Luka POV
Technically, there's one requirement for becoming a pack leader: you must be an alpha.
It's simple, but politics have a way of making things complicated.
Each pack ends up with its own requirements for a pack leader. Tasks that they have to be able to handle. Qualities they should have.
Growing up, I never dreamed of becoming the pack leader. Not even after the yearly Night of the Moonstone confirmed me as an alpha.
My pack is large enough that there are always multiple alphas vying for the position of pack leader when the time comes for the current leader to step down and enjoy retirement after years of dealing with the stress of managing a pack of werewolves in the middle of a human-dominated world. They might know about us and the other inhumans, but that doesn't mean they aren't prepared with tools that can kill or contain us and ready to use them.
Tools that require proof of humanity in order to buy them.
No, I'd rather not deal with both werewolf and human politics.
Except the world has never cared about my preferences. And it isn't about to start caring now.
The problem is that I don't trust the other candidates for pack leader to have the pack's best interest in mind. Since I'm descended from the founders of this pack, I have a sense of pride that's tied to its well-being.
That pride is what led to me entering the fight for becoming pack leader because as much as I hate the idea of dealing with pack politics, I hate the thought of what could happen if this pack fell into the hands of the wrong leader more.
Unfortunately, that seems to be the most likely future.
Grey and Rowan are the other alphas competing with me for the pack leader position. But from what I can tell, they've formed a temporary alliance between each other and the leader of the Hollow Peak Mountain Pack.
I don't know what sort of deal they made with our current leader to force me into an arranged marriage, but I know they chose the girl who failed to awaken her wolf to be my bride.
Cressida.
It's not unusual for a pack leader to require their successor to have a mate, and when you haven't found your fated mate, then a contractual marriage is acceptable. In the past—before we were able to live among humans without hiding our true nature—the pack leader's mate often took up responsibilities that helped care for the pack and kept humans from noticing that they were creatures that folk stories labeled as monsters.
Now, the practice is more traditional than it is practical, but it's difficult to lay your traditions to rest.
Maple's hand on my shoulder jars me out of my thoughts. She's been my assistant for years, and I know she understands why I got involved in the competition to become pack leader despite not wanting the role.
She, too, is a descendant of the founders of our tribe, as indicated by her bright orange eyes—the color of a full harvest moon. The same as mine.
"No matter how much you think about it, you can't back out of the marriage," she says.
"It's not about backing out." I look at the bedroom setup. It's not too late for me to swap out the bed for two separate beds. It might make the situation easier on both of us. "It's about what happens after the marriage."
"What happens after?"
"I don't know." I turn my back on the bedroom and look at Maple properly. "That's the problem. I don't know the plan, but I know there must be one. It doesn't make sense otherwise."
Maple tilts her head back and squeezes her eyes shut as if it's enough to make her problems go away through sheer force of will.
"Man," she says. "I get why you got involved in the pack leader competition, but why does it have to be such a pain to deal with?"
I understand her frustration. I've had a constant headache myself since getting involved in this mess that intensifies any time I learn about Grey and Rowan's various plans for the pack if either one becomes the next leader.
It's not something I'm supposed to know, but Grey plans on selling our land to humans for some new development they want to build that requires space and natural resources. While he would get to enjoy the money and be fine, the rest of the pack would be left homeless as the land that's belonged to us for generations is ruined for whatever project the humans have decided is more important than our home.
Rowan—as far as I know—doesn't have the same plan and isn't involved in Grey's plot, but I'm not about to trust that he has the pack's best interest in mind either.
"It'd be nice if you could prove Grey's plan," Maple says. "You'd think it would lower his support."
"I don't know that enough members of our pack would believe it. That kind of betrayal from a pack member is almost unheard of."
That fact alone has made my situation more difficult. Nobody would believe me that Grey has plans to ruin our pack for his own enrichment. Now, I'm stuck fighting for a position I don't want and about to welcome a wife into the middle of plots that she certainly didn't ask to be involved in.
And any danger or ill will she faces will be my fault.
"Well, I'll be living in your guestroom for the foreseeable future, I guess," Maple says. "Somebody has to look out for your wife when you aren't here."
"I appreciate it." I glance at the room that Maple has spent the day bringing her belongings into, and it looks like she's always lived there. "I hope that I can find a way to get her back to her family if she has a good relationship with them. She'll be safer the sooner I get her away from the pack after our wedding."
"Exiling the bride, very romantic."
I would laugh normally, but Maple's joke falls flat when we both know that our best options are keeping Cressida safe and trying to prove my worth to the pack leader so he picks me as his successor.
Victory feels almost impossible.