The Alpha's Unclaimed Mate novel Chapter 406

Chapter 406: Open The Damn Portal

"Portal. Shadowclaw. Now."

Dexmon Drakenfell was walking at a pace that suggested the destination was non-negotiable and the timeline was shorter than the sentence he had used to announce it.

"This is a terrible idea," Hyran said flatly.

"Noted."

"Your father removed you from her training for a reason."

"Also noted."

"The reason was biological, tactical, and correct, and you agreed to it four hours ago."

"That was four hours ago. That was also eleven shifts ago. The agreement had an expiration date and the expiration date was shift number twelve, and we are currently at fifteen, and the agreement is dead, and I am attending its funeral, which is located in Shadowclaw, where I will be in approximately ninety seconds."

Hyran matched his stride without breaking his own composure, because matching the stride of an agitated Alpha while maintaining composure was a skill Hyran had developed over a decade of advising men whose emotional states moved faster than their decision-making.

"To accomplish what, exactly?"

Dex stopped walking. Turned. Looked at Hyran. His eyes were full molten gold, his wolf had been screaming at him for four consecutive hours, and his ability to keep his wolf contained was operating on the final reserves.

"To hold her, Hyran. To put my arms around her and tell her she is doing well and be present for the next shift so that when the pain comes through the matebond, it comes through at close range instead of four hundred miles away where I am useless and bleeding on documents that my officers are too afraid to ask me to replace."

He resumed walking.

"You will be useless at close range as well," Hyran observed. "The proximity will make it worse."

"I am going to Shadowclaw, and I am going to see my mate, and this conversation is now over."

Hyran exhaled through his nose. "I will open the damn portal. But I want it recorded that I objected."

"Recorded. Ignored. Open it."

Hyran raised his hand. Gold light bled through the air, the seam widening into a doorway that opened onto a Shadowclaw corridor Hyran had memorized during his last seventeen visits.

Without hesitation, Dex stepped through. He turned left toward the training arena because the direction was instinct and the instinct was matebond and the matebond was a compass that pointed at Serena regardless of geography.

Hyran stepped through behind him. The portal closed.

They made it fourteen steps before Dex heard voices around the corner.

"—already told you, this is a terrible idea."

"And I already told you, the idea is happening regardless of its quality, so your assessment, while accurate, is decorative."

Aeron Lancaster came around the corner first. His expression was the expression of a Master Mage who had spent four hours making the same argument Hyran had been making and had achieved the same result, which was nothing.

Finnick Shadowclaw was one step behind him.

He looked like hell. His jaw was set, his eyes were flickering gold, and his stride carried the identical rigid determination that Dex’s did.

Both Alphas stopped.

They stared at each other.

The staring lasted three full seconds, which was long enough for both men to register the identical blood stains, the identical gold irises, the identical jaw tension, and the identical expression of a mate who had reached the end of his tolerance for receiving pain at a distance and was now here to do something about it.

Behind them, Hyran and Aeron made eye contact.

The look between the two mages carried an entire conversation. It carried the specific, weary solidarity of two professionals who had spent four hours advising two different Alpha Kings to stay away from the same woman and had both failed in the exact same way at the exact same time. The look said: You too? The look answered: Me too.

"Do we follow them?"

Hyran was already walking. "We follow them, we document the damage, and we prepare a report for Tiberon that will be unpleasant to write and worse to deliver."

"He is going to be furious."

"He is going to be correct and furious, which is the most dangerous combination Tiberon produces, and he produces it frequently."

Tiberon was against the far wall. His eyes moved to the doorway.

He saw his son. He saw Finnick. He saw the blood. He saw the gold irises. He saw, behind them, two Master Mages whose body language communicated "we tried" with the eloquence of men who had given up and were now managing consequences rather than preventing them.

His expression did not change. He pushed off the wall and crossed the arena floor, passing between Serena and the doorway, blocking her sightline to the entrance.

"You will sit against the far wall. You will remain silent. You will control your wolves. If either of you shifts, disrupts her training, or enters the floor, I will have Hyran sedate you. Am I understood?"

Dex opened his mouth.

"That was rhetorical, Dexmon."

Dex closed his mouth.

Fin nodded once. He did not like being told what to do in his own Keep, but he understood it.

Both Alphas walked to the far wall and sat. Hyran and Aeron positioned themselves on either side of the two. Sentries. Handlers. Babysitters. Now spectators.

Tiberon returned to his position against the opposite wall.

"Continue," he called to the arena floor.