We scramble to get dressed, our antics making us later than my warlord ever cares to be. I can't help but grin every time I'm directed an annoyed look. 

"Worth it." I mouth to him as we exit my chambers. I detour to the kitchen, and Verando takes the opportunity to roll his eyes, flashing me my favorite look as I snag a loaf of bread and tear him off a corner. Considering the offering, he accepts, taking a bite as he examines the crust. 

"You just insist on eating every day." He exhales, feigning disbelief. 

"Sometimes, even multiple times a day. Sometimes, even just for fun! Welcome to my world, Randy, where you can eat whenever you like. Shouldn't be such a novelty.." I press, shouldering my coat as I take another bite of bread. 

We walk in silence, leaving the courtyard with his sword placed on his hip and my fur hood over my head to guard from the chill. Slowly, I start to regret my comment but finally, he clears his throat. 

"Part of learning to live among each other is not taking things personally that aren't intentional. Forgiving you for something you never did... even if you lived with your father, even if you owned Lycan slaves, I can't damn you forever when you are trying like hell to help us. How can I expect you to understand what it was like? You were... a lad.. when it started." Shaking his head, he curses under his breath with an air of disappointment in himself. 

"Does it bother you that I'm young?" I ask, sighing in relief as we exit the main road for a smaller footpath. Pretending to be a royal, acting as if I were of some sort of superior breed, it had grown tiresome. I didn't wish for them to treat me any differently; I didn't want them to hold their tongue around me as they did my father. 

"Yes." Verando was honest if he was nothing else. "But, I'd like to think this is not permanent. You'll grow bored, war tends to separate people, changes them..." My expression gives away my horror, and he unapologetically puts his arm around me, utilizing my height to drape across my shoulder as he squeezes me to his side. "Come now, don't look so forlorn."

How could I not when he just admitted he hoped I lost interest? 

"Who looks forlorn? I'm simply wondering where you get all of your audacity." I retort shortly, brushing his hand off my shoulder before pressing my lips together in a silent scolding to myself. "That mean you don't love me? Is this your way of saying we should just be friends."

My warlord's eyes were ever scanning our surroundings; we were treading towards the edge of where merchants would go and entering the span that lycan footmen had carved out. I'm wedged closer to him as the path narrows; it's so painfully quiet out here; even the birds are silent. 

"I didn't say that." Verando finally concedes. "I'm saying I don't expect you to remain infatuated-"

"Infatuated," I repeat, mocking his accent, but I feel the frost within me begin to melt. "Smitten I could agree to."

"My apologies, Your Highness." Verando scoffs, placing his hand on the hilt of his blade. Even by ourselves, he walked slightly behind me, in line with my shoulder, guarding me from behind. His warmth on my back was a welcomed relief, and I resisted the urge to lean back into him. 

My mind drifts back to his words that he couldn't continue to blame me when I was unintentionally insensitive. "You know, you can talk about it if you need to. I mean, I know my family's involvement, but if it would make you feel better... to tell me.. then..?"

The offer is open-ended; I don't want to push him, to come off too soft to another man, or to appear too feminine. 

Did men even speak about their feelings? 

"In time, I think I might like that." He admits finally, bringing a warm smile to my face as I take his arm and absorb some warmth. "My my, the frozen mage finally engages in a little physical contact."

Dragging my tongue over my teeth at his sarcasm, I can't help but chuckle. "Well, how about I share. Much as it might be hard to believe, the royal family doesn't engage in much touch, and to be.. what I am.. is the greatest sin of the catholic church. So suffice to say, we weren't much as far as warmth. To touch another man.. like this.. in public would have gotten quite some stares; hell, a woman wouldn't be accepted." 

My hand trails up and down his arm, reveling in the muscle under his thin, pale shirt. "Trust me, the urge to touch you..." Taking a quick breath, I gasp as he stops, turning to collect my face in his palm, and I stretch up on my toes to meet his lips. "You never did fuck me on my father's statue."

"Tonight. You're mine." He exhales against my lips, hovering his mouth against mine. "You're quite the creature, you know..."

"Not so bad yourself." I sigh, glancing up towards the sky with a frown. "If you'd like to be fashionably late, I think you've succeeded. I'm sure Haryek is having a field day."

 I take in his tight, long sleeve and sigh as I force myself to focus on the task. Haryek will certainly be displeased with our tardiness. As we leave the city limits, he starts to slow. 

"You know.. I haven't seen Sota in a while, have you?" He mentioned it, and I gave him a look, which suggested Sota was the last person I wanted to see. 

"If I had you would be the first I'd come to find. The man practically wants me dead." 

"Odd. He's not one to hang back, but he's licking his wounds, I'd imagine. He's pretty upset with the delay."

The idea of Sota lurking in the is enough to make my skin crawl. We began walking again; I asked a different question to take my mind off it. "Was banishing Tonic really what was best for him?" 

Verando tracks the tree line as he speaks, cautious in his steps yet confident in his path. The further we got from the castle, the more on edge he got, and I found myself looking over my shoulder. 

"Yes. He's free of the bounds of an omega. He can do whatever he wants now. Besides, anyone who kills him is breaking the law now, and nobody wants that with this power struggle going on."

 I realize I'm not up to date with what's happening, and I'm grateful that he uses that as an excuse to fill in the gaps in my knowledge about pack politics. Frost has been promoted to the Delta position. Havoc was trying to gain a general position, but stiff competition existed. When Ziduri is taken, they will have an actual ranking ceremony and redetermine ranks, but for now, this is how it must be. 

After what had happened at the last ceremony, there was a reluctance to fight it out again for risk of favor from the Alpha. While those loyal to Verando felt secure in their positions, those who questioned his choices in higher positions felt more unstable than ever. He could act upon them if they stood against his word, and there was no ancient rule to protect them. 

Older wolves aren't happy with the lack of dedication to tradition, and Sota was happily at the forefront of that, though he'd yet to reveal himself since their last argument. I can't help but think it's a good thing the traditions are dying off. 

The fact that they take after Vikings and believe in War-torn heaven is a little off-putting, integration would go more smoothly with less violence and more structure. 

"Are we ready to move on Ziduri?" 

In the short answer, no. In the long answer, who knows?

Verando explained to me that the magic users were trying, but the elves were struggling to teach the lycans how to shoot Elven bows. 

The bows are too small and not heavy enough for lycan strength, but ever the problem solver, Verando was currently working with a rebel from the outer magic camps who had seen a longbow that could be used from the breast. 

With Bogdan due tomorrow, the lycans are struggling to find many positives, and morale is low.

With a heavy sigh, I see his shoulders begin to relax as he speaks to me; I've finally succeeded in taking the edge off for him. 

"Nobody wants to die. Even if you believe that glory is to be won in battle. War is ugly, I think it's settling in that we are moving out and there's nothing anyone can do about it. It's hard to look at your brothers and wonder which ones you will never see again, which ones you'll carry home, and if you will even return yourself." 

A slight chink in the armor. They don't want to die; we can all find common ground if we could focus on that. With each passing day, I held on to that tighter and tighter; I didn't want to die either.  

"We can do this. We have a lot of different angles from which to hit the elves. They won't know what's coming." 

They won't expect elves and magic users to side with the lycans.  Ultimately, the fact that I wouldn't yet have to say goodbye brought me the most peace.

We take the time to discuss battle tactics. He pulls a knife out of its sheath and slowly runs it across a sharpening stone while he walks. This is where he's the most at ease, casually walking and talking about how he plans to slaughter a whole nation. My warlord. 

It's not just the battle; it's the woods and the freedom. He's outside, in his element. 

I watch as he scans while he talks; Frost tells me that I'm not vigilant enough, and watching 'The Alpha' in his natural environment, I can agree with him. Nothing passes him; he watches the flutter of the leaves, and he tracks soundlessly over the ground as if he knows where the bare spots are. I feel like a child clamoring next to him and making a conscious effort to walk more quietly. 

It is unrealistic to expect to keep him locked away in a castle when this is all over, you can't domesticate something wild. But perhaps I could convince myself that he was this way out of necessity rather than desire. 

Even a street cat would allow domestication, and I can't imagine some slight comforts would go unappreciated. I wrap my arm around his and lean my cheek on his shoulder as we walk; the chill air nips at me through my coat. His voice and his accent soothe me as I listen to him talk about books he's read and the armadillo shell he intends to build with shields that could protect them from any skyward attacks. 

 There is also the option of tunneling under the walls, but we lack the manpower and the time to perfect that. Besides this fact, a tunnel failure would be catastrophic. 

Every tactic and angle makes it feel more real, and my stomach threatens to flip. I shudder, squeezing him closer. "Well, I could give you a fog cover. You can't hit what you can't see. Let them waste their arrows." I expect retaliation, the threat of my mortality looming, that I wouldn't be capable of helping, but Verando rarely sees me that way.

"If we could keep you out of sight, that might work to our advantage. Especially if we can get them to come out of the walls, which I doubt. If we could get the fog high enough, we could potentially even scale the walls. Truthfully, having you increases our odds drastically." 

The constant talk about having hot oil at the castle's disposal makes me reluctant to consider climbing any walls. 

I tune in and out of his excited babble about the possibilities and ways that could lead them to victory or failure. It seems like there's a very small window of opportunity to make this work. We pass a small stream, and in the distance, I can hear the roar of what could be rapids, but it's too distant to tell. I'll have to remember to go there on our way back.

 It's always good to map out potential water sources on these treks. 

Suddenly, he slows. I feel his tension and see him inhale. 

"What?" I try to avoid asking him too much like a dog.

 His lips parted as he savored the scent, settling on an identity for whatever had paused him.

My noticing almost embarrassed him as if it were involuntary. It caused me to smirk just the slightest; it wasn't often that I got to see him caught off guard. When he was with me, it was the closest he ever seemed to relax, and I took comfort in the fact that when I think back on his words, he thinks I might eventually lose interest in him. 

"Nothing. I just... this area smells heavily of elves. Still getting used to it, I guess." He murmurs, wrinkling his nose a little. 

"I'm sure it's just Haryek," I suggest. "We are meeting him, you know." Pressing my lips to his bicep, he stiffens at the affectionate gesture. "Is this not OK?"

Clearing his throat, Verando purses his lips to get a hold of himself, and I retract my grasp as I take a moment to look around. This was uncharacteristic suspicion, even for him. 

 "I.. no, it's fine. Sorry, I'm just a bit overwhelmed; the elf scent is strong. It smells different, but honestly, the man wears so much cologne it's a wonder we can tell him apart from the garden." 

 An arrow whizzes past us, and in an instant, Verando instinctively pushes me to the closest tree. 

"Hey! You called us here, asshole! Watch what you're shooting!" Verando snarls past the trunk, his hands on either side of me, his body protecting me.  "Are you alright?" He checks me over, and I nod hurriedly, panic rising to my eyes as I remember the last time we were under arrow fire. 

"Hey.." he murmurs, capturing my face with his hand. "It's fine. Keep it together; this is nothing. Simple, friendly fire.."

"No, I'm not-" I'm cut off as an arrow pierces his chest. The sickening thunk stops my heart, and I'm sure he will drop dead, but it seems to have penetrated his lung because he remains standing.

 I clutch his shirt and prepare for the next arrows, but I only hear congratulations on a good shot. Out of the woodwork comes a small party of shiny elves, all dressed up in sterling silver armor that reflects the leaves like glass. One of the elves removes his helmet, and he bears a startling resemblance to Haryek. 

"Taryek." Verando seethes.

How could I have been so foolish? So naive? 

Elves. So many elves. This was it. They had found us.