章節 8: Chapter 8: A Hunting We Will Go

Ravyn POV

"Neither of them are coming?"

Sipping coffee in the morning air, Ravyn gentled her voice in response to Jude's question. "Ginette Mond apparently will never move out of Wintertail, and Lady Garakh Anagnostia is, according to Jiro, working for Nauru Royal Intelligence. The rumors about her wanting to live somewhere with no humans around was really a cover for her latest spy mission."

Jude whistled. "It was a d*mn good one. Managed to fool a witch and an Alpha."

Ravyn couldn't help feeling deep relief. "As powerful as you are, orc women could out-Alpha the strongest Alpha. And, except for Royal Mage and future Queen of Nauru Kulenza and the indisposed Queen Durgat and a few members of the Mystics of Merkur, many orc women can be even more inflexible than Lady Yelna. But the males are even worse, including Prince Makhel–as admirable as he is. Remind me to tell you about him trying to court Anneliese."

"I heard. I guess orc men really are thick-skulled. It was obvious that she and Patch were meant for each other."

Ravyn said meaningfully, "Well, people don't always see what's right under their noses."

"Especially Cresta men." He smiled in a lopsided way.

"And witches with minds of their own. And Alphas."

"Well, THIS Alpha will try to listen to you as we select new prospects." He smiled charmingly. "And hopefully you won't want to tear my throat out."

"I haven't yet, and we don't need new ones entirely. We have yet to hear back from Queen Ylavi Crystalsprite of the Ember Faeries."

He sighed, looking regretful. "If I hadn't been so picky ..."

Strangely, she wanted to hug him, and she did. "No one said this would be easy," she murmured against his hair.

She'd chosen some women she thought could be his potential fated mate, based on her witch's matchmaking intuition. Clearly, she'd been wrong in the case of Lady Anagnostia and Ginette Mond–and how could she have not known that Lady Yelna had such narrow views? But even Vinessa Vermello hadn't passed the wolf test.

"Maybe we need a new strategy," she said.

"Maybe I need to focus on something I can actually do!" He paced the upper balcony of Cresta House. "I say we go talk to Patch and see if there are any new sightings of Daxius."

She wanted to protest. He needed a Luna, desperately.

But she'd learned to recognize that iron-willed expression that Alphas got. Dane and Jiro wore it on a daily basis. Besides, it had to be humbling for Jude to fail at this mate search.

At anything.

Like her Cresta boys, he was a strong, determined man with a sense of honor and duty as big as all the shifter territories. An intelligent man who was letting his emotions rule him–not that she blamed him. She'd been like him after Daxius left.

But he had a mate who, if she judged Emer accurately, really wouldn't want Jude to settle for a loveless match out of duty. She'd said just the opposite to Jude, but she'd been trying to provoke a response from him, and she succeeded.

If he got frustrated enough, that could work to her advantage. He might just surrender to the will of the Moon Goddess and embrace the happiness he deserved.

"Patch did hint that he might have something for us when I was helping out with the children earlier," she said. "Your idea is brilliant. Let's go find him."

Despite his office being filled with bizarre artifacts he'd collected on his travels and his papers being piled helter-skelter, Patch Cresta was one of the best intelligence chiefs in the shifter territories. His small but muscular body proud and strong, he stood considering a map of the Northern Continent with tiny wolf-shaped pins not only in the shifter territories but in the other allied kingdoms. His concentration was unbreakable while he studied his various operations in the shifter territories.

"We're not sure definitively it was him," he said the moment they entered his domain.

Ravyn exchanged a glance with Jude. "No sea serpent charm?" Ravyn asked.

Patch shook his head, pointing to the Sleeping Wolf Dunes to the north of the Moonsilver Mountains. "He was hiding out here. If he's looking for you, he's taking his sweet time about it. Maybe he's scared to face you in the capital where the Alpha would immediately seize him."

"At least he has a few brain cells," Jude said, lowering his voice, looking toward the door as if Lilia might be listening close by.

He cared about Lilia's feelings and didn't want to disparage her father around her. Admiration and affection surged inside her.

Patch coughed. "More than a few, sad to say. He picked a perfect place to conceal himself. The winds in those dunes are fierce, playing havoc with wolf eyes and wolf noses."

Ravyn lifted an eyebrow. "I have potions that can clear Jude's nose and my magic can at least shield us from the wind–up to a point. Everything is about balance and I can't meddle with nature too much."

Jude squared his shoulders, looking satisfied. "I have only one thing to say to that."

"And that is?"

"How soon can you pack all your witch supplies and leave?"

* * * * *

Jude POV

Ravyn Rolfe riding on him felt amazing, her shapely thighs clasping his furry body while he ran. She offered to teleport them, but they might very well appear in a sand deluge. Besides, just in case Patch's intelligence was wrong, he wanted to scout the territory in between New Moon City and the Sleeping Wolf Dunes.

She had few clues about how Daxius smelled, except that he had a fondness for spiced nuts, and also dwarf ale from time to time. Because he worked more with elemental magic than crystal magic, he frequently smelled like earth, water, air, and fire.

Did the woman not realize how keen her senses and powers of observation were? She really would make an excellent shifter.

The elemental magic was something he had a hard time distinguishing from, well, the other elements. However, spiced nuts weren't exactly common outside of a village or city, and neither was genuine dwarf ale.

He didn't smell any of those, nor did he sense unfamiliar magic. Perhaps he'd detect them as they closed in on the dunes.

Gripping handfuls of his fur, Ravyn said, "Faster! Now that your belly is full from that brace of grouse you got for us, we'll be able to reach the dunes by early afternoon!"

He planned to be quicker. He didn't want to be caught in the dunes overnight in a sandstorm and risk Ravyn's safety–no matter how brave her words were. Who knew what dangers might lurk, hidden by the veils of sand? Pushing his muscles to the limit, he bounded across the eastern plains, scattering flocks of wild birds that flew up in a wing formation to escape him.

The grass smelled fresh and the air sweet as he ran toward the hazy dunes in the distance.

Even with hunting every possible trace of Daxius along the way, all of which turned out to be nothing, they reached the dunes swiftly. A thin cloud of sand spread out, with the winds calmer than Patch had reported. Jude smiled at their good fortune.

He halted abruptly when an onyx stag and doe galloped across their path. Ravyn shrieked as she pitched to one side. She fell on the soft sand and Jude shifted instantly. "Sorry."

She got to a kneeling position and hoisted the rucksack on her back, since it had slipped when she took a tumble. "Help me up! And a little warning would be appreciated next time."

He smiled at her spunk. "As my lady wishes. The deer didn't give me any warning, either."

"Hmph. I suppose not. Just don't make a habit of that."

He helped her up, ignoring the thrill that shot through him at the touch of her hand. Their bodies were inches apart. "The winds are calm and the sand cloud is thinning–it's an excellent time to make our approach."

They walked through the dunes, and Jude sniffed constantly. No hint of spiced nuts, elemental magic, or dwarf ale. None whatsoever.

"Can you teach me to detect magic better?" he asked.

With a glance over her shoulder as she hiked, she said, "You and every shifter I've met seem to do just fine."

He growled. "Clearly not, or I would have spotted dark magic in Cyran."

It was a major regret he had as an Alpha and as a man. He'd taken the shiny picture of a swaggering Alpha at face value and not bothered to see the wounded boy underneath ... something he kept in mind when it came to his own son's grief. Even worse, he'd let decades, centuries, of distrust blind him when it came to the Crimsontail Shadows. He hadn't been alone–every Alpha had had the same weakness, including Dane.

Ravyn shook her head. "There's been more than enough hand-wringing over that boy. Whatever wrongs he committed, he's paid for them. The people who failed him will never make that mistake again. He's in a fine place now with his mate and children and family." She was quiet. "Besides ... Lilia could have been in his place. Or the Cresta boys."

"Or Bram," Jude muttered.

With a gentle touch on his shoulder, she said, "Sometimes, we can't stop our children from going down the crooked path. But we can make it as unappealing as possible before they even get there."

"I doubt Lilia would have ever gotten near it."

Her smile dazzled him. "Thank you."

He wasn't so lost in their conversation that he couldn't sense the wind changing, blasting them with a barrage of gritty sand. Sand everywhere, hemming them in.

"Can you shield us?" he asked, wrapping a knitted scarf around his nose and mouth.

The way she wove magic fascinated and baffled him, creating a shimmering shield of ... air, as far as he could tell. It surrounded them and kept the sand at bay. "This will last for only an hour," she warned. "I can cast it again, but it drains my energy fast keeping the forces of nature at bay."

"Then let's not waste any time." He didn't want her to be drained!

An hour of searching turned up nothing, only a few sand lizards–and Jude stepped in the nest of a slimy salamander or slime-mander and got squirted with ooze, Yuck. A sticky mess, and the more he tried to clean it off, the worse it got. Ravyn used a cleansing spell, which drained her energy further. "I could cast the shield again," she gasped.

"NO. We need to make ourselves some shelter and wait out this storm."

She grinned. "Spoken like a true Alpha. Patch packed a tent in the rucksack. It'll be a tight squeeze, but we'll manage."

He growled appreciatively. "I can stay outside in wolf form."

She gave him that forbidding glance he recognized from all the time he'd spent with the Crestas, and he backed down. "Where shall we pitch ou tent?"

He pointed to the foot of one of the taller dunes that at least offered some shelter. "There."

Several minutes later after battling the storm, they both managed to get the tent set up. It had a canopy that extended from the door that would at least let them make a fire shielded from the relentless wind, but that wasn't his main concern.

"A tight squeeze" was an understatement. He'd be pressed against Ravyn Rolfe even more tightly than when he'd pulled her into his bed.

Fenrir's guts! He hoped that his urge to kiss her was out of his system, and that his wolf would behave. Otherwise, he WOULD be sleeping outside with sand in his nose!