Chapter 3

The five wolves practically launched off the ground, scrambling and tumbling until they vanished into the night. A faint, sour stink drifted on the air. One of them had wet himself from fear.

Cain pulled his gaze off the fleeing wolves and turned it on me. He took in my little case, the creased cloak on my back, the old oak I'd spent half the night against.

“Following me?” I lifted my chin.

“Passing through,” he said.

“Passing through a border forest, in the middle of the night, just in time to catch five rogues about to tear into me?” I sneered. “That's some convenient timing.”

“You're down to homeless,” he said, stepping closer, “and you still won't come to me.”

“Let's go.” He held out his hand.

I looked down at it. Long fingers, sharp knuckles, a thin layer of callus at the tips. That hand had gripped my waist on full-moon nights and pressed kisses to my forehead.

“You rejected me,” I said. “In front of the whole pack. You told me you didn't love me. You brought her home and tucked her hair back in public, cleared out a warm hall for her, sent for a holy healer. You didn't come look at me once the entire time I was healing.”

“Now you turn up in a border forest, scare off a few rogues, hold out your hand, say 'let's go,' and I'm supposed to follow you?”

I looked at him and said it one word at a time.

“What am I to you, exactly? A wolf? Or a dog you whistle for and wave off whenever it suits you?”

Cain took me back to the Iron Claw stronghold anyway.

“Your wolf is wounded,” he said. “The tear the rejection left can only be held down by a fated mate's scent and gifts given by his own hand. Stay here. I'll look after you myself until you've healed.”

The wound to my wolf. The ache in my chest every full moon, where his public rejection had cut. Was that the truth, or just another excuse to keep me close?

“Don't worry. I know my place. I'll leave once I'm healed.” I smiled at the door.

“Stay as long as you want.”

My hand tightened around the silver comb. My heart beat a little too fast.

“Don't be foolish, Elara. He's kept you at his side for three years. Was any of it ever because he cared?”

The next morning I went to the main hall for the first meal.

The long table held roast venison, hot honey wine, black bread. Cain sat at the head with a bowl of broth, drinking slowly. When I came in, he tipped his chin at the seat across from him.

“I only found out yesterday that Seraphine is Vesna's daughter,” Cain said, setting the bowl down.

“There was an ambush between packs when we were young,” he said. “She took a silver-tempered dagger meant for me. The silver poison nearly killed me. They barely saved me.”

His voice dropped. “I owe her my life.”

Silver. Deadly poison to our kind. To block a silver-tempered blade isn't taking a hit. It's putting your life on the line.

I bit into the bread. “So all this, it's because you owe her?”

“Elara. Don't make things hard for her.”

He was worried I'd make things hard for her. So this was a warning. Was the real reason he'd brought me back just to pen me up and keep me in line?

“You really do love her, Cain.”

That night he took me out under the pretense of a pack gathering. We got there and I realized it was Seraphine's welcome feast.

She stood in the center of the crowd.

White dress, the Silver Mane moon-patterned shawl over her shoulders, the silver thread winking in the torchlight. She was reaching up to fix a strand of hair the night wind had blown loose, her fingers pale and slender.

Cain walked over, lifted his hand, and tucked the strand behind her ear.

Seraphine looked up, eyes rimmed red, nose pink, but a small smile at the corner of her mouth. I knew that smile. The omega girls back in Silver Mane who'd play helpless in front of me and run off to tattle the second I turned around all wore that exact face.

“Cain, you're too good to me…” Her voice wobbled. “It's all my fault. Because of me, Elara was struck from the rolls, her bloodline cut. It's all my fault…”

She lowered her head, and the tears fell right on cue.

Every eye in the room swung to me.

Some pitied me, some gloated, some were just there for the show. I fought to keep the tears down and turned away from all of them.

This was a pack tradition. Young war-wolves took turns sparring in the ring, judged by the highest-ranked Alpha present.

The first trial tested steadiness.

The task was to carry a jar of honey wine across a rough stone road without spilling. Cain called Seraphine's name, saying she had the worst time with jolting when she rode, so the trial would be good practice for her.

“She has an old wound on her left side. She can't take hard shaking. Steady matters more than fast here.”

Second trial, ranged archery. Cain said Seraphine flinched at close-up bloodshed, so distance suited her better.

Third trial, guarding the left flank. He said the old wound on her left side couldn't take impact, so on defense her left was her weak side and needed a wolf assigned to cover it.

Every word drove into me.

He remembered the old wound on her left side. He remembered how she rode. He remembered she couldn't stand blood.

I remembered the time my fever spiked until my wolf went unsteady. He came, took one look, and said, “Take medicine yourself.” I remembered the day I got half my shoulder torn open in the ring, blood soaking through my leathers, and he said flatly, “Handle it yourself.”

But Seraphine frowned once, and he redesigned the entire trial around her.

She shot me a smug little smile. I stood up, cut through the crowd, and walked out of the hall.

I would never skulk around like a thief, spying on your happiness.

The stone corridor was dark. Moonlight leaked through a high vent and drew a thin white line across the floor.

I hadn't gone far when shapes flickered out from a corner.

Three wolves. Drunk, eyes red, drool at the corners of their mouths. Patchy coats, not Iron Claw. Wolves from another pack, here for the feast.

“Well, well,” the leader leered. “If it isn't the Silver Mane princess. What are you doing out here all alone?”

I ignored him and turned to go around.

He threw out an arm and blocked my way.

“Don't run off. Have a drink with us.”

I didn't wait for more. The dagger was out, edge against his throat.

“One more word,” I said, “and I cut your tongue out.”

“A cast-off the Alpha threw away—”

He didn't finish. Footsteps came up behind us.

Cain.

He stepped out from the direction of the hall, his eyes passing over the three drunks and landing on me. He saw the dagger in my hand, the half-circle they'd boxed me into, the faint tremor in my arm.

His face darkened. His stride picked up.

Then a thin, high cry came from the hall, wet with tears.

“Ow! My shoulder… it hurts so much…”

Cain's steps stopped.

He glanced back. Seraphine was braced against the doorframe, leaning to one side, her face all pain.

He didn't come the rest of the way to me. He turned and strode back into the hall.

I heard Seraphine's voice. “Cain, you came…”

The footsteps faded.

The corridor held just me and the three drunks. The leader laughed out loud.

“Look at this poor thing. Sleep with me and I'll take you in, how about it?”

I backed up two steps, my spine against the stone wall. Right hand on the dagger, left hand finding the iron candle-stand set into the wall. I yanked it free and, with everything I had, smashed it against the stone.

A crack split the air.

Sparks flew. Chips burst off the wall and pelted the wolves in the face. They yelped and stumbled back, hands over their faces. One had his forehead split open by a fragment, blood running down through his eyebrow.

“Crazy bitch!” the leader spat, then staggered off.

The corridor went quiet.

I leaned against the wall and slid slowly down it.

The iron stand clattered to the floor.

I looked down. The web of my right hand was cut open on the stand's edge, blood running down my wrist, dripping onto the stone. One drop, then another.

After the feast broke up, I waited for the carriage at the manor gate.

Seraphine came out. Cain wasn't with her; he'd gone to fetch the horses.

She saw me and came over, her white dress glinting cold in the moonlight, the moon-patterned shawl fluttering at her shoulders.

“Elara,” her voice soft as honey. “I'm so sorry about earlier. My old shoulder wound flared up out of nowhere. Cain was on his way to check on you. I'm the one who held him up. You're not upset, are you?”

“If I said I was, would you go drop dead?” I said.

She smiled. “Look at the state of you. No wonder everyone throws you away. Cain taking you in is just going through the motions. It's a Silver Mane and Iron Claw alliance, nothing more. Don't read into it.”

Her voice dropped, just for me. “There's only ever been me in his heart. Since we were young. You're just an afterthought in the debt he owes me.”

A heavy crack came from overhead.

The whole stone slab of the ceiling split down the center, and rubble and dust came roaring down.

I saw Seraphine's face go white in that instant.

I saw Cain tearing in from the stables, his wolf eyes burning gold in the moonlight.

I saw him throw himself at Seraphine.

He folded her into his arms and took the falling rubble on his own back.

A stone the size of a millstone clipped his shoulder and shattered.

The debris hit me. The back of my head struck a pillar, and the world went black.

Before I lost consciousness, I heard Cain's voice come from somewhere far away.

“Seraphine! Are you all right?”

Then a rush of chaotic footsteps. Someone shouting for the healer. Someone shouting to carry her inside.

I didn't know how long it was.

I opened my eyes. Blurry vision, the taste of blood filling my mouth. The back of my head felt like it was splitting open. My left leg was pinned under something. I couldn't move.

Moonlight leaked through the caved-in roof and fell on my face.

No one was near me.

Everyone was gathered around Seraphine.

I could see Cain's back. He was half-kneeling on the ground, head bent, checking her injuries.

Her hand rested on his shoulder. He let it stay.

No one turned to look at me.

I lay in the rubble, listening to myself breathe.

Then I closed my eyes.

“Don't cry, Elara.”

“You can't cry.”