He shook his head. “They’re regal and—”
“No, dear.” She shook her head slowly, picking at baby’s breath blossom on her bodice. “The actual wolves, yes, but not the shifters. Their humanity can be their greatest weakness. Their lust for violence and anarchy, their quick tempers… She could never fall in love with one of them. Lilith is an alpha, anathema to a shifter because of her headstrong and willful nature she would be reviled. Not seen as a peer but as someone trying to usurp their authority and leadership. And because a female alpha within shifter circles were so rare they would not understand the treasure they’ve been handed. Their callous and cruel nature would slowly destroy her.”
“So why pair her off with me in this manner? It is cruel. If she made the deal with Rumpel it cannot be undone.”
These revelations only hardened Giles’s resolve to stick to the plan. Retrieve the chalice and send Lilith back to the safety of her home. Perhaps there wouldn’t be a love match for her, but there were worse things in life. At least she had a clan to return to, a home where she was loved.
“You are not understanding, Giles. You saw what those wolves meant to do to her.”
“She was in heat.”
“No.” She swatted his words away. “The first night.”
His jaw clenched remembering the group of men, he’d wanted to rip them limb from limb for cornering her. For entrancing her as they had, very nearly raping her. “I’ll kill them if they try again.”
Her lips twitched. “Then there would be others. And others still. They don’t want her, Giles, none of them do. They want to break her. To own her. It is sport for them and nothing else.”
Standing, he began to pace. “Are you saying she can never return?”
“No. Not there. Not without a mate. It is her only source of protection now. She will move on to one pack after another, but the moment it is discovered who she really is, she will run. An endless vicious cycle for her, she has tainted blood. She is impure. She would never be cherished by a wolf. She couldn’t have known that when she made that deal, but it is the truth nonetheless.”
“Why should she even need a mate? She is a grown, beautiful woman. You say we’re in the twenty-first century—isn’t the idea of a mate antiquated?”
“You’re preaching to the choir there, demone.” She held up her hands. “I’m all for blazing your own path, believe me. The idea of a fairy falling in love and marrying, it is blasphemy.” She shrugged. “And yet that did not stop me from doing just that with the Man in the Moon. Unfortunately, even fairies are more progressive than wolves. They’ve just barely evolved one step up from the Neanderthal. As much as I wish it were otherwise, it is what it is.”
“And so it is me or nothing.”
“Well, not entirely.” She thinned her lips. “It is demone as a whole. You see, when Lilith made the deal Rumpel asked her to specify which genus in particular she wished to stay away from. She mentioned all species of Kingdom, except—”
“For my kind,” he finished for her.
She touched the tip of her finger to the side of her nose. “Indeed.”
“Rumpel would not allow her into the castle to find herself a mate, Danika.”
Nodding vigorously, she gave him a look as if to say, Now you understand. But he wasn’t entirely sure he did just yet.
“Demone rarely venture outside of the castle. And once they do they are prompt to return. You are the first in centuries, and undoubtedly it will be years more before another comes along. By that point it might be too late.”
“So either I bind myself to her, or she faces an eternity of running?” He sighed.
Not that he didn’t enjoy her company. But that didn’t mean he meant to make it eternal. What did they know of one another? Other than she made him laugh and cooked terrible meals, and that sometimes she’d glance at him in a way that would make his breath catch and his body burn. But she was also slow to listen to his advice. Twice she’d run headlong into danger, once very nearly dying because of it.
His heart had nearly stopped beating in his chest at the sight of her bound and at the mercy of a sword’s blade. But then he recalled the kiss she’d given him after his rescue and how she’d looked at him in a way that shook him to his very core because he’d never known it before.
“Does she know? Is that why she was willing to run off with me? Is she hoping I will save her from herself?” he asked slowly, measuring each word, feeling the importance of it.
“Lilith is aware of how she is feeling, and knowing that cub as I do, I’m sure she’s terrified out of her mind. As far as she’s concerned she can fall in love with no one outside of her species or suffer death.”