TOUCH OF THE WOLF By Susan Krinard

Braden didn’t so much as raise his hand. He had never struck his sister. He didn’t have to resort to physical measures to make her feel his displeasure.

Rowena flinched away from him, conceding his power. Though she denied the wolf within her, her instincts recognized his dominance.

“I allowed you to remain with Lady Beatrice in London last year for one more season,” he said, “in spite other family’s betrayal of the Cause. I summoned you home after the Little Season, and you didn’t return. So I came for you. Your future mate will be attending the Convocation in two weeks. You will be there to greet him.”

“Another American.” She retreated around the table in a hissing rustle of skirts. “Do you suppose he has ever bathed?”

“You may like him or not, as you choose. But you will bear him children to strengthen the blood. He was selected as the best of the American candidates.”

“Perhaps, if I am very fortunate, he may be capable of writing his name and reading a child’s primer.”

“He needs neither skill to sire your children.”

He could feel her disgust at his blunt words. The loups-garous had always been an earthy people, accustomed to the realities of nature. But, over centuries, the veneer of civilization had weakened that ancient understanding. Rowena was living proof of the disintegration of their people.

If only some former leader had had the wisdom to guide the werewolf kind to some pristine wilderness, far from the defilement of men, they would not have lost so much.

But too many had fallen under the spell of power that came so easily, that made a life of luxury and dominance over others simple to possess.

Rowena wanted still more, and infinitely less. She wished to be human.

“And who do you plan to mate with our little American cousin?” she asked, her voice thick and tight. “You seem rather fond of her already, Greyburn. But that is impossible. You were incapable of caring for Milena, and she was a thousand times more—” She caught her breath. “But no. Milena was too much for you and your Cause, and too little. Perhaps Miss Cassidy Holt is more to your taste. Malleable. Unpolished. Closer to… nature.” The word was filled with contempt. “I feel pity for her if she is destined to suffer Milena’s fate.”

Braden heard her from a distance, as if his private shield extended to sound as well as sight. “You need have no fear of that, sister. I shall not take another mate.” He showed the tips of his teeth. “But your intemperate language proves that you cannot control the very impulses you scorn. I suggest you address your own defects before you complain of others’.”

He sensed the way her spine stiffened in affront. “You are right, elder brother. I shall do as you say. But I promise I will not become a beast. I shall never again run on four legs and howl at the moon. I will die first—just like Milena.”

And she spun and walked away, her steps for once not dainty and confined but awkwardly long for the binding skirts she wore. At the last minute she turned, her train whipping about her ankles.

“I pity you, Braden. You have nothing but your Cause to live for. You will end up like Grandfather. Is it really worth the price?”

After she was gone, Braden sat down in the nearest chair, draining his mind of all emotion. He could scarcely remember a childhood when he and Quentin and Rowena had played and fought and laughed together, before the Cause had woven them into its inevitable pattern. Even then Rowena had wanted to be like Lady Beatrice Savers’ daughter, Alice—carrying the werewolf blood but living as human.

If Rowena hated him, so be it. It was a price he’d long been willing to pay—to alienate his family for the sake of their race. He would continue to pay that price willingly. Just as his grandfather had done.

He was not lonely. There was no room for loneliness in the life he had built. As long as he led the Convocation and oversaw the Cause, he had work enough to drive every other distraction from his life.

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