Page 6 of Brutally Mated
“Seriously, baby,” Thorn is saying. “You’re so talented. I would have had to have bitten him or staked him or something.”
Tabby smiles, pleased.
The magic will have to be curbed, but I am not sure if that is the main problem in this moment. I am more concerned with her absconding from the feast.
“You left without us. Where were you going?”
“Oh,” she says. “Away.”
“Away.”
“Yes.” She’s smirking at me with obvious enjoyment, but I think I see a glimmer of fear in her pretty eyes. She wants me to think she’s a feisty little mountain she-wolf, but she’s hiding a frightened pup inside.
She is afraid of us. She was not prepared to be given to three males. She is a virgin and she fears for her body and what we will do to it later.
“We did not give you permission to leave without us,” I say, making no mention of her magic power. We will have to discuss that revelation privately and decide what to do about it. In theworld we intend to live, a single little witch could be more trouble than the entire mountain range of undead beasts.
She stares at me blankly.
“You need to obey us,” I tell her.
“The summon sunlight cantrip isn’t the only one I know,” she says, looking at me with a stormy expression. “I don’t need to obey you. You just saw I can protect myself.”
“Yes, you can,” Thorn says, a note of excitement in his tone. I make an impatient gesture at him. The last thing she needs is encouragement. This girl is almost entirely out of control. To make matters worse, she could not have said anything more incendiary if she tried. Not only has she flaunted magic, she now dares to threaten me with it?
The trick was impressive, but that is what it is. A trick of the light. There is more to surviving than being able to call down light. If the vampire had been a little faster, or if there had been another in the shadows, or if some other predator had emerged, she would be consumed as surely as we are standing here now.
She is putting herself at risk and she is threatening me. None of this will go unpunished.
“Little girl, if you dare to try any of your workings on me, I promise you I will thrash you past the point of your ability to bear it. I will break you over my knee.”
Her stormy expression deepens, then turns into a pout. “That’s not fair.”
I do not dignify that complaint with a response.
“Bring her,” I instruct Thorn and Skor. “We have to deal with this tonight.”
Tabby
I knew they’d come for me. My scent is strong and they are hunters.
Some small part of me hoped they’d just let me go. I am terrified of each of them, though I would never admit it. What would be the point of telling them of my fear? My experience in the pack teaches me that expressing weakness is a good way to be hurt.
The big man with the notes of gray in his beard is angry at me. Krall. He looks like his name, like he came out of some far northern cave. He wears the most scars out of any of his brothers. I bet he thinks that means he’s the strongest and the eldest, so he gets more say in things. I’m going to teach him otherwise. Tonight he’s going to learn that being old and battle-worn means nothing when you’re far from home and fighting enemies that don’t play by material rules.
My father is only a little older than he is. I try not to think about that. Feels wrong to be attracted to someone who could literally be my father. Oh, no. I’m blushing again. I’m glad for the night hiding my reactions. The way his eyes flashed when I reminded him that he could be subject to my magic as well is still making my knees feel a bit like jelly.
They pick up their clothes on the way back, but not before I have seen them all naked. They are all very muscular and very attractive. I am starting to feel a certain warmth low in my bellywhen I look at the way their cocks swing weightily between their thighs. Wolves are always casual with nudity. It is unavoidable when you shift so regularly. But this is different. So very, very different.
I don’t know where to look, but everywhere there is something to see. A thick, muscular ass. A set of broad, powerful shoulders. The long, strong legs of a warrior. All of these men are my mates. Just thinking that makes me feel lightheaded.
I am marched off back to their camp, which they must have set up before they came to my father’s den. As camps go, it is not bad. It is not good either. They have fortified it with fire and a few sharp pointed stakes hammered into the ground, but it is still simply a tent with a bit of heat. It’s not going to do anything to keep us safe if someone competent isn’t holding watch—and there’s nobody competent to keep watch besides me.
I could tell them the charms and sigils they need to use to keep the camp safe, or I could let the dark crawlers in the night sneak in and simply take them. That’s what’s supposed to happen. That’s what they deserve to happen. They don’t understand that they are the sacrifice for the pack. The dark things will feed on them, and they’ll be sated for a few more months.
“That was amazing,” Thorn says to me, his tone low so the other two don’t hear him, or can at least pretend not to hear him. “How did you learn how to do that?”
“My mother taught me to read before she died, and it was all in her books,” I say. “She would perform little charms from time to time and I followed what she did.”
