Mating Rights (2 page)

He looked over his
shoulder at her shaking her head and mouthing ‘no’.

“I have to,” he said,
slowly reaching for the door handle.

***

“The pickings are slim
for the festival this year,” Torolf said to Jaxon, nodding his blond head in
the direction of the open air wagon carrying eligible clan women behind them.

“Maybe they’re scared
they’ll like orgies and they’re all hiding,” Ranger said with a chuckle,
slapping Torolf’s bicep with the back of his hand.

Jaxon sighed in
exasperation, looking from Ranger’s scruffy, bearded face to Torolf’s clean
shaven one. Both of them had the kind of looks and attitude which would easily
win them a woman if they were willing to settle down—which they weren’t. No
more so than he. “The northerners are making the trek. These southern folk
don’t like to leave their warm climate for the cold. It’s a fool’s errand
Nicodemus has sent us on. But we’ve no choice but to follow orders,” Jaxon of
the Black Wolf Clan said, scanning the road ahead of them.

The morning breeze
flicked his long brown hair across his face, making strands stick to his
eyelashes and mouth. He frowned and wiped his face clean in annoyance. He knew
without looking that silver threaded the once dark strands. A little more salt
on his old head every day.

“Are you certain there
is another one this way?” Ranger asked, propping his hands on the worn pommel
of his saddle. “I’ve just about worn my ass off riding.”

“The baker said he delivers
wheat and oats this way a few times a year. He’s the one that said he thought
he’d seen a girl watching him behind a thatched cottage. I didn’t say a damned
thing about it,” Jaxon said, cracking his neck as if for emphasis.

“We’ll sniff her out if
there’s one here,” Ranger said, glancing behind them and giving the girls a
wink. “Don’t know why these people think they can go against pack law and not
give up their daughters.”

Behind them, the gaggle
of women they were escorting to the festival squawked and babbled like a flock
of geese. The sound of their high pitched voices and laughter made Jaxon grit
his teeth.
Babysitting duty.
He rubbed his throbbing temples, eager to be done
with this business so he could return to his home alone.

As much as the others
might look forward to the festival and the chance to find a mate, or just get
laid, Jaxon wanted no part of it. He preferred his peaceful solitude. He was
too damned old and set in his ways to want a woman to come into his life and
create chaos in his carefully ordered world. Jen had ruined him for all others.
Plus, he knew with his looks he’d never get one he
wanted. Most of them took one look at the scars on his face and high-tailed it
back to prettier fare like Torolf and Ranger.

The Bear Clan had done
more than just scar his face and ruin his knee. They’d given him a lasting
reminder of vulnerability that repulsed the others of his clan, even if they
were grateful for his sacrifice in protecting them.
Being
a hero wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.

Jaxon rose in the
stirrups, letting some of the kinks out of his sore backside. He rolled his
head, cracking his neck again as if that would alleviate the headache that’d
been bothering him since the night before. He didn’t want to admit it was
probably from sleeping on the ground and being on the road…that he was past his
prime.

Adolfo pulled the reins
with his meaty hands, making the enormous horses stop before the trail. The
pair snorted and pawed at the ground before settling down. “Road’s too narrow.
I’ll wait here with the wagon while you all check ahead.”

Jaxon nodded, nudging
his bay horse forward with his booted heels. Leaving the noise behind suited
him just fine. Behind him, Torolf and Ranger followed suit.

Ancient trees reached
their heavy arms towards one another, arching limbs over the road like a
canopy. Grey moss laced through the leaves, dripping from the branches like
curtains. Dust motes drifted through the early morning sunlight that dappled
the pitted trail.

Foliage hugging the
road slapped against his legs as he guided his horse along the little used
trail—if the overgrowth was any indication. If the baker was to be believed,
the couple that lived out here rarely went to town, but he said he’d caught
glimpses of a young girl a few times and thought they were keeping her out of
sight on purpose.
Jaxon knew how small towns
were. If anything didn’t seem normal, it was up for conversation and
speculation. It could be she was just too young to participate in the
festivities and had overprotective parents. Tradition dictated all unmated
women gather for mating rights, but he wasn’t so sure he’d want a daughter of
his attending the sometimes brutal festival.

The smell of earth
permeated the air, and the longer they traversed the trail, the clearer the
scent of cooking meat became. Jaxon caught a whiff of bacon grease carrying
through the air.

“We’re close,” he said
to Torolf and Ranger.

“I know. The smell is
driving me crazy,” Ranger said.

“My stomach’s about to
eat me alive,” Torolf muttered, clutching his belly.

“We’ll get done here
and go out on a hunt. I’m ready for some fresh meat,” Jaxon said.
As he said it, the quaint cottage came into his view.
A small paned window stood open, allowing bacon grease and wood smoke to
perfume the air. The trail came to an end at a small, closed gate. Over the
rustic wood fence, Jaxon could see a few dozen chickens pecking at feed strewn
across the dirt.

He dropped down off his
horse, handing the reins to Torolf before going to the gate. It opened with a
creak and he stepped under the small trellis trimmed in ivy before walking
stiffly down a flagstone path. His bum knee burned and pinched from riding in
the saddle for too many days, and he favored it with a slight limp.
The way the sunlight filtered through the great pines
surrounding the cottage produced a homey picture that made him miss his own
place.

Approaching the porch,
he could hear voices inside that quieted as he stepped on the hand hewn boards
and rapped sharply on the door.

A chair scraped inside.

His senses, ever acute,
detected furtive movement. Jaxon cocked his ear, listening to anxious moves,
steps across weakened floorboards—the scrape of two more chairs. He felt the
vibrations of a door being shut.

Puzzled, Jaxon frowned
and knocked again. Harder this time.

Footsteps approached
the door. Jaxon tensed, expecting the worst.

“Who goes there?” a
male voice asked on the other side.

By the raspy quality,
Jaxon suspected the man was older. “Open in the name of Clan Leader Nicodemus,”
he said.

A few moments passed.

The doorknob squeaked
as it rotated, and the door slowly opened. A cautious old man with black skin,
a salt and pepper beard, and gray hair peered through
the crack. Behind him, Jaxon could see what had to be the man’s wife, round and
short with wide, fear-filled brown eyes.

Why were they so
scared? Enemies certainly wouldn’t take the time to knock before attacking.

“Who are you? What you
want?” he asked in a furious whisper.

Jaxon cleared his
throat, relaxing the fists he’d made of his hands without realizing it. He
pasted a smile on his face. “Good morning, Sir, Madam. I’ve orders to round up
all available women for the Moonlight Festival. I’ve heard word from town that
you have a daughter.”

“We ain’t got no
daughter,” the man said, moving to shut the door.

Jaxon put his foot on
the stoop, blocking him. The man’s eyes widened then narrowed as he frowned.
“Reliable sources tell me you do. Can I check for myself? I’ve come a long
way.”

Behind the old man, the
wife tugged at his sleeve. He dipped his head to let her whisper in his ear.
Finally, he nodded. “I reckon. But make it quick. We was eating breakfast.”

The man opened the
door, allowing Jaxon to walk inside. “It won’t take long,” Jaxon said, applying
his politest voice and immediately spotting the loft above the kitchen and the
table set for three. Jaxon stopped at the table. Beneath his foot, he felt the
floorboards sag beneath a rug covering. Placing his hands on his hips, he
stared at the table then glanced at the plump woman. “Any reason you have three
plates? Were you expecting someone?”

The wife hurried to the
table. “That was just some extra I fixed for my husband. Sometimes he wants
seconds in the morning.”

Jaxon stooped and
flipped the rug up, revealing a trap door. “What’s this?” he asked, glancing
from one to the other.

“It’s just the root
cellar,” the old man said, crinkling his forehead and shifting his weight from
one foot to the other.

“You don’t mind if I
check it too?”

“Nothing down there but
salted meat and preserves,” the old man said, walking stiffly into the room.
His wife waited by the open door, wringing her hands.

“Just the same…” Jaxon
nodded, then pulled the rug and lifted the trapdoor.

As soon as it was
opened, a form lunged through the opening knocking Jaxon back on his ass. The
wind left his lungs and the floorboards reverberated with the force of his
landing. A girl leapt over his prone body, heading for the open door.

Jaxon snatched at her
ankle as she ran past. The girl stomped his fingers before continuing through
the small house, bursting outside and leaving him behind as he recovered.
Rolling on his belly with a roar, Jaxon launched
himself to his feet. She was quick, he’d give her that.

“Too old for this,” he
growled, following seconds behind her.

She rounded the
building, moving away from his men waiting outside the front gate instead of
heading straight for them.

“You got this?” Ranger
called when Jaxon came into view.

He didn’t answer,
focusing instead on catching the girl. Dust sifted into the air from her feet
striking the bare ground. She ducked around the thick trunk of a pine, heading
for deeper wood. Pine needles and leaves scattered in her wake.

Jaxon surged behind her
and felt his knee threaten to buckle beneath the strain. He realized her head
start would keep her just out of reach if he didn’t do something drastic. He
didn’t have time for this shit, and he damned sure wasn’t going back to his men
empty handed and showing them he didn’t have an edge anymore.
Without pause, Jaxon shifted seamlessly to the wolf,
his loose clothing no impediment to the change. Years of practice, from the
time he was a mere boy, allowed him to transform without pain or strain.
Padded feet hit the ground, soft and lithe, carrying
him with a speed his human form could never match. He charged through the
underbrush, a dark blur as he pursued the girl.
She
glanced back, eyes wide as she saw him. She stumbled over a root, careening to
the left to avoid hitting the trunk.

The scent of her fear permeated
the air, and he caught a whiff of fine sweat as she pushed herself ahead to
recover her unsteady gait. Weaving through the trees, she swiveled through the
sentinels in her wooden shoes and kicked them off to gain better traction in
the soft, moist loam.

The tactic wouldn’t
save her.

Jaxon shot forward,
energy pulsing through his powerful muscles. Her panting rang in his ears,
making his blood thunder with excitement as he closed in on her.
Her lilac dress flapped like a sail in a breeze of
her own making. He launched off the ground with his hind legs, snagging the
coarse fabric with his muzzle. Ripping at the fabric like a wild, excited
beast, he snatched her backward. She screamed, flipping backward to land on her
backside.
Halting her flight, Jaxon immediately
shifted back to human form, landing on top of her. He pinned her back to the
ground kicking and screaming, snapping her teeth at his arms and face and
flailing her arms in a tornado of movement that nearly stunned him.

“Hold…still,” Jaxon shouted,
sitting on her stomach to keep her from bucking him off. Fear strengthened her,
but she was still no match for his greater weight and experience.

“Get off me,” she
screamed, clawing at his face with talon-like fingers.

Her struggles forced
him to wrangle her arms to the ground above her head. It left him panting for
breath above her, his face within inches of her gnashing teeth and glaring
golden eyes.

“Do you yield? Do you
yield to me?” he asked again when she refused to answer, tightening his hands on
her wrists for emphasis.

Her eyes widened,
terror-filled. “Never!” she said breathlessly through gritted teeth.

Why was she so scared
of him? If he didn’t know better, he would have thought she’d never had contact
with the outside world.

He raked his eyes over
her form, snagging on her chest where her large, soft breasts jiggled with her
heaving breath. She was no child, but a full grown woman. No parent could keep
their child sheltered from the world forever, no matter how much they might
want to. Her smooth, caramel colored skin flushed with a youthful glow and the
exertion of her flight. High cheekbones and hollow cheeks gave her heart shaped
face a look of high born breeding, and her brown flecked, gold eyes framed by
thick, curly lashes were mesmerizing enough that Jaxon had to force himself to
look away from them. He settled on her full, pouty mouth. He felt his belly
contract, focusing on that orifice and imagining what it could do, and averted
his eyes back to her angry gaze. He damned sure didn’t need to entertain any
ideas about fucking her.