Chapter 1

Chapter One

Alfred

" O h, he's so brave!"

"Please be careful, Alfred."

"Return back to us safely."

As I exit the clan hall with my sister at my side, I am met with a bleak winter wind and a bevy of beauties who gather on the steps, fluttering lashes and cooing over me. Beyond the village lasses, warriors await me, horses ready, finalizing weapons and supply checks.

I catch Etta's poorly suppressed smile. My sister's belly is fit to pop. There is something about a breeding female that makes them bolder.

Not that my sister ever lacked boldness. She was a fine warrior maiden in her time before her first babe came along. Certainly, she can handle herself still and could dispense with any fool who dared to threaten her or her child. She would gut the bastard within seconds.

"Your resistance only stirs them to greater enthusiasm," she says, giving a pointed look to where a fight almost breaks out among the lasses in question as they argue about who will hand me my cloak. "Taking a mate is not the end of life, brother dear."

I could point out that she should likewise take a mate and remind her that she does not need to bring up her children alone. But given she lost her first mate not so long ago, and carries their second child, it is a delicate subject that I rarely broach. Brent was a close friend of mine, and I miss the bastard too.

And so, all focus falls on me: the unmated king who, nearing thirty, is well past the age where the people of the clan, young and old, feel I should have settled down. My father stood down as clan king a few years back. He now enjoys a quieter pace of life with my mother, an omega, who still ventures to other clans offering advice to omegas and betas who mate with alphas.

I was ready to take on the responsibility of the role.

I wasn't ready for all the fuss that would ensue regarding my unmated status.

I'm a man in my prime. Why the fuck would I settle down?

Mating is fraught with risks—my sister is testament to that. One day I will meet someone who makes me forget the reasons not to; until then I can enjoy the charms of many.

Not that I've done a lot of enjoying of late. Every damn lass I bed is too busy crowing about being my mate and the next queen of the clan.

They come alone—or in twos or threes, like that might encourage me—and are shameless, slipping into my bed of a night and trying to accost me at any hour of the day when I am not otherwise engaged. Even when I am engaged—for they very rarely mind who is around—with nimble fingers, they can have my cock out and their lips wrapped around it in seconds. This, I openly admit, weakens my resolve to peel them off.

I hate to say it, but it has reached a stage where it is all getting very vexing.

I scowl at the lasses as they flitter around me, petting me anywhere they can reach. Finally, I wrest my cloak from two who are about to come to blows over who will present it to me… and someone squeezes my ass.

"Gods! Have you no shame, Cassandra?" I pluck her hand off as she tries to sneak it under my leather jerkin.

Cassandra appears only marginally contrite as I set her away.

Shaking her head, my sister slips away to share a few words with Lor. He is the reason we leave with war in mind this day, for his two mates have been taken.

"Fuck's sake," Espen, my younger brother and second-in-command, mutters, though without heat, as he hands me the reins to my horse. "No man in the clan will get a look in until you have chosen a damn mate or mates."

"I am considering going celibate," I deadpan.

Espen emits a deep guffaw. Even Lor, who is rightly worried for his mates, cracks a smile at my expense. The big shifter has laid claim not only to a pretty omega but also to a barbarian alpha. How exactly that might play out when the alpha he claimed is a dominant bastard, I wouldn't like to speculate. But each to their own is the way of the clans.

"Keep a close watch," I say to Espen. "We leave you vulnerable with so many warriors gone."

He nods and clasps my arm. "Bring them back safe, brother."

Our mother produced a brood of strapping alpha sons. There are five of us altogether, and every one of us is a capable warrior. I mount, knowing our clan is in good hands under Espen's watch.

"We ride!" At my call, we leave for the rendezvous point.

The trees whistle past. The snow, while not yet heavy enough to preclude travel, is nevertheless deep underneath our horses' hooves, so I keep one eye on the trail as my mind focuses on what is about to come.

It is no small business setting oneself to war against a Hydornian kingdom. Mostly, they keep to themselves, and we keep to ourselves. But that is not an option when they have snatched a mated lass.

Word has been sent to the other clans, rallying them to our cause. I believe most will come. Even though it is late in the season and the passage becomes difficult at this time of year, there is safety in numbers and in presenting a united front.

We have supported Hydornia in its war against the Blighten for many years. Our young alphas head for the borderlands, for their enemy is also ours, and it is in everyone's interest to keep the green-skinned bastards out of our lands. The Hydornians are happy to take our men to fight, yet still look down on us and our ways just because we place no boundaries on how mating, marriage, and love might manifest: whether that is more than one lass with a man or more than one man with a lass. As long as hearts and minds are congenial, that is our way.

When Lor and Aston mated Freya, a sacred bond was formed… regardless of whether questionable means led to her claiming or whether the lass in question was born in Hydornia.

Now she is ours, and we shall get her back, or all who live in the great city of Pershore will find themselves surrounded and under siege.

I have no intention of painting the city streets red. I am no heathen for all that I may be a barbarian. Even so, taking a walled city is no easy feat, and to try would be folly. It won't come to that. The fancy king in residence will shit his pants when he sees a barbarian horde at his city wall. He will recognizes his mistake in taking a clansman's mate.

But if he doesn't… If we must…

Before the Goddess, Freya belongs to Aston and Lor.

Before the Goddess, they will be reunited, or our whole clan is ready and willing to lay down their lives in the trying.