by G. Bailey
Adelaide’s Storm
Her Fate Series: Book Three
G. Bailey
Contents
Join Bailey’s Pack
Description
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Epilogue
Bonus content
Prologue
Note From The Author.
Stay in Touch
About the Author
More by G. Bailey…
Adelaide’s Storm © 2019 G. Bailey
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Edits by Polished Perfection
Created with Vellum
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Description
Sometimes fate is your only blessing.
The four courts of Frayan, or what is left of them, have risen to stop a war.
But they will need a queen who will win the war.
Adelaide Autumn has to make a choice between her family and her duty.
Either way, it will break her heart.
Royals can’t always have it all...
Her pack must love her.
Her fate must be her choice.
The fates are going to war, and when you are one of them, you must choose.
Family or fate?
18+ Reverse Harem Romance
Prologue
Queen Winter of the Supernaturals
“Send a guard to Isola and let her know what has happened. With any luck, her sister would have foreseen it all and her army is already getting prepared,” I say, pacing in the bedroom with my hands resting on my hips. I can’t believe we had a traitor in our castle, a Fray that thought kidnapping Sophie, a child, and giving her to Lilyanne would save him. Lilyanne is evil, and I was stupid enough to think all the Fray here knew it.
“Winter, you have to slow down. The babies need you calm,” Dabriel gently tries to coax me into sitting down, but I can’t. I’ve let Adelaide down, again. I sent her to Frayan, clueless, and now I’ve lost her sister.
“You have to leave and save our other children. If Josh and Rick die,” I say, but Dabriel pulls me to his chest, and my words end in tears. I’ve already sent Alex and Leigha, along with their guys, to have all the Fray under house arrest for the time being. I want every single one of them to be interviewed about this all. Someone must know something or a way to save Sophie.
“We will not let that happen, my love. The problem is, we can’t follow them yet,” Dabriel tells me, referring to his vision. I look back into the nursery where my beautiful twins are sleeping in their cot, their faces a picture of innocence, and I know they need their big brothers. Atti walks in, pausing when he sees me so upset, and I see the pain in his own eyes. He liked Sophie. He was teaching her to make friends, to understand the ways of the magic world, with Harris teaching her the ways of the wolf pack.
“Sophie is gone, and it is our fault. We must find a way to tell Rick and, most importantly, Adelaide. She trusted us with her sister, and we failed,” I say, tears streaming down my cheeks. I really liked that girl, and gods, I’m so hormonal. “I need chocolate, asap.”
“On it!” Atti says, vanishing from the room. It makes me smile a little bit.
“We can send a letter,” Dabriel suggests.
“But we have no sense of direction and no clue if the letters will survive such a trip,” I say, and Atti appears next to me, offering me a bar of chocolate. I smile at him in thanks as I start to open it. Wyatt and Jaxson walk in as Atti suggests his idea, and Jaxson kisses my cheek before heading over to the twins.
“I know a blood spell that can be used on parchment paper. It would send it directly to who we choose. I don’t know if it will work, but it’s worth a shot,” Atti shares.
“My blood or Jaxson’s will send the letter to Rick. That’s all we need,” Wyatt suggests as one of the twins starts to cry.
“I’m going to look after our twins as they need a feed, and you four are going to send the letter and get our army ready. We are going to war one way or another. This ends soon,” I warn. Each of my mates smiles and nods in agreement as I leave them to figure this out. I just have to hope Sophie will be kept alive until we can help her sister save her.
I have to hope we can save her, or I will never forgive myself.
1
“Do you think it is safe to stay here, so out in the open?” Josh asks, his hand resting on my arm, his fingers running over the now gold flowers etched all over my skin. I lean back onto his chest, watching the pack around us as they set up camp, feeling how utterly peaceful it is. You wouldn’t know we were at war by simply looking at us. Even though all of them are strangers to me, it doesn’t feel like they are. It feels like it did when I met Rick, Josh, Nath and Mich. It feels like I found my home, my pack to protect and love me as I love them. I watch a woman who looks similar to a high school teacher I once had, except that this woman has long red hair that is the colour of autumn leaves. She is helping her partner, which I only know because I’ve seen them kiss a few times, and the man is clearly from another court with his silver, blue-tipped hair.
“We can’t move them all in daylight. It’s best we camp for the rest of the day,” I suggest. “I get the feeling they have travelled far and need some rest.”
“How could you know that, Adie?” Josh gently asks me.
“How did I call them to me, Josh?” I smile at him, and he smirks back. “Magic is funny, huh?”
“Magic brought me to you,” Josh says, leaning forward and ever so softly kissing my lips. “It is not funny, it is fucking perfect.” Josh kisses me once more, this time more passionately so that I almost forget there are so many people around us.
“Your highness, I would like to introduce myself and three others,” a man interrupts us, clearing his throat a few times. Josh pulls back, leaving me in a little bit of a haze. We turn around to see a middle-aged man with glossy grey hair that is clipped back, and piercing purple eyes. Three women stand behind him, each with their head bowed, and I suspect they are siblings from their same height and strawberry blonde hair. Mich, Rick and Nath are sitting a little away from us, around a small campfire, but they are in front of us in a moment.
“Who are you?” Mich demands, smoothly moving in front of me and the others. Rick and Nath move to his side as Josh and I stand up. I walk to stand next to Nath, and Josh stays close to me as the man moves his gaze to me, bowing once more.
“I am aware you do not know us, but we are the last of the five royal betas your parents chose. The other beta was—”
“My mum. She brought me u
p on Earth, I know,” I say, my voice thick with emotion. This man knew who my mum was…and I never really did. The only part of the woman that brought me up left is Sophie, and gods, do I miss her.
“I’m glad you have some knowledge of the past. I respected your parents immensely and everything they did to keep Frayan safe, even if their attempts did not lead to victory. We hope that will not be the case with you,” he tells me, and I incline my head.
“You have not told us your names,” I say.
“Of course, my apologies,” he says. “My name is Anthony, and these betas are Aspen, Elena and Tessa. In order. They are triplets; it is hard to tell them apart usually, but as fighters, you will not find a better group of three. There are songs written about the three red wolves who took down an army of Fray.”
“Is the song true?” Mich asks.
“All songs come from some form of truth,” he replies, and I smile at him.
“Why don’t they speak for themselves?” Rick asks.
“In the great war, they were mere babies when Lilyanne’s guards crushed their vocal cords. It’s ironic songs are sung of them, when they can never sing them. It was a miracle they lived and were rescued from the prisons at five years old. They can’t speak, but they can communicate by different means. Drawings, mostly,” he says, and I stare in horror. I feel speechless for a second before I shake it off and know exactly what I have to say. I walk away from my guys, who do not stop me, and stop in front of the women. I bow my head for a brief second and meet each of their eyes.
They may not be able to speak, but the look in their eyes, it is pure will. They are not beaten.
“I promise this will be the last fight for Frayan, and no one else will suffer under her hand ever again. There will be fate for her. She has escaped it too long,” I tell the women. “This land has bled with pain and cruelty for decades, and I will die if it secures a future without a tyrant ruling this world.”
“The land will bleed no more, for Lilyanne is the one that must fall,” Anthony says, and all four of them bow their heads once more. “I mean no offense, but words are not what we currently need. We must talk about the plan,” Anthony says. “I have come up with a—” I cut him off, and he angrily looks at me.
“My plan, you mean?” I challenge, raising an eyebrow. “Frayan is my home, and I am your queen. It will be my plan, and you may council me on it as much as the rest of my pack may. But I am alpha.”
“Understood. I do not mean to challenge you. I am simply unused to someone else being in charge after many years,” he explains to me, his eyes losing the note of anger there and replacing it with some respect.
“I’m sorry it took this many years for me to return. I wasn’t ready to be queen before,” I tell him. “I understand why you might not trust me. I want you to understand that Lilyanne has taken my family, my heritage and birthright from me. I was a baby when I was ripped from my parents, and I was brought up in a world where I had to hide who I was from everyone. This world is a chance for every child with powers, who is different, to have a safe place to exist, and it is my home. I was simply a girl before.”
“And now?” Anthony asks.
“No one will ever take Frayan and my crown from me. Lilyanne has to be stopped, and there will be peace like Frayan has never known. I will work my entire life to guarantee it,” I say, holding my head high and feeling like my parents would be proud of me right now. There was a long time when I didn’t want to save Frayan, but those feelings were born out of fear and the sense I was not what Frayan needed. Everything changed the second I saw the evil in Lilyanne’s eyes. I might not be the best person in the world for the throne, but I will not let Frayan fall. I will always be the queen that puts her people first and never lets them suffer.
“Good,” he smiles, and I notice my guys grinning at me from the corner of my eye.
“As for the plan, we will camp here for the rest of the day, and in the night, we will make our way to the old Frayan Academy. The rest of my army is there. Then we will make another plan. The last plan,” I state. I look back at my guys for a brief second before I speak. “We will plan for the last fight of the war.”
“We should send word to everyone in Frayan, let them know you are queen and you wish for anyone who wants to join to come to the academy,” Anthony suggests.
“That also gives our position away to Lilyanne,” Josh reminds him.
“She won’t come for me alone; she will come with her army. She is scared of me,” I say, because it’s true. I saw the fear in her eyes when I was at her mercy in the castle, and now that I’m free, she won’t come for me alone.
“Are you sure?” Rick asks.
“Positive,” I reply. “I have something she is terrified of. I have the power of the court of Frayan and the power of the wolf fates. I can fly, and I am the destined queen. She won’t give me an easy fight, and she will bring the full force of her army at her side.”
“And she and her army will die the moment they are close enough,” Rick says.
“That’s a good plan,” I reply with a smile, even as nerves fills me. No matter how nervous I am, I won’t give up any time soon.
I am going to end this war and make a world I am proud for my family to live in. I am going to make Frayan alive again.
2
I watch the campfire in front of me as Nath adds another log, and the fire curls around it almost instantly. Sparks blow in the wind, and I follow the sparks only to meet someone else’s eyes as they intensely gaze at me.
Rick.
He stretches a hand out and leaves it there, just letting me make the choice to go with him or not. I feel like there has been more tension, love and something else since our mating. The thing is, I can sense all the emotions from him and how much they soothe, excite and make me feel safe. I gently move Tay away from my leg, where she was resting her head, and lean her against Josh.
“I will be right back,” I tell Josh, who is almost asleep on the ground next to me, his head resting against the rock.
“Alright, darling,” he replies. Nath and Mich wave as I walk to Rick and take his hand. He links our fingers, tugging me to his side, and I rest against him as we head into the woods, away from the pack. We are getting close to leaving the Autumn court, and this is only our third rest that we have been forced to take due to the children and elders in the pack.
“We cannot rest in the Summer court. I feel we must all shift and run until we get to the rocks. We can take turns carrying the elders and children on our backs in wolf form. We can signal the academy for a boat—” Rick starts rambling his plans, perhaps because saying them out loud makes him less nervous somehow.
“It’s going to be okay. This isn’t the hard part, Rick,” I remind him as we get to a clearing. The clearing is covered in little yellow flowers with purple leaves, and I love how the sun shines on them, making them almost look like fairy lights. We walk into the clearing a little bit before lying down, resting our heads back as we look up at the sky. Rick leans on his side before slowly stroking a finger down my arm and following the pattern of the gold flowers.
“They suit you,” Rick muses, his voice thick and husky. “Do you like them?”
“Yes. They remind me who my father was and why he died,” I reply honestly. “I wish I could have met him and spent more time with my aunt. The fates feel like they are disappearing from everywhere and leaving us to fight on our own.”
“A wolf fate,” Rick murmurs. “The fates live on through us, in our memories, in our songs and poems. The fates will be remembered forever, which makes them immortal.”
“I may only be half of him, but it’s enough to link me to the pack and to understand that being a wolf fate was more than a title. It’s a responsibility to the wolves, to the magic and animals of Frayan. It’s enough to know fate is whispering and watching, wishing only that we win this war,” I tell him, the words feeling like they are more than just words. They are a promise only fates can know.
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“Winter is part goddess of fate, did you know that?” he asks, and I shake my head. “She sometimes sees them watching, whispering, and she says they plot the future we are unable to see yet.”
“They don’t leave us. Not until all the work of fate is done,” I reply with a small smile.
“And when will that be?” he rhetorically muses.
“Not any time soon,” I tell him with a chuckle. I look up into his eyes as I curl a hand around his neck. I lean up and kiss my mate, finding love and acceptance in every second I am with him. He too soon breaks away from the kiss to rest his forehead against mine.
“We are chasing happiness, and the only way to be truly happy is to be honest with each other. I sense your emotions, and I know how you feel for Josh, Nath and Mich,” he tells me, and I’m speechless for a long time, just staring into his eyes. This isn’t something I’ve been brave enough to bring up yet, mainly because I haven’t a clue how to tell Rick this. He is my mate; I don’t want to hurt him, and if it were the other way around…
“I’m sorry—” He cuts me off, placing his finger against my lips.
“Don’t be sorry for love. Hell, there really isn’t enough of it in this world as it is. I’ve spoken to my brothers, and we all know that our lives are a million times more complete and perfect since you moved in next door,” he tells me, being so sweet. I wasn’t expecting that.