Gabel reeked of Platinum's perfume that night. I didn't think he had touched her. Perhaps he had. I hadn't felt it if he had. Maybe she had just touched him.

Maybe he had tried to touch her and found the Bond wouldn't let him... cooperate.

I indulged silent laughter. I was sure he felt that.

Ah, that would be priceless. The wolf who told me he didn't believe in dalliances having a dalliance just to test himself against the holy Bond, to find he wasn't as powerful as he thought. I liked the cruel thought, although I didn't like myself much for my enjoyment of it.

That Bond worked both ways. I didn't want Gabel to turn me cruel and harsh, but I had to survive.

He didn't say a word to me. Not a single word.

Good.

Breakfast was more subdued than usual, as was the next night's dinner. Platinum seemed extremely put out. She sat in her usual spot with her usual friends, glaring at me and pouting at Gabel.

Hix gave her a baleful look that made her look down at her eggs.

Gabel asked me to look at Alpha Anders again.

"I doubt much has changed." I told him, annoyed he would treat me like a security camera. It didn't work that way.

"No?" he asked.

"If visions are going to be so subject to change that a simple encounter can change the determined outcome of events, the Eye is closed." I told him. "Outcomes are normally the result of many previous choices, and it is rare that one simple, trivial action will change them."

He paced from his windows overlooking the training ground and stood right before me.

I bit my tongue. The Bond squirmed, whispering to me its pleasure at Gabel being so close. The sore Mark, still bruised, throbbed. If he had been humbled, and learned his power as a mortal only went so far... could I forgive him? Was there any hope left between us?

"It is never so simple, Alpha Gabel." I repeated. "If the Moon thought one small encounter could change everything, She would have shown me nothing. Summoning Anders here for a little chat and to parade your warriors in front of him is nothing of consequence. It is as if you went out into the woods and marked a tree. Eventually it might lead to something, but not instantly."

Gabel jerked his head to the side, his gaze going back to the window. His strong jaw ticked as his muscles clenched.

"Anders is entrenched to whatever path he has chosen." I added. I feared if Gabel would charge off and do something that would get people hurt. "One or two sweeping actions from you will not change it. In fact, whatever you are planning right now might already have been anticipated in what I saw."

"Meaning the Moon foresaw me attacking Anders and it changes nothing." Gabel focused on me with frightening brightness in his eyes.

I gulped, swallowed. The Bond squirmed at his attention, but my good sense advised me to be afraid. "Yes."

"And what use are your powers, then, Oracle, if they do not show me what I can change?" he hissed.

"You criticize the Moon? She is not your servant. She humors your inquiry. Obviously the situation with Anders is requires more than a blunt object and roar of fury."

Gabel snorted, annoyed.

"Why does Anders upset you?"

"I suspect he is disloyal. I suspect he moves against me."

"Why do you suspect this?"

"A thousand little things. And he was not very respectful at the summons. His body bent in all the right ways, but his scent was scorn and his eyes jaded." Gabel gestured, annoyed. Then his eyes rested on my bruised Mark.

Perhaps Anders had not been impressed with Gabel's choice of Platinum.

His fingers reached out to trace the fading outline of his teeth. I shivered. His touch sent pleasure along my skin.

It is a terrible thing to despise and desire a man like I did Gabel. I had no choice in it. It could not be rationed with or reasoned with or ignored.

Gabel's fingers brushed higher on my collar, up to my neck, under my jaw. His ocean-green eyes were intense. He seemed to see me for the first time. As if realizing I was actually there, and very real, and not just some trophy he had randomly acquired in his crusade to be King Alpha.

His fingers moved under my jaw. He held me still with that one finger, and bent his lips to mine.

The Bond squirmed and cried with glee within me, a feeling like moonlight poured through my skin and veins, soothing and cool and content. It was bliss. Like I had been starving for weeks, dying, and now I had been served a plate of divine food.

His lips moved over mine, so gentle and slow. It seemed impossible to me Gabel could have any artistry and delicacy in him. His tongue grazed my lips, and tentatively, mine sought to join his.

Platinium.

The memory of her scent mingling with his cut through me. The vision of her dangling on his arm, their fingers entwined together, Gabel kissing her fingers as if the most elegant of courtiers.

Hix's apology. A beta apologizing for an alpha.

From somewhere I found the strength to pull away from the moonlight. The Bond twisted and squeezed, but I wasn't sure if it was the agony of betrayal or rejection. I gasped around the pain and clutched my stomach. "No!"

Gabel fell back a step, face shocked.

"No!" I found my voice.

"No, buttercup?" he asked me, as if I was the crazy one who had just spouted madness.

I didn't know what I felt. I wanted to kiss him. I wanted him to touch me. But I didn't. I was the half moon: part of me in darkness, part of me in light.

"I said no." I couldn't go back on it now. I just had to think of Platinum and the moon's curve shrank to an unamused, waning crescent. My mouth opened to spit at him about how dare he humiliate me with Platinum.

I wouldn't give him the satisfaction. No. He wanted me to express my jealousy and injury over Platinum. I refused to do that.

Instead, if he wanted me to ride the Tide for him, I'd give him an answer that had nothing to do with my emotions. "If you want me to scry for you," I told him. "My body cannot be distracted."

Gabel's face darkened as if a cloud passing across it. "Ah."

I think he was mad that I hadn't told him I was mad at him.

I had also told him the truth. To slide out of my body and seek the Eye of the Moon meant my body couldn't be excited, or just getting over excitement. Flesh got in the way. The flesh had to be still.

"No," he said, barely above a mutter. "No, if you say it will serve no purpose, then I won't bother. I will have to decide how I want to approach this matter of Anders."

"May I go?" I asked him.

"So eager to get away from me, buttercup?"

He expected something else after the way he had been treating me? I grasped for an answer that wouldn't be a lie or reveal my suffering. He was the monster that ate fear and pain. I wouldn't feed him with mine. "I will remain if you want the company."

That wasn't the answer he had expected. His eyes crinkled in the corners, and briefly took on a predatory gleam that sent a jolt of terror right through my core. But the look passed. And, with just as much false pleasantness, he said, "I would enjoy that."

 At least he had a large collection of books to pass the time with...

/**

HI THERE.

Your next shipment of ham-in-a-can has arrived. ENJOY THE NOMS.

I swear, if this book gets like 1MM reads I'm going to eat my hat. Not that I OWN a hat. But I'll go out and buy a hat just so I can eat said hat. BUT IT MAKES YOU GUYS HAPPY, SO OKAY. DINNER'S READY. 

Cheers-

Merry

(your loyal pantster)

***/