Series: Werewolves of Wall Street Series by Renee Rose
Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 78974 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 395(@200wpm)___ 316(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78974 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 395(@200wpm)___ 316(@250wpm)___ 263(@300wpm)
As he’s leaving, the Warden pauses to shoot me a disdainful look, and I ignore him. He’s not a threat to me right now. I know enough of his secrets to destroy him.
Aiden is another story. He’s a very real and present danger.
There was a time when I hoped a new alpha would make our pack better, kinder. But it didn’t take long for my childish fantasy to fall away. Aiden is worse than his father. Aiden isn’t needlessly cruel; he’s strategic about it. He’s the sort who would patiently explain why your life must be forfeit for the good of the pack, then slit your throat and walk away.
He has no conscience, no empathy. While I feel the full weight of what must be done. My pack has been at war with the Blackthroats since before my birth, and in that war, I am the Adalwulf’s most powerful weapon.
I’m caught between honoring my gift and my calling–listening to the Grandmothers–and trying to survive. It’s like walking a tightrope, blindfolded, over a pool of hungry piranhas.
“Alpha.” I clasp my hands and bow my head before Aiden. His aura is a roiling black with red streaks. Heavy, oppressive, weighing down my shoulders.
“Aster.” He doesn’t call me Seeress, which throws me off, since we’re clearly doing formality at the moment. “The Warden has called to my attention the fact that you haven’t given a credible vision for the pack since the last seeress died.”
A tight fist closes in my solar plexus. I’d feared this day would come, but I hoped I’d given him enough to keep him from demanding more.
“I see visions all the time. Not all come to pass.”
How do I explain that I have bright dreams every night of a gorgeous young man–packed with muscle and fierce with drive–somehow related to the Blackthroat pack. Not a Blackthroat but near them.
Close to our enemy. The visions feel raw and intimate, not like other foretellings. They wake me in the middle of the night. Several times, it felt like the enemy wolf had also been awakened in dreamtime. Sometimes, he looked right at me.
Who is he? Why am I Seeing him? What does he have to do with me?
There’s something inside me that longs to find him, but that’s delusional. Especially if he’s a Blackthroat.
He’s the enemy. And I’m the Seeress. My power lies in my bloodline as a veilwalker, maintaining my virginity–and therefore my second sight–and being bound to the alpha of the Adalwulf pack.
Those tenets have been drilled into me since I was seven years old and selected to be Oma's acolyte. They said my magic was strongest. That I’d be able to hold the binding. And they wanted me to be trained early, so I knew nothing else but this destiny.
But they can’t control my dreams.
Nor can they stop Fate. But I don’t know what Fate wants for me. I don’t know why she is sending me the images of this man. I have enough to deal with in the aftermath of Oma and Odin’s deaths and Aiden’s ascent to power.
Aiden assaults me with his cold blue gaze. “We will complete the Blood Bonding ritual during the upcoming lunar eclipse.”
I reel, suddenly dizzy. The decree punches me in the solar plexus, and I have to struggle to breathe. Outwardly, I show nothing but acquiescence. I know better than to anger my alpha. Aiden’s never struck me in the face the way Odin did, but I watched him kill his father in cold blood.
The Blood Bonding. Dammit. I had hoped Aiden would shun the old ways.
The ritual is the magical binding of alpha to seeress. Aiden resisted it until now because he knows the binding will siphon some of his life force and alpha power to me. He needed his strength after murdering his father and taking the helm of a pack that just suffered serious losses in the war with the Blackthroats.
Now, it seems, I’ve made it necessary.
I should have tried harder to receive a message for the pack, but the Grandmothers just weren’t giving me anything I could say. Not without terrible repercussions.
But the lunar eclipse is less than a month from now.
My stomach churns.
Even though I have been groomed my entire life for this binding, the thought of completing it makes me sick.
But I have to. It is part of my role.
There’s no other life for me.
“During the eclipse, you’ll bind your magic, and your fate with mine. Then you will produce the guidance I require.”
Still struggling to breathe around a constricted throat, I bow my head. “Yes, Alpha.”
“You will give your visions to us.”
“Yes, Alpha.”
“If after the binding, you still fail to see beyond the veil, there’s an alternative.”
My head jerks up. An alternative? I thought there was only this one path paved for me. Without meaning to, I raise my gaze and meet Aiden’s stare. His eyes flash silver, a sign that his wolf is ascendant.