Tess glanced up from the letters on her polished desk to peer out the bedroom window. Four cloaked figures huddled outside in the snow, their muffled voices carrying through the crisp air. Her lips turned in a smile even as her stomach contracted in hunger. She dared not greet her boys when she had not fed in so long. She sighed.
“Here, my lady.”
Her eyebrows rose into a delicate arch. “How quickly you respond, my cub. One would almost think you had been waiting for me to notice you.”
She noted his awkward silence but did not turn to look at him. Instead, she lifted her pen again and continued tracing flowing letters across the script. Her steady hand fashioned a small flourish at each corner of the page. She laid down the pen. His heavy, musky scent countered her building hunger and settled her mind, though the dull drum of his heart teased her. He stayed mute behind her, unaware of his influence.
“Romulus,” she sang, “Why were you waiting outside my door?”
“The boys have returned.” His demure voice held a trace of resignation. He did not continue, but stood at attention, eyes riveted on the pages where she had written. Tess winced as his pace quickened.
“Are those the papers, my lady?” he abruptly asked.
“Naturally.”
Outside, the wind had picked up again, and the murmur of voices retreated to the downstairs hall. The floor shook slightly as the door was slammed shut against the elements. Most of her recent conversations with Romulus had played in this fashion: the tenseness, the long silences, and the strange disquiet in her normally unshakable cub. It was almost a relief to see that something could sway him from his servitude and submission to her. She wondered, if she pushed him far enough, would the monster within him finally break loose?
“My lady, is it true what the boys were doing in the woods?”
Tess straightened, then stood, her lithe form flowing with inhuman grace to his side. He appeared as a figure of gold in the warm light of the fireplace, and when she caressed his cheek, he remained as a statue beneath her touch.
“Romulus, not all your kind are as…tame…as you are. Their numbers must be controlled. Do you understand?” He turned away from her hand, his face distorted.
“Does it bother you that much, my cub?”
“You sent the boys, who I consider my adopted kin, to learn to hunt and kill my true kin. And you ask,” his golden eyes hardened, “if it bothers me?”
“They are not your kin, they would have killed you if they had found you in-“
“If you had not found me so young, I believe you would have killed me as well.”
Tess froze, lips parted and eyes plaintive. The hand that reached for his arm was stilled. “My cub…” she whimpered.
He stepped away from her and turned his gaze to the wall. “It is time you learned the difference between a cub and a wolf, my lady, and between blood and water. This wolf is not tame.”
He snatched the papers from her desk and threw them into the fire. Both he and they vanished in a flash of gold, leaving Tess with both a heat and a chill she could not escape.
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