Chapter 2: Feast of Thorns and Broken Glass
The grand hall felt like a gilded cage, the roar of conversation a wave Lexi had to consciously swim against. From her seat beside Michael—a cold, empty space of mahogany between them—she watched Bianca lean in, her rose-gold silk dress whispering secrets against his arm. “You look pale, Michael,” Bianca murmured, her voice a liquid carry over the clatter of silverware, her hand settling possessively on his forearm. “All that stress, for a blessing that smelled more of rust than rosemary.” Lexi’s fingers tightened around her water glass, the crystal groaning under the pressure, her knuckles bleaching white against the linen.
The glass held, a minor victory in the humming silence of her own rage. Lexi’s fingers relaxed, her breath evening out as she placed the goblet carefully back on the linen. She didn’t react outwardly; after all, she knew he had a lover, she knew he didn’t ask for this alliance, but this display was disgusting. She cut a sideways glance at the two of them and spoke calmly, tilting her head as if in contemplation. “And will Mistress Valenti be joining us in the bedchamber as well? I see she’s sitting on the dais of the wedding party... was this a double wedding? I didn’t realize the Blackwoods had such little sense of loyalty.” She took a sip from her glass of water, the quiet clink of crystal against her teeth the only sound at their end of the table.
The entire table froze, every conversation dying as heads turned toward the dais. HE GROWLED LOW, the sound vibrating through the table linen and into Lexi’s bones. Bianca’s hand fluttered to her throat, her eyes widening with fabricated alarm. Lexi met his stormy gaze over the rim of her glass, her own pulse steady against the frantic beat of his anger. “Just clarifying the seating arrangements,” she said, her voice deceptively light, as she set the glass down with a final tap.
Michael’s hand slammed down, making the silverware jump. “You will learn your place,” he said, each word a shard of ice. The gold cuff on Lexi’s wrist grew warm, as if resonating with the golden light that had flashed in the chapel. A thin crack appeared in the base of her water glass. Then, with a sharp ping, the crystal shattered, sending a spray of water and blood across the linen like a spilt warning.
The jagged shard had bitten deep into her palm. Lexi looked at the cut, calm and collected, without so much as a gasp. She took a linen napkin and blotted the blood, her mahogany eyes lifting to meet Michael’s glacial stare across the ruined table setting. “By all means, Alpha,” she said, her voice rising in clear, carrying precision though she never shouted, “tell me. Where is the Blackwood Luna’s place supposed to be?” The hall was utterly silent, every guest understanding her meaning perfectly: by slighting her, he was slighting the pack.
The silence tightened like a wire. Michael’s expression didn’t change, but a vein pulsed at his temple. HE GRABS HER WRIST, his fingers digging into the tender bones beneath the gold cuff, the movement so fast it was a blur of contained violence. A sharp, electric crackle hissed in the air between them, and the scent of ozone cut through the smell of roast meat and perfume. Lexi didn’t pull away; she just stared at their joined hands, at the way her own blood from the cut palm was now smearing his skin, a dark, binding paint.
The blood was a stark contrast against his skin, warm and insistent. I look at him not backing down; if he expected me to squirm at his death grip he had another thing coming—it hurt, sure, but I’d be damned if I showed it. A muscle jumped in his jaw, his gaze dropping to their joined hands as if the blood offended him more than her words. "Release me," she said, her voice low but carrying the same steady calm that had filled the chapel. Around them, the hall remained frozen, every breath held waiting for the crackle to ignite into a blaze.
He didn’t release her. Instead, his grip tightened, a visceral counterpoint to the blood, warm and slick, between their skin. The scent of it, coppery and sharp, cut through Bianca’s perfumed cloud. “You want a place?” he finally said, his voice a low, rough scrape meant only for her. Then he yanked her to her feet, the motion sending a jarring ache through her shoulder, and the hall erupted into sound.
The hall's noise faded into a muted roar as I found my balance, my shoulder screaming where he'd wrenched it. I was standing now in front of him as he towered over me, my whole arm throbbed with a hot, persistent ache, and I refused to let even a flicker of pain cross my face. I tilted my chin up, meeting his winter-grey gaze that was all storm and no warmth. "Want?" I said, the word scraping out, "No... I don't want anything from you... the place you've given me is already made of glass and spite." His grip on my wrist didn't loosen, but something shifted in his eyes—a flicker of something like recognition before it was swallowed by the familiar resentment.
The low growl didn’t come from Michael. It came from behind his shoulder, from Dante, whose eyes had gone lupine gold. Then a heavy hand settled on Michael’s arm, the touch firm but respectful. “Alpha,” Dante said, his voice a taut wire in the silent hall. “The blood speaks. The feast smells of conflict, not celebration.” Michael’s fingers twitched, then uncurled from Lexi’s wrist, leaving behind a bracelet of bruising and smeared red.
The release was a different kind of violence. I exhaled softly, not showing it as I sat back down, biting my tongue to stop from antagonizing him more and forcing myself to endure this evening. The sting in my palm was a dull, grounding pulse against the sharper ache in my wrist. Michael’s attention snapped back to Bianca as if pulled by a string, his cold rage settling into a familiar, protective focus. “Someone see to her,” he said, his voice flattening as he nodded toward Bianca’s pretended distress, his hand coming to rest on the small of her back. My own blood cooled on the table as I watched them, the metal of my mother’s cuff like ice against my skin.
My own blood cooled on the table as I watched them, the metal of my mother’s cuff like ice against my skin. I didn’t look at either of them for the rest of the evening. His mother, seated on my right, leaned in with a quiet question about the gardenias in my family’s old conservatory, her voice a soft blanket over the hall’s tension. I turned to her, answering politely and warmly, describing the scent of damp earth and white petals under glass. When his uncles joined in, debating the best soil for mountain laurel, my words to them were polite and welcoming too, giving their end of the table a fragile, conversational calm.
I could sense his irritation simmering across the table like heat off asphalt, a constant, prickling presence. I didn't understand it; all I was doing was being kind, asking his mother about her perennial beds, laughing softly at his uncle’s terrible joke about fertilizer. That’s when I caught Bianca’s look of pure indignation, her porcelain doll face tightening as Michael’s younger cousin showed me a picture of her new puppy on her phone. A calculation clicked in my head: this easy warmth I’d stumbled into wasn’t something she’d ever been capable of bringing out in them. A maid nervously approached with a fresh, folded napkin for my still-damp hand, and I smiled at her warmly, looking her directly in the eye as I took it. “Thank you, that’s very kind,” I said, and the woman practically blushed at the simple gratitude before scurrying away.
After the maid disappeared into the kitchen's swing door, the silence at our end of the table thickened, pregnant with Michael's unspoken fury. He leaned back in his chair, the wood groaning under his weight, and his eyes followed the path the maid had taken before locking onto mine. "Comfortable playing the gracious hostess in a house that isn't yours?" he said, his voice low enough that only I could catch the razor edge in it. The bruise on my wrist throbbed in time with my heartbeat, a fresh reminder of his grip earlier, but I kept my smile fixed, turning it toward his mother who was watching us with concerned eyes. Before I could respond, Bianca's laugh trilled out, too bright and sharp, as she placed a hand on Michael's arm and said, "Darling, don't be cruel—she's just trying to fit in where she clearly doesn't belong."
Before I could respond, Bianca's laugh trilled out, too bright and sharp, as she placed a hand on Michael's arm and said, "Darling, don't be cruel—she's just trying to fit in where she clearly doesn't belong." My irritation spikes and a pulse of cold air rolls off of me like a cold wind; the tableware clicks with frost and the breath of everyone at the table fogs for a moment, only to dissipate as soon as I realize it and pull my energy back. I don’t answer any of them and continue to talk to his mother, my fingernails turning slightly blue at the nail beds and my hands shaking slightly. I’m really tired and now cold, a deep, bone-aching chill that started in my marked neck and settled in my joints. “You were saying about the gardenias needing more shade?” I asked, forcing my voice to stay level as I curled my freezing, trembling fingers into the bloodstained linen on my lap.
Michael’s mother, Elara, leaned in, her gentle voice a quiet counterpoint to the lingering chill. “Yes, dear, but you’re shivering—are you quite alright?”
"I'm fine, just a little tired. It's been a long day," I answer gently. Michael, seated next to me, stiffens at the renewed wave of cold air I can't seem to contain, and now looks at my blood-smeared hands as if his mother's words had finally dragged the fact that I could possibly be hurt into perspective. His mother continues, her voice losing its softness for a tone of pure steel, "Michael, take your Luna up to your apartments. I thought your father and I taught you how to take care of your pack better than this." She refers to me as pack, and I give her a small, genuine smile, the first real one all evening, just as Michael stands with a scrape of his chair.
He didn't speak, just rose from the table with a predator's unsettling quiet. Michael’s warm hand lands at my elbow; the electricity is still there but worse now, a live wire against the deep chill radiating from my bones. He feels exactly how cold I am, and a flash of concern colours his features before he schools them back to indifference. Bianca tries to rise out of her chair or say something, her mouth opening in a perfect 'O' of protest, but his mother fixes her with a cold look and harsh words about knowing her place at another pack’s table. “Sit down, Bianca,” Elara said, the words not loud but final, slicing through the girl’s performative concern like a blade through silk.
Michael’s grip on my elbow tightened, a silent command to move, his warmth a stark contrast to the deep chill that had settled into my marrow. HE WALKS ME TO THE APARTMENTS, his pace too fast for my shaky legs through the cavernous, echoing corridors. I’m exhausted and stumble on the way as he practically drags me; he thinks at first that I’m being stubborn and wanting to make a scene, his exasperated sigh hot against my temple. But at the stairs I falter again, my vision swimming with black spots as the world tilted, and finally collapse in his arms shivering uncontrollably, my last conscious sensation the shocking heat of his body and the low, startled curse that rumbled from his chest.
He cursed again, this time with a ragged edge of frustration that wasn't entirely anger. His arms slid under her knees and shoulders, the movement abrupt but secure, lifting her against the solid wall of his chest. The cold radiating from her skin seeped through his shirt, a shocking contrast to the feverish heat of the marking site on her neck. "Stubborn," he muttered into her hair, his breath warming her temple as he took the stairs two at a time. In the hollow of his arms, Lexi felt the world recede into a distant, jostling rhythm of his heartbeat and his footsteps.
In the hollow of his arms, Lexi felt the world recede into a distant, jostling rhythm of his heartbeat and his footsteps. He shouldered through the door to his rooms, barking "Get a healer, now!" at a startled guard, his voice stripped of its usual controlled tenor. He laid her on the dark duvet of his bed, the fabric cool against her clammy skin, and that’s when he saw them: the livid, fingerprint-shaped bruises already blooming across her slender wrist. He stared at the violent marks set against her human-pale skin, his own handiwork, and a hot wave of frustration—at himself, at the situation—crashed over him. How could he have handled her that way, forgotten she was only half as durable as a full Lycan, a woman he’d now sworn to protect? He scrubbed a hand over his face, the rough sound of his palm against his stubble loud in the sudden quiet of the room.
His gaze dropped to the ornate gold cuff circling her bruised wrist, the same one that had flashed in the chapel. With a muttered oath, his fingers found the hidden clasp, the mechanism releasing with a soft, final click. HE REMOVES THE CUFF, the weight of it sudden and significant in his palm. The uncovered skin beneath was paler, fragile, the darkening bruises a brutal indictment against it. He stared at the contrast, his breath catching in a way that had nothing to do with anger.
The healer, an older woman with hands that smelled of sage and clean linen, nudged him aside without ceremony. She pressed her fingers to the side of Lexi’s throat, her other palm resting lightly over the fresh marking bite. “It’s normal exhaustion, Alpha,” she said, her voice low but firm, a pointed glance including his mother and Dante who had followed them in. “She’s half-human. The force of a new bond with an Alpha of your strength… it’s a storm her body has to learn to weather.” Michael’s jaw worked silently as the healer smoothed the damp hair from Lexi’s brow. “She doesn’t need your suspicion right now. She just needs time, and rest.”
Michael’s fingers curled around the cold weight of her cuff, the metal biting into his palm as he remembered the flash of gold in the chapel and the sickening ease with which he’d bruised her. A low, pained sound escaped Lexi’s lips, her eyelids fluttering as another tremor wracked her frame. “Out,” he growled, the command cracking through the room’s stifling air, and his mother’s sharp sigh was the only reply before the door clicked shut. He was alone with the shallow rhythm of her breathing and the palpable, unfamiliar heat of the new bond throbbing at the base of his own skull. Swearing under his breath, he reached for the blankets, his movements uncharacteristically hesitant as he tucked them around her shoulders.
After tucking the blankets, he stared at her pale face, the dark circles under her eyes a stark contrast to the vibrant woman from the chapel. The bond pulsed in his chest, a foreign warmth that felt less like a connection and more like a shackle. "What kind of bond leaves one person broken and the other just... empty?" he muttered, the words tasting bitter. Her skin was still cool to the touch, but the mark on her neck glowed faintly, a persistent reminder of the forced union. He stepped back, the weight of her gold cuff in his pocket suddenly feeling like a verdict he wasn't ready to face.