BROOKE

We left when the sun was high, moving through the woods like a herd of cattle. Mother always warned me that being mated to an alpha wouldn't be easy. With power came responsibility, and with my ankle much better, Huck was free to tend to his pack. Organizing a group as large as ours was no small feat, and despite my years of training for this very thing, I found myself quite useless. There was very little to carry, and even less for me to discuss. After all, I'd prepared for parties, alliances, and appearances. Not war. Not...this.

They used words as sparingly as they did resources, and platitudes seemed equal to watering the foliage. It wasn't uncommon for people to be guarded. In that way, I supposed we were the same. But while mountain wolves crouched behind their walls, valley wolves paced atop them, daring anyone to try and climb over.

Huck checked on me periodically, but for the most part, I walked alone. An alien. An oddity. A spectacle. They wouldn't stop staring.

"Your Grace?"

I turned, and my eyes widened at the sight of a familiar face. "Goddess! You're—" I threw my arms around him. "How are you here?"

"With great effort," Bear said.

I pulled back, taking him in as if he were a mirage. The last time I'd seen him, he'd been unconscious and bleeding out. "I thought you were dead."

"So did the sentinels." His brow pinched as he took in my appearance. "I'm sorry I failed you, Your Grace."

"Don't be. You did far more than most would even attempt. I am in your debt."

He didn't look convinced.

"Walk with me," I said, beyond relieved to have someone to talk to. "When did you get here? How?"

We continued forward, and he told me about how he'd traveled down the mountain, blacked out, and woke up with the valley wolves. I couldn't believe he'd been here this whole time, and I hadn't even noticed. Then again, I'd been preoccupied. I searched the masses for Huck, seeing him nowhere. Why hadn't he mentioned this?

"How did you do it?" Bear asked.

I blinked and focused back on him. "Do what?"

"How were you able to have your mate so close without anyone knowing? How did you control the pull?"

I studied him closer, then repeated his words back to him. "With great effort. Why? Did you find your mate?"

He sighed out his nose and nodded.

I wanted to congratulate him, but his expression held my tongue. By the look on his face, one would think he'd been mated to a porcupine. "A valley wolf?"

He nodded, and his jaw tightened as he turned his gaze forward. For the longest time, we walked in silence, and I didn't think he would say anymore. "She's already in love with someone."

"Oh." I touched his arm, offering comfort the only way I knew how. "Was she already marked?"

"No."

"Well, at least—"

"I must confess, Your Grace, there is a reason I approached you."

My lips closed, and I waited expectantly.

Bear hesitated, seeming to battle for his words.

"What is it?"

"My mate is Jewel."

"Oh." I stared at him, connecting the dots one at a time. My wolf didn't like the picture they formed. Jewel was his mate. She was in love with someone else. Jewel, with her long, blonde hair, and longer legs, dancing by the fire, her eyes fixed on Huck.

She was my sister...and I wanted to destroy her. "Who is she in love with?"

The memory of her hand on Huck the first day we met. The way she'd challenged me with her smile.

"I think you know."

I swallowed hard. "Huck has no romantic interest in her," I said, reassuring myself just as much as him. He didn't. He'd said so. She was like his sister. But, even as I thought it, my wolf stirred uneasily.

Bear nodded, but he was quiet for so long, I thought the conversation was over. "I swore loyalty to you, Your Grace, and nothing has changed about that, but I worry what I'll do if he ever..."

"He wouldn't."

He nodded again, and the conversation was buried beneath the weight of our situation.

I took a slow breath. "So...what is she like?"

He grunted. "Infuriating."

"Is that so?" Jewel's voice came from behind us.

We turned, and she was standing there as if that's where she'd always been.

The color drained from Bear's face, but she wasn't looking at him. She was too busy glaring at me. "Is this that famous mountain wolf gossip I always heard about?" Her smile was mocking. "How fun!"

Bear took a step forward. "Jewel—"

She stepped back, ignoring him. "In the valley, we say what we need to say to the person's face or not at all."

"I wasn't—"

"If you feel intimidated, just say so."

"I don't—"

"After all, it must be hard to know that, for the bulk of his life, your mate slept with me."

My lips closed; my wolf growled.

Her brows lifted, and she watched me closely, seeming to enjoy herself. "I'm sure he never compares the two of us." She gave me a once over, clearly unimpressed.

She was goading me. She was my sister. I hated her. She was important to him. It was better to leave it. But I was my Mother's daughter, and I'd been programmed to never accept such disrespect. I crossed my arm's and met her stare. "I'm sure the smell has vastly improved."

She growled.

I growled back.

Then as if he'd materialized from thin air, Huck stepped in between us. "Have you lost your mind?" he asked Jewel, his voice deadly quiet.

"She—"

"Walk it off!" he boomed, his tone echoing to my bones. No sooner did the words leave him, Jewel turned and stormed away from us.

Bear followed her, and Huck turned his fury toward me. "What was that?"

"She was being disrespectful."

"So you decided to, what? Fight her?" He heaved a breath out his nose and shook his head hard. "I love you, Brooke. You're the smartest, most cunning, witty, and gorgeous woman I've ever met, but you can't fight, Jewel. She would destroy you."

I bristled. "You don't know that."

"How many physical fights have you been in?"

I clenched my teeth, hating that he was right. "My wolf could—"

"Jewel has been fighting her whole life. Don't be stubborn. Not on this. If you got hurt because of her, I don't know what I'd do."

"She's in love with you."

He groaned. "I already told you—"

"She told me she slept with you."

His head fell back. "Of course she did."

"She said for the bulk of your life, you slept with her."

He laughed darkly beneath his breath, sounding as if he were in physical pain.

"Is that funny?"

"We slept together. As in sleeping. We were kids, Brooke. It didn't mean what you're thinking."

"That's not how she made it sound."

"Because she was fucking with you! It's what Jewel does. Give her time. She'll come around."

"Am I supposed to just let her talk to me like that?"

"Look—" He took my shoulders gently, forcing my eyes to his. "I get it. I know. If it were anyone else...It's just...Jewel has lived a totally different life than you have. Not that I'm excusing her, but she has good reason to distrust you."

"Me? I haven't done anything to her!"

"No, but the mountain has. Give her time. Let her get to know you."

"I am trying."

He lifted a brow. "It's no secret you don't like her, Brooke. You haven't since the start."

"But that was different. It was before—" My lips clamped shut. How could I tell him? Should I?

"Before?" Huck searched my face, his brow creased by whatever he saw there.

I swallowed hard and looked at my feet. "When I was in the dungeon, Mother told me something."

"What?"

"My father wasn't a failed gambler. He was fated to a valley wolf. And h-he had a child with her."

Huck stared at me for a long moment, seeming either unable or unwilling to fill in the blanks. "What are you saying to me right now?"

"She's my sister, Huck."

He shook his head. "No. Jewel's father—" The creases deepened, and he chewed his lip and looked toward the fast disappearing group. If we didn't hurry, we'd be left behind. "She must have been lying."

"No. She wasn't."

"How do you know? You said so yourself, she's lied to you your entire life."

"Mother never lies without purpose, and I can't think of a single reason for her to say that. We'd fallen. We were at the bottom. This was probably the most honest she's ever been."

His gaze shifted across mine, then he took my hand and began pulling me forward, hurrying to catch up to the others.

I followed, having to nearly run to keep up. But even after we'd reached the rest, he didn't slow. He pulled me through the masses, head swiveling as he searched the many faces. He didn't stop until we found Flora.

"Who was Jewel's father?" he asked her without so much as a hello.

Flora's eyes flashed, and she studied his face. If there was one thing I knew, it was how to spot a tell, and Flora wore her every thought plainly. She knew something. "Why are you—"

"His name," Huck said.

"Huck, I—"

"Tell me his name." His tone was calm, but it resonated as if he'd shouted. The same tone he'd used on Jewel.

"It was Dean." Flora threw a hand over her mouth. "Huck—"

"Dean?" Huck shook his head. "No." His features pinched, and he shook his head harder. "Dean was...He wasn't—"

"Did you know him?" I asked.

Huck looked at me as if he were seeing me for the first time. "He was like a father to me," he said. Then, focusing back on Flora, he added, "Dean was a valley wolf."

Flora wrung her hands in front of her. "He thought it was safer if nobody knew. He wanted to protect her—all of us."

He was like a father to him. My father, who had never been a father to me.

Huck turned suddenly. "Jewel, wait!"

That's when I saw her. She'd overheard. She must have, because she tore away from us as if the devil himself was chasing her.