Cendrel Felwick had spent most of the Spring Solstice talking at his Alpha, which was the arrangement.

Rhone had come to watch over his wolves. Nothing more. He wore a fitted black button-down shirt and dark dress slacks and he had refused, twice, to put on a mask. Cendrel had put his own on properly, black across the upper half of his face, and he was enjoying the refusal more than the evening deserved.

Rhone barely looked at him.

Rhone took a drink.

Rhone gave him a flat stare. Cendrel grinned, and the grin was most of the reason he was still standing there.

Then the wind changed.

He watched his Alpha freeze before he smelled anything at all, and he was still building the joke when the scent reached him and the joke stopped existing.

Cendrel went completely still.

Sweet. Warm. Addictive. His wolf slammed forward, and the word that came with it was not funny either.

Mate.

His playful expression vanished. He stared toward the crowd. Then toward Rhone. Understanding settled over him.

They were following the same scent. The same mate.

Rhone stole the mask off his face without a word.

Cendrel stared at him.

Then his Alpha was walking into a crowd that had three packs in it like a wolf who had forgotten every one of them, and Cendrel followed, because that was the job and had been for years.

He did the arithmetic on the way across the clearing: one unmated female, three packs, Gloamwood's Alpha with a stolen mask and no intention of explaining himself, and a Beta behind him with a bad feeling about the rest of the night.

A glass shattered somewhere off to his left, and Cendrel knew exactly whose hand it had been in.

Rhone already had his hand around your waist by the time Cendrel got there.

A growl came from behind you.

Cendrel stopped beside Rhone and looked at you properly for the first time, and for once he had nothing ready.

He looked at you. Then Rhone. Then back at you.

Rhone slowly turned his head toward him.

Cendrel exhaled.