I had a lot of fancy things to wear by the time I needed to get ready to go out with Arthur for supper. I opened my ridiculously large and nearly empty walk in closet and discovered it was not nearly so empty as the last time I had looked, although there was still plenty of room for more to be added.
I walked to a row of dresses and pulled on a green one. It fit me perfectly. I tried a red dress and it looked excellent on me. I tried a yellow one and I looked glorious, and in the past I had not even thought I looked good in yellow.
Perhaps this was some sort of magical wardrobe in which everything looked wonderful on me and if I walked to the back I would find a land of snowy fir trees beyond the fur coats.
I shook my head at my own whimsy and forced myself to focus.
I finally decided on a cute maroon dress with a moderate neckline and a hem that was just above my knees. I found some matching heels on a shelf and decided it was fate.
Or on second thought it was more likely someone had the job of finding shoes that would look good with my dresses.
I heard a knock at the door and walked and opened it. I was surprised not to find Arthur on the other side, but rather a black haired woman who seemed to be only slightly older than me.
She curtseyed and I nodded uncomfortably. "Lady Anne, I'm Velda and I was sent to act as your lady's maid if it pleases you."
She was wearing a tidy uniform, so I guess her words fit her look. "Yeah, that sounds nice," I lied.
Velda smiled as if she was truly pleased with my answer. I wondered what I was supposed to let her do for me. "Well, I guess you should do whatever you need to do."
She smiled. "Shall I do your hair, Lady Anne?"
"That sounds fine." I had been planning to just wear it down like normal, but I did not really care enough not to let her do something. She seemed to really want to. The job was probably something like an honour for her, as weird as the idea seemed to me.
"How do you want it done, my lady?"
"I think... Down?"
She nodded and I thought she would be disappointed, but then she ushered me over to a seat at a dressing table and began doing things to my hair. I did not argue. Instead I picked up my phone and decided to text Kayla. I had not responded to her last ten messages, so I probably owed her one.
[Me] Sry I didn't text sooner, was as busy as I thought I'd be.
[Kayla] Np, how is it?
[Me] It's amazing and overwhelming. Can't wait for you to get here.
[Me] I don't know when that party is yet.
[Kayla] So happy for u
[Kayla] I'm super excited about it too!!!!!!
[Me] So... we marked each other.
There was a long pause. I could picture Kayla jumping around like crazy and then running to tell Rory before responding.
[Kayla] No way!!!!!!
[Kayla] That's so fast!!
[Me] Not really. We're destined mates, right?
I felt just a tad defensive and embarrassed by her reaction. If even Kayla thought we were going too fast, maybe we had.
[Kayla] Ur right, but I thought ud take longer because ur u, right?
[Me] Thx?
[Kayla] U know what I mean
[Kayla] Ur super cautious
I decided to change the subject.
[Me] Arthur took me on a tour and I also met the queen today.
[Kayla] No way? What's she like????
[Me] Pretty nice, but she kept asking me questions trying to figure out what was wrong with me.
[Kayla] Ur abnormally normal Anne
[Me] Thx? Anyway, she told me to call her by her name in private
[Me] It's so weird
"All done," said Velda with obvious satisfaction.
[Kayla] Weirdly awesome!!!!
"Thank you," I told her. This maid seemed nice enough and there was no reason not to be polite. I was still allowed to try to be polite, wasn't I?
I looked in the mirror and my hair was down, but had been styled into loose curls. I looked a bit different.
[Me] Yeah. I've gtg, Arthur's taking me out for supper.
[Kayla] Even more awesome!!!!!
[Kayla] Have a great night!!!!
I rarely wore makeup because I did not really need any since we werewolves are supernaturally good looking, but I did put on some moisturizing lip gloss. After all the workouts my lips needed a bit of TLC.
Velda was cleaning up and I slipped on the heels and looked in the full length mirror. I looked pretty good and I was fairly certain that Arthur would agree. I grabbed a purse I found and shoved my phone inside. I quickly left my room to find him.
Arthur was already ready and waiting in front of the television. He was wearing a very nicely tailored grey suit and he looked so good in it I could barely comprehend the sight before me.
Then he smiled appreciatively as he looked me over. My brain froze and crashed because there was no way for it to process all the incoming logic defying hotness information.
"Ready to go?" he asked.
I only nodded because my mind was still reloading.
Arthur took my hand and we began to walk through the halls. There was a limousine waiting outside and he helped me get into it.
"So, where are we going?" I asked.
"It's a surprise," he told me.
"You know, you could tell me an it would still be a surprise. I wouldn't know a single restaurant that is not a chain restaurant in the capital. I mean, I assume you have a few McNightold's or PizzaDens? But besides that?" I shrugged.
"We do. Why, do you prefer fast food?"
"I like it, but I'm not fussy as long as it's not vegetarian. I'm no vampire."
He chuckled at my joke.
"Don't say that around any real vampires. They're rather sensitive about that nowadays."
"Will I be meeting vampires?" The idea made me uneasy. I didn't know what it was, but I always had such an instinctual aversion to them.
He nodded. "Likely, especially since we have a vampiric delegate who stays in the palace most of the time. Have you never met one?"
I frowned. "Well, Maryville isn't exactly vampire central."
"Don't worry, Vincent is quite likeable."
I nodded. I would have to take his word for it for now.
"We all have that unpleasant feeling when dealing with vampires at first," he explained. "Perhaps it is because we're their natural enemies, natural opposites. We're life and reproduction, they're death and destruction."
His description almost sounded like poetry to my not at all biased ears and my heart fluttered.
"But we've clearly won the battle of survival of the fittest, so it doesn't hurt us to be magnanimous in victory. Besides, you'll really like Vincent once you get to know him, of that I have no doubt. He has an interestingly long perspective, unique business concerns and he's helping us forge a proper treaty with the vampire council."
"I thought we weren't at war with them?"
"We're not, but we're looking to solidify allies against another potential conflict."
"What conflict?" I asked. I imagined I needed to learn all of this for the future.
He took my hand. "I could tell you, but would you rather not just enjoy tonight first? There'll be time for politics tomorrow if you want."
I let myself relax. I did want to just enjoy his company for now. No doubt all the problems would still be there to bother us in the morning.
<<< << < > >> >>>
We arrived at a restaurant even I could tell was fancy with my untutored eyes. Arthur helped me out and I was pleased to see that there our arrival was relatively unnoticed, at least at first.
As Arthur helped me out of the car and into the building, I noticed that some people were looking, but at least no one had their phones out yet.
As soon as the thought crossed my mind I saw a woman tapping furiously on her smart phone. I supposed that I had thought too soon.
<Don't worry, Anne,> Arthur whispered in my mind.
I nodded and smiled at him. We were led by a hostess to a private dining area.
I sat at the table across from Arthur. I would have preferred to sit directly next to him, but I imagined that would be weird so I just accepted the arrangement.
And there was one advantage to our placement: I would be able to spend the entire meal admiring him like a lovesick puppy.
I let Arthur order, since he knew the place.
The serving staff were extremely solicitous and I wondered if it was because we were in a classy restaurant or if it was because they were serving the prince.
Probably both.
"So, tell me something I don't know about you?" he asked.
I tried to think of something. "I don't know. Honestly my life was really quite uneventful until recently. I suppose out of the ordinary things only started in my family with the whole Ellen being rejected by Wilson thing."
Arthur shook his head. "If Wilson felt even a fraction of what I feel for you for your sister, I don't know how he did it."
I smiled. "I know what you mean."
"You never considered rejecting me?"
I smiled at the little crease between his eyebrows. "Of course not. I was too busy worrying you would do that to me."
"Never. You're stuck with me now," he said, his eyes moving to the mark at the base of my neck.
"How terrible," I joked.
He raised an eyebrow. "You did seem a bit reluctant."
I smiled wider. "Never about you, just about all this," I said, waving my hand to encompass the room around us.
"Restaurants are really not your thing, then?" He grinned. "We could still go and grab BurgerAlpha's."
I could not help my smile at his teasing. "You know it's not the restaurant. What I mean is the rest of the world."
He nodded to give me the point. "Speaking of the rest of the world, mother set your welcoming celebration for next week."
"So soon?"
"Too soon?"
"No, I'm just worried we might be going a little fast. People are going to think we're being led about by our wolves," I pointed out.
"Well..."
I frowned at him. "I didn't let you mark me today because of my wolf. Mostly."
He raised his eyebrow again. His quizzical expression made me want to give him any answer he requested. "What?"
If I were an enemy spy he would have all the answers out of me in six seconds without even requiring torture.
"No, I decided, but I just could not back out because she would have made my life a living hell if I did," I explained.
He nodded. "I understand. My wolf was fighting me, too. That's the difficulty with strong wolves."
He looked concerned. "I don't like that you weren't able to back out, though."
I shook my head. I did not want him to feel bad about it of all things. "It's not like that. I did not want to stop you, so it didn't matter. In fact I actually..."
His gaze was so piercing I could imagine he had x-ray vision. His intense attention made my heart pound. I could see he wanted me to finish my sentence, but how could I say it out loud?
<I actually sort of liked it...>
An appreciative smile crossed his handsome jaw.
<I hope you'll like everything we do together.>
My cheeks got hot at his words.
I was saved from what would surely have been a bumbling response by the arrival of our appetizers.
I inspected the food before me to cover my reaction. There was a lot of animal based protein.
"My wolf would really like this meal if she were paying attention."
"Mine too," he agreed. "Total silence on your end?"
"Yeah. I wonder if they found each other yet," I mused.
I popped a shrimp into my mouth. It tasted like ambrosia.
I could reach out to her and probably catch her attention if I really wanted, but I suspected she would not welcome the interruption whether she was still searching or whether she had found him already.
"I think they have. My wolf howled something about an hour ago that I could not understand, but he sounded more excited than I've ever heard him sound before."
"My wolf probably won't talk to me again for a week," I mused.
Still, I smiled, happy for my wolf. A vision of the two of them meeting and running together in some dimension my wolf assured me I would never understand crossed my mind.
There was no point in questioning my wolf about the Wolfscape. The one time she had tried to explain she had become so frustrated with me she refused to talk to me for several days. She had claimed I was being obtuse, but how was I supposed to fathom a dimension beyond my perception? I mean, I obviously understood the three dimensions of physical space, I could kind of see how time might be another level on that, but what could be on top of that?
Supertime? Double time? Hyperspace? Timespace? Time squared?
These sort of questions frustrated her so I gave up. For such a allegedly superior being she could be such an impatient brat. It was good that she refused to talk to me after her terrible explanation that devolved into our argument, because I had been pretty angry at her as well.
She had said some very insulting things to me about my resemblance to flatworms.
Regardless of my werewolf's attitude and my lack of understanding, the Wolfscape was somehow involved in werewolf bonds and mind links. We were able to talk to other wolves by somehow slipping our verbal thoughts through that fifth dimension or something like that. We were linked to others through that time/place/thingy.
Honestly, I just did not know. Maybe some genius werewolf out there could reason it out, but it was beyond me.
"Your wolf is pretty dominant then?" Arthur asked me.
"Well, if you're asking if she argues all the time, then yes. She rarely agrees with me on anything. I actually think she sometimes argues with me simply because she enjoys it."
"I get along better with mine than yours, I think," he commented.
I smiled. "I would not be surprised. Pretty much everyone seems to."
"Still, you have excellent self control."
I felt myself blushing at his words. But at the same time, even though my wolf could be handful I still wanted Arthur to like her. "She's not irrational, just stubborn. She's always there for me when it counts," I said a bit defensively.
"I can see that, Anne. Your wolf seems very nice and my wolf already adores her."
Maybe my near constant tingles were a sign of a medical condition that had been aggravated the mate bond. The whole marking thing only made it so much worse. Perhaps I would need a check up once I got properly settled in.
And then I caught Arthur's gaze and all trace of rational thoughts slipped from my mind again.