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~ TARKYN ~

The following day was the most humbling experience of Tarkyn’s career. First because his body failed him.

The soldiers had located he and Harth’s position overnight while they slept, then crept to the cliff-top above and climbed down to ambush them. But that meant that Tarkyn and Harth were to climb back up.

Yet, when the adrenalin of the confrontation passed, Tarkyn found he barely possessed the strength to keep himself upright.

.....

His soldiers were forced to feed him and allow him to rest while they fashioned a hammock of vines to lift him and Harth to the top of the cliff.

Then, though the land sloped gently down, Tarkyn’s strength would wane so quickly, a trip which would normally have taken a healthy Tarkyn half a day, stretched to two. He ordered one of the soldiers ahead to warn the Queen of their arrival and demand an audience but the soldiers refused.

Tarkyn had never had his orders refused. Ever.

“I’m sorry, Sir,” the young soldier, Rhay, said, ducking his dark brown head, though his jaw was set. Keeping his shoulders rolled in acknowledgement of Tarkyn’s superior dominance, still he lifted his bright blue eyes to hold Tarkyn’s gaze, his eyes full of regret coupled with resolution. “The Queen was very firm, very... clear in her orders. If we found you or a prisoner, we were not to leave you alone or split our defenses. We watched one of the males almost overpower three of our guards when they were taken by surprise. The training these creatures have had-”

“I am not a creature!” Harth snapped, both anger and fear burning in her tone.

Tarkyn put a hand to her arm-while she was strong, she clearly hadn’t worked with trained warriors who lived by the structure of hierarchy even more than the tribes, and who were trained to set down aggression quickly and emphatically. While he adored her fierce, unflinching way of addressing the world, she would need to learn to deal with military males with greater caution.

Their instincts were honed and molded. Some would put her down before they thought.

But when he touched her, he felt her shaking under his hand and turned quickly to meet her eyes.

“You do not need to fear. I won’t let them touch you,” he murmured. The guards would hear, but be discreet.

But Harth didn’t respond, just held his eyes, her brow furrowed.

He walked more closely at her side, his heart swinging between joy that she was there, that she was his mate, and that they were together, and sick dread about how this might play out.

While all of the WildWood had been at peace for over a year, those of them who’d fought the humans, who’d lost loved ones... the instincts to see an enemy behind every bush were still there. It had been part of Tarkyn’s difficulty in the past year.

He’d remained so focused on keeping everyone safe, that the King had pulled him aside and gently requested he “chill the fuck out.”

His tense attention to every sound and leaping to every detail had, he understood, made it harder for others to rest in the new peace.

But that had been half his battle. He was a warrior. What life did he have if there was no enemy to fight?

He’d spent the past three months rudderless, continuing guards and patrols of the Tree City, and even into the portal territories to ensure they hadn’t made a mistake. That there was, indeed, no way for the humans to return.

And so far, there had been nothing.

Yet now...

Three hundred like Harth? Here, already. They must have arrived before the portals closed, yet even if they were a day’s travel away, how had their patrols caught no scent or sign?

Tarkyn’s thoughts were interrupted by their arrival on the edge of the Tree City.

For a moment he sighed with relief. He was home. And he had found his mate! He could finally begin the life he’d always wanted.

But instead of taking the main trail that would lead them among the Great Trees, to the center of the Tree City where the Market, the covered, open-air dining for the City nestled, and security council buildings, the stalls for the traders, and the various homes of the people... instead of drawing Harth towards his home tree on the Northwestern edge of the Tree City, the soldiers kept them to the little-used trails that skirted the city wide, curling south.

He supposed he should have been grateful that the soldiers that now walked before and behind, and alongside he and Harth, didn’t turn west and take them to the Great Trees that had been used as prisons in the Wolf War. But Tarkyn had demanded an audience with the Queen-something his rank allowed, though he would have his balls removed by her if he used it frivolously.

So, like a common criminal, he was marched along the outskirts of the city he’d given his life in service to protect.

His pride burned.

Harth’s eyes widened when she caught sight of more and more of the Great Trees.

Fifty-feet across at the base of their trunks-sometimes more-their thick boughs rolled out parallel to the ground, though fifteen or twenty feet in the air, the thick, upward pointing leaves turning them into shade in the summer, and some retreat from the rain in the winter.

Soon, as they circled below the city, then met the trail that would take them further south to the Royal Meadow and the Queen’s cave, Tarkyn sighed with relief.

His body ached both with pain, and with the desire for sleep. His steps were heavy, and his mind fogged with weariness.

He needed several good meals, more water, and solid sleep for days to regain his strength. But he couldn’t risk allowing any of the males to sense his exhaustion more than they already had. Though they knew and respected his dominance, if any were to challenge him directly in that moment, he would not win.

And with his mate on his arm and under threat, he couldn’t afford to suffer a blow to his power.

Finally, they broke out of the line of the forest and into the meadow and even Tarkyn smiled.

They were home. His home. And for the first time in his life, he returned to the WildWood with his mate at his side.

Despite his weariness, hope fizzed in his chest and energized him.

‘Thank you,’ he prayed. ‘Thank you for answering my call. Now help me keep her here safe.’