Page 135 of The Wolf King

Across the platform, Blake’s lips curve into a wicked smile.

I try to think of something, anything, I can do to make this right, to make it look like Callum is not challenging his king.

Then the Wolf King’s jaw tightens as he stares at Callum.

“A word, please, Brother,” he says.

My eyebrows lift as James walks past us both, heads down the steps leading down from the platform, and through a door behind the throne.

Callum scans the Great Hall as a mixture of hostile and intrigued faces stare up at us. When he doesn’t find what, or who, he is looking for, he turns to Blake.

He gives me a hard look before turning on his heel and following the Wolf King through the door—leaving me alone with the Wolves.

Blake saunters over with his hands in his pockets. He stares out at the room.

“Well, it was bold, I’ll give you that,” he says.

Chapter Forty-Seven

“You said be bold,” I hiss.

“Yes, look him in the eye, answer his questions, don’t cower before him. I didn’t expect you to challenge his claim to the throne!” Blake laughs, and it’s a real laugh, too. Not contrived, like usual. “That was excellent. Not for you, obviously. But for me, that was truly entertaining.”

“Shut up, Blake.”

The Great Hall is filled with agitated voices. Someone shouts, “Death to the Southlands king!”

I chew my bottom lip. “Callum is the Wolf King’s brother?”

I am standing on the precipice of a storm that could break at any moment. All it will take is one wolf to charge onto this platform, one alpha to draw his sword. Robert certainly looks like he wants to as he mutters darkly to the large red-haired male beside him.

I glance at the door behind the throne. If the worst happens, that is where I will run. I would rather take my chances against the Wolf King with Callum at my side, than this unruly mob with only Blake for company.

Blake is completely at ease beside me, his hands in the pockets of his breeches. It is as if he is looking out onto one of the Northlands lochs on a peaceful morning.

His eyebrow cocks up. “He didn’t tell you?”

There’s an irritating smugness to his tone. He knows damn well that Callum didn’t tell me, and he is clearly trying to get a rise out of me.

An ugly feeling of betrayal twists with the anxiety building in my stomach. Why would Callum have kept something so important from me?

I want to voice my concern, but I do not want Blake to see my weakness. I swallow. I focus on one of the tapestries that shows the Elderwolf howling at the moon so I don’t have to look at the sea of hostile faces.

“They have a... complicated relationship.” Blake’s voice drops to a whisper—answering my unasked question anyway.

I try not to take the bait, yet I cannot fight the curiosity that flares within. “How so?”

Blake’s lips curve into a smile as if he’s pleased I’m willing to play his game with him.

“Their father started all this.” He inclines his head at the crowd of Wolves in the hall. “Bringing all the clans together. He was the first Wolf King. When he... died—”

Blake puts a strange weight on the word, and his eyes glint in the morning light that seeps through the narrow windows.

“—it left the position open. It was assumed one of his sons would take the title, though things do not work the same way here as they do in the Southlands. No one is entitled to the position based on the blood that runs in their veins. Rather, it is based on the blood that they spill. Any wolf can win the throne.”

“By challenging the current king?”

Blake inclines his head. “The appointment is more political than they will admit, though. Without the backing of at least half of the clans, the title means nothing.”

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