Shifter Fated Mates: Boxed Set
Page 1
Contents
Copyright
Seize the Hunter
Shapeshifter Futuristics by Michelle M. Pillow
About Seize the Hunter
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Rise of the King (King of Prey)
About Rise of the King
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Retribution (Ghost Cats)
About Retribution
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Epilogue
Dance of Souls (Best Intentions)
About Dance of Souls
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Epilogue
The Savage King (Lords of the Var)
About The Savage King
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Warriors of Darkness
About Warriors of Darkness
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
About the Author, Michelle M. Pillow
About the Author, Mandy M. Roth
About the Author, Jaycee Clark
Complimentary Material
Act of Mercy by Mandy M. Roth
The Dead Tell by Jaycee Clark
Barbarian Prince (Dragon Lords) by Michelle M. Pillow
King of Prey (King of Prey) by Mandy M. Roth
Shifter Fated Mates: Box Set
By Michelle M. Pillow, Mandy M. Roth, Jaycee Clark
Includes:
Seize the Hunter by Michelle M. Pillow
Rise of the King by Mandy M. Roth
Retribution by Jaycee Clark
Dance of Souls by Mandy M. Roth
The Savage King by Michelle M. Pillow
Warriors of Darkness by Mandy M. Roth
Shifter Fated Mates: Boxed Set © copyright 2014 by Michelle M. Pillow, Mandy M. Roth, Jaycee Clark
Box Set Electronic Printing June 2014, The Raven Books
Cover art by Natalie Winters, © Copyright 2014
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
All books copyrighted to the author and may not be resold or given away without written permission from the authors, Michelle M. Pillow, Mandy M. Roth, Jaycee Clark.
This novel is a work of fiction. Any and all characters, events, and places are of the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or events or places is merely coincidence. Novel intended for adults only. Must be 18 years or older to read.
Published by The Raven Books
www.RavenHappyHour.com ~ www.TheRavenBooks.com
Raven Books and all affiliate sites and projects are © Copyrighted 2004-2014
Seize the Hunter
By
Michelle M. Pillow
Seize the Hunter © copyright 2006 - 2014 by Michelle M. Pillow
Previously Titled: Talons: Seize the Hunter
Fated Mates: Box Set Electronic Printing June 2014
First Electronic Printing October 2006, The Raven Books
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
All books copyrighted to the author and may not be resold or given away without written permission from the author, Michelle M. Pillow.
This novel is a work of fiction. Any and all characters, events, and places are of the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or events or places is merely coincidence. Novel intended for adults only. Must be 18 years or older to read.
Shapeshifter Futuristics by Michelle M. Pillow
Michelle on Amazon
Dragon Lords Series
Barbarian Prince
Perfect Prince
Dark Prince
Warrior Prince
His Highness The Duke
The Stubborn Lord
The Reluctant Lord
The Impatient Lord
The Dragon’s Queen
Lords of the Var Series
The Savage King
The Playful Prince
The Bound Prince
The Rogue Prince
The Pirate Prince
About Seize the Hunter
Fate is giving her the one man she’d never want for her very own.
Princess Ari of the planet Falconia knows it’s her time to marry and has picked out several suitable men in her mind—none of which are Falcoan Army Commander, Rurik of the Fifth. The man tormented her as a child, causing her untold humiliations. But there is really no need to worry about such a match. Shifters cannot rule and Rurik is a natural born falcon shifter.
Trusting destiny, Ari sips from the Marriage Chalice, sealing her future. But things don’t go as planned. It would seem fate is giving her to the man she despises. How can she find happiness with the one man she could never want for her very own?
Dedication
To my fans. Thank you for your constant support.
Chapter One
Princess Ari of the planet Falconia disliked the warriors who flew in the Falcoan Army, but none punctured her thoughts like Commander Rurik of the Fifth. She hated him and his smug, self-confident attitude. He’d thought himself so superior when they were children—swooping down to knock her on her ass so her new gown would become covered in muck, or overtaking her in games because of his naturally enhanced stamina and strength—and all because he was born a falcon shifter. His kind was rare and given the utmost consideration, as they were destined to lead the armies that guarded her home planet from outsiders. All other warriors turned after birth, their powers enhanced by choice, not fate. Rurik was a falcon by destiny and it made him impossibly arrogant to deal with. He’d grown up training at her home in the palace and was constantly around to torment her.
And now he was coming back.
Well, she had news for him. She was no longer the awkward, gangly girl he’d known. She’d gone through puberty late, very late, but her powers had come to her, as they did all non-shifting Falconians. She’d been sixteen seasons, nearly twenty-four years old according to the calendar they observed from the Old Way, and her father had begun to worry she’d never bloom. Too bad Rurik had been deployed to his post merely days before it happened. She would’ve loved to prove him wrong about her.
It didn’t matter. Now she was a powerful, envied princess, and soon she’d be qu
een. With her mother gone, she was the sole female of power on their planet. She controlled the armies. She controlled Rurik. And, with the evening’s coronation ceremony well upon her, she would control the entire planet. Her father would step aside, for men did not rule as well as women. Falconian males’ blood ran too hot.
That is why Rurik was coming back. All commanders were to be in attendance, for tonight was the shifting of power. But first, there was another ceremony—one that took place this very afternoon. Today she would drink from the sacred Chalice and awake next to the man who was to be their future king, her husband, her mate, her eternal lover. And it couldn’t come too soon, as far as she was concerned.
Whereas normal women of their society could take as many lovers as they pleased, she was held to a higher standard. Until she married, she was allowed three semi-lovers with whom all pleasures of the flesh were allowed but one—the final claiming of her heart. If things got too close, she was obligated to end it. In a life that kept her in front of the eyes of all, she longed for someone to hold her in the night, to look at her with eyes not judging but seeing. She wanted the comfort and safety of a man who would not leave her.
Her first lover, a traveler and diplomat who visited them soon after her powers had come to her all those years ago, had been to spite Rurik. He’d been an enfem, a slender, pale man who spoke and acted as far from a hot-blooded warrior as possible without being an actual woman. She still cursed that wasted pick. Whereas he did hold her, he also cried most of the night speaking of his feelings. Falconian women were stronger than he was. The second man she thought she could someday love, until she realized that lust and love were two different things. The third was a practical choice, if not her best one. He’d been an older man, a trainer who instructed more than participated.
Ari looked at her reflection in the still water that made up one wall of her bedroom. She could touch the wetness, but magic kept it from caving in on her and soaking her. It was a good thing too. Her hair had taken three skilled hairdressers four hours to do. The waist-length red locks were twisted around strands of wire to keep it in place and then bent around her head to fashion an intricately beautiful crown. It towered above her, five hand spans high in the front and tapered down to a half span in the back.
Her gown was of the finest weave, held into place with a thick metal band that wrapped around her chest and back, leaving her tanned shoulders bare. The band was bent to fit her body perfectly, molding along the top of each breast to keep the flowing material that hung from it from falling down. The royal dark-red material moved with her, clinging and releasing her curves with each step as if it were air.
Holding her arms to the side, she waited as her attendants slipped silver coils onto her arms. They wound around from shoulder to wrist, decorated with the shiny black stones found only in the dark depths of Falconia’s lucid waters. A matching stone hung from the chain that dangled from her hair, down the part in the middle of her head.
Black makeup outlined her large blue eyes, made all the more noticeable by a dark red stripe that stretched from temple to temple, encircled both eyes and crossed over the bridge of her nose. The red matched the color on her lips.
Turning, she looked to the mating bed that had been prepared in the center of the room. The Chalice never chose poorly or with cruel intentions. It was neutral and often its choice led to happiness for both parties. At least, it gave a happy start. What the two people did with the mating given them was up to the couple and there had been those who ruined a good thing.
Unlike the peasants who could draw a ring in dirt to form the mating circle, her bed was that of a princess. It was high up on a raised platform, so high she couldn’t see the top of it from her place on the floor. Above it, the water wall curved with the true ceiling, giving her a reflection of thick gold and red pillows encircling the edges and an abundance of silk to lie upon. Sweet herbs were scattered on the floor around it. So strong was the ancient spell, no one could cross the herbs and reach the bed. Only the Chalice’s magic could break through the boundary, carrying her and her husband inside. She knew that even if she were inside, none could see her. All they would see was the view she saw now…a reflection of an empty bed.
Inside the herbal sphere, it would be as dark as deep space. The magical boundary around the edge would keep them from falling as she and her mate consummated what was to be. Whether they shared names before was up to them. Some married couples did, others didn’t. Ari had decided to let the male’s actions guide hers. Clearly, since it was her marriage ceremony, he would know who she was.
“Princess?” Vara, her best friend and head attendant spoke quietly, signifying that they were done and it was time.
In all there were ten attendants, all daughters from noble families. Vara was a cousin, as was her younger sister Petra. Should Ari die, Vara would take the throne. Some thought Ari foolish for keeping Vara as a close and trusted friend, but she wasn’t scared. Vara would never hurt her. Their bond was too close for that. Besides, Ari knew Vara’s deepest secret. She longed to be in the armies, flying into battle. Politics were too tame for her. Someday, Ari hoped to give Vara a chance at her dream, though she hadn’t told her cousin as much.
Petra was just a child—the youngest attendant honored because she was family. Maura, Aurelie, Thora, and Lena came from the different providences around the queendom. She knew them from childhood and thought well enough of them to honor them.
Lucia, Adria, Jael and Clarinda were all from a neighboring castle. Their dark skin was a beautiful brown, enhanced by the beauty of their big, round, brown and green eyes. Their father, Lord Viceious, was Supreme General to all the armies and a man Ari had dealt with on many occasions. Their being honored as attendants was merely politics. She had no close connection to the four girls.
The women had been unusually quiet, as was tradition, giving her time to contemplate whatever it was she should have been contemplating on this day. Unfortunately, Commander Rurik was the thing that kept popping into her head. She knew it was because she’d heard his name that morning, whispered in girlish excitement. A maid had seen him arrive with his men, swooping down from the skies to land within the palace walls.
“I am ready,” Ari stated, lifting her chin. With a small wave, she parted the liquid along the water wall, creating an archway. “Join the others in the hall. Vara will walk with me.”
The attendants rushed from the room through the new door, leaving Ari alone with Vara.
“You’re distracted.” Vara threaded her arm through Ari’s. Her cousin was a slender woman, but had the skill of the best warriors when it came to using a talon glove. With it, she could be deadly. Looks really were deceiving. Vara’s purple gaze, wavy brown hair and dark brown complexion were the envy of many women.
“Yea.” Ari nodded. “Rurik is here.”
“Ah, I remember him. He’s the one you gave a blood oath to avenge yourself against.” Vara gave a small laugh. “Is that what you’re doing on your Mating Day? You’re plotting revenge for childish hurts?”
“Childish?” Ari gasped. “You call wanting a little vengeance for being knocked off a platform into a bed of dung in my coronation dress on the day I was crowned as a princess a small affair? It’s permanently recorded in the Book of Ari as historical fact. I can’t erase that. Only three moons ago I saw it again when I was flipping through my life.”
“Ah, perhaps not.”
“Or when he slipped that love note under my pillow, making me believe that Mikael wanted to marry me? I made an ass out of myself in front of the whole palace.”
“Mikael is still very sexy. I don’t blame you for being mad about that.”
“He still looks at me as if I might try and kiss him again,” Ari mumbled.
“You did embarrass him by doing it in front of the other flyers,” Vara said. She pulled Ari’s arm, urging her to walk through the door in the water wall. A long hallway stretched before them, angling toward the ground, leading
directly to the hall. Since her chambers were set high above the ground without support from underneath, the door in the great hall was the only way in or out—unless you were a falcon shifter, in which case you could fly up to a window. “Did you ever discover for certain whom the note was from?”
“Nae. I cannot prove it, but I’m sure it was a prank. Rurik is the only man who’d have the nerve to do such a thing. He didn’t deny it.” Even now, remembering the simple, horribly unpoetic words, she felt a twinge in her heart.
“That’s mean,” Vara whispered needlessly.
“I’ll show Commander Rurik that I am no one to be trifled with.” Ari smiled at her cousin. Yea, she would show him and when the supreme power to rule was hers, she’d make sure he and his legion of men were shipped to the other side of the planet. He would spend his days protecting Falconia’s marshes from outside invasions.
* * * *
Commander Rurik smiled as he entered the palace’s great hall in the center eye of the castle. They called it the “center eye” because the castle looked like the stylized shape of an eye when they flew over it. Two curved walls formed the battlements along the outside. Yards and gardens were where the whites would normally be and in the iris was the main palace tower.
It was strange being back in the palace after so many years away. He’d grown up there, as did the other natural born falcon shifters. They had been treated like royalty, given the best education, trained to be lethal warriors and yet held apart by what they were. Being natural born gave them one place in Falconia’s society—the life of a commander. Other warriors chose to fly in the armies. The pure bloods were born to do it.
He would be expected to marry a woman with little money and power. His position afforded him any comfort and it would honor his name to elevate a woman who had little, and help to support her family, but he wasn’t allowed to marry a nobleman’s daughter—not with his bloodline. He never fully understood how he could be so revered, so trusted to protect lives, and yet so undesired as a son because of his falcon birth. Honor kept the commanders from rebelling, and they never thought of taking over the planet, though they easily could.