by Noelle Marie
“Hey,” she said, trying to sit up in her attempt to reassure him. “I’m fine. A little achy, maybe-”
“No!” Caleb commanded, gentle hands pushing on her shoulders and forcing her to lay back down on the couch. “Just rest. You hit your head when you fell.” Well, that certainly explained the cold compress and the dull throb originating from the side of her skull. “Sophie and Zane went to go find Bastian. They should be back any minute-”
The sound of the front double doors bursting open, ricocheting loudly against their adjacent walls, had Katherine cringing into the cushions.
“Make that right now,” Caleb corrected himself, releasing a relieved gust of air.
Katherine wished she felt that same relief.
Bastian sprang into the room, his entire body exuding tension. When his frantic eyes caught hold of hers, the barest hint of it fled. That, however, didn’t stop him from striding over and kneeling down next to her in the same spot Markus had occupied mere minutes before. He grasped either side of her face, eyes roaming over her features as he searched for any obvious sign of injury. They fixated on her left temple where Katherine knew a pretty bruise must have been blossoming.
Sophie and Zane appeared in the living room moments later, both looking rather harried as they hurried in after their ruffled alpha.
“What happened?” Bastian asked, brushing a tender thumb over the bruise on her forehead and unknowingly repeating Katherine’s earlier words. She fought to contain a ping of annoyance when instead of addressing the question to her, however, he turned his head and directed it at Caleb, who continued to look on with worried eyes.
“I don’t know,” he admitted, sounding pained at the confession. “She just fell. I tried to catch her, but it happened so suddenly. I mean, she looked a little pale this morning and didn’t eat much for breakfast, but that’s not totally abnormal for her lately,” he rambled nervously.
Katherine fought the urge to wriggle in guilt at the obvious worry in his voice.
Sophie laid a comforting hand on Caleb’s shoulder, shooting her brother a pointed look. “It’s okay, Caleb, it’s not your fault. It’s not anyone’s fault. I was making my way to the farmers’ market when I saw it myself. She just fainted, and I don’t think anyone, not even Katherine, knows why.”
Sophie’s eyes shifted to the small brunette. She raised her eyebrows, giving her a chance to speak up and deny it.
Katherine bit her lip.
Bastian nodded determinedly at her lack of response. “Markus, go get Gabriela.”
Katherine couldn’t stop an automatic scowl from spreading across her face at the woman’s name. “I don’t need a doctor,” she argued.
Bastian spared her a glance. “Gabriela’s a healer, not a doctor.”
She narrowed her eyes at the obvious brush-off. “I’m fine,” she reiterated, attempting to prove the point by throwing her feet on the floor and maneuvering herself into a sitting position.
Despite the fact that she’d fainted for no apparent reason, she did feel fine. And, okay, maybe she was a little worried that if Gabriela looked at her she’d somehow catch on to the fact that Katherine was losing her inner wolf. Then the pack would know, Bastian would know, and they’d... they’d... well, she didn’t know what they’d do! She didn’t know what she would do if it was true.
“You just collapsed!” Bastian snapped. “You’re not fine.”
“Like Caleb said, maybe I should have eaten more for breakfast.”
“She skipped supper yesterday, too,” he piped up.
Katherine shot him a betrayed look, attempting to communicate with her eyes what a tattletale he was being, but all he did was shrug helplessly in return. It was true; she had skipped supper, but who could blame her when the meat-stuffed calzone Caleb had made had smelt like death warmed over?
Bastian could, apparently.
His blue eyes bore into her green ones. “Why are you skipping meals?” he demanded.
“It was just one,” she shot back. “The last I checked it wasn’t a crime to not be hungry.”
Although her pack mates with the more vigorous appetites – Markus and Zane, for example – were probably baffled by the concept.
Bastian ran an agitated hand through his mop of hair. “Why are you trying to get out of this?”
Katherine felt backed into a corner by the question and so grasped onto the only ace she had up her sleeve, and hoping it would aptly distract Bastian, she flung it at him. “I don’t know. Why are you trying to hide the fact that Haven Falls’ population is dying out?”
Bastian balked in surprise. A tense silence fell.
“Where did you hear that?” he asked after a while.
He shot an accusing glance at Markus, who immediately threw his hands in the air, shaking his head in denial. “Don’t look at me. I haven’t said jack to her about it.”
“I overheard it in town,” she admitted easily. “Did the rest of you know about it, too?” she asked, surveying the room.
By the way Zane shifted uncomfortably, Sophie bit her bottom lip, and Caleb suddenly refused to meet her eyes, she knew she had her answer. Anger burned hot in her belly. “So what? Why was it so important that I didn’t know about this? Is it because I’m a bitten wolf and you blame me for this mess? Because I’m pretty much barren, or whatever?”
“Katherine, no-!”
“Why would you think-?”
“Enough!” Bastian bellowed. He pressed the palms of his hands hard into his eye sockets. “Everyone but Katherine, out,” he commanded, the authority in his voice leaving no room for argument.
But Katherine was always up for a challenge. She scowled. “You can’t kick everybody out. This is their house, too. God, you can be such a prick-”
“Fine,” Bastian interrupted her. She released an embarrassing yelp when he abruptly stood, throwing one arm over her shoulders and looping the other under her knees so that he could heave her up with him. He cradled her like a child, and she scowled as he marched her to their shared bedroom, closing the door behind them before depositing her on the bed.
She glared up at him. “Well?”
“What exactly did you hear?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Why? So you can pick and choose what to tell me? I heard enough, alright?”
When he didn’t immediately explain, Katherine rolled her eyes. “I heard that Haven Falls’ werewolf population is slowly diminishing. That no one’s had a baby in nearly a year. That some people think allowing born and bitten wolves to mate is behind the problem, and that a solution has been offered before you to join forces with another colony, but you’ve refused. And, oh yeah, the same people who think that bitten wolves have somehow diluted the gene pool, think you’re rejecting said solution because of me.” Katherine took a deep breath. “That’s what I’ve heard.”
Bastian’s scowl grew more pronounced the more information she spewed at him. By the end of her rant, his nostrils were flared and the dark blue of his eyes more closely resembled the black of his pupils. “That’s not why,” he spat. “You have nothing to do with my decision.”
Katherine crossed her arms over her chest. “Oh really? Why haven’t you told me any of this then?”
“Because I didn’t want you to think that any of this... shit had anything to do with you!”
“Well, good job with that one,” she retorted.
Bastian took a moment to compose himself, drawing in a deep breath through clenched teeth before stiffly taking a seat next to Katherine on the bed. He reached over, and she reluctantly allowed him to take one of her hands in his. “The western colony is... primitive,” he finally settled on after making sure she was looking at him. “When I was a kid, my father visited there as an ambassador of sorts. When he returned, he told me how they live. They reside in primitive huts, sleep in the dirt, and eat meat raw straight from animal carcasses even when they’re in their human forms. Worse, they know nothing of order. Violence is prevalent, and there are constant battles for p
ower with no lone alpha serving the community for long. I assure you that it would be a mistake to have them here; they would never assimilate.”
Katherine pressed her lips together. She understood what Bastian was saying, and yet... “But that was what? Five, ten years ago when your father visited? Maybe they’ve changed since then. How would you know? You’ve never been there. And if there really is a problem, if the werewolf population of Haven Falls is dying out,” – Bastian snorted at that, probably thinking the proclamation dramatic, but she ignored him and continued on – “joining with them seems like a logical solution.”
“No.” His answer was flat, void of emotion, and left absolutely no room for argument.
“But-”
“Katherine,” he snapped, “it’s perfectly normal for our population to fluctuate. As far as I’m concerned, there is yet to be cause for panic. If the time comes when that changes, I’d still think of another solution before inviting them here.”
“Like what?” she asked sharply. “Are you going to go around biting innocent people on the full moon?”
Bastian shot her a betrayed look, but he needn’t have bothered. She felt horrible as soon as the words escaped her mouth.
“Of course not,” he said after a moment. “You know as well as I do that survival from the bite is far from guaranteed. I would never willingly subject anyone to it.”
“I know,” Katherine murmured, not quite meeting his eyes as she played with a loose thread at the bottom of her shirt. “I’m sorry.”
Bastian sighed, dropping her hand and throwing a muscled arm over her shoulders instead. He pulled her to him until she was practically on his lap, her head buried in the crook of his neck. “Just trust me on this, alright?” he said after a moment, pressing a chaste kiss to the crown of her hair. “I know what I’m doing.”
Katherine felt any anger she may have still been holding on to dissolve. “So you’re not just refusing to invite this western colony to join us to spare my feelings or something?” she asked, words coming out half-muffled as she talked into his shirt. “Since they have a plethora of potential bedmates for you to choose from and I apparently can’t get pregnant?”
“What?” he asked, sounding truly baffled. He pulled away and forced her to look up at him. “Of course not.”
She believed him. And yet... she bit her bottom lip. “When were you going to tell me? That the odds of us ever having kids are next to nil?”
Bastian frowned, tucking a wisp of loose hair behind her ear. “I thought you knew. I mean, didn’t you have some sort of Sex Ed. class at school? Plus, we haven’t exactly been careful.”
Katherine felt a heated blush threatening to climb up her neck at that. After all, the second part of his statement was true. As for school, she’d either been gone when they’d covered that particular subject, or it was considered common enough knowledge that it was never even brought up.
“Does it bother you?” he asked, and Katherine realized she’d been silent for a beat too long.
She shrugged. Until that day, she’d never really had reason to think about it. Why would she? She was only seventeen. “Does it bother you?” she shot back.
“No.” His answer was immediate and absolute. “Katherine, to be frank, I don’t want kids. After what happened to my parents... I mean, I don’t think I could handle the emotional investment.” He paused. “I have enough people to worry about as it is,” he added more light-heartedly, shooting her a playful smirk.
Katherine rolled her eyes, but couldn’t deny the fact that a smile was threatening to break loose across her face. “And your position as head alpha? I mean, don’t you need an heir, or whatever?” she asked, repeating one of the words she had heard earlier that morning. “Won’t the other alphas make you step aside if you don’t produce one?”
Bastian snorted, waving off her concerns. “No one’s a good enough fighter to challenge me.” Katherine was tempted to call him arrogant, but she knew deep down that he wasn’t being conceited; he was simply stating the truth. “It’s a worry for far in the future, anyhow. I’ll probably hand the title over to one of Sophie’s kids if they display alpha tendencies.” He paused. “Well, if she ever settles down, anyway,” he added, almost offhandedly.
“Are you sure?” Katherine pressed.
Bastian gently grasped either side of her face, forcing her to meet his eyes. “All I need is you.”
The mix of relief and elation those words caused had Katherine darting forward and pressing her lips to his. Bastian reacted immediately, his hands slinking down to her hips, where he grabbed her and lifted her fully into his lap. One of his hands remained there, at the small of her back, pressing Katherine fully to him, while the other tangled itself in her hair, holding her still while his lips battled eagerly with hers, his tongue lapping at her mouth.
Not to be outdone, Katherine busied her own hands, sneaking them up under his shirt to explore the lines and dips of muscle they knew so well. When one of her hands drifted lower to play with the waistband of his jeans, however, Bastian pulled away. “Don’t think,” he said, breathing heavily, “that I’ve forgotten about the fact you fainted a little more than an hour ago.” He kissed her jaw before sucking on the sensitive skin below her ear.
She gasped, and he groaned against her.
“If you feel the slightest bit sick, or if I even suspect you do,” he continued, downright panting, “you’re going straight to Gabriela so she can look you over. Got it?”
Katherine smirked. “Yes, sir.”
She had the pleasure of seeing his eyes darken with lust before his mouth once again connected with hers. Katherine spent the next hour in a blissful daze as Bastian used his tongue and teeth to show her over and over again just how much he meant it when he said he didn’t need anyone but her.
* * *
Katherine’s stomach churned, and she felt the bile burning up her esophagus about two seconds before it happened.
She managed to make it to the bathroom just in time, throwing herself over the rim of the toilet bowl where she promptly puked. The vomit burnt the inside of her nose and mouth as she violently heaved. Again and again she gagged on the foul liquid as her stomach spasmed and forced it out of her body.
Hot tears stung her eyes, and she was gulping in lungfuls of air by the time the organ had completely emptied itself. Wholly spent, she flushed the toilet before resting her forehead against the cool porcelain seat.
The bitter, unpleasant taste of vomit stuck to the roof of her mouth, and acknowledging her gawking audience for the first time, she gestured vaguely at it. “Can someone get me a to-othbrush?” she asked, voice cracking on the last word.
Caleb was quick to oblige, ducking out of the doorway where the rest of her pack, sans Bastian, was standing.
He wasn’t standing there because he’d been the first to follow her when she’d abruptly booked it from the kitchen. She’d been forcing down a second helping of Caleb’s meat-filled potpie under Bastian’s watchful gaze when the urge to vomit had abruptly struck her. Bastian had thrown himself down beside her on the bathroom floor, where he was still kneeling, one of his hands rubbing soothing circles on her back.
She risked a peek at him.
And immediately regretted it.
His brow was creased in concern, his eyes tight with worry. She knew what was about to come out of his mouth before he even opened it. “You’re going to see the doctor.”
If she wasn’t so exhausted from puking her guts out, Katherine would have been tempted to sassily point out that Gabriela was a healer. As it was, she barely had enough energy left to argue about seeing her. With what the woman might discover – namely, that Katherine was losing her inner wolf – looming in the forefront of her mind, however, she had to try. “But it’s the full moon tonight. I promise I’m-”
“I swear to God, Katherine, if the next words out of your mouth are that you’re fine, I’m going to-”
“She has a point.”
> Both of their heads swiveled towards the doorway at the unexpected interruption. It was Sophie, pushing her way into the room past a frowning Markus and Zane. Caleb had returned from fetching her toothbrush and was standing in the doorway as well, grip lax on her brush as he stared.
“What?” Bastian snapped.
“Not about being fine,” the blonde was quick to explain. “Something is obviously wrong.” Sophie eyed Katherine, something curious in her eyes that the brunette couldn’t quite place. “But tonight is the full moon,” she continued, directing her gaze back at Bastian. “Everyone will be meeting for the gathering in a few hours. Gabriela probably doesn’t have time to see her right now.”
Bastian snorted. “She’ll make time.” The “or else” was implied.
“Yeah, except she and her pack could already be gone, well on their way to the clearing,” Sophie pointed out.
Bastian frowned, the tick in his jaw the only physical sign of his annoyance as he stared hard at the floor, thinking his sister’s words over.
“I’ll go see Gabriela first thing tomorrow,” Katherine piped up hesitantly. After all, surely she’d feel better after a night spent running around as a wolf. It would give her a chance to reconnect with that side of herself.
“Fine,” Bastian said finally, though his frown didn’t ease, “but no moon gathering for you.” The hand rubbing circles on her back drifted down to grasp one of her hips. “You’re stuck here, and I’m staying with you.”
Katherine was about to agree when Sophie once again spoke up. “You’ve got to go to the moon gathering. Surely it’s not a good idea for the head alpha to miss it with all the recent unrest.”
Bastian scowled. “I don’t care.”
“Actually, she’s probably right,” Markus piped up hesitantly from the doorway. “You don’t want other alphas getting ideas.”
“Go,” Sophie reiterated before Bastian could argue more. “I’ll stay here with Katherine. Everything will be fine; trust me.”
Bastian’s eyes hardened. “I’ve trusted you with her before.”
“Uh, the “her” you’re speaking of is right here,” Katherine pointed out, the utter annoyance at being talked about as if she wasn’t in the room enough to finally inject her with some of her usual spunk. She used the edges of the toilet to push herself into an upright position.