The Wolf Prince Hid His Mate, So the Lords Wanted His Crown novel · Chapter 3 of 24
Chapter 3: The Rimewood
Hakon and Joren run the pine forest as wolves and shift back at the hunting lodge, where the first kiss in two years ends on Joren's mocking line. Someone is watching from the ridge.
"Loser carries the clothes," Hakon said, and shifted before Joren could answer.
The change went through him in one long pull of bone and sinew and skin.
Then he was on four legs in the frost.
A black wolf the size of a pony stood at the edge of the Rimewood.
He did not wait for an answer.
He ran.
Behind him he heard the grunt and crack of a body changing.
Then came heavy paws on the pine needles, and the scrape of a pack dragged by its strap.
Hakon put his head down and flew.
The wood was dim and silver in the first light, with mist between the trunks, and he knew every root of it.
He had run here at twelve with a boy who could not keep up, and at sixteen with a boy who finally could.
Now the brown wolf came up on his left flank, nearly his equal, amber-eyed and grinning with his tongue out.
Wolves speak to one another without words, and Hakon heard it plainly.
You're slow, he said.
You're cheating, Joren answered.
Hakon said, You started early, and Joren said, You always say that.
They ran side by side through the pines, shoulder bumping shoulder.
The trees thinned, and the hunting lodge stood in its clearing with smoke-black beams and a woodpile under the eaves.
Joren hit the porch a stride ahead.
He dropped the pack on the planks and shifted back, a bare man on one knee with his chest heaving.
He looked up at Hakon with a wolf's grin still on his face.
"A stride ahead, Your Highness, and I carried both our clothes."
Hakon changed and landed naked on his hands.
"You cheated," Hakon said.
"I did not."
"Your left paw was on my tail at the stream."
"Your tail was in my way," Joren said.
Hakon rolled to his feet and laughed in spite of himself.
It was the first time he had laughed in two years, and it surprised him so much that he stopped.
Joren had stopped too.
The morning sun came through the pines onto the porch.
It lit the scarred line of Joren's ribs and the iron ring on its cord.
Hakon looked and did not make himself look away.
Joren was not as calm as he had been in the suite.
He was half hard, and he made no move to hide it.
"Don't," Joren said.
"I didn't say anything."
"You were going to."
"I was going to say you look cold," Hakon said, "and you should go inside."
"That's what you were going to say."
"It's what I'm saying."
They went in.
The lodge was one big room with a stone hearth, a table and two bunks.
The academy kept a cupboard there stocked for hunts.
Hakon found dried apples and a heel of black bread, and stood at the table eating with a blanket around his waist.
Joren crouched at the hearth with his back to him and lit the fire.
The silver crescent on Hakon's hip began to warm.
He ignored it.
"The Duke's dinner," he said, to say something.
"Friday," Joren said.
"I'll tell him no."
"You'll tell him yes and be rude about it."
"I'm always rude about it," Hakon said.
"That's why he'll like you less every time he sees you, and why he'll keep asking."
Hakon put the apple down.
"How do you know that?"
"Because I've watched him ask your father the same thing since I was nine."
Joren stood, wiping soot from his hands, and the blanket on Hakon's waist did very little to hide what that did to him.
Joren's gaze went there and came back up.
"Stop looking at me like that," Hakon said.
"You're the one who's looking," Joren said.
"I'm allowed. You're mine, to guard."
"Am I?" Joren said.
He crossed the room slowly.
Hakon backed into the table, and the table edge hit the back of his thighs.
Joren stopped a hand's width from him.
His breath smelled of woodsmoke and frost, and Hakon watched his mouth.
"You're thinking about it," Joren said.
"About what?"
"Whether it tastes the same."
"It's not the wine, then," Hakon said, and his voice cracked.
"Highness," Joren said, low and rough.
Hakon took Joren's face in both hands and kissed him.
For a heartbeat Joren did not move.
Then he made a sound deep in his chest and kissed back, hard.
His hands went into Hakon's hair and gripped.
His mouth was hot and demanding, tasting of apple and smoke, and he opened Hakon's lips with his tongue and took the kiss deep.
The blanket fell.
Hakon pulled him in by the waist, skin to skin, and the two marks flared together, bright enough that the whole room went silver.
It was better than the first time.
It was so much better that Hakon thought he might cry.
Joren tore his mouth away.
He was breathing hard, his forehead pressed to Hakon's, and for a moment neither of them let go.
Then Joren smiled, thin and hard.
"Careful, Your Highness."
"What?" Hakon said.
"It's only the pine air," Joren said. "It gets in the blood. It will pass, like the wine."
Hakon went white and then red.
"You son of a..."
"Get dressed. Your trousers are on the porch."
Joren turned away and went to the window, still naked.
His shoulders were shaking, from anger or want, and Hakon could not tell which.
He pulled on his trousers with clumsy hands.
At the window, Joren stood absolutely still with his hand on the frame.
"Don't turn around," he said.
"Why?"
"There's a man on the ridge."
Hakon looked.
A hundred paces up the slope, among the grey trunks, a figure stood in a dark coat.
Its face was turned toward the lodge.
Joren went for the door.
Hakon went after him.
When he reached the ridge, Joren stood at the edge of it, and the trees beyond were empty.
Only a single set of boot prints led away through the frost.
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