Antiope
All around me chaos. Everyone is either screaming or growling or crying. We are back in Magnus’s office and the Council is losing it fast. Magnus is caught! Magnus is held and we don’t know by whom and what for.
“Kill them all! Attack!” Torhild proposes for the millionth time.
“Calm down,” Egil tries. “We need to know what we are up against.”
“Our Alpha,” someone laments.
And me? I have both hands on his desk, my back on the others, barely holding it together. He is gone. One night with him. That’s all I got. One night. And now he is gone. He is not dead, I would know by the sheering pain in my very soul but other than that I know nothing. He could be in pain, hurt, tortured. Goddess! I squeeze my eyes together.
Why did I have to connect the dots? Why did he have to be that foolish? Why am I not there with him? Why? Why? Why?
“Let’s go to them,” Max is begging me constantly.
Her pain is greater than mine. She is an animal and she has two basic needs: survive, procreate. And the latter she can do only with her mate. She needs to be close to him. I need to be close to him. I need him.
The voices around me are getting louder and louder. Panic has gotten a hold of everyone and despair is creeping in.
Then, through the pain, the agony and the panic, I hear it. The phone is ringing. Despair is replaced by hope. The tears by a smile. It’s him. He is calling me like he did when he was at Gunnar’s to tease me, to keep me on the phone just to hear each other’s voice. He is going to tell me he is alright and that he is coming back to me. I pick up the phone.
“Alpha Magnus’s office. This is Luna Ulfisson speaking.”
“Just the person I wanted to talk to.”
I freeze. This is not Magnus’s deep voice. This one is darker, sinister and sounds more like a growl.
“Who is this?”
“The man that has your mate.”
“Kill,” Maximo demands.
If only that was as easy. This man has Magnus and I need to play this right. I only have one chance at this. Why did he keep him alive? What does he want?
“Good,” I hiss low so that I am not heard by the rest of the pack.
Silence.
“You may not have understood well. I am holding your mate prisoner.”
“He is not my mate,” I growl.
Egil turns to me but I mind link him swiftly.
“Keep the commotion going. I need time.”
“What is going on, Antiope?”
“Give me some time.”
“Listen to me,” I say in the phone. “I have no idea who the hell you are but if you rid me of Magnus, I’d be grateful.”
Silence. I can hear the plans he had made crumble down. He was planning on blackmailing me but I am not giving him an inch. The minute he knows what Magnus means to me he is good as dead.
“You are bluffing.”
He is good.
“That asshole,” I lower my voice, “abducted my sister to force me into mating with him. Good riddance, I say. And I get to keep his pack.”
An angry growl is his response. Gotcha! He wants the pack. In all the world there is no better werewolf army than The Ulfisson pack. For whatever he is planning, he needs the pack.
“I will kill him and then I am coming for you.”
“You are most welcome. I am sure my warriors would defend fiercely the grieving widow of their beloved Alpha,” I chuckle cruelly.
Silence again. He has been planning long for this. Well, if he was planning that Magnus would have a quiet, submissive Luna he made the wrong bet.
“But if we work together…” I throw the bait.
A growl. Please, Goddess!
“I am not working with dead people.”
Fucking...
“Don’t act tough with me, asshole!” I hiss. “You can’t fuck with this pack and you and me both know it. That’s why you are keeping Magnus alive.”
Pause. I am spot on.
“These are some hardcore motherfuckers. They won’t be taken down easily, they won’t stop till they get revenge and they won’t bow down to anyone. Not even me.”
“You are their Luna,” that asshole says.
“And they will respectfully let me stay here and maybe give me some pension. But the pack? I am an outsider. Egil will take control of the pack. The power and the resources.”
“And you don’t like that.”
“Hell no,” I smile. “Magnus abducted me, took my sister and blackmailed me. Dragged me here to freeze my ass off. No one will have me now. I will be Magnus Ulfissons’s widow.”
“What do you want?”
“All of it.”
He laughs. A cruel, animalistic laughter. Every hair on my body stands from fear. There is something seriously wrong with this guy.
“I like you, Luna Ulfisson.”
“Antiope Everstone. That’s my name.”
Good thing I hated Magnus in the beginning. I had good practice for this role.
“You see, AntiopeEverstone,” he says and I swallow by the open threat in his voice, “I happen to want it all too.”
“Something tells me you are after more than this pack,” I dare. “But you need them to accomplish your goal.”
“Careful.”
“I am being careful. And helpful. If I help you have the pack and use it to take what you are after, surely you can let me have it afterwards. ”
Silence. The longest silence of my life. This will either work or I have just screwed up and condemned Magnus.
“How?”
I sigh inaudibly and turn to Egil that is watching me. I nod and he keeps the arguments going.
“You can only gain the loyalty of this pack by fighting their Alpha before their eyes and killing him.”
“I have defeated their Alpha,” he says firmly.
I am not sure what and how he did it but I know he did face Magnus in a fair fight and lived to tell the tale.
“They need to see it with their own eyes, with their own rituals.”
“So you want me to come there and trust you?”
He is not stupid. Of course what I am proposing is too risky for him. But I need Magnus here, in our borders, the only place where he is safe.
“Them? No. Me. Trust me.”
“Why?”
“I want Magnus dead just as much as you. Maybe more.”
“Why?”
“Because...” I need a plausible lie. “Because he forced himself on me. And for that he has to pay.”
All my agony for my mate’s well-being, all my hatred for the man holding him, all the pain I feel for not having him near me, is poured into this lie. And it seems to be enough. I hear a soft chuckle.
“I have seen your pictures, Antiope Everstone,” his voice turns into a deep growl. “I must say I do not blame the man.”
I want to throw up.
“At least you are honest about it,” I force a lightness in my voice.
I am not beneath using every weapon in my disposal right now. If I have to flirt with the man that holds Magnus I will do it.
“And I have seen you fight. You killed some of my wolves. How come you didn’t fight Magnus?”
“He was holding my sister in silver chains. He has to pay for that too.”
“Seems like you hold a grudge against this man.”
“Bring him here, defeat him in battle and then I can show how much of a grudge I hold against him,” I grind my teeth.
Please work! Please work! Please work.
“And how grateful you are to me.”
Bile is rising in my stomach. The idea alone of another make touching me is repulsive. Maximo is out of her mind with rage and I am this close to threatening the man. But I need to keep this going. It’s my only chance.
“I can be quite grateful. And to prove that, I am making sure that you don’t have to worry if Magnus ever wins this battle. I have a silver dagger that will make sure he won’t.”
“Ha! I like you, Antiope Everstone.”
How soon can we change that?
“I can see why Magnus had to force you to be his Luna. You make an excellent leader. Might make a formidable Queen.”
That’s what he is after!
“Now, how can a girl refuse such an offer? Listen,” I pretend to lower my voice. “Can’t talk anymore, they saw me on the phone. Call me tonight if you agree to this plan. If not, kill Magnus and send me his head.”
That’s all I say and hang up.
“What the fuck was that?” Egil yells as soon as he sees me hanging up.
“We got a serious problem in our hands. But I have a plan.”