Chapter 2
Once the mating ceremony ended, the feast began.
I had a few cups of mead and ate half a roasted deer leg.
Nobody toasted me or talked to me.
Irene was escorted to the mating chamber by the maids.
I sat around for a while before finally getting up and leaving.
The hallway was dark except for a few faintly glowing moonstones.
I headed toward my quarters in the east wing.
My head was starting to spin as the mead kicked in.
If I'd had an inner wolf, it probably wouldn't have been able to hold its liquor, either.
I pushed open the door at the end of the hallway and stepped inside.
The fireplace was crackling and filling the room with warmth.
I shrugged off my coat and tossed it onto a chair.
That was when I noticed someone sitting on the edge of the bed.
She was tall and wearing a silver-white gown, but she wasn't Irene.
My heart dropped.
She stood up and took off her veil, revealing silver hair and piercing ice blue eyes.
Her features were so flawless that it was like the Moon Goddess had carved her face by hand.
It was Miranda, and my brother's mate.
Had I walked into the wrong room?
No, this was my room, the last one in the east wing.
There was no mistake.
"Are you Kane?" she asked.
Her voice was low, a little rough.
"No, you don't look like him," she added.
She walked over and looked me up and down.
Her gaze was like an ice blade, slicing right through me.
"Wolves say Kane looks rugged," she said with a cold, faint smile. "But you're better-looking than him."
"I—"
Before I could finish, I staggered.
The buzz from the mead suddenly hit me hard, and the whole room started spinning.
I stumbled forward.
Miranda caught me before I hit the floor.
Her grip was strong, nothing like the soft touch one'd expect from a high-born female.
And I caught a whiff of something cold and clean, like cedar in winter.
"You can barely stand, huh?" she said.
Then she threw me onto the bed without a second thought.
I lay flat on my back with my head spinning.
Miranda stood over me, looking down.
Her ice blue eyes narrowed.
"Where's your inner wolf?" she asked.
I hesitated for a couple of seconds.
"I don't have one."
"Wolfless?" She frowned, clearly surprised. "The Thornclaw Pack actually has a grown wolf without an inner wolf?"
"Yeah," I said. "Only me."
Miranda was quiet for a moment.
Then she said something that caught me completely off guard.
"But I can feel your inner wolf," she told me.
I froze. "What?"
"It's weak, hidden way down inside," she said.
She leaned in until her ice blue eyes were only a hand's breadth from mine.
"But it's there." Her tone left no room for doubt. "My white wolf picked up on it."
I felt like someone had punched me straight in the gut.
Ever since I was sixteen, everyone had called me wolfless.
I had no inner wolf, no wolf form. I was nothing but a defective for life.
And now, she was telling me I actually had one.
"You're joking," I said.
"I never joke," Miranda said, completely serious.
She stood up straight again. "But it's been sealed. You weren't born missing it. Someone did this to you."
She paused, and her eyes turned sharp as a blade.
"Someone used forbidden magic to stop you from awakening," she said.
My head started spinning.
All the pieces suddenly clicked into place.
When I was sixteen, the night before my awakening ceremony, Kane had handed me a drink.
He'd said it was to celebrate what was coming.
The next day, nothing had happened at the ceremony.
Everyone had laughed at me, and even my father had wanted nothing to do with me.
After that, I became the pack's biggest disappointment.
So that was the truth.
It had been because of Kane.
"You figured it out, didn't you?" Miranda asked, reading my face.
She let out a short, cold laugh. "Your pack's dirty little games are something else."
She turned, walked to the window, and pushed it open.
Moonlight poured in and caught her silver hair.
"Do you know how I ended up here?" she asked without looking at me, her voice calm.
"The maid told me that my room was the last one in the east wing, so I came straight here."
She looked back at me. "Looks like someone wanted you to end up in the future Alpha's mate's bed."
"And then what?" she continued, almost talking to herself.
"Then you'd be killed, I'd be ruined, and the alliance with the Snowfield Pack would fall apart. That's a pretty nasty move, taking care of two problems at once."
I sat up, my head finally clearing.
"You can leave now. Before things get any worse—"
"Leave?" Miranda cut me off.
She turned all the way around, the moonlight spreading out behind her.
Her face in that light was so beautiful it was hard to breathe.
"My father's guards are everywhere out there. They don't care who they're guarding. They only know the ceremony happened," she said.
Her voice got lower, harder. "Everyone at the mating ceremony saw us walk into this room together.
"If I walk out now, your head will be on a spike before sunrise. Tonight, you either carry this with me, or we both die."
I looked into her eyes.
There wasn't any fear or doubt in those ice blue eyes, nothing but a cold, almost scary clarity.
"So what do you want to do?" I asked.
Miranda didn't answer.
She walked to the door and pulled it open.
Two warriors from the Snowfield Pack were standing outside, both half-shifted with their wolves right at the surface.
"Tonight, anyone who comes near this room..." Miranda said.
Her voice was quiet, but every word carried ice. "Dies."
The warriors bowed their heads, grunted in acknowledgment, and disappeared back into the shadows.
She shut the door and turned to face me.
"You're my fated mate," she said.