Calla

The Ice Wolves crammed into the giant ballroom, the crowd so tight it was nearly impossible to navigate through. Wolves, in all their splendor, danced and mingled in silver and diamond-studded attire—gossamer gowns as white as snow, shined silver boots the shade of moonlight, and enough jewelry that the room rattled with their movements, cutting over the music. The crowd was filled with a glittering lack of color, the ballroom overflowing onto the frozen balconies that looked out over the city. A ten-piece orchestra played for the ballroom and a lone violinist played for the balcony.

I hung close to Mina. She was wrapped head to toe in furs to keep warm. Meanwhile, I was overheated in my golden coat and tails, my thick hair in loose curls around my face making my cheeks hot. The warmth from the ballroom seeped out through the open windows, enough to fight off the winter’s chill. It was nice out here away from the throng, but I knew I would eventually have to go in and participate in plan Manipulate the Ice Wolf Queen.

“I hate this,”

I signed to Mina and she smiled as she carried on playing. “You should be in a ball gown beside me right now.”

She paused, tucking her violin and bow under her arm to sign, “I am a musician. Politics is your game.”

She gave me an incredulous look. “Let me perform.” She paused for a moment as if debating herself before adding, “The music will help.”

She carried on playing and the sound of her song did actually slow down my racing heart a little. I spotted Briar moving through the crowd, her fan fluttering to catch my attention. I locked eyes with her and nodded.

“See you in a bit,”

I said to Mina. She waved her bow at me and kept on playing.

Briar breezed through the crowd, and they all seemed to part for her. She was a beautiful blue beacon in a sea of white and silver. Klaus worked his way through the crowd toward her, and the two of them quickly struck up a lively conversation.

I found Grae next to Ingrid, chatting with similar joviality although the hoops of Ingrid’s glittering ball gown were so wide that Grae stood beyond arm’s reach.

“Ah, there you are.”

Grae’s smile broadened as he reached out to me and pulled me into a lingering kiss. I wanted to tilt my head back and melt into him more, but I knew my crown would slip right off my head and clatter to the floor. Grae broke the kiss and wrapped his hand around my waist, pulling me into his side.

Ingrid watched us, a mixture of scrutiny and some kind of sadness, longing maybe, sketched across her face. I wondered if she had any lovers. I wondered if she ever got lonely on her frozen throne.

“Your sister is quite the charmer,”

she said, falling straight into Briar’s trap.

I turned to find Briar and Klaus at the center of the ballroom. Briar’s head was thrown back in laughter and Klaus beamed down at her. Judging by the look on his face, Briar’s misguided attempt to only appear to ensnare Klaus’s heart was most certainly failing. They twirled around the ballroom like something straight out of a storybook, drawing everyone’s gazes.

“They certainly make quite the pair,”

I said, tilting my head and acting like I was admiring them. “Very regal.”

Grae let out a little hum of agreement.

“Yes,”

Ingrid said with an air of boredom. “Such a shame your sister will never be a queen.”

“Who knows.”

I shrugged, pretending to be just as casual about the tense topic. “Lines of succession change all the time. Who knows what will happen to either of us.” Ingrid paused for such a brief moment that I almost missed it, but it was there. My words had landed their target. Now time for a hasty retreat. “Anyway,” I said with a light laugh. I turned to Grae. “Shall we get another drink?”

We bowed our heads to Ingrid and she bowed back, the two of us skirting away before I could undo the work I’d done. Too heavy of a hand and Ingrid would be enraged, too light and she’d never consider it.

“Is she still looking at them?”

I whispered to Grae. He twisted half back to steal a glance at Ingrid.

“She’s staring daggers at Briar,”

Grae said and I pinched my lips together to keep from laughing. “Hector’s talking to her now,” Grae added and I had the urge to look back at our friend. I wondered why he would put himself in the line of Queen Ingrid’s wrath, but maybe he was trying to stoke her suspicions as well.

“We’re going to have to rescue Briar before the end of the night,”

I said. “I have a feeling she’d appreciate our help detangling from Klaus.”

“He’s a fool if he thinks those fluttering lashes are real,”

Grae said. We both looked over at the two of them, and Klaus had pulled Briar closer, the two of them dancing as if they were the only people in the room. “Maez is going to kill him,” Grae muttered.

“She told Maez what she was doing, but . . . Maybe we should intervene?”

I turned to move into the crowd of Ice Wolves when Grae’s hand landed on the crook of my arm and he pulled me back.

“Give them a few more dances, little fox. She trained her whole life for this, remember?”

he murmured as I let out a little whine, folding my arms across my chest. “And stop staring at them like that. Come on—let’s go rub elbows, find ourselves some more allies.” He paused, studying me. “You’re going to have to stop glowering.”

“I wasn’t taught how to hide my feelings like you and Briar,”

I bit out. “I was taught how to use them to kill people.”

Grae grimaced, sucking a breath through his teeth. “Okay, maybe we’ll work up to the elbow rubbing.”

I tried to mold my expression into a hardened neutral one, but I was certain it was still far from pleasant. “.”

“I can’t help it,”

I muttered, worrying my lip as I watched my sister swirl around the ballroom. “We need this. It’s too important to fail.”

“You staring at them won’t do us any favors.”

Grae stepped in front of me, breaking my line of sight. “You need to relax. Let Briar work her magic.”

I grabbed a flute of sparkling wine from a silver tray, swigged the whole thing back in one gulp, and set the glass back down before the server had time to zip past.

“That’s not relaxed,”

Grae said from the corner of his mouth.

I was buzzing with nerves now, bouncing on the balls of my feet. “Distract me then.”

Without missing a beat, Grae’s lips landed on the shell of my ear, his warm breath making my skin tingle. “I hear the greenhouses are beautiful this time of evening.”

I turned in his light hold and found his brow arched expectantly, his dark eyes hungry.

Touché, mate.

I bit the corner of my lip at that look and he reached out and tugged it free with his thumb, and Gods, I wished he’d done it with his own teeth.

Hunger curled low in my belly as I whispered, “Lead the way.”

The words had barely escaped my lips before Grae’s fingers threaded through mine and we practically ran out of the ballroom and down the quiet hall. I couldn’t contain my giddy laughter. Would it always be this way? Would I always feel so ravenous for him? My mate.

Gods, I hoped so.

His desire for me was clearly just as keen judging from the way he kicked the greenhouse door open and dragged me inside, my laughter pealing off the glass ceiling.

“Wait,”

he commanded. His hands frantically fumbled with his belt as he turned to the glass door.

“Slow down,”

I laughed.

“No—it’s not like that. Although I don’t have any interest in slowing down once I get started,”

and I nearly melted even as I squinted at him in confusion while he removed his belt until he started looping it through the door handles and tied them closed. I let out a surprised giggle as he turned around with a feral grin. “No interruptions,” he rumbled, making my core clench.

He stormed toward me, not stopping as he stooped and hoisted me one-handed up and onto his shoulder. I let out a surprised squeak, holding my crown to my head, as we plunged deeper into the gardens. Broad leaves whacked into us like we were trekking through a jungle.

“Where are we—”

My words were silenced as Grae set me down against the back wall of the greenhouse. Behind the glass was a wall of glittering snow. In front of me was the thick foliage we’d just walked through, obscuring the path. We stood on a semicircle of white stones, cushions dotted around it. A beautiful space that looked designed for quiet contemplation, which was the furthest thing from my mind. Starlight beamed down from the glass roof, refracting and sending skitters of moonlight dancing across the plants as if we were floating in the middle of a constellation. It was magical, the perfect angle that could only be seen from this very spot.

“How did you know this place was here?” I asked.

“This used to be a favorite hiding spot when I’d visit Taigoska as a child,”

Grae said, his hands encircling me and pulling me against his chest as I reached out and rubbed a soft leaf between my thumb and forefinger. “I dreamed of showing you one day.”

I released the plant and trailed my fingers up Grae’s biceps and into his dark hair. “What else have you dreamed of showing me?”

My words unleashed him, and then we were a flurry of mouths and desperate hands. I loved this. The frenzy, the unending need for him.

I dropped my crown to the ground and carelessly knocked Grae’s off as his tongue plundered my mouth. His fingers dug into my belt, frantically unbuckling it. I moaned into his mouth, and he snarled back, our Wolves howling to each other from inside our minds.

He yanked down my trousers as I hastily kicked off my boots, stripped bare from the waist down. Grae didn’t waste a second, dropping to his knees before me. His hands kneaded the flesh of my ass as he pulled me toward him. My eyes fluttered closed as I felt his hot breath tickle through the hair between my legs. One single inhalation and then his tongue was licking up my folds and parting my flesh. I groaned, one hand fisting in his hair as my other slid across the slick glass behind me. Condensation beaded across the pane from our wildness. My palm mark squeaked across the wet glass as Grae’s tongue circled my pulsing clit.

My moan echoed through the quiet space. Grae hitched one knee up over his shoulder and continued to feast on me. My head fell back, banging into the glass, the pleasure building tighter and higher like a hot coil ready to explode. My hand slipped again, squeaking across the glass, and I nearly toppled sideways. Grae clenched onto my hips tighter to keep me from falling face-first into the stones below as we both let out a chuckle.

“Grae.”

My voice came out all husky and raw as I steadied myself on his shoulders.

I dropped my foot back onto the stones below me and pushed him backward until he was lying splayed across the ground. I straddled him, my hands frantically freeing his cock from his trousers, happy for a second reason he’d already taken off his belt. Grae’s hooded eyes watched me with lust-laced heat as I guided him toward my dripping core. His fingernails dug into my hips as I lowered onto him, my head rolling back with the mounting pleasure. I didn’t know how long I’d be able to hang on. I was already teetering on the edge of an orgasm. The stress and anxiety of the day just made my movements more feverish. I needed this, we needed this—this anchoring to something real and raw and so far from our fears.

I rode him with wanton abandon, relishing in the feeling of him filling me over and over again. Grae’s hips bucked, bouncing me upward, matching each of his movements with my own.

“Fuck, that’s good,”

he groaned, his breathing so jagged I knew he was trying to hold himself back. That only spurred me on, working him faster until his eyes were clenched closed and he sputtered, “, I—”

My matching moan silenced him, my hands fisting in his jacket and holding on for dear life as my orgasm tore through me. My cries of pleasure bounced off the glass, echoing through the whole greenhouse as Grae erupted with me. He gripped me so tightly, plunging back into me as he released again and again, our orgasms burning so long and bright that I saw stars.

I collapsed on top of him and his arms banded around me, holding me to his heaving chest. I buried my face in his neck, breathing in his scent, listening to his heartbeat slow. I kissed his skin, tasting his salty sweat and wishing we could stay in this quiet little secret place in the world. But even as my release echoed through me, I knew I had to go save Briar from Klaus’s overzealous advances. I had a Queen to convince I was worthy of her aid. I had a court that needed my protection and humans in Damrienn who needed saving.

“That is my favorite kind of distraction,”

I murmured against Grae’s skin.

“Certainly clears the mind.”

“Now let’s go find ourselves some more allies.”

My mate grumbled as I forced myself to get up and regroup from that quick burst of passion, but he soon followed. We both knew we couldn’t linger here.

In another life, Grae and I would stay all night, watching the stars and listening to each other’s beating hearts. But that dream would only be a reality once I secured the future for us all.