Trudging through the forest near the encampment Mariah knew only 3 things.

One, her people just won the most recent battle against the dark fae.

Two, she is pissed at her people for winning the most recent battle against the dark fae.

Three, she hates just how much father’s Captain won’t utilize her and her skills.

Mariah has been waiting for the day her father would allow her to travel to a war encampment and help fight in the war against the dark fae. They have been oppressing and fighting against these monsters for before she was born.

This is what Mariah has been training for. Why have Father throw her into the mix with his soldiers at the age of 6 only to not send her out on campaign? Why ensure that by the age of 12 she could use her light magic and shift so flawlessly that she could eliminate 7 of his best fighters on her own? Why ensure that by 19 she was able to decieve males with only glance before allowing her to slit their throats? What use was she?

Mariah was bred and raised to win a war.

She remembers he grandmother telling her stories of the days in which the dark fae started this war over the Blessed Dagger, the one item powerful enough to grant the bearer immunity to all. The dark fae, claiming it was stolen by the light fae, attacked, plunging us into this decades long dispute.

Now that she is old enough, Mariah has ventured out on a campaign with permission from Father under the right hand of Captain Yullo, one of his most trusted men.

Not only is he her Fathers most trusted, but the most loyal. Loyal to the degree that if Father tells him to keep his beloved daughter behind the line of fire and not in the bloodthirsty fight, he would chain her to the war table in his tent while overlooking the battle raging below.

Mariah lets out a blood curtailing scream of frustration. She stops in the woods just before a clearing and starts thrashing out in rage, slicing a tree repeatitively with her freshly drawn sword.

Her bloodless, spotless sword.

“Wonder what the trees here did upset someone so?” a rumbling voice questions behind her.

In the most fluid of motions, Mariah pulls a knife from its hidden spot along her ribs and throws it pinning the body of the voice to the tree he was leaning on. In a manner of a single moment, her sword has been returned to to its sheath and another knife is replaced in her hand held just below this stranger’s Adam’s apple.

“Who are you?” Mariah demands, digging the knife in a little deeper.

Small pants leave her lips from her previous exertion. She inhales this male’s scent which causes her to slacken some.

The male clears his throat.

“Well, no wonder who hurt you. A Swift like you had no opportunity to get hurt.” He comments on her fae ability. “You’re obviously going to hurt me. What a vicious little thing you are,” he responds to her question with a glint of entertainment in his voice. “Aren’t you some-“

The male stops mid sentence.

Both Mariah and the male are in a trance like state assessing one another.

Mariah takes in the hulking male before her. Despite her knife pressed to his clean shaven throat that leads to his freshly cleaned face and angled jaw, he has dark locks that end up curling around his pointed ears. His ears are tipped with obviously gold and bronze piercings that line the length of them, the right ear more than the left. Her eyes fall from the glint of his ears to the juxtaposition of those fae shifter eyes. One vibrant orange and the other a cool relaxed grey. His lips are full and partially parted the same way Mariah is aware that hers are.

She knows this male could immediately reverse their positions. She knows what the bronze and gold piercing represent. That they oppose the silver and rose gold of the ones decorating her own pointed ears. Mariah knows that they are aware they are both at odds facing an enemy.

She knows that not only is he also assessing her light jewelry that trails down her ears, but he sees her auburn hair braided neatly down her back with a few fly aways from her moray recent aggravation activities. Plus, she knows he can appreciate heterochromia of her fae shifter eyes, one pale blue and the other a spring green. He may note the scar that she has running along her rounded jaw from when she was training and a soldier got to close to her face.

Mariah knows he sees her just as much as she sees him.

But what she knows they both are aware of, is that the second they both had a moment to appreciate one another’s scent, something snapped into place. A recognition. Something that many fae dream of but are never able to find.

A mate.

“It’s you…” Mariah trails off, lost in the contrast of the orange and grey of his heterochromia.

_It’s you. _

__

__

The lilt of that bass tone in my head makes her shiver.

Mariah allows his hand to grab her wrist and lower the blade. The action not one of malice despite their opposing sides.

Realization washes over Mariah as to what this means.

_This can’t be happening_, she thinks. She turns away and starts trudging through the forest back to the encampment.

“Mariah!” that lulling bass calls out, “This _is_ happening.”

She stops and turns to face this male. Mariah makes another assessment that she didn’t note before. This male isn’t dressed like a dark fae _soldier_.

He wears a well pressed black tunic and trousers, but the sword at his hip has a handle encrusted with gems and etching of runes for protection. Only one of a high standing could bear such a sword.

“Who… who are you?” she pauses for another moment. “And how the hell do you know my name?!” Mariah swiftly closes the space between them again and holds the knife in hand back up with the tip to his throat, again.

_Seems like my love has some violent tendencies._ His voice in her head is a caress she didn’t know she longed for. A blazing heat is also shared along this new connection she shares. It makes her go weak at the knees, but she refuses to let her strong position flop at the lulling words of a man. Her father taught her better.

He must notice her reaction to him speaking in her head and switches to verbal communication.

“All know of the fair, Pricess Mariah Allegheny of the Light Fae. Everyone recognizes your pale blue-green heterochromia. Your speed is absolutely legendary. Oh and if I tmeber correctly, your shifted form is that of a phoenix? Am I wrong?”

Mariah regrets that this male now has opened his mouth.

“My love, close your mouth, it is agape,” he lilts. “I wish to fill it but based on how you ran, I don’t think my m-“

“Stop,” she demands.

_Who is this stranger who thinks he has any right to know me? _She thinks to herself.

She watches him light up after her fleeing thought passes. Knowing he wants to answer the question she obviously just projected to him by accident. He looks to her for permission to do so. The innocent puppy dog look in this hulking males eyes softens her tight facade some.

“Fine”, she huffs pretending to be annoyed, but truely a little amused. She doesn’t show it, but can feel his relief between them the same way he probably just felt her mild amusement.

Once again, this male lowers the knife from his throat but kneels before Mariah holding that hand in both of his own.

“Before you, I am nothing more than yours. My friends call me Jay, but formally I am know as Jaylon Huntering.”

Mariah’s sharp inhale of his full name is more than he needed to tell her.

_The Dark Prince._ she projects.

With this projection, he rises above her once again. In his hands he takes the knife that was in hers moments ago and slips it into the hidden sleeve along her ribs. The action has her on edge, but craving more.

The shadows this man projects over her now are nothing compared to the ones he wields over his enemies. And not only do his shadows linger and steal the breath from his enemies, but his shifted form is that of a dark maned lion.

He is the embodiment of power.

Mariah feels the power thrumming through this new connection.

_Are you afraid, my love?_ he inquires with a tilt of his head.

Maybe it’s the power now coursing through her or it’s the frustration of the loss she just had, but she feels suddenly alive and needing more. This was the more she was definitely looking for.

Mariah lifts her blue-green eyes to meet his grey-orange ones. Her hand lifts to graze along the bronze and gold metal glinting from his ear, a shiver rakes this large male and makes it way straight through what it must be recognized as, a bond.

Mariah closes the space between them.

_Oh love, how could I be afraid of the male who is my darkest night and who will forever and always be mine?_ she inquires.

The way her words affect Jay is obvious. She appreciates the way he resists to hold her as she feels the space between them shrinks.

She leans up as he comes to meet her with lidded eyes. Their lips touch as she says into his head. And he echos back to her.

_After all, love, you are my mate. _