A Wolf's Duty (51 page)

Watching the
fight as the two wolves rolled and attacked each other mercilessly
Alex felt a sense of helplessness overcome her. Her hands clutched
the grass surrounding her, nails slicing through the thin blades as
she saw them disappear from her line of sight. Desperate to see
what was going on she tried to rise to her feet, immediately
falling back to the ground as pain exploded within her legs.
Moving is a bad idea. But I want to know what’s
happening to Tobias.
The whispers from the
grass filled her mind telling her of the movements of the wolves
and the blood spilt, but without eyes it couldn’t tell her who was
harming who and fear for Tobias’ safety rioted within her. Her
heart began to pound within her chest as she watched a wolf
approach her; blood coated his pale fur and her fear
multiplied.

The scent of
his mate’s fear assaulted his sensitive nose and Tobias’ movements
stopped as he watched her clutching the grass around her, her face
pale from fear.
God, what must I look
like? No wonder she’s afraid of me. I just killed someone and she
was there to see it. She has such a kind heart; she’s probably
terrified. I shouldn’t be here.
Turning
away from her, he was surprised to hear her voice calling to
him.

“Tobias!”
Just where does he think
he’s going?
“Tobias, come over
here!”
Is he hurt?
Fear once again rushed through her. “Tobias please come
here.”

Her pleas had him moving
towards her and his surprise increased as she began to examine him,
her eyes darting to and fro over his frame.

“Can you change back? I
can’t see if you’re hurt because of all this fur.”

His body transformed back
to his human form and she gasped at the deep bleeding furrows on
his shoulder that stretched down to cut his chest. “You’re hurt,”
she gasped, reaching forward, her hand hovering over the
wound.

“I’ll heal,” he intoned,
his mind still trying to understand her actions.

“Are you ok?”

“I told you, I’ll
heal.”

“You don’t sound ok
Tobias.”

“You’re afraid of me, I
can smell your fear and I don’t like it.”

“Tobias I was scared for
you not because of you and I was right to be, you’re
bleeding.”

Hope flared within him.
“You mean that you’re really not afraid of me?”

“I’m beginning to
understand how your mind works, I might not see things from the
same perspective as you but I know that you aren’t really a violent
person. Wolfie on the other hand…” She raised a hand to cup his
blood-spattered cheek, slightly surprised when he began to
practically purr with contentment. “Wolfie isn’t a bad person, he
just tends to overreact in situations like this. Besides our law
isn’t the same as it is for humans.”

“Our law?” he
questioned.

“I’m the Princess of the
wolves remember, your people are my people too.”

“You don’t have to be
dearest, you don’t have to be the Princess of the wolves
anymore.”

“What are you talking
about sweetheart?”

He groaned, desperate to
pull her into his embrace but all too aware of the blood that
covered his body. “This isn’t the first time you’ve been hurt
because of my crown, first Lucinda and now Elijah. I’m a failure as
a mate and so I’m willing to let you go.”

What are you
saying idiot?
his wolf snapped.

Ignoring the voice in his
mind he continued. “You don’t have to stay with me.”

Her jaw dropped at his
statement before her eyes narrowed in the beginnings of
frustration. “Is that what you want Tobias? Do you want me to go?
Don’t you love me anymore?”

“I love you more than
anything.”

“Then why are you trying
to get rid of me?”

“I’m doing this to protect
you.”

“I don’t need protecting,”
she snapped. “Bad things happen to people all the time Tobias, it’s
no one’s fault least of all yours. If you want me to go because you
don’t love me or care for me anymore then that’s one thing. But if
you just want me to go because you think I’ll be safer away from
you then I think you should know that people die from accidents
everyday and they’re gone. Life isn’t safe no matter where you are,
so you should live it to its fullest while you still can and I
can’t imagine one more full than the life I want to live with
you.”

“Dearest,” he groaned
wanting nothing more than to take her words at face value and hold
her close.

“Even if you tell me that
you’re willing to let me go, I’m not going to let you go, ever.
We’re mates remember?”

“Yes dearest, how could I
ever forget that I have a mate as perfect as you? Mates should stay
together.”

“Always?”

He pulled her close
disregarding the blood that covered his body. “Always
dearest.”

“I love you
Tobias.”

“I love you too dearest,
with everything that I am,” he whispered into her ear as his arms
tightened their grip around her body.

Would you
really have let her go?
his wolf
questioned.

Yes. I might
even have left her alone for a full day before I went after her,
but I’ll always find my way back to her side. She’s my mate and the
better half of myself.

I told you I
make good decisions,
the wolf
laughed.

Just this once
lets say that you’re right even if we did have to wait two hundred
years.

Yes, but now
we have eternity.

Eternity? I
like the idea of that.

Epilogue

A few weeks
later

Lying against the soft
sheets of the bed in their room, Alex watched through hooded eyes
as Tobias walked in from the bathroom, his skin glistening with
small droplets of water after his shower.

“So sweetheart, how does
it feel to be King?”

He smiled at her,
towelling the last drops of water from his body before approaching
the bed and slipping between the sheets. “Not all that much
different to how I felt when I was Prince.”

She turned to face him.
“Yeah?”

“Well there is one small
thing.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a relief to have
finally gotten rid of my Council of advisors, I don’t need them
anymore and after what happened when you went missing I’m glad. I
don’t think I could stand the sight of them anymore. What about
you, how does it feel to be Queen?”

She groaned at
the reminder of her new position and the events that had led up to
her acquiring it. The coronation ceremony had been a lesson in
anxiety and had stressed her out more than she cared to let Tobias
know. Conducted in front of every member of the clans, she hadn’t
been able to shake the feeling that she would manage to embarrass
herself somehow. The feeling was even worse as Tobias had surprised
her by somehow managing to incorporate a traditional human wedding
into a wolf King’s coronation. All eyes had been on her at that
moment and she had barely managed to suppress the words of shock
that threatened to spill from her mouth. Somehow she had managed to
escape the two ceremonies unscathed, with her dignity still in tact
and she was exceedingly glad that both events would only happen
once in her lifetime.
The Queen thing on
the other hand…
“That will take some
getting used to but I think I’ll manage somehow. Your mum is still
showing me the ropes.”

Yvonne had been a godsend
in helping her learn exactly what it took to be Queen. The lessons,
if she could call them that, weren’t as formal as she had thought
they were going to be. However she should have expected something
along the lines of informality, the wolves weren’t really very big
on making too much of a fuss and the same thing seemed to apply to
their treatment of royalty. When she had been Princess, she had
seen that people respected both Yvonne and Thomas, but the respect
was mutual. There wasn’t a single member of the clans that Yvonne
couldn’t recognise on sight and she knew so much about everyone,
that if Alex hadn’t known otherwise she would have suspected that
she lived with each and everyone of them. That however wasn’t the
case and that was the only downside she had found to being Queen,
she was expected to know everybody. The meetings made her anxious
and her stomach churned wildly when she had to meet new clan
representatives, though she had recently discovered that the antics
of her stomach couldn’t be blamed on just nerves alone.

“She’s not being too hard
on you is she?”

“Don’t be
silly. No one is being too hard on me. I’ve got you as a mate and
they’re all too afraid of you to even come anywhere near
me.”
What an understatement that
is.

After her disappearance
Tobias had become almost like a second shadow, refusing to let her
out of his sight. The constant proximity to him she could cope
with, it was the threatening behaviour he exhibited to any one who
so much as breathed the same air as she did that made her laugh.
News travelled fast as it always did within the clans and once
people had heard of Tobias’ brutal decimation of his cousin, people
began to go out of their way to avoid her, lest they accidentally
harm her and incur the wrath of their new King. It was at the very
least odd to be treated as though one had the plague but Alex
didn’t mind being able to avoid meeting lots of new people at once.
There was no need to make excuses to avoid seeing people when they
came up with such creative ideas all on their own. It wasn’t as
though she were lonely, when she got sick of Tobias following her
and sent him away, Ilyanna and Maria were always about to spend
time with. Ryan was a little preoccupied at the moment and
Sebastian…She groaned at the thought.

“It sort of makes the
guards I assigned you redundant if they won’t go anywhere near
you.” Tobias laughed.

“They’re a special case
and they’re all lovely anyway. It’s still sort of weird to have
them following me about though.”

“I’m not moving on this
dearest, I reduced the guards down from ten to two. There’s no
further I can go without getting rid of them all
completely.”

“Well having ten guards
was a bit ridiculous. Have you spoken to Amanda lately
Tobias?”

“Yes, she’s settling in
fine as her clan’s leader. She does keep reminding me that it is
only temporary though. I think she keeps saying it more for her
benefit than mine, so far she seems like an excellent leader.
Honestly though I hadn’t thought that the two of you would become
friends after all that happened.” His voice was low as he recalled
the incident that had almost taken her from him and he
unconsciously reached for her, touching her skin softly to reassure
himself that she was fine.

“Why not?” Alex shrugged.
“It isn’t as though she had anything to do with what happened with
Elijah, I figure that she’s the one who suffered more out of the
two of us. She actually had to live with him for the last hundred
years, she deserves a medal for being able to do that. It does seem
a bit unfair that she’s going to be alone for the rest of her life
because of what that bastard did, all her dreams for a family are
gone now.”

“That isn’t true. It is
possible for her to seek human companionship if she should wish it.
She may one day find a man that she falls in love with, she could
build a family if she wanted to.”

“I guess, though I don’t
think I’d want to. Can you imagine falling in love knowing that the
one you loved was going to die while you lived on?”

Tobias chuckled, “She’d
have to claim him as her own just like I did for you, he would
share her lifespan and she his. The instinct doesn’t place the same
restrictions on our females. Elijah never treated her the way he
should, he never loved her and so the bonds between them are weak
enough to overcome. His passing hasn’t seriously effected her. She
would have to be very sure of her choice for if something happened
to him, she would die, but she does have the choice.”

“Oh,” she replied inanely.
“Tobias?” She murmured.

“What is it
dearest?”

“What do you think is
going to happen to Sebastian?”

“You shouldn’t worry too
much about him dearest.”

“Do you think he’ll be
alright?”

“Of course he’ll be fine.
Everything is going to work out for him just as it did for me.
Besides, we have more important things to be thinking about.” He
pulled her close, before rolling atop her small frame caging her in
with his body.

“Oh and what would those
more important things be then?”

“Well I did my duty and
ascended to the throne,” he began, lightly sprinkling kisses over
her face.

“Yes you did.”

“My next duty as Prince
will be to produce an heir and I think we should get in some
practise.” He grinned before pressing his lips against
hers.

I don’t think
you’re going to need to worry about that one.
She grinned in her mind. The doctors within the estate had
confirmed it after Ilyanna insisted she go and see them about the
near constant nausea she was experiencing. She had made them
promise not to tell Tobias and was waiting for the perfect time to
spring news of his impending parenthood on him.