The Wolf Crown (The Wolf Kings #2) (MLM)

CHAPTER ONE.

Text copyright © KatherineBlackmare ™ 2023

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*

                Jack ran as fast as his legs could carry him.

Past narrow windows and ancient tapestries depicting brutal war scenes, pine forests, full moons. The morning air was crisp and bit his cheeks and nose, and in the mist that clung to the palace's walls and towers, Jack spotted a hint of fur on the maze of stone bridges below him.

He gasped and stumbled, but caught himself with a hand to the ground, and kept running in a new bout of speed. He turned a sharp corner and leapt most of the way down a worn stairwell.

Almost there, he thought desperately. Almost there.

He rounded another corner—and there it was! The large oak front doors, engraved with gold depictions of wolves gathered around a moon. Just one more set of stairs and he would be home free. His heart pounded, his soles ached, his throat swelled, but he ran. Just a few more steps.

Almost there . . .

But just before he could close the distance between him and the doors, a large wolf—larger than any normal beast—with deep chestnut fur and vicious green eyes, stepped in, clouded by morning mist and heaving.

"No!" Jack yelled, but it was too late, his momentum too strong to stop now, and he was soon running right into the wolf's face.

He stumbled back, disoriented, just as something hard hit his head.

"Ow!" he clutched his crown, watching the baseball bouncing away to a roll and hitting a wall.

The wolf sat down, waving her tail, her eyes on Jack wide and innocent as her tongue lagged like she was expecting a treat.

Jack shook his head and sighed, "I already told you, Mira, you can't transform during a play, it's cheating."

The wolf titled her head, and before Jack's eyes, the beast faded away to reveal a woman around his age, if a few heads shorter, with big forest eyes that never blinked and long chestnut curls that were barely covering her exposed breasts.

"Oh my God," he muttered, looking away from the now naked Mira Craft as her mate, an elf named Everett Mallow, came running in with her frilly dress in his arms.

"Mira!" he heaved, running a hand through his damp jet-black hair, his silver fang earring catching the bare morning light. "We've talked about this, you can't just strip off your clothes in the middle of a courtyard!"

Mira poked her cheek. "I never knew braceball had so many rules."

"Baseball," Jack corrected. "I don't know why I bother teaching you how to play if you're just going to use your powers to transform anyway."