Rules of the Game

Chapter Six: 

Selene's POV

By afternoon, the whole tower knew I was getting married.

I learned it the way I learned everything in that fortress, from Vera, who set a tray on the desk at noon and said without looking at me, 

"Congratulations." She said with a smile that looked like a frown. I didn't know how that worked, but the look on her face showed it perfectly.  

I stared at her. "On what?"

"Do not." She straightened the napkin with unnecessary care. "The Alpha stood in front of the council at dawn and announced a Binding. Midwinter. A peace ceremony. He did not ask anyone's opinion, and Marcus nearly tore the chamber apart."

My stomach dropped. There will be a wedding, he had said. I had thought it was a threat.

"A Binding," I repeated, to buy myself a breath. "Is that a marriage?" I asked, not exactly sure how things were done in these parts.  

"It is a vow of peace before the Moon Goddess. He's not going to claim you, so don't say dream. You aren't worth him." Vera's eyes finally met mine, dark and guarded. 

"But the pack will treat it like one. And when the pack believes a thing, that thing becomes true."

"I did not agree to anything."

"No." She studied my face for a long moment. "I do not think the Alpha asked you."

She left. The lock turned. I sat with the tray going cold in front of me and felt Vesper pace inside my ribs, restless, worried, and, Moon Goddess help me, a little pleased.

You are an idiot, I told her.

She did not argue.

The sun crawled across the floor. The light turned gold, then red, then grey. I did not eat. I kept hearing the click of the lock and the quiet, terrible weight of his voice. Every word comes through me first.

He came after midnight.

I heard him on the stairs, the unhurried tread of a man who owned every stone under his feet. The lock turned. He stepped inside and shut the door behind him, and the room, which had been large and cold, suddenly became very small.

He had changed his shirt. There was a streak of soot along his jaw he had not wiped away, and his hands, I noticed, were scarred and burned in places no one would see unless they looked closely. I looked closely.

"Sit," he said.

"I prefer to stand."

"As you like." He leaned against the door, folded his arms, and looked at me for a long, flat moment. "You have questions."

"I have a great many."

"Ask one."

"Why a wedding?"

"Because your father will want proof that you are close to me, that I have accepted his brilliant plan of an invasion.” He said, rather sarcastically.  

I blinked. "That is the reason?"

"That is one of them." He did not move. "Darius sent you across my border to be a bride. If the bride is imprisoned in a tower, he will wonder why. If the bride is bound, in front of my pack, in front of his couriers, he will believe his plan is working. He will keep sending orders. And every order he sends is a door I can walk through."

"And the pack? They think I am going to be their Luna."

"They will think what I want them to think.  They are my people and they do as I say. They do not know beyond that"

"Marcus will kill me."

"Marcus will not touch you." The words came out hard and fast, with no thought in them at all. For a moment, something flickered across his face. Then it was gone. "Not while you are useful."

Useful. The word sat between us like a dropped plate.

"I want terms," I said.

His eyebrow rose.

"If I am to lie to my own father, in my own hand, for you," I said, and my voice shook, and I made it stop, "then I want to see every letter before it is sent. I want to read every word you write in my name. I will not put my signature on anything I have not read."

"You have no leverage."

"I have this." I held up my left hand. "You said it yourself. You are going to rip my father's pack apart, and I will be at the centre of it all. If I am going to be in the middle, then I would like to know what I would be holding.” 

He was silent so long I thought I had gone too far.

“You speak like you have a choice in this… a chance to voice your thoughts and opinions. For that I would give what you ask, but only because it amuses me… I wonder if you will be as bold when you eventually face death.”  he said.

I swallowed and stared at him because it was the only thing I could do. Something like surprise moved behind his eyes, as if the word had left his mouth without asking his permission.

"Agreed," he said again, flatter this time. "Now. We begin."

"Begin what?"

"Lying." He pushed off the door. "Tell me your name."

"You know my name."

"Tell me a different one."

"Selene Wynter," I said, because it was the first name that came to my mouth.

"Again."

"Selene Wynter."

"You touched your thumb to your wrist."

I looked down. I was holding my left hand in my right, thumb pressed against the pulse.

"Your tell," he said. "When you say a thing that is not true, your left hand moves. A twitch in the first two fingers. It is small. A wolf would not see it. A man who has been lied to all his life would."

"Is that what you are?"

"That is what I am." He did not blink. "Say it again. Keep your hands still."

"Selene Wynter."

"Your breath caught."

"It did not."

"It did. Here." He touched two fingers lightly on my collarbone. "The air stops, then starts again. Lie slower. Breathe through it."

"This is ridiculous."

"This is the difference between a daughter and a spy."

I swallowed. I tried again. And again. By the fourth time, my hands stayed still, and my voice came out level, and the corner of his mouth moved in something that was almost, not quite, approval.

"Better," he said. "Now your posture."

He stepped behind me. I stiffened. His hand came to rest on my shoulder, his thumb under the strap of my tunic, and he drew my shoulders back with a single, firm, unhurried press.

"You carry yourself like a girl who expects to be struck," he said, very low. "Stand like a woman who has already decided she will not be."

My skin was on fire. I could feel every inch of him at my back, not touching, not quite, the heat of him rolling over me in waves. Vesper had gone still, all her attention fixed on the place his hand rested.

"I am frightened," I said suddenly. It came out in a rush. "I have never lied to anyone I was not training with. And if I fail, I do not think it will be you who dies."

He was silent. When he spoke, it was almost gentle.

"You will not fail."

"How can you know that?"

"Because you are afraid. Fear makes people careful." He moved around to face me. "And because you trust something I do not."

"The Moon Goddess," I said.

He made a short sound that was nearly a laugh. "Of course."

"She brought me here," I said stubbornly. "I do not know why. But she did. And I believe she will see me through it."

"The Moon Goddess has never once intervened in my life."

"Perhaps she has been trying, and you have not been listening."

His eyes narrowed. For a moment I thought I had struck something raw. Then his hand came up, slow, unhurried, and caught my chin between thumb and forefinger. He tilted my face to the lamplight.

My pulse went wild. I could feel it pounding against his thumb.

"You say that to a man who has done what I have done," he murmured, "and your heart is running like a deer's."

"Because you are touching me." I said, embarrassed as I thought through the words I had said.  He was terrifying, but at this moment he was not. He had my life in his hands and somehow I liked it…. 

"Is that a lie?"

"No."

His thumb moved, very slightly, along my jaw.

I knew then that he knew what I had overheard. I knew it the way I knew my own breath. Severing a true bond would kill her. I had heard him say it, through a door, to his own Beta, and I had said nothing. A woman holding one card does not show it to the man holding the knife.

But for one long, terrible heartbeat, I wanted to.

He let go.

The air rushed back into the room. He stepped away, and his face was a wall again, flat and cold and perfect.

"The pendant," I said, because it was the only thing in my head. "Where is it?"

"Locked away."

"I want it back."

"Not yet."

"It is all I have of my mother."

"I know." He said it so quietly I almost missed it. Then, harder: "Not yet."

He opened the door. In the corridor, the lamplight cut a hard line across his face.

"A courier waits at the border drop," he said. "A Ravenmark rider. He asked for you by name."

My heart lurched. "Who?"

"Roan horse, white blaze. A corporal, my Gamma says."

"Corvin," I whispered.

"Then he will believe you." He held my eyes. "You meet him at dawn at the Hollow Oak. You say what we agreed. You give him lies, and you do it well. I will be watching."

"Everything."

I nodded. My mouth was dry as paper.

"And Selene," he said.

"Yes?"

“One wrong move and you will not see me coming. You'll only see what's left afterwards.” His voice was soft, almost…kind. 

The door closed and the lock turned.  I stood there in the middle of the room with my hand against my chin, where his thumb had been,  and the print of it burned there long after the sound of his boots had faded.

He was a monster, a two faced evil monster who could make anyone do whatever he wanted…  I was caught in his trap, and couldn't convince myself that I hated it here.