Chapter 301: Talia again

I leaned my head back and let out a long, jagged breath. I had literally just shooed this woman away ten minutes ago, but apparently, Talia was like a weed—you pull her once, and she grows back with three more heads and a grudge.

She’d spent her ’time off’ well, it seemed. She had three other females by her side, who all shared that same sharp, judgmental glint in their eyes.

They were definitely a part of the ’Committee of disgruntled mothers’.

It looked like they were here to assassinate me with the daggers in their eyes.

Sigh, I need a break.

“Look at this,” Talia said, her voice dripping with fake concern as she addressed the other mothers, though her eyes were pinned on me. “The kingdom is still picking up the pieces. Our beast kin are exhausted, the land is scarred, and yet our ’Queen’ is so… restless that she’s already bringing in more males to satisfy her whims.”

One of the other females, a tawny wolf with a bitter twist to her mouth, nodded.

“It’s lascivious.” How do they even know that word? “How can we trust a leader who treats our territory like her personal mating ground? While we worry for our pups’ future, she’s out on the shore collecting sea-beasts.”

Well, excuse me for not being the wolf that hid with her tail tucked between her legs while other beasts were fighting and saving each other.

The air in front of the tent turned heavy. I wished I could just shove them aside and be done with it, closing my ears to whatever argument they had prepared, but then I thought…

The more dissatisfied they are, the crazier they become, taking huge gambles and throwing detonating schemes.

The dream flashed through my mind again. The fire. The blood. Fenric’s face crumpled in grief.

I know they could never beat Fenric if they all ganged up together, but that was ’if’ they ganged up together. There was no limit to the number of underhanded schemes jealous females could employ.

And maybe Fenric fell victim to one of those schemes, hence the misfortune.

My forehead creased and my eyebrows furrowed together, knitting at the space between my eyes.

If I let this escalate into a shouting match, or worse, if one of my guys lost their temper at her attitude towards me and actually resorted to violence, I was handing Talia the match to light a fire.

One that would likely but us all one way or the other.

I stepped forward, putting myself directly between the ’mothers’ and my husbands—and Thalor. I didn’t look angry; I just looked tired.

I looked like a mother who had just had a long day of shopping, and taking care of three, no six loud children, and would like to rest before her last nerve snapped.

“What do you want, Talia?” I asked, gripping my basket of cubs tight.

She looked down at the two cubs in my basket and then scoffed, irritated by the sheer sight of my offspring.

How dare she?

“You want to be queen? Fine, be queen.” She said. “But you can’t just be queen in name alone. You have to act the part. But you can’t take charge of the females in the kingdom since they still see you as a stranger, and instead of trying to get to know them, you go around flaunting and then come back with an extra mate. Do you think the position of queen is a joke?” She folded her arms across her chest. “I told you you’re not worthy, so just step down before you humiliate yourself further.”

I stayed silent, watching as the three beside her nodded with their mouths twisted down in frowns.

My eyes darted from one to the other and then landed back on Talia.

So, in the end, it’s still the jealous talk of a female who wants to be queen.

Or rather, jealous that I am getting the attention of the hot pretty sea prince that came out of the water for the first time.

“Is that what this is, Talia?” I asked, my voice low but carrying a weight that made the tawny wolf blink. “You’re really going to stand there and use the ’stability’ of the kingdom as a weapon against me just because your feelings are hurt?”

“Our feelings?” Talia scoffed. “This is about decency!”

“No,” I cut her off, taking a slow step toward her. “Decency is helping the sheep tribe rebuild their homes instead of standing around my tent gossiping. Decency is making sure the water is clean—which, by the way, is exactly what Thalor here will help us with.”

I gestured to the Sea Prince, who was watching the exchange with a strange, observant stillness.

“You want to talk about the ’changes’ the kingdom is experiencing?” I continued, looking each of them in the eye. “We are moving from a world of war and poisoning to a world of alliances. Thalor isn’t a ’whim’ I brought back to fill my harem. He’s a Prince of the Deep who knows how to value when someone actually helps him and his kind. If I treat him with the respect he deserves, the West Way gains an ally that can keep our rivers pure forever. If I treat him like a prisoner—or chase him away because you’re jealous—I’m failing this kingdom.”

I shifted my weight and poked around.

“You want to be queen so badly that you go around spreading rumors about me, getting the other females to think I came here to steal their potential suitors, and that’s precisely why they will never come to my side. To them, I am an enemy… one you created with that lying tongue of yours. But am I really the enemy?” I turned my gaze back to Talia, my eyes narrowing as I stepped towards her. “Am I? I led the war alongside the king, I saved the sheep tribe, I did all of that and because of that, there is no need to cower or choose sides.”

Talia was beginning to cower but not yet. I couldn’t stop my words yet, not when she still had a lot of fight in her eyes.

“If you so wish for it, we can start the battle of picking sides now. We can run a vote so the beasts of the west Way choose who their queen is and I bet you, no matter how hard the gears in your head click, they can never come up with a more innovative way to improve the West Way like I can. I’m that capable.”

“You… you’re just yapping, saying all sorts of nonsense. What capable? You… You’re just a female who relies on your mates.” Talia spat back and my brow twitched.

“Sure, let’s just say I do rely on my mates,” I pushed my body back. “Then, do you wanna bet?”

“What?”

“We’ll have a fist fight right here and check if I need my mates to beat the crap out of you.”

“That’s so vulgar. How can you act like a male?” She spat out, but I could see the way her tail trembled behind her and her eyes flickered.

“I used to hear that I act like a male a lot, but you know, it’s only the incapable ones that complain about that,” I said and then chuckled. “Well, since you aren’t up for a fist fight, what about an innovation contest? We’ll each do something to make our lifestyle feel much more easier. Can you do it?”

“I… I’m not a craftsman.” She stammered and I grinned.

“Oh? Then how exactly were you going to lead the West Way as queen? What exactly could you do to make the lives of the beast folks better and more enjoyable? Don’t tell me…” I placed my hand over my mouth, mockery filling my eyes as I asked, “You weren’t going to do stupid things like hold parties for females to pick a male they liked, were you?”

She flinched and I caught it right there.

Talia had no spine, no plan, and definitely no qualities of becoming a good queen.

The only qualifications she had were being a female, and one who had given birth to a pup for Noah.

Other than that, she was flat-out useless.

“Phew,” I flipped my hair over my shoulder.

She couldn’t even make a comeback no matter how much I talked, telling me she definitely had no bite aside from her bark.

“You’re quite pitiful, Talia.”

“What?!” Her face bloated with red.

“It’s true. You called me lascivious because I have males who love and protect me and you don’t. It’s because you have no one like my mates that you find a way to pick at me every second you get. It’s truly pitiful and pathetic.”

Talia opened her mouth, but the words died as the onlookers began to murmur. I wasn’t just talking to her anymore; I was talking to the audience she had tried to build, exposing her true colors so they could see exactly what kind of ’queen’ she wanted to be.

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