The Last Wolf Prince

5 - Let Me Explain

~~Tristan’s PoV~~

As soon as Raya tells me she’s actually a woman, Griffin yaps excitedly in my head.

All your worrying was for nothing, you stupid oaf! She’s a woman. Claim her now!

I shake my head to quieten him; I have enough to sort out without worrying about him too. Give me a moment, Grif.

It’s all a little overwhelming. I want to claim her, of course. Now that she's said she’s a woman, I don’t know how I ever missed it. Her features are delicate and so is her small frame. There aren't many curves I can see, but that might change if she were put into a proper dress. It’s the haircut and the clothes that threw me off, and something in her bearing too: a self-assuredness and a toughness that is rare for a woman, or at least the ones I've met.

Yvette is confident, but in a different way. I can't quite explain why it's different, only that it is.

It makes sense that Raya comes from far away, looking and sounding as she does, but she says she grew up right here. Does she really come from the future? It sounds unbelievable. How could I be mated to someone who was born long after I died? Did the goddess always know she would come back to meet me? Was this all fated from the start?

Or maybe, just maybe, she is lying to me? Or maybe she believes it, even though it isn’t true? Maybe she’s a little crazy, like the old woman who lives deep in the woods.

Are you calling our mate crazy? Or a liar?

Griffin never gives me any privacy when I’m trying to think. I’m not calling anyone anything, I’m just trying to figure this out. Keep quiet, please.

Then there’s the last thing she said, about being from the Valerian line. Valerian wolves are incredibly rare. They were an ancient race of wolves, prized for their gifts of speed and strength beyond regular wolves, as well as other gifts that I have only heard hinted at. For hundreds of years, they were the natural rulers of these lands, but their dominance inspired envy and eventually they were nearly wiped out in a stunning betrayal by their closest advisors and friends.

It is a tale every young noble wolf knows, a cautionary story meant to illustrate the dangers of placing your trust in the wrong people. No ruler can ever completely trust another, unless they are bonded by blood or fate.

The Valerian wolves who survived were the weaker members of the tribe, carrying only a fraction of the powers their ancestors had, and it was only the women who carried them at all. Though the powers were diluted, they were still enough to make them sought after as warriors, as protectors, and especially as mates. Mates of Valerian wolves were blessed with uncommonly good luck and long life. Those men were considered highly favored by the Goddess.

I guess that makes us favored, then.

I shake my head once more. Please, Grif, for the love of the Goddess, hold your tongue.

“Are you alright?” Raya is watching me closely, her brows drawn in concern, and I realize I must look like a madman myself, shaking my head at nothing she can hear.

“I’m fine,” I assure her, my voice rougher than I would like. “My wolf likes to argue with me, and he’s a little worked up right now.”

I watch her carefully for any signs that she knows why he’s worked up, any signs that she knows we are mates, but there are none. Either her wolf hasn’t told her, or she is keeping it to herself just as I am.

There must be some way of finding out if she’s telling the truth about any of this before I let her know what I know.

If you don’t tell her soon, I’m going to take over and do it myself, Griffin growls at me. I don't know what you're waiting for. Even if she's crazy, she's still our mate. We can help her. Tell her, Tristan. Tell her, tell her, tell her.

I groan out loud as he chants in my head, acting like the stubborn animal he used to be when we were younger. Raya’s look of concern grows deeper as I try to think over top of Griffin’s chattering, until, acting on instinct alone, I reach into the scabbard I keep tied around my waist and place my hand on the ivory-covered handle of my knife.

Without a word of warning to either Griffin or Raya, I throw it at her, hard, aiming the point of the blade directly at her right shoulder.

My breath catches in my throat as her eyes widen, fixed on the flashing blade that is hurtling towards her.

And then, just as I hoped, she ducks out of the way, moving faster than even the most skilled of my warriors could, evading the knife by mere inches.

What the hell are you doing? Griffin howls, but I’m not listening to him. My attention is focused entirely on Raya, whose head turns to follow the knife’s trajectory. It embeds itself firmly into the wall behind her, the handle quivering from the impact.

She is completely unharmed. It seems she is telling the truth about being Valerian, at the very least.

“What the actual f*ck?!” she demands as she turns back to me, her amber eyes blazing with indignation. “Why did you just try to kill me?”

“I didn’t try to kill you,” I tell her honestly, but just as bluntly. “If I had, you wouldn't have got off quite that easily. I just needed to know if you were telling me the truth.”

The moment she puts it together is clear. “You were testing my Valerian reflexes.”

When I nod, she scowls deeper.

“And if I had been lying, you would have been okay with wounding me, at the very least? When you don’t even have antiseptics?”

“Anti… what?” She has some strange words. I also don’t know what an ‘actual f*ck’ is.

She sighs, rubbing her temples with her fingers for a moment. “Never mind. Have I passed your test now, at least? Will you let me talk?”

There seems no harm in that. Perhaps I’ll be able to tell from what she says next whether the other things she said are also true, so I spread my arms in invitation. “Go ahead. I’m listening.”

“Thank you.”

Taking a deep breath, she places her palms flat on the table, showing me she has nothing to hide so that I can concentrate on what she is saying. It’s an old werewolf custom, and I’m glad to see she observes it. If she were a shapeshifter in disguise, it's not something she would know.

“According to our historians, the Faceless began to attack the packs surrounding the kingdom in the last few months. Since you know who I’m talking about, it seems that has, in fact, already happened.”

I simply nod, giving nothing away. This is information that could have come from a number of different places. It doesn’t mean she has any window into the future.

“These attacks were merely warnings, a prelude to the real battle to come. That is what I'm here to try to prevent."

I lean closer, paying close attention to every word. "What happens in this battle?"

"They seem to have targeted Bertran specifically. He was offered a meeting to negotiate some kind of truce, and it was during that meeting that they launched their attack."

There is nothing in Raya's demeanor to indicate she's lying, but it's hard for me to believe anyway. "We would not fall for that so easily."

"I didn't say it was easy," she countered. "Apparently the prince and his men - which I guess is you - demanded that they come here to the castle for this meeting. You figured that you would have the advantage on your own territory."

That does indeed sound like what I would suggest under the circumstances. "So how did they manage to outwit us?"

"They are shapeshifters," she explains, which is exactly what I have suspected. My heart beats faster at the confirmation. "But not like we are. They can take any form, mimic any living thing. If they wanted to, they could turn into a carbon copy of me, so you would have two Rayas sitting here with you, and it would be very difficult to tell the difference."

That is exactly what I have been afraid of, but if what she's saying is true, then it makes far more sense for them to take the form of someone I know and trust, rather than this small, unusual woman I have never seen before. It seems another point in her favor, indicating that she is, in fact, telling me the truth.

Raya continues her story, unaware of my train of thought. "It is said that one of them took on the shape of the prince's closest friend, and then literally stabbed him in the back. He died thinking he had been betrayed by the one he trusted most."

An unexpected wave of emotion hits me as I imagine the scene. Could it have been me whose form the creature took? I was certainly one of Bertie's best friends. Did he die thinking I had killed him?

Quickly, I shake my head, pushing the thoughts aside. Bertie is not dead, there's no need to get upset about it. And now that we know this is their tactic, we can take steps to prevent it. If Raya is for real, this is indeed very useful information.

"What is their true form?" I ask, wanting to know as much about the enemy as I can.

This time, it's Raya who shakes her head. "No one knows. That is why we call them the Faceless. If anyone has ever seen their true face, they haven't lived to tell the tale."

My mind races as I think back over everything she has said. "You said if they were here with us, it would be difficult for me to tell the difference between you. But not impossible?"

She gives me an impressed look. "Good catch. No, it's not impossible. I can teach you the few tricks that we have found, but I must warn you that even when you know what to look for, you can still be fooled, especially in the heat of battle."

It sounds like she is speaking from experience, and there is a twinge of pain in her voice that makes me want to understand and comfort her. Griffin urges me on as I ask her about it. "What happened?"

Her lips part in surprise, but she doesn't pretend not to know what I'm talking about. Taking a deep breath, she answers the question. "It was my parents. As a Valerian wolf herself, my mother should have been better equipped to evade an attack, but they played on her emotions to fool her."

Though her eyes are dry, the pain in her voice grows stronger, and so does my urge to take all that pain away. "They killed her?" Raya nods, and my chest grows tighter. "How old were you?"

Her amber eyes look straight into mine. "Six. One of the monsters took on my form, calling for her in the forest. Though she must have known on some level that I was safe in the children's compound, she couldn't ignore the sound of my cries. Her mother's instincts overrode her logical mind, and when she got close, they surrounded her. She was fast, but not invincible. My father tried to defend her, but they tore them both apart."

The emotion in her voice is almost enough to break me. It certainly doesn't feel faked. I have a nearly overwhelming desire to take her in my arms and hold her. Griffin certainly wants me to, but I can't let my personal needs overrule my duties. I still need to know if she's telling me the truth. It's a very moving story, but something doesn't quite make sense to me. "How did you find out that's what happened?"

She immediately understands what I mean. "There were others with them, others who witnessed what happened, but they couldn't help them. Wolves usually band together during the hunt, but it's understood that in an attack, everyone looks out for themselves. Unless they are mates, of course."

"The hunt?" I'm confused again. What hunt is she talking about?

"That is a whole other story," she says. "If you agree to let me help you, hopefully it will never come to pass. Please, Tristan. Will you trust me?"

She reaches out with her hand, and though I don't know exactly what she wants, I can't stop myself from stretching out and placing mine in hers. As soon as our skin connects, an explosion of sparks travels from my hand through my whole body, lighting it up, and Raya's eyes go wide in surprise.

"What the...?" She pulls her hand back from me, blinking rapidly, before her expression turns to disbelief. "Are you my mate?"