He Traded His Pregnant Luna to the Lycan King novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Price
On Blood Moon night the Lycan King demands one woman of the Alpha's house, and when Torin says "Take my Luna" Wynne rejects him in front of both packs, crosses the line on her own feet and hears the King whisper "Two heartbeats. Does he know?"
At moonrise on Blood Moon night, the Lycan King's marshal read the price out to the whole Stonewater Pack.
"One woman of the Alpha's house, for the two wardens his hunters killed on the north bank."
Forty wolves stood in the border clearing, and nobody breathed.
On the far side of the stone line stood the King himself, Ronan Greaves, a head taller than his guards, and he had not said a word.
I was kneeling on the frozen rock beside Odette Brannigan.
The King's guards had put us there an hour ago, a hand on each of our shoulders, and we were not allowed to stand.
My knees had split open through my gown, and the white cloth was red to the hem.
At breakfast Torin had kissed my forehead and said, "Whatever he asks for, you'll be home by moonrise. I'd never let it be you."
I had believed him.
Odette had fastened the clasp of my gown that morning, and her hand had stopped at my waist for a moment.
"Eat something," she'd said. "You look green."
Now she knelt beside me with her hands folded, looking at the ground.
Torin stood at the front of the pack with his beta and the elders, close enough that I could see his jaw working.
He was my mate, and the whole valley called him the strongest Alpha it had ever had.
"Alpha Halloway," the marshal said. "The choice is yours. Name her."
Torin looked at Odette first, and he looked for a long time.
Then he looked at me, and it took no time at all.
"Take my Luna," he said.
He used the voice he used for telling the cook to bring more wood.
"Odette trained under her mother," he told the King. "She's the last healer we have."
"My Luna's wolf hasn't spoken in three years. Stonewater loses nothing."
Nobody in the pack said no.
My hands had gone cold.
He had run the border all night, and I had slept until noon, and the pack doctor had patted my arm and called it a weak Luna's constitution.
I had known something for two days that Torin didn't.
Eleven weeks.
I had meant to tell him tonight, after the ceremony, with the moon on both of us.
I could have said it then, with my hand on my stomach, in front of everyone.
If I had, he would have kept me for the pup.
He had just told forty people what I was worth without one.
I looked at his face and I said nothing.
I stood up.
The nearest guard's hand tightened on my shoulder, and the King lifted two fingers.
The hand let go.
"Torin," I said. "You didn't ask me."
"Sit down, Wynne." He said it low, like I was embarrassing him. "It's a year and a day. I'll buy you back."
"With what?"
He didn't answer, and he didn't look at Odette, and I knew then.
I put my hand over the mating mark on my throat.
My mother had taught me the words when I was a girl, in case I ever needed them, and I had never believed I would.
"I, Wynne Ashcroft, reject you, Torin Halloway, as my mate and my Alpha."
The mark tore open under my palm.
I bit down on a scream and kept it behind my teeth.
Torin took a step backward, although I was ten paces away and had not touched him.
His hand shot out and gripped his beta's shoulder.
Somebody in the pack gasped, and Odette's head came up for the first time that night.
I didn't look at either of them again.
So I walked across the stone line on my own feet.
My knees gave out on the second step, and a hand closed around my elbow before I hit the ground.
It was the King's hand, hot as a stove through my sleeve, with an old burn scar running up past his wrist.
He was much bigger up close, and he smelled like cold pine and smoke.
He bent his head, and he spoke so quietly that only I could hear.
"Two heartbeats in you," he said. "Does he know?"
"No."
His grip tightened, just slightly.
"Then you're the most expensive thing I have ever bought," said the Lycan King, "and I am not giving you back."
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