The Alpha King And His Chosen Luna novel Chapter 203

< Over nothing

Over nothing

(Isla)

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I went inside the way he asked.

Not because I didn’t have questions. Because I could see in his face that he needed a minute and pushing him for answers while Vorak was still that close to the surface wasn’t something I wanted to do.

I went to our quarters and sat on the bed and thought about what had just happened.

Kael had touched my arm.

That was it. That was the full extent of what had occurred. A wolf who had been watching us train crossed the ground, said something kind, and touched my arm the way wolves touched each other without thinking about it. It had lasted maybe two seconds.

And Caius had growled.

Not a warning sound. Not something controlled or considered. Something that came from underneath all of his control and got out before he could do anything about it. I’d felt it in my chest before I’d heard it with my ears and for a half second I hadn’t understood what I was hearing because I had never heard that sound from him before.

Then he’d taken a step toward Kael.

Just one step. But the way he’d moved, the way Vorak had been right there underneath it, had told me that one step had cost him something to keep at one.

Kael had looked like he might not recover from it for a week.

I lay back on the bed and looked at the ceiling.

Vaela stirred inside me.

‘That was new,’ she said.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It was.’

I was still lying there when the knock came.

I sat up. “Come in.”

It was one of the younger pack members, a girl whose name I’d learned two weeks ago and whose expression right now was caught somewhere between trying to be professional and failing completely.

“Luna,” she said. “I just wanted to check if you needed anything.”

“I’m fine,” I said. “Thank you.”

She nodded but didn’t leave immediately. Her eyes gave her away.

“You heard,” I said.

Over nothing

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Her composure broke entirely. “Half the pack house heard,” she said. “Kael came back through the main corridor and his hands were still shaking. Someone asked him what happened and he said the Alpha King growled at him and took a step toward him over nothing and then told him to leave.”

I looked at her.

“Over nothing,” I repeated.

“That’s what he said,” she said. “He didn’t seem to understand what he’d done.”

“He touched my arm,” I said.

Her eyes went wide. “That’s it?”

“That’s it,” I said.

She pressed her lips together very hard.

“You can laugh,” I said.

She did. Briefly and with her hand over her mouth, but she did.

After she left I lay back on the bed and stared at the ceiling again and thought about Caius standing very still on the training ground breathing through something that had gotten out before he’d had any say in it. Then going somewhere. I didn’t know where. But that was Caius. Even in the middle of something instinctive and unmanaged, he wouldn’t just sit with it. He’d go looking for the explanation.

I heard his footsteps in the corridor before he reached the door.

The door opened.

He came in and stopped when he saw me lying on the bed looking at the ceiling with what was probably a very specific expression on my face.

He looked at me for a moment.

“You already know,” he said.

“Half the pack house knows,” I said.

He closed his eyes briefly.

“Kael told people his hands were still shaking,” I said.

“I know,” he said.

“He didn’t know what he’d done wrong,” I said.

“I know that too,” he said.

He crossed to the bed and sat on the edge of it and looked at his hands for a moment.

“Sera said I’m jealous,” he said.

I pressed my lips together.

< Over nothing

“Don’t,” he said.

“I’m not doing anything,” I said.

“You’re about to find this funny.”

“I already find it funny,” I said. “I’ve been lying here finding it funny for twenty minutes.”

He looked at me. Something in his expression shifted, not quite resigned, something close to it.

“Kael wasn’t doing anything wrong,” he said. “He was just talking to you.”

“I know,” I said.

“Vorak doesn’t care about that distinction apparently.”

“Also something I gathered,” I said.

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He was quiet for a moment. I sat up and looked at him properly. He wasn’t embarrassed the way I might have expected. More unsettled. Like something had happened that sat outside the version of himself he’d built and maintained for a very long time and he wasn’t sure yet what to do with it.

“Has it happened before?” I asked. “The jealousy.”

“No,” he said. “Not like that.”

“What changed?”

“The bond is complete,” he said. “Sera said Vorak is still adjusting. Any wolf near you registers differently than it used to.”

“So every wolf who comes near me is going to get growled at?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “It’ll even out.”

“When?”

“When I trust that no wolf is going to take you anywhere,” he said. He said it plainly, without embarrassment, just as the fact it was.

I looked at him for a moment.

“You know that already,” I said.

“Yes,” he said. “Vorak is catching up.”

I reached for his hand and he let me take it.

“For what it’s worth,” I said, “Kael is never going to touch my arm again.”

“No,” Caius said. “He isn’t.”

“The whole pack knows by now,” I said.

“Sera warned me about that,” he said.

< Over nothing

“She’s usually right,” I said.

He didn’t argue with that.

I leaned into him slightly and he put his arm around me and we sat there together in the quiet of our quarters with Wraithbone going about its day outside and nothing requiring either of us for now.

“You should apologize to Kael,” I said.

“I know,” he said.

“Today,” I said.

“I know,” he said again.

I smiled against his shoulder.

“I like that it happened,” I said quietly.

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