Her Wolf King

{le frere}

THE BROTHER

The castle was still that morning.

Lenore's feet landed on the bedroom floor, sinking into the grassy carpet,  fingers brushing the moss-covered walls as she slipped on a robe draped over the heating rack next to her bed. Outside, through the window with the green curtains half-drawn, she spied not a bird singing, nor a rabbit darting across the lawns.

It sent a sense of foreboding through her, dread resting in the pit of her stomach. She performed her daily ablutions and said a prayer for her family. She thought of Timothy, her younger brother, the blacksmith's apprentice, and hoped he was doing alright without her. She'd left so suddenly... even before fleeing her wedding with a dangerous animal, she had moved into the Stone residence, so easily leaving her father and brother behind. Was that wrong of her?

Shouldn't she have stayed to help them?

Lenore put the thought out of her mind as she braided her hair, tying it with a blue grosgrain ribbon, and slipped into a cerulean gown that buttoned to her throat. She wondered where Everett slept. If he slept at all. Last night, they'd had a quiet supper, each eyeing the other with a mix of suspicion and curiosity. Too many secrets lay between them, too much of his past, for her to be truly comfortable in his presence.

Yet in his presence was where she wanted to be. It must have been that she was too used to spending time in the company of others that she preferred not to be alone. Perhaps, she would even choose the half-feral, half-civilized company of her new husband than be alone with the wisps of servant girls or ghosts of housekeepers.

Or so she told herself.

While she had retired to bed, she hadn't seen him do the same. Was it because their marriage was, well, a marriage of man and wolf, not man and wife? And why did she care? This was a year of her life, nothing more.

Yet the monster... She shuddered. It had seemed so real. And it had been too vivid in her eyes. It had shrunk from her touch. And the horse that was in the stables now... Everett had said it always shied away from him. Was she not as human as she thought? Were her dreams of chasing fairies... were they more real than she suspected?

Stewing in her thoughts as she took bites of buttered toast, Lenore barely noticed the clanging sound of the doorbell that rang out through the entire castle.

Just then, Everett made his arrival known. He was dishevelled, his tunic stained with what looked like dirt, and he wore only one boot.

"Where have you been, and have you ever heard of taking a bath?" she asked, dropping her knife onto the table where it clattered against the white linen, leaving a splotch of jam.

"There's an intruder on the grounds," he said, kicking off his remaining scuffed boot.

"Does it have anything to do with the doorbell that just rang?" she asked, turning to him.

"Probably," he said, as he took the toast from her plate.

Her mouth dropped open and she reached for his wrist. "Get your own breakfast, you madman!"

"So it's the theft of food that infuriates you? Good to know." He polished off her other slice. "Needs more jam."

She picked up her knife. "Don't provoke me."

He picked up his own knife, spread butter and jam on a scone, and held it out to her as a peace offering.

Lenore smiled, batted her eyelashes, and smashed it in his face.

The doorbell rang again and they both jumped to their feet, Everett wiping at the clotted cream in his beard with a napkin.

"I've never seen someone with such poor table manners." Everett scowled at her--at least, she thought it might be a scowl, underneath the jam and butter. The scone had fallen to his lap, leaving a splotch of white on his already-dirtied shirt.