard that I thought he might break a tooth soon. I briefly wondered whether he’d take a breeder if we ultimately failed to produce a pup. I pushed the thought away. It was still early, maybe the last heat took.

Further testimony revealed that the dead Alpha had cheated on his mate even outside of agreed-upon breeding times (not that the Luna agreed to those either, but you know what I mean). And to punish her for pushing his breeder down the stairs, he killed her old nanny, who’d basically raised her. And he did it in front of her, while commanding the Luna not to look away. Nana, he commanded his own mate! Who does that?!

So that's all we learned today.

We had dinner with Father and Eden afterward, and I actually enjoyed seeing her again. We went for a walk later, just the twoof us. It was quiet and peaceful outside, and as the snow was falling, it gave me hope that, in the morning, the world would be clean again. Not for Luna Regina, maybe, but for the rest of us.

I didn’t tell Nana how haunted Eden looked as she gazed at the silent snow. She must have been remembering her first mate, who was killed by a bear who attacked them during the two months they were supposed to spend in the wilderness of Alaska as per their mating customs.

Why had I never noticed how sad she always seemed while I was growing up? A memory from the trial flashed in my mind’s eye: an equally sad, pale, blonde female in a black dress, looking like she was perpetually mourning something or someone as she sat next to one of the Alphas. I hoped I’d see her again tomorrow, maybe strike up a conversation with her.

???

I never thought I’d say this to you, Nana, but your mother-in-law... she seems like an angel now. Luna Regina’s mother-in-law testified today, and she was so full of spite and bile and pure hatred towards her son’s mate – it was unsettling. You’d think he was her mate or something. I made myself sick with this thought, ugh. Yuck.

Unfortunately, her son was really out of his mind by the end. The things he said and did were not indicative of a sane wolf. The worst thing is that he kept commanding her. I don’t know why that one bothers me the most. It should be the infidelity, right?But somehow, taking her choices from her by force seems the worst of his sins. Oh, and the murder.

I asked Dominic about him last night, but he said he'd always seemed nice and normal at the Alpha summits they’d attended together. And then, after Dominic's first mate died, his uncle usually went in his stead, so he hadn’t seen Alpha Henry in a while.

Then Dominic went somewhere and was gone until 2 am, at least. I knew that because that’s how long I waited for him before succumbing to the emotional and mental exhaustion of the trial. He was curt and abrupt with me this morning at breakfast, and it was all very different from the new dynamic that we’d enjoyed over the holidays.

The trial was clearly stressful for him, and I didn’t know how to help him. I did remember, in the panic I was experiencing in our room the night before, that this was where Cassie died, so maybe those memories were upsetting him. I just wished he’d talk to me about it. I could be a good listener, I could comfort him.

The Court organized a formal tea for the Lunas this afternoon, and most of them were really nice and friendly. We weren’t allowed to talk about the trial, but I could tell all of us were shaken by what we’d heard.

I was especially intrigued by Agnes, the Minnesotan Luna. She is so delicate and quiet, and there’s something about her that drew me to her. We spent the afternoon chatting about our packs, her two pups, and our Luna duties. I always love learning about other packs and how they do things!

She told me how their unmated females wear gilt circlets on their heads from the time they’re 15, and once they’re mated, their mate takes the circlet off and puts a golden bracelet on their wrist, adorned with a tiny lock that only the mate has the key to. They never take the bracelet off after that.

The female’s family is expected to provide a dowry for her – which seems really unfair to poor families, but I didn’t want to insult their pack, so I didn’t say it. She told me the males dig out swords that their male ancestors were buried with before they can claim their mate and that one was even harder to stay silent about. She said it was a Viking custom – I’ll have to go to the library once I’m back home to read up on them.

Tomorrow is the last day of the trial and I guess we’ll finally hear from Luna Regina herself. I’m really nervous for her, if that makes sense. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow.

???

You know, Nana, a wolf can sometimes think that his or her problems are the worst in the world. One can obsess over insignificant details and paint oneself as a victim or as the damaged party, but then you come face-to-face with true tragedy, and you’re left speechless. And deeply ashamed of how petty you used to be.

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