Page 5 of The Wolf Queen

“Convince the Granians of anything other than looking after their own arses?” Maynard had been a petty officer, but the upheaval after our loss at Snowmere had meant he’d received a rapid promotion through the ranks.

“No. We must convince the Granians that they need to look after their own arses,” I corrected.

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Dane’s smile sharpened, then he nodded. “It is the only way forward. Either that or we quit the country altogether and try our luck over the mountains in the lowland countries.”

There was a moment of silence. Some Strelans had done that after my people had first invaded the country, seeing the hopelessness of the situation and preferring to leave their country than be cooped up in one part of it. We could do that, I thought, the idea sparking something inside my chest—a tiny flame that needed fuel to burn—but instead of encouraging it, I squashed it viciously. Most Strelans had stayed, tied to this country by blood or worship, family or culture, and they had persisted, no matter what the people I was born into had done.

We would also persist.

“Exactly.” I nodded to Dane and he smiled wider, his whole face lighting up. I basked in that radiant expression for as long as I could spare him my focus, then continued to drive my point home. “Strelae has been a thorn in the side of Grania since the moment they landed on our shores. My father’s people were mightily inconvenienced by the fact that people already existed in rich lands that the Granians wanted to take and they discovered just how sharp that thorn was. In Eleanor’s time, Strelans fought Granians, tore them apart on the battlefield, making clear just how little use their light armour was, forcing the Granians to develop a heavy plate that could withstand a half-shifted Strelan.”

I saw each man straighten then, that valiant fight for freedom seeming to fire something in them.

“And our people very nearly won the day. I’m not sure if it’s taught in schools on this side of the border, but the generals needed the alliance with Strelae as much as Strelans needed Granian aggression to stop.” I swallowed hard, feeling a deeply entrenched need to keep this information from them, the facts having been drilled into the head of every Granian whilst in the school room. “It’s painted now as a glorious victory, but the fact remains that the Granian army was being resupplied by the Farradorian Empire and those supply lines had been broken. If Eleanor…”

That sentence could have ended in so many ways, but instead of going through each one, I fixed my gaze on each man.

“We need to save our people. We need to take our country back, drive Callum out and burn his fucking corpse on a pyre, to ensure that he and his Reavers never rise again. And to do that, we have to get across the border; claim some of those rich lands for ourselves.”

I didn’t see the men around me or the walls of the old farmhouse. Rather my mind’s eye conjured a familiar keep, surrounded by moors on one side and good farmland on the other. It was a place I’d loved and hated in turns, but now felt curiously dispassionate about. It was an asset, held by a weak man, and I needed to take it.

“We’ll take my father’s lands,” I told them, “and hole up there, eat, heal, replenish. If we can succeed there, we can succeed anywhere. And then we can move forward, taking Strelan lands back, piece by piece, and raising a mighty army to sweep back in and smash Callum’s skull against the base of my throne.”

I was telling them what they wanted to hear, but words alone would not be enough to convince people to take such a drastic step. Even so, the murmurs grew louder, more excited, and I felt as though I was absorbing that energy like a sponge. My eyes found Dane’s again, holding them for a second, seeing the bright gleam there, as well as the fear. How the hell would we achieve this? We both wondered, but that mind that was always ticking away inside his head had found a worthy problem to ponder. We would find a way. We had to.

“Darcy contains the power of the true queen inside her,” he told them and somehow that was enough to sway the gathered council. “With that power, we will succeed.”

“Which means you need to teach me about what that power is supposed to do.”

I said the words gently, then had to fight to stop myself from locking my teeth together, because that’s when I saw it. The blue fire of healing that Gael and I had been able to summon, then that feeling of pack that came from fighting by the Maidens’ sides and last of all this. My bloody hand, those crystals, the transformation of every one of my people into wolves as we streamed through the caverns to here.

“That’s something I think I can assist with.” Selene, head of the Wolf Maidens, was standing at the back of the room, but now she came forward. “If you were born in Strelae, if you were the queen to be, you would have come to us and we would’ve trained you.” Her eyes slid to the men around. “That’s what our order used to do, before we were reduced to being dance masters for pampered girls.”

“Show us then,” the general said, with a nod. “Show us what the power of the true queen actually is, beyond the myths, and then maybe I can find a way for us to invade Grania.”

Chapter5

Selene strode onto the rocky field we were using as a practice ground with a strange kind of confidence buoying her step, but it was one I didn’t share.

And neither did my mates.

“We’re going to… what?” Gael muttered under his breath, shooting everyone else dark looks, even as he moved closer to me. “Force Darcy to perform like a fucking monkey in front of everyone, when she should be resting?”

He stepped in front of me, cupping my cheeks in his hands in a heartbreakingly familiar way, but it felt like an age since he’d last done this. I stared into that fractured blue eye, wanting to dive into the cloudy depths and just lose myself, but I couldn’t. When I went to pull away, he stopped me.

“Darcy, love…” He was hurting just as much as I was and that’s what made it so hard to be around him. Each one of us was an overfilled cup of pain and we kept our distance for fear of splashing on the other. “You don’t have to… We could…”

I placed my hands over his and closed my eyes for just a second, letting the war, our situation, everything just wash away. I felt him, felt the bond, like an invisible rope that tethered the two of us together, never letting us get too far away from the other. We had tested its limits since emerging from the caves under Snowmere, but now that I was here, back in his orbit, something inside me settled.

“That.” My eyes flicked open to find we had an audience. Selene watched all five of us with what seemed almost a wistful gaze before seeming to realise, her cheeks warming slightly. “That’s what you need in order to tap into your powers and you already know this.” Her tone was slightly chiding, implying that it was obvious, but when I looked at her in confusion, she continued. “Connection. It’s where all people find their power. We Maidens tap into a collective power.” Ayla, one of the other Maidens, sidled up to her and Selene slung her arm around the other woman’s neck. “It’s why we never take husbands, never bear children. Our connection is utterly focussed on each other.”

She gazed down into the other woman’s eyes and, at that, I understood what she was saying. Something throbbed between them, something hot and true. Both women flushed before turning their attention back to us.

“You are a pack.”

I knew it, felt it, in so many ways every day, though many of which I discounted. Lying down beside them in our tent and knowing that they were there, sometimes needing to hear the slow whistle of their breaths before I could fall asleep myself. The way Axe dogged my every step, guarding me even to the point of waiting outside the latrines. The way Weyland made sure the children were all right when I was dragged away by one of the many demands on my time, then delivered them to me at just the right moment, to bring me back to what was important. His easy smile, Gael’s much more guarded one and Dane’s keen, searching look, like he saw something inside me that I didn’t recognise. I nodded then in agreement with her words.

“A pack is like a family, but bound by tighter bonds, stronger instincts. Look after it, protect it, provide for it,” she said. “That sense of pack can extend to a large family group, in the case of a lord, or even to a whole town or county. But for a queen?” Her smile had an edge to it, part mad, part sad. “The whole country must become her pack and she must lead it.” She turned to the general. “What is the objective that you want this pack to achieve?”

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