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Lady Maccon blinked awake to her husband’s worried, loo face "Conall," she said, "please do not take this the wrong way But thatI have ever seen inof a huar"
"Well, perhaps you had best wait to pass judghtly and glanced about She appeared to have been carried into one of the drawing rooe
"Well what?"
"Did it work? Did theto survive?"
Lord Maccon sat back slightly on his haunches "A re, a full Alpha female Rare even in our oral histories Boudica was an Alpha, did you know?"
"Conall!"
The head of a wolf came into Alexia’s line of vision It was not one she was personally fa about the e Lady Maccon struggled to prop herself farther up onto the pillows
The wolf’s neck was covered in blood, the fur matted with a dark red crust, but otherwise it showed no injury As though the blood were not her own Which, technically, as she had now beco Maccon lolled a tongue out at Alexia Alexia wondered how the ould respond to a scratch about the ears and decided, given the dignity of the woman when mortal, not to risk such an approach
She looked at her husband At least he see her ely "My first successful change in years, and a female Alpha at that The howlers will cry it to the winds"
"Somebody’s proud of himself"
"Except that I should have re metamorphosis is to outsiders I am sorry, my dear I didna mean to upset you"
"Oh pish tosh, it wasn’t that! I’m hardly one to be overcome by a bit of blood It was siainst her and ran a large hand down the side of her face "Alexia, you have been entirely co salts"
Madame Lefoux came around the side of the couch and crouched down next to Alexia as well "You had us very worried, my lady"
"So what happened?"
"You fainted," accused Lord Maccon, as though she had coainst him personally
"No, with the metamorphosis What did IThere was this crash of thunder and a bright blue light and then--"
"Don’t be ridiculous," snapped Lord Maccon "You sound like a novel"
Mada started to convulse and then collapsed to the floor, dead Everyone stood around staring at her body, until all of a sudden, she began spontaneously changing into a wolf She screae is the worst Then we realized you had collapsed Lord Maccon threw a conniption fit, and we ended up here"
Lady Maccon turned accusing eyes to her husband "You didn’t, and on your granddaughter’s runtled
"Stuff and nonsense," replied his wife sharply "I never faint" A bit of her old color was returning Really, ould have suspected she could turn quite that ashen?
"There was that one incident, in the library, when you killed the va and you knew it"
"How about that time we visited the museuin Marbles?"
Lady Maccon rolled her eyes "That was an entirely different kind of passing out"
Conall crowed "My point exactly! Just now, you actually, positively, did faint You never do that kind of thing; you’re not that kind of fe with you? Are you ill? I forbid you to be ill, wife"
"Oh, really Stop fussing There is absolutely nothing wrong with ible ride" Alexia pushed herself nore her husband’s still-stroking hand
"Soain"
Alexia shook her head decisively "As it wasn’t Angelique who tried before, and it wasn’t Madame Lefoux who stole ible, I believe the perpetrator never followed us to Kingair Call it a preternatural hunch No, I’ poisoned, husband I’m just a little bit weak, that’s all"
Mada back and forth between the two of theh they were both batty She said, "She is just a little bit pregnant is what she is"
"What!" Lord Maccon’s excla out her skirts, and Lord Maccon stopped s out his wife’s face
The French inventor looked at theenuinely amazed "You did not know? Neither of you knew?"
Lord Maccon recoiled away froht, arlared at Madame Lefoux "Don’t talk piffle, nant That is not scientifically feasible"
Mada her confinen of a delicate condition--nausea, weakness, increased girth"
"What!" Lady Maccon was genuinely shocked True, she had been slightly sick to her stomach and unreasonably off soht be in an indelicate condition The scientists could be wrong, after all; there didn’t exist very many soulless females, and none of them were married to olves