“The future is just a….very long time.” I said after a minute. “If you’ve already got someone, then I want to find my someone as well. That’s all.”
“No.”
His flat response struck like a whipcrack.
“…No?”
“No.” He nodded curtly, “You are not leaving. You are marrying me as Luna. There is no other future that is acceptable in this scenario.”
“Doesn’t that strike you as unfa-.”
“Avery.” There was that commanding voice again. It clicked my mouth shut and made me sit up and listen.
“Do not go near Ryan again.” Gideon commanded.
I tried to speak back but my body wouldn’t respond. I should have felt angry that he was commanding me like this, but the same instincts that kept me from talking back also reassured me that somehow what he was asking was correct and good.
I hated that he had that Alpha power over me. While I managed to stand up to Ryan just fine, Gideon had this way of getting behind my shields. Was it because I was in his pack now? I was becoming more Nightwolf than Silvermoon?
I could only nod.
The car rolled to a stop on Nightwolf property and Gideon opened the door to get out. As he left, he gave me one final look before stepping out of the car.
“We will be married at the next Dark Moon.” Then he disappeared into the night.
Two weeks away.
Avery’s POV
The pack library bore some similarities to the records room in the basement. Both were packed to the brim with information. Whereas the records room had boxes of files, the library had more bound books, but both boasted a copious amount of dust.
I mused that one might be able to tell what the state of current affairs was for a pack if their library looked like no one had used it in years.
If our lives were more peaceful, perhaps there would be more time for scholarly pursuits.
Whereas previously I had been digging around in more general subjects like botany, pharmacology, and medicinal shelves to support my burgeoning medical interests, this time I was deep in the stacks looking for the tomes that recorded the earliest records pertaining to Nightwolf Pack’s history.
Primarily, I was looking for information regarding the early pacts and alliances that had been formed between Nightwolf and Silvermoon. I wanted to know where this intermarriage tradition had arisen.
Maybe I could find evidence to support ending it.
Mostly, the old records were cut and dry records of a struggling settlement trying to get by. Planting records and census rolls were in thick supply, providing sobering insight to the harshness of life in these northern forests.
I flipped past heartbreaking records of swaths of deaths to famine, disease, and war. When the pack reached dangerously low levels, they had often turned to neighboring packs to form alliances and boost their numbers through interbreeding.
There were stories hidden between these dry lines, I was sure. In one instance, Nightwolf had allied with a pack named Ghostwraith, and then just two generations later a bloody war nearly decimated both.
Why had that alliance fallen apart? There was no Ghostwraith Pack still operating that I knew of.
I guess history is written only by the survivors.
Finally, in the records from about 300 years previous, I found mention of intermarriage between Silvermoon and Nightwolf.
Aha!
I squinted at the whispery, hand-written script.
“Advantageous marriage between Silvermoon Lunar Votaress and Nightwolf Alpha arranged to the sati of both packs. Eternal peace secured so long as marriage bond is fortified every third generation. Interbr will further temper the sanguine cacodemonology that infects the Nightwolf bloodline. Matrimonial amalgamation confers sovereignty to the Nightwolf Alpha bloodline that shall not be revoked so long as th union is intact.”
It took me a moment to parse the archaic language. I hunted down a dictionary to look up a few of the words I wasn’t familiar with.
If I was interpreting this correctly, it wasn’t just that the marriage formed an alliance between our two packs. It sounded like the children born from the union would have a degree of protection from the demonblood vulnerability that Gideon had displayed.
I didn’t know much about how genetics were passed on in werewolf packs, but I knew that most packs had some sort of historian or librarian who carefully monitored who bred with whom, to prevent serious illness and defects.
It was part of the reason why werewolves put so much stock in finding their ‘fated’ or ‘true’ mates. Many believed that our internal wolf-spirits carried subconscious knowledge of which pairings would make each bloodline stronger or weaker, and steered us to our mates accordingly. Otherwise, the inherent close-knit small communities of werewolves would be much more susceptible to inbreeding and madness.
But there was more than that in this pact with Silvermoon. Not only did it temper demonblood tendencies, but it conveyed sovereignty, which meant that the legitimacy of the title of Alpha was tied to this marriage as well.
So Gideon’s intention to marry me was strongly rooted in the fact that if he didn’t, he could lose his title of Alpha altogether. That explained why he was so adamant that the tradition needed to be honored at all costs, even when he himself had no interest in the marriage romantically or physically.
That realization was like a blow to my gut.
I had known that, to some extent, I was a trophy wife. I just hadn’t realized how immaterial my own happiness was.
No wonder Gideon didn’t care how I felt about marrying him!
He would be happy with basically anyone, so long as it meant he was secure as Alpha!
I flopped back in the leather armchair and stared at the ceiling. I was so screwed.
I looked up what votaress meant, and found that it was some sort of cult devotee. Was this an old fashioned term for a Moon Goddess worshipper? Or just someone who carried the Silvermoon bloodline?
I knew that in my grandmother’s generation, there had been a Moon Goddess high priestess who had helped to lead Silvermoon pack in traditional rites, but the practice had died out when she did, and she’d had no apprentice to take up the mantle.
In my generation, most people viewed the legends of the Moon Goddess as old-fashioned religious nonsense. They went about their lives, maybe occasionally making an offering here and there on special occasions, but most people didn’t really believe in her.
But I knew she was real.
At least… I had seen her in my dreams.
I didn’t know yet why she had touched my life, and the thought scared the bejeezus out of me. It was one to offer some moonwater to a goddess shrine at the Full Moon to ask for a blessing. It was another thing en to feel like she was taking a personal interest in your life.
I had found the information I’d been looking for, but it hadn’t helped me with my argument with Gideon in the slightest. If anything, it had only confirmed why he would resolutely continue to follow tradition. Intermarriage was the best hope he had for bearing children that didn’t carry the demonblood curse.
But that would imply that he intended to have children with me. Was that part of his plan as well?
I knew that he could easily overpower me if he wanted to. Would he try to force me to bear his children if I didn’t agree?
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