He watched the focussed expression on the twenty-two-year-old Alpha. His naturally brown eyebrows – opposing his white hair – were pulled together in concentration as he adjusted the angle at which he looked at the countertop.
The halfling wondered if Grayson had always been so mindful. He didn’t come across as such a type – he seemed more likely to take the impulsive amd aggressive approach instead of the practical one.
Grayson hummed, “Okay,” he picked up the stool yet again and placed it on the chipping countertop. Just as before, he analysed the legs of the stool; turning it to different angles as his eyes scanned top to bottom.
“Grayson, what are you-”
“One second,” the ivory male interrupted – continuing his assessment.
Cory kept quiet, hiding how hot he was getting beneath the thick hoodie. If he were to show it, Grayson would get him thinner clothes which would probably be his. At first it was a matter of anger at his ex-mate, the conviction to not wear his clothes. Now, it was a principal; only mates should share clothes and Cory is not Grayson’s mate.
You’re wearing Lucian’s clothes, the halfling’s mind spoke.
Lucian isn’t mated yet so it’s fine.
Cory looked at Grayson’s blue eyes haze over before they focussed on the smaller male, “Lucian is coming to keep you company so I can get the tools.”
“He doesn’t have to do that…” Cory tested the fragile trust already.
“He does, because you’ll run again and then this little progress will have been for nothing,” Grayson smiled softly. His eyes crinkled on the sides with subtle sadness.
“Fair enough.”
The scarlet-haired man wanted to tell Grayson that fixing the cottage wouldn’t convince him to stay. He wanted to tell the Alpha that he would leave no matter what. The ivory man was trying his best – being his best. But, he shouldn’t waste that on someone who isn’t his mate.
“Grayson… All this effort – you’re wasting it.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You are though,” Cory said again.
“If the effort is for you, it’s not a waste” Grayson spoke confidently.
“Precisely my point, this effort should be for your mate; not your ex-mate-”
“Cory, you can keep denying it for years. But you are my mate and I’ll keep telling you that truth.”
Cory pursed his lips, as he let his mind wander; aware of Grayson’s gaze.
“Did- Were you with her during her final moments?” The mixed blood asked referring to Joy’s passing.
Grayson smiled softly, “I was.”
Cory fiddled with his hands slightly, “How was she?”
Grayson walked slowly to the bed and sat a respectful distance from Cory. He didn’t want to touch his mate with his apparently icy touch and he tried to ignore the anger slithering around his bones at his Beta’s scent on his mate, “She was… lucid. But, in a weird way – like she knew where she was, but she was looking around in a different place. She was mumbling words, none of us knew what they meant or were but they just made me feel so peaceful – protected… A few moments before her passing she had such a soft smile as she looked up at the ceiling – I’ll never forget that kind of gentleness and belief in a simple smile.”
Cory squared his shoulders, “She was the strongest woman I’d ever known and likely the strongest woman I’d ever meet. Joy was… she was just too good to me – protecting and nurturing me. Looking back, she seemed to put me first.”
Grayson looked at Cory curiously, “You want to say more… Do you?”
The mixed-blood narrowed his eyes in hesitation, “I don’t want to add fuel to a fire or tarnish her reputation – which was already rotten in this pack – but that night you rejected me, she gave me a bag and told me where to go. Four years of study and independence – four years of growth… all owed to her foresight.”
Grayson nodded slowly, Joy hadn’t packed all of Cory’s clothes because some had been left behind – which he territorially took to his room and smelled the scent for a few days before it faded. Joy was the one who gave the ivory man the clothes. The Alpha decided not to tell Cory that part.
“It was me,” Cory spoke in the silence, “She was staring at me. I was floating above her bed; she was looking at me in those final moments. I saw her eyes grow hazy – losing the light of life. I then booked my plane ticket when I woke to thank her and wish her a peaceful rest.”
Lucian opened the front door holding a basket. Not intricately woven but semi-sealed. He walked to the kitchen and put the basket down.
Grayson slapped his hands on his knees, “I’m going to get the things for the wood – see you guys later.” With objective steering his mind, Grayson left the cottage.
“Hey,” the Beta greeted darting his gaze between the basket and Cory.
“Grayson knows wood work?” Cory asked.
“Oh, yeah we all had to learn some of it for the development and building of the houses. He really took an interest in it.”
“Houses!?” Cory asked in shock.
“A lot has changed in four years, Cory. Grayson increased the pack budget more significantly than his father – people don’t live in huts and tents anymore. It’s still a work in progress – but small houses are a sign of development.” Lucian then rummaged through the basket.
The halfling was mildly impressed, despite wanting to be indifferent. He had thought the tempermental, rageful Grayson Lightpaw would be the downfall of the pack legacy. In his old mind, the scarlet-haired man had painted a tyrant of anger and entitlement; Grayson seems to have turned out the opposite.
Something soft was thrown at Cory’s face.
He picked it up and saw it was a shirt with thinner and lighter material, “How did you know?” Cory could have portrayed his happiness but dialled it down so as to not cultivate any attachment whatsoever. He needed no tie to the pack so he could leave with no loose ends.
“It gets hot at night and hotter during the day. That hoodie is thick and for winter so I just figured,” Lucian grinned. The Beta acted as if he had not seen the glimmer of relief in Cory’s hazelnut eyes – but it made him happy to see it nonetheless; for some unwelcome reason, the happiness was in conflict with itself – who was Lucian happy for?
Cory stood and attempted to take the hoodie off before pausing, “Would you mind turning around?”
Lucian cleared his throat, “Sure.” The Beta’s mind had become traitorous, it conjured images of white silk as skin – smooth and precious. It tempted his senses by conjuring what it would feel like to run his hands across the porcelain skin – would his coarse hands leave marks? Would the marks last? What does the untouched veil of skin feel lik-
“Lucian, why is this shirt even bigger?” Cory grumbled or whined. Lucian couldn’t tell as he had lost focus when he turned to look.
The Beta’s light brown nightshirt was indeed thin, the fabric was on the edge of being transparent. What had captured the brown-haired man’s full attention was the wide seam that failed miserably to cover the halfling’s collarbones. Lucian could see the flatteringly prominent small bones delicately bulge from the silky skin.
“Even the sleeves are longer!” Cory complained as they covered his hands completely – he was drowned in a brown ocean of fabric, “How is that possible? Are you sure this is your shirt?”
Lucian took a hesitant step forward. His eyes roamed the shirt and the skin it didn’t cover; they wandered across the skin it did – the slim figure visible behind the light shirt. His green eyes admired the striking red of Cory’s hair against his pale complexion. The mixed-blood was roughly a head shorter than the Beta, despite his slight build and frail-looking body the halfling could defend himself – he could rely on himself alone. Somehow, that added to the allusive appeal.
Cory adjusted the seam as best he could to centre it, he tugged it from both sides. It now covered some of his collarbones, but the seam was snug across his shoulders – he did not feel very modest in this regard. He raised his eyes from the large shirt to meet Lucian’s; they seemed fixated.
“Lucian? You okay?”
The Beta blinked harshly, bringing himself back to rational thought, “What? Yeah, my nightshirts are bigger because I stretch them accidently when I sleep.”
Cory sighed softly, “Okay, thanks.”
He sat back down on the bed and began rolling the long sleeves up his forearms. The material of the shirt felt nice, soft and thin – he was already cooling down.
“Oh! Here,” Lucian handed Cory the basket.
The mixed blood quirked a suspicious brow, “Why… is everyone being so nice all of a sudden? Did Grayson put you up to this?” His suspicion had reminded him to stay sharp and Cory thanked his neurotic paranoia for that.
“He doesn’t even know I brought these in, he just saw the basket.”
Cory still analysed the taller man.
“I promise,” the Beta put his hand on his heart and palm in the air like it was a solemn pledge.
The red-head opened the basket, inside was a sealed toothbrush, a travel sized bottle of mouthwash and dental floss. All of Cory’s deprived oral hygienic needs.
Lucian noticed the look on Cory’s face, “I could tell you were using some old soap to clean your teeth with your fingers…”
Cory’s cheeks flared slightly and he looked away from the Beta, “How did you know?”
Lucian chuckled; it was deep and throaty – unlike Mark’s. “I could smell it and recognised that Joy smelled of that soap every day.”
Cory closed the basked, “Thank you, Lucian.” The halfling smiled in appreciation. He gazed into green eyes with sincerity.
Lucian opened his mouth, his eyes bouncing across Cory’s face before he walked to the fireplace; he just stared into it. His thoughts raced the neural pathways in his brain to see which words would reach the finish line first.
Cory looked at Lucian then disregarded him and continued rolling his sleeves up.
“You said you wished you were my mate instead of Grayson’s…”
Cory shrugged as he finished rolling up his sleeves, “I apologise for that – I’m sure that made you uncomfortable. Grayson is your best friend and it was wicked of me to say that.”
Lucian remained facing the warm orange flame for a moment before turning around, looking at the pale man, “I wish you were mine too…”
Those words thundered through the air, their meaning and consequences. One could hear the thunderous clap of the shocking revelation. Lucian had never shown any interest in Cory in the past. They passed one another like strangers on the pavement – even though they had lived on the same pack grounds. Cory took a deep breath – unsure of how to proceed; he needed peace so that Grayson wouldn’t attack Lucian and so that the halfling could leave before the explosive drama. The explosion that would not only destroy a brotherly friendship forged in the crucible of training, but also the current Alpha and Beta dynamic.
Before it erupted in revelation – if it ever did.
All because of an unlucky man who was both wolf and magic.
“I’m mate-less, Lucian. I’m not sure if your interest in me is from a genuine place or if it’s-”
“It’s genuine, Cory. I’ve noticed you long before Grayson even knew you were in the pack…” the Beta commented softly yet he remained composed.
“Do I smell like your mate? Doesn’t it bother you that I’m male? That I can never bare you pups and continue the Dolion bloodline?” Cory asked the needed question; the question that was vital to both Alpha and Beta. The continuation of their bloodline.
“No...” The Beta admitted to Cory’s first question, “But also, no, it doesn’t bother me. A mate is a mate and that’s all there is to it, even if you aren’t picked for me” Lucian’s green eyes gazed deep into Cory’s brown ones.
If only Grayson had said those words so many years ago…
Cory looked away from the lean Beta, adjusting his seam again, “You’ll find your Lunar-assigned mate, Lucian. Had the Moon paired us together then I- You’ll find the person you’re destined to be with and you’ll both be happy about that,” the halfling looked back at the Beta.
“I want that… I want that with you.”
The door opened gently as Grayson easily carried a box of what looked like tools – Cory wasn’t sure what they were classified as. Lucian’s gaze remained on the halfling but there was nothing left to be said as the words ran in fear out the opened door.
Grayson placed the box down on the counter and it groaned under the weight – yet the Alpha carried it with utter ease, “Lu-” But Grayson turned and saw Cory’s new shirt and slightly revealing collarbones. He cleared his throat when Cory adjusted the seam yet again to hide his seemingly distracting collarbones. They were just collarbones, what was so enchanting about a basic piece of anatomy?
“Lucian, help me out with this counter man?” Grayson asked his friend.
“Sure,” the brunette replied with an easy smile – a smile Cory could see also held a sense of strain to it…
The blizzard raged outside the sanctum with roaring winds that howled to
him of promise – of opportunity. Absently he gazed out the permanently frosted
window; the whispers of secrets he used to hear more than two millennia ago had
been hushed by the frigid cold within him.
No one dared to enter his sanctum in which he could relax his magic; the temperature was too low for any form of life to be sustained. The grey marble that constituted the entire palace had been frosted with a thin coat of ice from his very presence. Small jutting icicles sprouted slowly from the frosted floor like growing blades of grass.
There was a knock on the incredibly thick and large wooden doors; it was hesitant and even the ice could tell their origin was fearful. The person on the other end was not ready yet, “Your Majesty…”
“Enter,” he spoke.
The thin ice that coated the inner doors cracked and fell to the ground like a shattering window. The guard closed the door behind him, already shivering in voice, “We have…r-r-received n-ews that s-s-she has die-” The guard’s voice stopped completely.
The regal man trailed his paper-white fingertip across the windowsill, a line of ice manifested instantly following his finger’s trail.
“Of course she chose death…” the man whispered. He turned around; his white robe, frozen with thin ice at the end, scrapped against the arctic floor as he walked robotically to the man whose skin was already a blueberry shade of purple.
He gently put his index finger on the dead guard’s breastplate that hid his heart behind it, “You had a brave heart, I’m sure…” frost rapidly spread across the guard’s armour where the paper-white finger was placed until the palace guard was covered in a thick coating of pure ice, fitting his form like clothes. He had been frozen from the outside to the inside. Bones, blood and brain were all fragile shards now.
The man removed his finger and stared at his latest sculpture that had once been a palace guard. Impassionately he flicked his wrist and the icicle guard, the frozen statute, shattered to shards that shone with indifference.
“I already knew she would make such a choice…”
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