Coldsnap: The Billionaire Alpha's Fated Pregnant Princess (GL)

Chapter 469 - [E] Red Fish, Blue Fish, Dead Fish, Wolfish pt1

***[POV: Director of Cultural Development]***

The crowd closed behind them, eventually. It was the weirdest thing they’d seen in a while. But they’d seen a lot of weird things recently. Just another day in the damned Apocalypse.

"Rushwater... what the hell was-"

"Situation is resolved. Resume your route if you want."

Thomas is asking questions like always. His wolf was still too close to surfacing, the turquoise that shone barely fading from his eyes.

We’d been spreading our pack members into these groups to build rapport and trust. But I think with some of ours, it’s just infecting them with disobedience.

Then again, he always was a bit of a jerk kid.

I realized that my hand was still up. The one I’d used to signal them to stand down and hold their position. I lowered it very slowly when they came back.

"Leave those two alone from now on. And spread the word. Citra Lomdi - or anyone she talks to - is not to be antagonized. Any more than you would Kyrie Voss or her important people."

Facing the three of them, keeping my shoulders square and my voice in that register that worked... well enough on our casino floor security members. Even at two in the morning when they slouched.

The humans anyway, the wolves just smirked at me. Thomas himself looked like he wanted to argue. But he joined the other two already backing off.

Though not because of me...

Because they’d just been stared down by something that made all their instincts scream *do not engage*. Just like looking at the Rimecoat Alpha herself.

And the smart play was to pretend they’d already been leaving me alone in a basement full of humans who were all very carefully not looking at me for too long.

Good. Because my hands were still shaking after being that close to her again. I stuffed them in my coat pockets and started walking in the opposite direction from where she’d gone.

Mostly because I just needed to move. Partly because standing still right now would mean thinking.

"Yes, I can’t think and walk. I can’t- fuck."

A real transmigrator... probably. It wasn’t just delusions performed with a pretty actress level of skill. I’ve known that for weeks now, sort of.

At least she’s a real Chosen, whatever the hell that is actually supposed to be about. And she is a fox. Definitely a fox! Not a werewolf soul inside her... and not even a wolf spirit.

Now that I’ve been nearby her, that fact - and *everyone* connected to her - is that much more obvious. At least to me. For reasons I still only kind of understand thanks to confiding in my own Alpha about my troubles lately...

"No. Not now. Not in public."

My thoughts twisted toward one particular problem. One particular person. I had a very carefully maintained schedule of when I allowed myself to do that.

Walk. Breathe. Focus on only that.

...

Okay. That patrol had been doing their job, basically. I knew that. Three wolves teamed on a standard sweep, catching the argument anomaly and finding an unaffiliated teenager holding a high-value infant in a zone with inconsistent security coverage.

They’d have been negligent not to investigate and not to encircle. If I’d been running that patrol shift, I would have brought my team over too. I’ll pat Thomas on the head later and apologize.

It will be funny when it pisses him off. Which I also want to do. Because I know what Zoé saw when she looked up and found six glowing eyes calculating the situation around her.

Gauging whether they could and should take her down. The same thing every rogue and unaffiliated person in this basement now saw a dozen times a day.

Are you one of ours? Do you belong here? Who authorized you? It didn’t matter that the answer to all of those questions was: Yes, Yes, the Lunar Fucking Goddess Herself.

The asking itself was the problem. Assessment of weaknesses. Categorization of how to contain or drop an unruly target. It is always very... kick first, see if hornets come out next.

It feels like if I was kicked in my chest they’d definitely come out. My heart feels like nothing but a nest of them lately.

Crawling around.... telling me to do more. Do something bigger to gain favor. Beg for help if I have to.

I finally turned a corner into one of the service corridors - the ones that most of the civilian population weren’t allowed in. It was quieter here... with that industrial white that Lunarizon put over everything.

Kind of reminds me of a white padded room? A nice little torture that can break me down and let me actually breathe completely. At least once I slide along the wall and lay on the floor with my phone out.

"Okay. Okay, okay, okay. Just once. Just a look."

[Hey. I’m still here. Lunarizon’s still holding up. I organized a movie night with a projector. You would have roasted my film pick, but it’s PG for families. Please be okay. I love you.]

Staring at this stupid message again. I’d typed it out to someone who might be dead, for all I actually know. And then I’d gone and enthusiastically run a two-hour entertainment block for two thousand human survivors without missing a beat.

Because that’s what you do. When the alternative is curling up in a supply closet and screaming a name.

"Three weeks. That’s how long it’s been since I sent that last message to Mille."

I’d been *keeping it together* by running that kind of ’morale’ programming for living sections nine through fourteen. Coordinating activity scheduling for the other sections with the civilian government liaison office that Claire had set up from the remains of Vossden.

Just to keep people busy and entertained, so they don’t fight each other or anything.

And of course, helping Joseph field requests from the rogues and other tribals who kept drifting toward us. Because our pack... our tribe were the ones who talked to them with suggestions and compromise instead of at them with orders.

Luca is a good guy, but he doesn’t have the way about him needed to actually lead. Not a whole place like this. And Claire... the less I think about what she *will* do when it comes down to making tough decisions, the better.

"I *like* sleeping at night. When I can."

Weeks of being useful. Of being the version of myself that so many people needed. Organized, warm, competent, approachable. The sort of Ellie who worked at the casino and made polite strangers feel welcome.

Except now instead of selling the Stonewater brand of... ’inclusive community’ over comped cocktails and thrice daily beadcraft lessons, I was doing it over bowls rationed soup and movie screenings that finish an hour before the automated blackouts.

All while hiding the fact from most of my own people that I also belong to some other pack now. Which makes me feel like I’m being pulled apart by chains to five different masters.

Blood dripping heritage and loyalty to Joseph Greyclaw, my Alpha.

White steel links of survival and just outright fear of Kyrie Voss.

A glowing claim on me that I didn’t exactly consent to, from Princess Citra Lomdi.

Rusted, cracked, and heavy with love and guilt over the unknown fate of my Mille.

And that thin, creaking one between the weight of the other four that I use to tug *myself* along. What’s left of her, anyway.

Which turns out to be plenty enough to push up off the floor and keep walking. Because I have to report what just happened.

Then I can break down again before I go to sleep.

That’s been the tradition so far.