Chapter 50

Silas

This was a hopeless cause.

Three days had passed since we'd been in the princess' presence. Jessalyn had been moved from the healer's cottage and into the single women's long house. In response to what they'd been told about us, all the other women, including Creed's own sister, formed an honour guard around our girl. And while I watched the lot of them chatter away in the dining hall, shooting us the occasional baleful look, I just remembered.

The way Jessalyn's gown clung to her form as she dropped down into the bath, then that brief glimpse I had of her perfect skin as she whipped the dress up and over her head. I'd forced my eyes away, but I could fill in the gaps from the memories that felt seared on my brain. I could make her into a girl that turned towards me, an amused look in her eyes as she gestured for me and my knives to come forward…

But she didn't.

The princess avoided my gaze assiduously. I knew this because I tried to capture her attention at all times, but if she deigned to look my way, her eyes slid over me with all the interest a perfect stranger might muster. So I'd spent my time away from her doing research, talking to the males here, mated and unmated, and finding out what the process was.

The stories were the same, whether they were from those who lived here or the ones that were now flooding into the pack village to participate in the games. They clapped me on the shoulders, told ribald tales of their exploits and how they got their mates to accept them, so I knew what today was. The official opening ceremony and… an opportunity to familiarise ourselves with our mate. Apparently, the whole of the games was both about proving ourselves worthy to our mate, but also to her family, so today we were about to parade past the entire host of wolf shifters currently residing on packlands, stripped to the waist and oiled up so we shone.

And Jessalyn was to be the one that oiled us up.

"Welcome to this year's mating games!"

Elder Wren's voice carried out across all the field, and I heard the crowd go silent as a result. Wolf shifters had discipline that humans could never match. I couldn't see what was going on, because like all the other contenders, we were now standing in a massive tent, each pack clustered in their own little section.

"For the love of all the gods," Roan muttered, undoing the ties of his shirt and jerking it up over his head. "I'm more bloody nervous than I was at my first battle."

"Just don't soak your breeches like you did at the battle of Nairne," Arik snarked, as if the prick wasn't already shirtless in readiness for our princess' attentions. He was working his hands as well, clenching and releasing his fists to make his muscles pop. For all his dry manner, he was just as worked up as the rest of us.

"No one is soaking anything." We all turned around at Creed's sharp words. "No banter, no bullshit, just fucking humility." A strange kind of stillness went over the whole pack. "We fucked everything up, and we will make this right."

I nodded in recognition.

"As you say, brother."

When I thrust my hand out for them to add theirs, I was reminded of all the times we'd done the same thing and managed to succeed against terrible odds. Their hands slapped down on mine, making clear they remembered. Creed nodded to me, then the others, right as Elder Wren made the announcement.

"We have many of our fine young males, seeking to find their mates this games. Shortly you will meet them all, but first… All the young females who have been chosen need to report to the main tent."

She was coming. Jessalyn was coming here, and she would be forced to reckon with us. All of Arik's posturing and Roan's nerves made perfect sense as I flicked open every button of my perfectly tailored shirt and then tossed it on the ground, like it didn't cost enough to feed several poor families for a week. My heart was pounding, my mouth dry as I stared at the doorway of the tent.

Women came. I could hear their chatter, their giggles, though they fell silent when the first of them came to the entrance. The females stopped where they were, regarding the lot of us, wide eyed. None of them were my Jessalyn. She would have marched over here, nose in the air, with an imperious look and a sharp word for us. Perhaps she stood in the middle of the group, rolling her eyes at this entire spectacle. Somehow the idea of that comforted me, but the women's nervousness was dispelled as several males stepped closer.

That look, I knew it well. They raked their eyes over the tall, willowy wolf shifter woman nearest to us, like she was the most precious thing to walk the earth, and I knew then what she was to them. She hoisted up her jar of oil, no doubt provided for her by her family, and then grinned as she rushed forward. I was forced to look away when she went to smear it across their bare chests. Woman after woman streamed in, either finding her mates by sight, or the males made clear they were the ones that recognised her. Some went to work with gusto, oiling up each male, while others hung back, needing to be coaxed to complete the job. Every female began working with her males in some capacity as the last of the women walked in. Fern sighed, sighting her males as she rushed over to greet them, leaving Jessalyn just standing there.

That sardonic twist of her lips, the way her eyes raked across each one of our bare chests, but especially the way her smile faltered upon closer inspection: I soaked every moment of that in. She recovered terribly quickly, though, sauntering toward us with a bottle of oil in hand.

"Jessalyn—"

All the reverence I felt was in Creed's voice, but she held up a hand.

"The ladies of the village have taught me about what is expected of me, so let's get this done, shall we?" Her tone allowed for no nonsense. She retrieved a pair of leather riding gloves and pulled them on as she set the oil down on a nearby table.

"Don't trust yourself to touch us with your bare hands, Princess?" Arik asked.

All of us frowned at him, waiting for the bastard to realise what the hell he was doing, baiting her.

"Trust?" Her eyebrow curved upwards. "I guess the urge to wrap my hands around your throat and choke you until your face turns purple is a pressing one, but no. Have no fear. I will not be overcome with lust by the prospect of massaging oil into your manly chests."

She might not, but my body had other ideas.

"I wear gloves rather to help me to manage my revulsion." She poured the oil into the palm of her glove. "Vomiting all over the floor of this very nice tent really won't do."

"You weren't feeling nauseous last time, lass…"

Arik was an idiot. A total fucking idiot who's head I would shove into the nearest latrine once this farce was done. He could breathe in other people's shit rather than constantly speaking it. But whatever he had to say, it was cut off the moment her hand slapped down on his chest and then smeared across it.

That's when I recognised the scent.

Each family made their own oils, perfuming them with different floral extracts to make them more attractive, but I wasn't catching the scent of roses or lavender right now. The harsh blast of horse liniment hit my nose, and that's what had Arik gasping. When we were still cadets, trainers had pinned us down and worked the bloody awful stuff into our thighs or shoulders when we were unsuccessful at masking we had an injury. Probably because the cure was far worse than the disease. It burned like the fires of hell when it touched your skin, the older cadets laughing as you could only suck in one breath, then another, as the wave of chemical heat tore through you.

Just like it did Arik right now.

"Horse liniment?" Roan chuckled. "That's bloody… Oh dear mother of all the gods."

She slapped her spare hand down on his chest, my brother's voice going to a sharp squeak as her palm slid across one poor unsuspecting nipple. Roan couldn't make out another word, just little high-pitched whines. The oil left his skin looking red raw and angry everywhere it touched, as she massaged the two of them with all the finesse of a drill sergeant. But the two of them gleamed, just as required. Because rather than using a carrier oil that would soak quickly into the skin, this seemed to sit on the surface, burning all the hotter.

"Is this the penance we're to pay?" Creed stepped forward, ready to take his licks. "If so, I pay it gladly. Whatever it takes to make things up to you, lass."

Jessalyn spared him a single look, then turned her eyes back to the other two, moving around them, spreading the toxic brew over their shoulders, down their arms, then across their backs until the two of them were red and gleaming, like a drop of blood. When it came Creed's time, you'd have thought he'd have shied away. We all knew how harsh the burn of horse liniment was, and the sharp stink of it made clear what it was, but instead he sank down to his knees. He gazed up into her eyes and waited for his sentence to be carried out.

She paused for just a second, which gave me hope, but that was as quickly dashed as well. What she hoped all along, I'm sure. The Jessalyn of before the night with the bandits would never have done this, but right now, she poured the oil into her palm with a decisive air and then rubbed it into his skin.

Something I'd experienced before.

Pleasure and pain, they were the two sides of the same coin, so when she was finished anointing Creed, I stepped forward.

"Seeking to cause me pain, Trouble?" I asked, the scent of her still apparent above the stink of the liniment. I watched her eyes widen as they finally met mine, glad for that attention. "You can't hurt me with that."

"You think so?" That cocked hip, that hard gaze, I sucked up every detail, unable to look away, because even though she was so obviously angry, at least she was looking at me. She was reacting and I could see under that cool mask she'd erected. "I spoke to Mother Marian and Hazel. They assured me this oil would burn as fiercely as a thousand suns, without causing any permanent damage, of course."

"Shouldn't have worried about the last bit." I tilted my head to one side, feeling alive for the first time in days. "I can take anything you can dish out. Make it hurt, princess."

Her title, that was a trigger word. Her whole body jerked at the sound of it. I didn't want to piss her off, but if being polite wasn't helping, what options did I have? I watched her pour the liquid into her gloved palm with a theatrical flair that made it easy to imagine her wielding a different weapon. A riding crop perhaps? Or even a whip. Maybe even a knife. My skin turned to goosebumps, shivering in anticipation, but she didn't string the wait out, slapping her hand down on my chest.

Gods above…

Whatever the mothers had done, they'd ensured the oil lived up to its claims. Her touch always burned me, but this was something on a whole other level. A small grunt, that's all I got out, as every nerve ending started to scream at the same time.

Burning, that's what it assured me was happening, I was burning alive. But at least I felt alive now, rather than the grey, formless ennui of the past few days. I let out some rapid pants, then grabbed her hand by the wrist. She frowned as I dragged her palm across my chest, forcing it to caress every single muscle as I stared into her eyes.

She was touching me, I wanted her to acknowledge that. Jessalyn had spent her time concocting a punishment designed for me and my brothers. If she really didn't give a damn about us, she would have done a slapdash job of oiling us up with nothing more than cooking oil and wandered off without a look backwards. But a woman that was inspired to punish us was a woman who might be convinced that we had served our penance well and could find it in her heart to forgive us. So I forced her hand to map the entire breadth of my front, right before I stopped her to go back for more oil.

"Roan had tears in his eyes. Arik cursed me in a very creative and offensive way," she said, peering up at me. "But you… you like this."

"I love it," I corrected, "because when you're touching me, punishing me, I know you give a shit. It forces you to focus on me and me alone, and that's all I want. See me. See what you've done." Blood was rushing to my extremities, making me glow as red as a tomato. "You can do a whole lot more and I'll endure it all, because when you make me pay for every idiot thing I've done, hope remains."

She snatched her hand back then, staring at me and then the rest of the pack, as if seeing us for the first time. My brothers stopped cursing and stepped closer, forcing her back.

"You've had your fun, Jessalyn," Arik said. "Now what?"

I would curse his name until the day I died, but never more than now, because the princess dropped her bottle of oil back down on the table and then wrenched her gloves off before leaving the tent without a word.