The Alpha's Concubine (Historical Shifter Romance) (43 page)

"I think there are more ways for women to be happy than you think. And men too, for that matter."

"So do you agree with her or not?"

"All I am saying is that you should not be afraid of letting Netya learn from her. Trust in her wisdom to make her own choices. If you want her to be with you, give her good reason to be."

Khelt thought it over for a time, tapping the surface of the water with the tip of his spear. Caspian's own attention had long since been dragged away from his fishing line, preoccupied instead by the painful weight in his stomach. Ever since his night with Netya, he had been fighting the urge to follow the exact same advice he had just given Khelt.

What the alpha saw as troublesome, Caspian found intriguing. When Adel first came to the pack, he had wondered, for a time, whether he might harbour feelings for the new den mother. Many of the young men his age had been enthralled by her beauty, but it was the qualities of her character that had called out to Caspian. She was different from the other females, embodying the things he only glimpsed shades of in most women. But she had been distant, even then. He soon realised that her heart was too hard, her spirit too volatile, to be the woman for him. The attraction had grown cold, and Caspian had all but forgotten it until Netya arrived.

Netya. Why did she hound his thoughts? Why did he now purposefully avoid looking at the symbol he had marked down for her in the wood, despite longing to look at nothing else?

He knew why, of course. In a way, he almost hoped she would grow to become more like Adel or Khelt, so that his feelings could cool once more. If she did not, the months to come would be hard on him indeed.

"What if I take her as my mate?" Khelt said eventually.

The announcement startled Caspian more than he had expected, so much so that his composure cracked and he growled out his next words with incredulity. "You can never do that!"

"I know, I know." Khelt put out a hand to calm his friend. "I would never risk the pack's safety by allowing Adel's clan to learn of it. It would not be a true mating, but she and I would feel it in our hearts. If I tell her I desire her as my woman, and we perform the ceremony alone, together, she will understand how much I care for her. Our spirits will know they are joined, even if no one else does."

Caspian looked away, fixing his gaze back on his fishing hook. He stared at the sharp bone point until he could almost feel it boring into his eyes. All of the enjoyment of sharing the pastime with his friend had gone.

"What do you think?" Khelt said, when he received no response.

"Yes," Caspian replied, his voice dry. "I expect that would be a fine idea."

* * *

Khelt was not the only one for whom things had changed since his return. Everything seemed subtly different, despite much returning to the way it had once been.

Netya was happy to enjoy the alpha's pleasurable company in the evenings again, and the lightening of her duties as an apprentice allowed her to spend more time with Fern, Erech, and the other young people. Whenever she was called to Khelt's den she was eager to share with him the things she had been learning, whether it was fascinating new uses for a plant, or the insight she had been reading into her dreams.

Despite Adel telling her not to put any stock in her glimpses into the spirit world just yet, Netya still found it exciting to ponder her visions, wondering where they came from and who they might be meant for. The others were always curious to hear about them too. She was forbidden from sharing many of the seers' secrets, of course, but that did not stop her from talking for hours with her friends about what their dreams might mean. It was little more than indulgent gossip, but her newfound status lent the conversations a hint of sincerity that made her companions hang on her every word.

She adored having a calling she could truly consider her own, one that fascinated others and lent both weight and confidence to the things she spoke of. Equally, she became more interested in hearing from others about the skills they were pursuing, now that she no longer felt like an outsider looking in. The hint of youthful longing and jealousy she had always felt toward those in positions of status was gone, and more than ever she realised that she had finally crossed over the boundary that separated the girl she had once been from the woman she had become.

And yet, when she came to Khelt's chamber in the evenings, full of eagerness and passion, he seemed interested in none of it. Netya was unsure at first what her conversations with the alpha were lacking, but after a few days it became clear. She forced herself to question what was making her feel uncomfortable—a skill that Adel had encouraged her to develop more thoroughly—and realised that, while Khelt would listen patiently to her for a short while every evening, he never questioned her further about her apprenticeship. When he responded, it was often with the intent to change the subject, and he never seemed truly at ease with her until they moved on to other topics, or abandoned talk entirely and retreated to the furs.

He still begrudged her training as a seer. He did not want to be reminded that she was spending time with Adel instead of him, and it hurt Netya to feel that she was unable to share her experiences with the alpha. It was a stark contrast to the passion and tenderness he showed her, which had only grown more intense since his return. Khelt was not a man of great words, but he communicated his feelings in other ways. It was clear he cared for her deeply, but the path she had taken left an invisible barrier between them. It was as if they were two people embracing through a veil, never close enough to be content.

To her equal dismay, Caspian seemed to have abandoned her entirely. There were many times when she found herself longing to sit with him on the rocks again, to share the things she felt unable to with Khelt. But days would go by without her so much as catching a glimpse of the man who had made her the pendant she now treasured. He was always just out of reach. When she caught sight of him bathing upstream from her in the spot used by the men, she would begin swimming in his direction, only for him to have finished and climbed back up the bank by the time she arrived. During meals, he was always on the other side of the camp, if he even put in an appearance at all. It frustrated Netya, so much so that she stopped even trying to track him down. If he did not want to spend time with her, perhaps she no longer wanted to spend time with him.

She tried to share the things she would have told Caspian with Erech, joining him at the edge of the crafting area to watch him knap some evenings, but it was not the same. Caspian had the ability to take a thought and explore it, to stretch something simple into a conversation that left Netya with just as many new questions as it did answers. Erech saw things in a simpler light, with straightforward, practical solutions. If there was something he did not understand, he would dismiss it with a shrug, or recite the advice he had been given by his father or uncles on such things.

It was difficult for Netya to relate. Many of the Moon People were of a stoic, accepting nature. Their animal instincts tended to make the world a small place, where even new questions could always be answered with the wisdom of the past. She wondered whether perhaps, if she were more like them, she might not be so bothered by the strange new changes in her life. If she had a wolf of her own, would things be easier?

Unable to talk it over with Caspian, she turned instead to Adel. One afternoon, as they sat side by side stripping down dry tree bark for the soft pieces that worked best in medicine, she finally asked her mentor a question that had been in the back of her mind for many months.

"My people sometimes told stories about how it was best to kill those wounded by your kind, in case they became infected with the Moon People's curse. I always wondered whether it was true."

Adel turned her apprentice's attention back to the task at hand with a nudge and a frown, but once Netya had gone back to stripping bark she answered.

"Our curse, as they call it, is our animal side, and yes, it has been known for your people to become like us."

"Does that mean there could be a way for me to call on a wolf of my own some day?"

"Why would you want such a thing? I thought you of anyone would understand how violent and impulsive it can make us."

Netya shook her head quickly. "It is not that I desire it, but such magic does make me curious. As a seer, should I not know of such things?"

"I suppose you should, in case you are ever forced to do what your people only spoke of. It is true, when we take on the shapes of wolves our bodies contain a poison that is harmful to your kind. Through savage wounds or the mingling of blood, it can be passed from one person to another, and it grows like an infection. When I was a girl, my pack wounded one of the Sun People's warriors and took him captive. The seers tried to tend to him, but the poison of the wolf who mauled him was already deep inside his body. There is no cure for such a thing. We listened to his cries of agony for days before he died. My pack took no more prisoners after that."

"But if the infection had not killed him?" Netya said.

"I have never seen it for myself," Adel warned. "It seems those who resist the sickness and survive are left with newborn wolves inside them. There are a few of them to be seen at the gatherings when packs come together. Their scent is strange, and the others are always wary of them. Most die, or are killed before they can settle. Both my people and yours fear what they do not understand."

Netya grimaced. "I think you have convinced me to remain myself."

"Good. You are learning well." Adel smiled. "I may make a seer of you yet."

—
33—

The Cave of Alphas

It was a long time before Adel permitted Netya to venture into the spirit world again, and when her training finally returned to the subject of spirits and visions she was glad to have her white wolf draped about her. She had met him only a few times in her dreams since. The memories of his presence were vague and disconnected, but they had not been frightening. In the dream she remembered most clearly, she had been wearing his pelt at first, only to become one with it as time went on, staring out through his eyes as she walked on four legs and felt the wind rushing through her fur. The monster had become her guardian, and she hoped he would be there to protect her when she finally took her waking mind into the spirit world once more.

She need not have worried. As Adel had explained, she had no intention of using the nightwood berries again until Netya was more prepared, and the visions she experienced without them were likely to be less vivid. Once every few days, they mixed new leaves, berries, or other stewed plants into the nut meal, and Netya would eat until she felt the touch of the spirit world taking her away.

It was almost with disappointment that she discovered most of her induced visions did not even take her outside of the chamber she was sitting in. The spirits could be reached in many ways, Adel said, and it was not always through direct visions that Netya would commune with them.

Some of the plants she sampled took her thoughts to strange places. Unfamiliar sounds whispered through her ears, colours blossomed from the stone walls that she had never seen before, and her senses took on new keenness that made the mundane fascinating. One afternoon she spent hours working her way around the edge of Adel's chamber, running her hands over the walls and the fur of the various animal pelts, amazed by the appreciation the spirits gave her for the ways in which nature crafted such wonders.

She slipped into some visions where her wolf pelt seemed to be moving on her body, his distant growls echoing in her ears, but they never took her as deep into the spirit world as the nightwood berries had. The spirits of the animals in Adel's chamber spoke to her too, but if their words held any profound wisdom, it was lost on Netya.

One day she felt the grass mat beneath her come to life and burrow its fronds into her thighs, burning like fire as Adel's soothing touch became a grip of iron that crushed the air from her lungs until she feared she was about to die. When she came to her senses again, she realised it had only been the work of the spirits playing tricks on her, but Adel made sure they avoided the berries that had brought on that particular vision in the future.

The weeks passed until summer was upon them again, and with the turning of the seasons Netya was permitted even more time to herself away from her duties. The warm weather lightened inhibitions and made for good hunting, meaning that many of the seers, Adel included, had to spend more time tending to the needs of the pack than usual. With the celebration of the summer fires once again on the horizon, passions and romantic rivalries came into sharper focus. If a day went by when a young woman did not come to the seers' cave searching for guidance on matters of the heart, there would almost always be a male in her place who required healing. Posturing and acts of heroism to impress potential partners often led to recklessness, and frequent, if minor, fights broke out between friends and enemies alike. They were far less vicious and bloody than those Netya had witnessed in the winter, but even mild wounds still needed a healer's touch to soothe pain and safeguard against infection. Even with their resilient bodies, the Moon People left nothing to chance.

She tried to follow Brae's example when the older seer reprimanded two laughing young males as they sat together in the antechamber waiting to be tended, but it was hard for Netya to hide her smile. The bruised and bleeding pair had been fighting just moments earlier, and yet now they had their arms around each other's shoulders, cracking jokes about which one of them had impressed their favourite female more.