To Rule the Alpha's Heart

32. The Salt Caves (Part 2)

CALLA VORONÍN

Long days spent traveling to the Salt Caves bled into longer nights spent wrapped in Einarr's embrace. Calla wouldn't complain. She savored every moment together and regretted every moment without him.

It seemed that the further they trekked north, the more desperate Einarr was to touch her – hold her and kiss her and fill her...

Once, at sunhigh, Einarr paused the Onyx Craven's migration to satiate their shared desires. He brought the pack to an abrupt halt, allowed Calla to slide from his wolf's back, then carried her behind the nearest spruce. Hardly shielded from the eyes of the pack, Calla hastily bunched her frock around her hips and wrapped her legs around Einarr's naked waist.

With a mighty thrust upward, Einarr slid between her folds, still slightly slippery from their previous night's coupling. Calla clawed at his shoulders and buried her head in his neck as he guided her hips, up and down and up and down. She remembered gasping his name, begging for release, but Einarr's urgency could not be delayed. He filled her to the brim with his seed and whispered his apologies, then promised to repay Calla tenfold when they stopped in the evening.

He did not disappoint her. Not once.

One evening, while Calla sat with the elders and helped prepare the pack's latest kill, Gudrun nodded toward Calla's stomach and smiled. "The Moon Goddess bless with pup soon."

The surrounding elders murmured their agreement, eyes sparkling with wise excitement, while Calla, who had been slicing a slab of meat from the thigh of a female elk, blinked at the elder's audacious statement. An uneasy laugh slipped from her lips and heat rose to her cheeks. "I– I do not think it is so easy..."

In truth, she hadn't given conception much thought. She knew that humans struggled to conceive when paired with a shifter's seed and figured it could not happen so quickly. When she first mated with Einarr, she was so confident that she would never want to carry his heir. And yet... so much had changed.

Calla dropped the slab of elk meat and placed her hand on her stomach, right above where a baby – Einarr's baby – might rest one day. It hadn't happened yet. She last bled at the full moon, half a moon-cycle ago. Something like momentary disappointment twisted in her gut.

As if she could sense Calla's inner turmoil, Gudrun reached a wrinkled, motherly hand to her cheek and caressed. "You are strong Luna," she insisted. "Do not fear."

☽ ☽ ☽

Calla carried those words with her as they continued their journey north. They reached the Salt Caves within the week.

Calla couldn't contain her awe when an expansive mountain-face breached the horizon, shadowing over a city that rivaled the size of Roandör, Nortend's capital. According to Cyril, the clusters of tents surrounding the base of the mountain each belonged to a separate pack visiting the spiritual site. Calla counted at least four separate clusters.

The knot in her stomach tightened with every step they took closer to the mountain. At the same moment, something like anticipation – longing – tugged at her chest, as if an invisible string connected Calla's heart to the salt caves waiting within the tower of rock.

Einarr was right. She felt closer to her Seer gifts than ever before.

"You are well, Luna?" a familiar female voice interrupted Calla's thoughts as they finally neared the city. Calla turned to find Idoneah walking beside her.

Einarr and his Sanguin ran ahead to inform the city of the Onyx Craven Pack's arrival, leaving Calla in the company of Cyril, Iva, and Lucia. Several of the pack's elders surrounded her as well, but she never expected Idoneah to seek her out among the crowd. The female had seemed content to ignore her.