chapter 2

The dining hall was bigger than her father's entire house.

A table long enough to seat forty stretched beneath a ceiling of carved beams, and only three places were set at the far end. Sunlight poured through arched windows onto silver platters piled high with eggs, smoked fish, and bread still steaming.

Lillo hovered in the doorway wearing a borrowed sweater two sizes too big. The maid had taken her denim jacket, thorns and all, with a look that suggested it might end up in a furnace.

"Sit," Bryce said, without looking up from the papers in his hand.

"I prefer to stand."

"Then you'll eat standing. The eggs won't mind."

"Pwetty lady!" A small voice rang out from a booster seat stacked with cushions. "Sit by me! I saved you a chair!"

Lilly patted the empty seat beside her with great ceremony. Lillo sat, mostly because refusing a three-year-old felt like kicking a puppy.

Lilly studied her with grave seriousness, a strawberry smushed in one fist. "What's your name?"

"Lillo."

The little girl's eyes went perfectly round. "Lilly? Daddy! Daddy! She got my name!"

"Almost," Bryce said into his coffee.

"Almost my name." Lilly gasped, a tragic, world-changing gasp. "Are you my mommy?"

Lillo choked on her tea.

Across the table, Bryce's cup stopped halfway to his mouth.

"No, sweetheart," Lillo managed, thumping her own chest. "I'm not your mommy."

"But you got the same name. Mommies and babies got the same names. Miss Pip's cat and her kitten is both Biscuit."

"That's... different."

"Maybe you're a little bit mommy," Lilly offered generously, and went back to her strawberry.

Behind his papers, Bryce's shoulders were shaking.

"Don't you dare laugh," Lillo hissed.

"I would never." His voice was perfectly grave. His eyes were not. For one heartbeat the smile reached them, and then something older and sadder passed over his face and was gone, so fast she might have imagined it.

The nanny appeared at his elbow. "Come on, little wolf. Blocks time."

"Wiwwo plays blocks too!" Lilly announced, sliding off her seat.

"Lillo does not play blocks," Lillo said.

"Daddy sayed you will learn." Lilly waved a sticky hand over her shoulder as she was carried out. "Bye bye, almost-mommy!"

The door clicked shut.

Bryce set his papers down. The warmth drained from the room like water from a cracked bowl, and the Alpha King looked at her across the empty table.

"Now," he said. "The fire."

Lillo's fork stopped midair. "What fire?"

"My scouts saw it from the ridge at midnight. The whole eastern sky turned orange. A bonfire in the middle of your village square, burning hot enough to crack the stones." He leaned back. "And you walked into my forest smelling of scorched pine and ozone."

"Bonfires are festive."

"Pine burns, Lillo. It doesn't smell like a thunderstorm."

She set the fork down very carefully and slid her hands beneath the table. Bryce noticed. Of course he noticed.

"Why did you burn it?"

"Why do you care?"

"Because my mate set fire to a rival pack's heart, and I'd like to know whether I should expect a war by lunchtime."

"I'm not your mate."

"Tell that to your pulse." His gaze dropped, just for a second, to the hollow of her throat, where it was hammering. "Tell me why."

Lillo held his stare. Every instinct told her to run, and the worst part was that her body didn't want to run away.

"Ask me again when I trust you."

"And when will that be?"

"Never."

"Then I'll ask every day." He said it lightly, like a promise and a threat in the same breath. "I'm a patient man."

"You're an annoying one."

"That too."

The doors banged open. A guard stood there, chest heaving, one hand pressed to the wall. "Majesty. The Montana Alpha is at the border gate." He swallowed. "He's brought forty wolves. He's demanding his daughter."

The silence stretched. Lillo felt the blood leave her face.

Bryce rose slowly, buttoning his cuffs as if the news were a mild inconvenience. "Let him wait."

"Majesty—"

"I said let him wait."

The guard bowed and vanished. Bryce came around the table and stopped beside her chair, close enough that the bond pulled tight between them, close enough that she could smell cedar and rain.

"Last chance," he said quietly. "Is there anything I should know before I walk out and meet your father?"

Lillo stared at her hidden hands, at the faint tremor in them that she couldn't make stop.

"No," she said.

Bryce looked at her for a long moment. He knew it was a lie. She watched him know it.

Then he nodded once and walked out to meet the man she'd burned a village to escape.