Our affections were cold, but our bed was on fire.

Through the dizzying, sweaty haze of sex, I couldn’t deny the slight confusion that surfaced. As the glorious, handsome third lycan prince grasped me so tight I felt he may shatter my bones out of passion, I tried to veil my surprise.

Aldrich, my newly appointed husband, was a dominant, yet gentle lover; his grip was fierce, but his eyes were soft, the former iciness melting into warm pools as they met mine. I was not expecting our wedding union to be warm—my only predictions contained emotionless, dead eyed glances and no kissing, only adhering to the elders’ prophecy and not actual passion. After all, the heartbroken royal would surely not love me.

He was forced to marry an average female wolf; he had every right to accept the marriage, but refuse me. That did not happen.

Tonight we were not strangers, we were fevered lovers.

Perhaps that is what ignited the fire, I thought to myself as I shuddered at his heavy, hot breaths in my ear. There was a form of desperation, of longing in the prince’s touch. Maybe he was thinking of his former lover who married his brother, heartbroken that he was not deemed good enough for the noble lycan female, Emily.

I remembered her name with the same pang of longing; except, my longing was the desire to be as good as her, which I knew I never would be. I mimicked his desperation, knowing I was an average female werewolf, not noble or beautiful. I thought of how perfect she was for my husband, and automatically dug my nails into his back.

An ugly civilian trying her best to be good enough for a prince in bed.

His beauty reflected his royal title, a perfect prince. The sweep of his long hair, his sharp jawline, and his strong nose made him look like a god. I knew he owed me nothing, I knew I would never be on his level, both of us coerced into a prophetic marriage…

But he seemed so…into it. Into me.

Sweat coated both of us, and the bead of perspiration glowing on his tanned forehead showed he was putting in just as much effort as me. The animals inside us were ravenous and unleashed, and I couldn’t help but feel unprepared.

I did not plan for this ravaging, frenzied interaction. Our wolves had a passion for each other that our human forms never did when they met. As if our love ran even deeper than surface level, as if I wasn’t just some woman he was forced to marry.

I had no hopes for a loving, happy marriage. I would be foolish to envision a world where, despite any prophecy, despite an order from the Moon Goddess herself, the noble Aldrich would truly love and admire an average female wolf. But maybe I was wrong.

Maybe he would soon succumb to the wolves inside of us that were ripping at each other.

Maybe his impassioned, lingering kisses and sensual grazes of touch on my hips was not just ceremonial.

“Cathy,” he murmured with longing heavy and thick in his voice, signaling that he was nearing release.

The sound of his beautiful royal voice shaping my average name ushered a release in my lower belly as well. And in that moment, I imagined the entirety of our sweet and loving marriage as I climaxed with him, a smile daring to reach my lips.

*

I woke up to sunlight caressing my face. The smile remained on my lips as I awakened, despite my body’s new soreness. Pathetically, I invited the ache, for it gave me a sweet reminder of our union. A warm glow enveloped me, swimming in the dazzling haze of memories from my former wedding night.

Slowly, I eased myself to a sitting position, releasing a contented sigh. When I opened my eyes, I found even more glorious reminders; his kisses sprinkled across my naked body, tangled in sunlight saturated sheets. I turned to face my new beautiful husband.

The other half of the bed was cold and empty, as if no one ever lied there at all.

Confusion ripped me from my trance. “Aldrich?” I called hoarsely, my voice tainted from deep sleep.

There was no response. The ominous silence felt like ice water poured down my back, violently extinguishing any remaining warm glow. My body went cold as I noticed how clear my skin was of any love blemishes. He did not mark me.

A voice carried from the living room, all the way down the grand stairwell. “This damned woman drugged me!”

Everything inside me froze. I didn’t have to wonder whose voice it was.

It was my new husband’s.

“Lock her up,” Aldrich vehemently ordered the guards with a growl, “I don’t want to see that witch again.”

When I shakily wandered to the door to glance down the stairs, I discovered Aldrich facing his guards like a raging storm in the living room.

“The wench made me bed her. I awoke to her naked body, a body I never undressed.” His voice thickened with disgust.

I collapsed to the wooden floor, my legs quivering from the sight as I stared in horror.

It seems he discovered the same nightly aftermath that I sleepily smiled at. A smile did not cross his face; instead a long, murderous scowl.

“My prince,” murmured the general guard, seemingly someone closer with Aldrich, “I hear your concern, but it’s in the prophecy to wed her, my lord. Do you not wish to have offspring?”

“I wished to with Emily,” Aldrich snapped hoarsely, a flicker of pain and outrage beneath his powerful scowl, “who was supposed to be my chosen mate. But despite my wishes, I accepted that thing as my wife.”

He then pointed to the stairwell and snarled, “Clearly that was not enough for the disgusting mongrel. Remove her from my bed and take her away immediately.”

My first thought was to run. But when I forced myself upon my shaking legs, the soreness between them now an aching regret, my second thought reminded me there was nowhere to run. Prince Aldrich was drugged and he thought I did it. How could I have done it? Was there something in the champagne at the wedding? I knew I was not beautiful, but did that make me conniving and evil?

I whimpered, a sob growing in my chest. This was all a horrible misunderstanding.

I flew down to the living room before the guards could stampede the stairs, tripping over myself, my naked body bruising upon the wood floor. Chaos erupted around me, and I fell to my knees before the prince, whose expression wore utter disgust.

“Aldrich, I did not drug you!” I cried desperately, my knees bruised, face certainly reddening and swollen from the hot tears.

“Save it, wench,” Aldrich scowled at me, already dismissing my cries as he turned away and waved for the guards to close in.

Another sob tore from me–a pathetic, fevered and childish sound–as the guards stormed toward me. I cried, begging for them to listen to me as metal cuffs closed around my wrists, vigorously shaking my head as my hair wildly fell into my red face. But it was like screaming underwater.

They did not hear me.

***

Locked away, I morphed from royalty to prisoner within twenty-four hours.

It was an abandoned, debilitated cottage. Only one sliver of light filtered through the barred windows, enough to make a pale, thin spotlight on the dirty stone floor. Despair and dust swallowed me, and as time slowly and painfully passed, the panic started to morph from adrenaline to pure defeat. The hope withered away to nothing but dust.

After a month of the servant only bringing one scarce meal a day, I knew what my fate would be.

I was intended to die here. Not that this was a true life anyway, either sitting or laying on the floor, silently making friends with bugs and the occasional rodent. It was like the in-between of life and death, and I was stuck in it.

To make matters worse, as the month carried on, I began to feel nauseous whenever I woke up, retching bile onto the dirty cottage floor. The retching happened every day for months. Then the sickness caught me, my body ravaged by the brutal coughing and body spasms.

One day, when the servant arrived right on time with the rations of bread crust and someone’s leftover apple core, I weakly looked up at him. He reluctantly caught my gaze, weary.

I managed to rasp out the broken word through my dry lips, my voice raw. “Why?”

The servant cleared his throat, breaking my gaze as he murmured. “Princess Emily.”

He didn’t have to explain. I knew what he meant.

A couple days after that, my heartbeat drastically slowed. By then, I had three discoveries, three more pieces of information than I did when I first entered this cottage.

First, I am dying. I will not make it through the night. Second, Emily is behind my death. And thirdly, the most painful of the realizations…

The pup inside my belly is going to die with me.