by Noah Harris
Erik said nothing, only frowned as he rooted around for another rock to throw. Dante didn’t push it, knowing his best friend wasn’t a fan of the arrangement. Erik was a strong believer in individuality and personal choice, and it offended him that Dante was forced to have little choice in who his mate was. It had been a fact of Dante’s life for years, and he’d come to accept it, albeit grudgingly. There was no alternative for him, certainly not a more appealing one, so despite his own reservations, he was set on this course. They’d had more than a few conversations, and downright arguments about it in the past, and Dante could see his friend was trying to avoid another one.
“How long do we have?” Erik finally asked, sounding depressed.
“You already know how long,” Dante told him quietly.
Erik threw another rock. “Yeah, but it always sounds better when you say it out loud. It just sounds like a downer when I do.”
Wishing they weren’t fixated on how long Dante had left, he sighed. “Noah and his pack will be showing up in a few days. We’ll have a big celebration for his arrival, pulling out all the stops to make him feel special and welcome. Everyone, from allied septs, and even Lone Wolves, will be welcome to show up during the celebration. The Elders have made sure everyone in the area knows what’s happening, trying to make a big deal out of it. I think they’re using it to show that we’re respectful to anyone who’s an ally.”
“So, still playing the game of politics then?” Erik asked with a smirk.
“Something like that,” Dante shrugged.
“So once this guy shows up, you’re going to be whisked away and I won’t get to see you again, huh?” Erik asked, trying to sound like he was joking.
“Well, I mean, despite it all being arranged, there’s still a courtship process to go through. He can’t just show up and carry me off just because our septs arranged for us to be together. Tradition dictates that he’s gotta win me over before he can claim me,” Dante said.
Erik laughed. “Claim you, huh? Sounds like fun.”
Dante rolled his eyes. “Yes, claim me. I mean, it would be a mutual claiming, but still.”
“At least the guy has to work for it. What if he doesn’t win you over?” Erik asked.
Dante frowned. “What do you mean?”
Erik stopped looking for another rock and turned to face Dante. “Well, what happens if you just plain don’t like him? If he has to work to win you over, that means there’s a chance he might not win you over at all. What’s he gonna do then?”
“I don’t really think that’s possible,” Dante answered.
“Why not? The guy could be a jerk or a big wimp. You saying you could be with someone who was a wimp?” Erik demanded.
“What makes you think I couldn’t be?” Dante asked with a huff.
Erik’s brow cocked. “I’ve seen the guys you have fun with when no one else is looking, not one of them was what you’d call a wimp.”
Dante laughed. “Okay, fair point, but that’s not going to be an issue. You don’t get to be a respected alpha of an even more respected pack by being a wimp. From what I understand, he’s a capable warrior and leader. He’s not going to be a wimp.”
Another thought seemed to flit through Erik’s mind. “Geez, guess that means you can’t sleep with anyone else, can you?”
Even though his future was inevitable and had been decided years in advance, Dante had at least been able to enjoy relative freedom with how he spent his time. Werewolves were a passionate species, their behavior often heavily influenced by animal instincts. Dante might have been destined to be mated to Noah one day, but thankfully, no one expected him to walk into the arrangement with his virginity intact.
Dante shot his friend a crooked grin. “Why, is your curiosity finally getting the best of you? You finally giving in and ready to give me a go?”
Erik snorted. “Oh baby, I love it when you talk dirty to me.”
Dante motioned to his body. “You’ve got limited time now, so if you’re going to take a ride on the Dante, you gotta do it now.”
Erik wrinkled his nose, tossing a handful of dirt at Dante. “Gross! It’d be like sleeping with my brother.”
Dante posed. “Oh c’mon, we can break all the rules.”
“Oh God, please stop before I get sick,” Erik begged as he made exaggerated gagging noises.
“Now I’ll have to live the rest of my life, knowing I was rejected by you. How can you sleep at night, knowing you’ve given my ego such a blow?” Dante demanded, putting as much mock insult into his voice as he could.
“You’ve managed to live with it for years, so I think you can do it for several more. Plus, we both know you couldn’t handle this anyway,” Erik said with a cocky slant to his gaze.
“Not that there’s much there to handle,” Dante said with an air of innocence and a smirk.
He wasn’t surprised when he saw Erik launch himself at him, knocking the both of them into the dirt. Dante yelped, laughing and rolling in the soft dirt as he tried to wrangle his friend off him. Erik was cursing playfully as he tried to pin Dante down. It was an old game, and neither of them were really trying to best the other. They grappled in the dirt until they both lay, side by side, gazing up at the clear blue sky while they gasped for air and grinned at one another foolishly.
That had always been one of the more curious aspects of Dante and Erik’s friendship, at least as far as the rest of the sept was concerned. Both of them were, physically anyway, exactly each other’s type. Dante’s partners were noticeably smaller than him, whereas Erik, when he did sleep with a man, tended to choose partners who were around Dante’s size. Not once had Dante thought about doing anything sexual with Erik and as far as he knew, Erik had never had those kinds of thoughts either. It hadn’t stopped the sept from looking askance at them, wondering about it was just something that went on between the two of them when no one was watching.
“It’s weird to think about,” Erik finally said without moving.
“What? Me being someone’s mate?” Dante asked.
Erik shook his head. “I’ve always known that one day this would happen, you know? But it always seemed like it was forever down the road. Now, in less than a month, you’re going to be hitched to some guy you barely know and leaving the sept. I’m losing my best friend, and I don’t even know where the time went.”
Dante reached forward to rest his hand on his friend’s chest. “You’re not losing me. I’m going to be part of an allied sept. We can visit one another whenever we want.”
“That’s not really the same thing. I’m going to miss having you around every day. Watching the Elders try to hunt you down, only for Rosa to dig you out of some hole and drag you back by your ear. I even have fun watching you flirt with some of the guests that come in, because you’re a giant attention whore. It’s going to be weird not hearing you laughing at something ridiculous or see the sept pups get excited when they see you. The kids love you,” Erik explained with a sigh, patting Dante’s hand.
Dante smiled sadly. “Even if this wasn’t arranged, our lives would have to change some time. We couldn’t always live like we have been, we had to grow up.”
Erik nodded. “I know, but I guess it’s just different because we always knew this was going to happen. It makes it harder, knowing we were always on borrowed time. Makes me feel like we didn’t do enough with it.”
Dante didn’t know what to say to that. He lapsed into silence punctuated only by the soft sounds of the lake lapping at the shore. He knew there was nothing he could say that would make Erik feel better. If he were honest, he wished for the same thing Erik did. Dante wished he’d had more say in what happened to him, even though he’d known that was never possible. Even if something had happened to Noah, some accident or if he’d died in battle, someone else would have stepped up to take his place.
“This is how it’s always been. We’ve just gotta accept that,” Dante said, wondering, not for the first time, who he was trying
to convince.
“Doesn’t mean we have to like it though,” Erik grumbled.
“Hey, for all we know, I could meet the guy and he could end up being my True Mate,” Dante said, trying to lighten up.
Erik flopped his head to the side so he was smirking at Dante. “You really think you’re going to meet the guy you were arranged to be mates with and you’ll suddenly experience the Joining?”
“Hey, stranger things have happened. The Elders are supposed to do their best to represent what Gaia wants for all of us, right? Maybe they got lucky this time around and somehow stumbled on the will of the goddess,” Dante said with a laugh.
Erik squinted at him. “Are you getting soft and romantic on me all of a sudden?”
“Me? Never. I don’t have a romantic bone in my body,” Dante insisted.
At least that’s what he tried to tell himself, and anyone else who’d listen. The romantic side of his life had been decided before his first change, and that kind of practical arrangement didn’t leave much room for romantic fantasies. He considered himself pragmatic about the arrangement with Noah, and actively denied wanting anything else.
Still, there was something appealing about the idea of finding his True Mate. The Joining was said to be a magical moment, shared between two werewolves destined to be with one another by the will of Gaia. The patron goddess of both werewolves and everything in creation couldn’t be wrong, and she supposedly used the poorly defined Joining to display her desire for two specific werewolves to share their lives. It was a rare occurrence, and one that was highly sought after and respected by werewolves across the globe. Most werewolves never got to experience it, having to settle either for an arrangement between their pack and another to find a mate, or through the old-fashioned courtship route, or as Erik called it, dating.
“Wouldn’t it be something though? If you found your true mate before Noah arrived. The Elders would be so pissed,” Erik said with a snort.
“I don’t think that would stop them from trying to push me into being with Noah though,” Dante replied.
Erik laughed. “You really think they’d be so stubborn about it that they’d ignore a Joining? C’mon, even the Elders aren’t so bullheaded that they’d try to deny the will of Gaia, right?”
In theory, the Elders were supposed to be representatives of both their own people and the voice of Gaia. Dante had never quite said it aloud, but sometimes he wondered just how true either of those things were.
Dante shook his head. “I don’t know what they’d do if that happened, though yeah, I’m sure they’d be pretty pissed. Not that they’d admit it, since that’s supposed to be a divine moment and all. Still, no point in even thinking about it, right?”
Erik shrugged. “Okay, so it’ll never happen, but that doesn’t mean it’s not funny thinking about it. Can you imagine the looks on their faces?”
“I don’t think it would be any different than the time we ambushed that human truck,” Dante said with a small laugh.
Erik burst into a fit of laughter at the memory. “I almost forgot about that. They were so pissed about it, too. They almost had my hide over that.”
“It was kind of obvious it was your idea,” Dante snickered.
“Look, I had to introduce you to the world of pie one way or another, okay? It’s not my fault there was a truck full of them driving through the nearby pass,” Erik snorted.
“I still can’t believe the look on that human’s face when he got out of his truck to find two wolves waiting for him,” Dante said, trying to contain his laughter.
Erik wasn’t bothering to restrain his laughter. “Wolves are something humans see on TV or in zoos. That poor guy wasn’t prepared to meet two of them face-to-face. Bet he was even more shocked when he came back and found his truck had been raided.”
Dante’s shoulders shook with laughter, “And then the Elders found us, buried in the boxes from the pies, unable to move.”
“You ate so much,” Erik cackled.
“They were so good!” Dante protested, still laughing.
Erik rolled to one side, propping himself up on one arm. “I’m going to miss you. I don’t know what I’ll do once you’re gone.”
Dante smiled wistfully up at his friend, “I’m sure you’ll find some way to cause trouble.”
“Maybe. I guess we’ll see, huh?” Erik asked.
“Yeah, I guess we will.”
Chapter Three
An elbow dug into Dante’s side, as one of the Elders hissed quietly. “At least look like you’re enjoying yourself.”
Dante sighed, glancing at Elder Marrow. “I would if you guys would let me enjoy myself.”
“You don’t need alcohol to enjoy yourself,” the older man told him.
It wasn’t just about that, and the Elder damn well knew it. Dante wasn’t thrilled that he was being kept away from the alcohol, but it was also about the fact that everything he did or didn’t do at the celebration was being dictated by the Elders. He’d made a fuss over not being able to drink simply because it was the easiest thing for him to focus on. His outfit, where he stood, who he spoke to, and how he came across had all been determined and controlled from the moment he’d arrived. If he’d been allowed to just have a single glass of something stronger than water or juice, he might have been able to calm down.
“Am I allowed to cross my arms?” Dante asked, meaning it sarcastically.
Elder Marrow didn’t look amused. “You can stand upright and proud. Let your poor, future mate believe you’re a civilized creature for at least a few moments before he learns the truth.”
It was said harshly, but Dante didn’t take offense. Elder Marrow was by far the most easygoing of all the Elders. He was the one least likely to come down on Dante when he didn’t necessarily fit the mold expected of the last living heir to a prestigious line of werewolves. If it weren’t for all the expectation placed on Dante, he suspected Elder Marrow would probably get along with him considerably better than he did. As it was, Dante was probably one of his greatest headaches and frustrations.
“I promise to try not to scare him off right away,” Dante said softly.
Elder Marrow glanced at him, then out at the gathering of werewolves in the decorated clearing. “I have no doubt you’ll do just fine. Despite the fact that you like to act like a feral animal at times, you are utterly charming in your own right. I’m sure Alpha Noah will find some quality in you to enjoy.”
“Was that a dirty joke?” Dante asked innocently.
Elder Marrow sighed. “Perhaps you should remain silent when you meet him. Try for a charming smile, a wistful nod of your head, puppy dog eyes, anything.”
Dante gave him a crooked grin. “I promise to be on my absolute, best behavior.”
The Elder gazed back at him, the corners of his mouth twitching as he looked as if he were trying to not smile. Dante knew his reputation for being a bit wild at times followed him around like a cloud, but he felt he was more than capable of doing what needed to be done when the time came. Let everyone say what they wanted to about his tendency to wander off, get into trouble, or just simply look as if he wasn’t paying attention. There wasn’t a lesson he’d been given yet that he hadn’t learned well, and no skill that he couldn’t display.
Elder Marrow’s eyes slipped over Dante’s shoulders, widening as he took in a sharp breath. “Then I hope you’re ready, because they’re here.”
Dante’s stomach tightened and he remained motionless as Elder Marrow hustled off to greet the new arrivals. Dante couldn’t see anyone specifically, but it was obvious the group had the attention of just about everyone at the celebration. Any moment now, his soon-to-be mate would be standing before him, and the eyes of the sept would be on him to mark every word and move he made.
“Ever feel like a prize piece of meat put on display?” A male voice asked from over his shoulder.
Dante turned, looking for the owner of the voice before finally having to glance down. Unli
ke humans, the average height of werewolves, especially males, was at least six feet. The man who’d spoken was noticeably shorter than that, having to turn his chin upward to look into Dante’s face. In the light of the fire, it was difficult to tell if the man’s hair was simply dark brown or as black as Dante’s own. His eyes were just as dark, seeming to soak in the light of the nearby torches, glowing with them as he smirked up at Dante.
Dante tried to smile at the stranger. “I would never be so foolish as to say something like that.”
The werewolf tipped a mug toward his mouth with a snort. “Out loud you mean?”
“I’ve no idea what you mean,” Dante said evasively, a genuine smile gracing his mouth.
“I’m Liam,” the man said as he raised his hand in greeting.
“You’ve probably already heard my name spoken at least a dozen times by now, but I’m Dante,” he offered in reply.
Liam nodded. “You’re the talk of the whole sept. Then again, when word was passed my way of what was going on here, your name was used about that many times. Yours and your new mate’s.”
“Not my mate just yet,” Dante corrected, maybe a little too quickly.
Liam seemed to notice the wince and nodded. “Fair enough. The guy has to earn the right to call you that after all, right?”
Dante nodded. “That’s what they tell me.”
Liam laughed at that, the sound wild and playful. “And I have no doubt they tell you a lot of things, and frequently.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you at any sept gatherings before,” Dante noted.
Liam’s smile turned wry. “No, you wouldn’t. Loners aren’t known for getting invited to social events all that much.”
Dante nodded in understanding, hoping his face didn’t betray any negative emotions. Lone Wolves, or simply Loners for short, were werewolves who, through either choice or circumstance, had no pack and were not directly aligned to a specific sept. Dante himself could have ended up being a Loner were it not for his pack’s prestigious history. It was that fact that encouraged the sept to take him on as a ward. There were always circumstances, usually unhappy ones, that led to a werewolf becoming a Lone Wolf. Dante could feel his curiosity rising, aching to know if it had been forced upon Liam or if he’d chosen the path of a Loner.