To Mate an Assassin: The Lost Alphars Series, Book 1

by Ceri Grenelle

  When Lottie wasn’t in the room, or one of the other imbeciles claiming to be Captain and Lieutenant, Cymbeline found herself staring at the string collection. She imagined the Alphar sitting at that piano and playing some tune to match his mood, the music drifting out the window and filling the hearts of whoever happened to be on the great lawn. Did he play something when he first became Alphar? It was probably a strong and victorious melody like The Anvil Chorus.

  She’d kept up her litany of inner mocking as she touched and fiddled with all the instruments, but it was hard to keep her thoughts in their disdainful and cynical vein when her gaze spotted a guitar made for much smaller hands. The wood was old yet cared for, and she could see a new fret board had recently been installed. Cymbeline’s hands had smoothed over the dark wood of the tiny headstock and taut lines of strings. If she knew nothing else about this man, she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he loved music. It was almost sweet, thinking of him as a young boy learning to play and she almost found herself smiling at the image. But then the skin of her wrists would itch and pinch from the cuffs and she was brought back to her present situation.

  Her strength and full use of limbs had returned, but instead of concentrating her energy on formulating an escape plan, she was cruelly subjected to lessons on Were society. It was demeaning and absurd to the point of being hilarious. She couldn’t help but be insulted, thinking how someone in her position, a position within the very society she was being forced to have a kindergarten level of instruction on, was above this humiliating treatment. She’d been taught by some of the greatest minds, not that they remembered after losing any memories of their time with her per their contracts. To think she needed to learn about pack structure from two people still doubting the existence of Incendiaries was laughable. But she listened patiently like a good student, knowing any amount of good behavior would help in an earlier release from the cruel and unusual punishment she was forced to endure.

  Rhiannon, the tall and haughty blonde woman claiming to be Lieutenant, stood in front of a wall-mounted flat screen TV. A digital diagram was on the display and the Lieutenant had a laser pointer to help with her instruction. That spiteful part of Cymbeline, an allotment of her subconscious she hadn’t dealt with since puberty, wished Rhiannon and the other man present, Aaron, were feline shifters. She gleefully imagined them scrabbling after that laser pointer and looking like idiots while doing it. She’d video it and post it to some shifter-centric message board. Cymbeline appreciated this spiteful fragment of her mind, she decided, it was great stress relief.

  “For the purpose of this discussion we are going to discuss an average pack structure, one that would exist outside The Mansion, as we live under the Alphar and that comes with special circumstances. At the top we have the alpha. Directly below the alpha we have his or her sergeants, there are usually two. Family or childhood friends usually occupy these positions, as the alpha must have complete trust in them. Beneath that we have the warriors—a type of soldier. There can be an indeterminate number of those depending on the amount of dominants there are in a pack. Then come the dominants that choose positions other than soldiers. After that are maternal figures and submissives—no less important than the dominants—and then of course the young ones. Oh, there is also the head physician, or healer, who holds a position more on the outside of the hierarchy. Dominants and submissives alike look to our healer for care and guidance. Clear?” Rhiannon smiled expectantly at Cymbeline, waiting for a sign the pupil was listening. Cymbeline grudgingly nodded, prompting Rhiannon to clap her hands once and continue. Cymbeline had the strong urge to strangle her with the translucent, magical handcuff chain.

  “Splendid. Any questions so far?” Cymbeline simply stared at her torturer. “Moving on. Now, the mate of the alpha, feminine or male, has a position outside the structure of the pack.” And right then it was made crystal clear why she was being tortured with this lecture. “The mate is considered the alpha’s equal, no matter how dominant or submissive that mate is. She or he supports the alpha and creates connections within the pack that the alpha can sometimes be too busy to foster as often as he or she would like. The mate is the human connection, the alpha’s voice. Now that’s not to say the alpha doesn’t spend any one-on-one time with his people, but during times of conflict, it is a great benefit to any pack for the alpha to have a mate.”

  “Understood,” Cymbeline said shortly, wanting Rhiannon to move on to another topic even though, and she’d never admit this, she had next to no knowledge regarding the position of the mate in a pack. In truth she was a bit pissed with her trainers’ lack of information on the subject. At the same time, she understood why they never thought to teach her about mating. She was a machine, an asset. Machines didn’t mate. It was one of her main directives to cage her emotions. Being taught the details of mating might have generated unnecessary fantasies she would never be able to fulfill.

  “Now. The Alphar’s mate—”

  That was enough. “I do not need to know about the mate of the Alphar. I understand completely what your goal is in this endeavor. I know everything my trainers thought I should know about pack structure, and that is all I wish to know. Stop treating me like an ignorant foreigner.”

  “Aren’t you the least bit curious about what’s happening to you?” Rhiannon asked, folding her arms across her slim frame and leaning against the wall, one eyebrow arched in a not too subtle judgment. Cymbeline’s hackles rose, her Wolf’s rumbling growl fueling her irritation. The Alphar may have different motives for keeping her here, but to this woman she was simply an intruder, a science experiment.

  “I do not acknowledge that anything is happening to me.” Cymbeline tried to calm her breathing, her pulse ratcheting up under the stress of being confined. Keep it together, she chanted in her mind. She couldn’t unleash here, they would all die, and they didn’t deserve that. No matter how much they pissed her off. “I am not curious about anything beyond why I am still being kept against my will in the personal bedroom of the Alphar. I want to discuss my future responsibilities as Incendiary under the rule of the new Alphar and then I am going to leave.”

  Rhiannon exchanged a not too subtle glance with the Captain, sitting on what must have been a sturdy piano bench not to break under his weight. “Fine.” She turned off the laser pointer. “We’ll leave it. For now. But you’re crazy if you think we’re just going to let you roam around HQ without some form of containment. You attacked our men without cause—”

  “They were wet behind the ears and needed a good ass kicking.”

  Rhiannon ignored the acerbic comment. “And the cuffs are staying on until the investigation into your background is complete.”

  “What background?” she asked incredulously, running her hands through her knotted curls. They just didn’t get it. “I don’t exist, I don’t have a past. They erased me the moment they chose me. The only place you will find anything about me is in Riddan’s personal files.”

  “That route is also being investigated,” the Captain said, finally chipping in. “Sorry, Rhi, but I agree with her on the guards’ situation. They need more practical application in what they were taught besides standing and guarding a gate all day.” The Captain stood, buttoning his well-cut suit. The man had an almost magnetic bearing about him. She could see, for all his jovial smiles and chuckles, how this man could be respected and looked up to as Captain. There was an uncivilized, nearly barbaric quality to him. It was hiding just beneath the finely pressed suit and amber tiepin. Bear shifters were never to be underestimated. “Listen, Ms. Kendall, you may be a skilled assassin as you claim, but you can’t dodge this subject forever. Especially with Kerrick as your mate. The bastard is nothing if not determined.”

  Rhiannon broke her caustic rigidity and snorted, pulling out her phone to start typing. “Truer words.”

  “Isn’t that a bit disrespectful when discussing your Alphar?” Cymbeline was pe
rplexed by their attitude. She had always been taught to allot proper regard to the Alphar and treat him with deference. As she would have done with this Alphar, if he had known anything about her and wasn’t making audacious claims that she was his mate.

  “Of course we show him respect,” Rhiannon said, snapping the phone shut with a short growl. “He’s our Alphar. He has sacrificed more than you could ever understand to become leader and save this damn territory from Riddan’s shit.”

  “He’s more than just our Alphar, he’s our family.” Aaron pulled Rhiannon into his big body, rubbing her shoulder and nuzzling her temple in a familiar way.

  “I would give my life for him, and he would more than gladly do the same for us,” Rhiannon said, her eyes bright with anger. “We’ve earned the right to tease and laugh with him. Don’t judge us because you don’t understand us.” And Cymbeline saw through the outward abrasive nature of the Lieutenant to the loyal heart and graceful intelligence. She saw it in the set of the woman’s jaw and her absolute conviction that the Alphar would keep them safe and do what was right for their people. It must be wonderful, having that much faith in someone. Cymbeline was almost jealous.

  “Anyway, he’s practically our brother.” Aaron tugged his Lieutenant’s hair playfully, earning a swat. “We’ve been ragging on each other since we were kids. So let’s talk about what the Incendiary does.”

  Cymbeline nodded, thankful to be back on familiar territory. “Shouldn’t the Alphar be here for this as well?” Her Wolf sat up in attention, wagging her tail in anticipation, and smiling a sharp-toothed, open-mouthed grin at the prospect of seeing the one she chose to mate. Traitor.

  “No, he will not,” Rhiannon said, taking a seat in one of the many armchairs about the room. “Kerrick is in conference with a Vryk ambassador. We shouldn’t expect him for a long while.”

  “Why is that?” Cymbeline couldn’t help but note Rhiannon’s frustration at the mention of the Vrykolakas. Cymbeline knew many Vrykolakas, had even had a more than memorable intimate encounter with one or two in the past. The majority of them were self-absorbed, their vanity a true weakness, but she had no particular problem with the race as a whole.

  “There is a large Vryk Clan that resides nearby. It’s no secret that we’ve been having land disputes with them since Kerrick ascended. Apparently Riddan had been very compliant in letting them go and do whatever the hell they wanted.” She stuck her face back in her phone. Cymbeline sensed if she could, the woman would spend her life buried in some form of technology.

  “Crazy bastard. You met Riddan, right?” Aaron asked, sitting in a seat near Cymbeline.

  “When I took my oath to serve him.”

  “What was your impression?”

  “It is not my place to say.” Cymbeline was reluctant to engage either of them in a conversation involving her personal feelings or opinions. They would clearly report any discussions they had shared back to the Alphar, and for some reason she found that disconcerting. Not because she was reporting to her Alphar on what she was saying, she expected that of any Lieutenant, but because it was this particular Alphar, this man, that she was reporting to.

  “Why is that?” Aaron tilted his head inquisitively, his long braid spilling to the side of his shoulder. The hair was thick and black, nearly feminine in its lustrous length. Cymbeline couldn’t imagine why he would possibly want hair so long, that sort of vanity could only hinder him in a battle. He and the Alphar were so different, Rhiannon as well, how could they possibly be related?

  “The Alphar, Riddan, was my superior. My liege. I was not trained to have an opinion on him. I was trained for one purpose since childhood. To serve and protect my Alphar and his people in a way that keeps me outside of any pack structure and emotionally detached.” Not that the last one worked out so well for her.

  “Why were you supposed to be emotionally detached?” he asked.

  Cymbeline frowned, considering the two for a moment. As much as the situation she was in irked, Rhiannon and Aaron were the Alphar’s right and left hands, on top of that they were apparently his cousins as Aaron had proclaimed when introducing them. In normal circumstances she would have been reporting to them anyway. So she told them a half-truth. They didn’t need to know the real reason she and any other Incendiaries who survived birth were picked for this position. If word circulated about her origins, what her mother’s irresponsible life as a human made her, there would be a hunt for any baby born as she was. Incendiaries were rare, only a small percentage surviving birth, but it wouldn’t lessen the manhunt when some of the preternaturals realized there were human children in existence that could snap their necks during a tantrum.

  “Emotional detachment is necessary. Would you like to personally know the people you were ordered to hunt down and kill?”

  “Hmm. Good point, especially if you knew and liked them.”

  “It’s the main reason why Incendiaries are necessary in the first place, so those who reside within a pack structure will never have to hunt their kin.”

  Aaron grunted, playing with the end of his braid. “I’m beginning to appreciate you a bit more, little assassin. Tell me what you did for Riddan.”

  “I hunted Weres convicted of grave crimes and rogues.”

  “Who gave you the order and how did you get them?” Rhiannon asked without lifting her head from her phone.

  “The orders are sent to a P.O. Box near my current place of residence, which changes every six to ten years. I was instructed that the person actually sending the orders could vary, but since nobody seemed to know of my existence it must have been Riddan who sent all the orders.”

  The Captain leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees. “As hard as it is to admit Incendiaries are a real thing and not some scary story, I have to say a person of your qualifications could be helpful in situations involving rogues.”

  “Have there been any rogues the past few years?” Cymbeline couldn’t help but ask, as she usually had to dispatch at least three per year.

  “There were a large amount of rogues during Kerrick’s ascension, which, regrettably, is a normal occurrence when a new Alphar takes over. We sent teams to subdue them.” Aaron rung his hands together, his knuckles gone white. “There were at least twenty across the country, and we knew all of them.”

  Cymbeline leaned forward, needing them to understand her purpose. “That’s what I’m here for,” she said gently. “You can depend on me to hunt and take any rogues down.”

  Rhiannon snorted. “You were the Incendiary three years ago. Where were you then? Anyway, do you think Kerrick is going to allow you to keep hunting? Voluntarily put his mate in danger?”

  “He does not have any say in the matter,” Cymbeline said shortly, disturbed by the idea she would not be allowed to fulfill her purpose in life. “I am the Incendiary and I will be the Incendiary for this territory until I die.”

  “He won’t accept that.”

  Cymbeline schooled her emotions, containing her anger no matter how much she wanted to rail at them. It would be too dangerous to let it all go. “He will have to be a big boy, suck it up, and deal with it.”

  Aaron raised his eyebrows, a small smile peeking at his lips. “Fascinating. Do you know how many women would kill to be in your position? He’s handsome, he’s strong, and he’s a good man. He is the most powerful shifter on the North American continent.”

  “If you admire him so much, perhaps you should appeal to be his mate. I am sure you would make a darling couple.”

  Rhiannon burst out laughing, obviously surprised the assassin had a sense of humor. Cymbeline had been rigorously trained throughout her childhood and had lived in isolation the majority of her lifetime, but she was not without a sense of humor. In all honesty she would have actually gone insane without finding little details about life to amuse herself.

  “He’s not my type,” Aaron grumbl
ed.

  “Ah, you prefer husky men?” She couldn’t stop herself, the annoyed look on Aaron’s face was fuel to her sarcastic fire. “Shorter men? Although compared to your stature everyone must seem short.” She had never acted in such a manner with anyone other than Irisi before meeting these people. Chatting with them oddly brought something out of her that made her want to poke and tease. To have fun and not think of hunting.

  “Wow,” Rhiannon said. “Just wow. I like her.” She turned to Cymbeline. “I like you. You get to stay if you keep teasing this tub of lard.”

  Cymbeline groaned. “That is precisely what I do not want.” She squeezed the arms of her chair in frustration, the caged feeling returning once again. “Let me go. I will return to my residence. You will never see me again and when you have a rogue problem, notify me and the problem will go away. I will take care of it efficiently and quietly. Tactfully.”

  “Tactfully?” Aaron asked.

  “My kills are always humane. Something my trainers insisted upon. These rogues were members of our society at one point. They had parents and friends and perhaps just made a poor choice in deciding to Turn. Or maybe the choice was not theirs to begin with. Having been human, I understand the pressures of dealing with the Turn.” The majority of rogues were, sadly, newly Turned shifters. Not every Turn goes smoothly, and not every human was meant to handle the dual nature of a shifter life.

  Aaron nodded. “That’s good to hear.”

  “I am also skilled in the art of torture.”