LOGINZayden's POVI was hanging on to my sanity by a thread, and the thread was fraying.For the past days I sat through the council with a face carved out of stone. The officials ranted on and on, arguing like children over a toy, over tariffs and border posts and whose pack had the right to the northern pass, and when they finally reached an agreement they turned to me and asked for my opinion. I gave them one. I will not let them drive me crazy, because that seems to be their intention. No one in that room could have guessed that the whole time the Veilbrand was raging in my skull, whispering in her voice, burning in my chest like a coal.I am fine without you.Over and over, in the quiet tone she had used when she said it. I turned pages and signed my name and heard it again.I barged through the door of my office the moment the last official had cleared the corridor, and by the time it shut I had torn off my coat, my vest, and my shirt and flung them wherever they happened to fly. I
Yvaine's POV I started walking away from him. I didn't know where, maybe to my room. I only knew I couldn't stand there another second under his gaze.His footsteps soon followed me.I stopped and turned. "Please leave me alone, my lord."I said it with every ounce of respect I could manage, but my voice was stern, and it showed. Damien only chuckled and fell in step behind me again."Tell me something, Yvaine. You don't like Zayden, do you?"I kept walking. I would not dignify that. But the question landed somewhere low and unguarded, and my chest tightened around it. I hadn't admitted anything to myself. I hadn't even realized there was anything to admit. So why did it sting?His cologne reached me before his hand, the warm and expensive kind of cologne, and then his arm was draped over my shoulder."Have a drink with me." He said so close to my ears.I nearly snapped. I shrugged his arm off and stepped away. "Why are you so obsessed with having a drink with me, my lord?""Well I'm
Yvaine's POVIt was supposed to be nothing. Just a hospital visit to get my stitches removed.Doran was buried in work, so I had to come to him. I hadn't expected a wolf kingdom hospital to be this busy. I'd assumed everyone here healed on their own, but chronic illnesses clearly didn't care about werewolf blood. The corridors were packed with patients, nurses, and the the air was thick with worry.Rhett had sent Brad to drive me, and Brad now stood a few meters away, watching me like a robot on guard duty. Rhett had threatened him within his life if anything happened to me. It was uncomfortable, but I was used to Brad, so I let it go.I sat on the edge of a bed in the bay while Doran snipped the last stitch. It stung more than it hurt. When he lifted my palm to the light and studied the pink line across it, he frowned."It's healing cleanly, but it will scar. I'd recommend a laser treatment to keep it from leaving a mark.""That isn't necessary," I said at once. "I can't afford it."
Yvaine's POV The restaurant wasn't a fancy place. No candlelight, no waiters balancing silver domes on porcelain. It was the kind of restaurant where the plates came heaped and the prices are very low, and it was packed even this late, with every table crowded and the air thick with steam and laughter. "This place has the best food in the city," Rhett said, pulling out a chair for me. "I'm not biased." "You're completely biased right now, but I trust you, if you say it's good, then it is so." I said, almost failing to hide my excitement. "Well maybe I'm slightly biased." He slid the menu across the table. "Get the braised lamb. Trust me, it tastes really good." I was still scanning the page when I noticed a man cutting through the crowd with a tray in his hands. He was huge, with a heavy brow and his face looked naturally ready to start a fight. "Rhett," I whispered. "Someone scary is coming behind you." "I know." He didn't even turn around. The man reached our table. Rhett t
Yvaine's POVI lay under the blanket with my eyes shut tight, praying for sleep.It would not come because the argument was still burning hot in my head, every word replaying in his voice, cold and reasonable, which was only more fuel to my annoyance. ‘An ordinary human like you would have been finished long ago.’ …. ‘Let's see how long the executioner lasts alone.’I pulled the blanket over my head. I wanted to sleep and forget the whole day, the juice, his name, this palace, and my own name too if it came to that.But the more I thought about it, the angrier I got, and the angrier I got, the more my eyes stung. I refused to cry over a man who had called me an ordinary human. The brutal fact.That mean, arrogant, impossible bastard of a king. I was finished with him. I would prove to his face that I could stand on my own two feet.Then, in the dark under the blanket, the heat drained out of me and left something colder spreading over my body.Oh no.Yes, I had done it. Me and my mou
Zayden's POV She walked into my office like a child on her way to a scolding. She had her hands clasped, chin up, eyes fixed on a spot two feet in front of her boots, and it was adorable. Then I flicked the thought away. She crossed the floor, sat in the chair before my desk, and folded her hands in her lap. The bandage on her hand was new. It was tied in a neat, careful knot I wanted very much to cut off. I tapped my fingers on the edge of the desk. I had four days of words ready, but she started talking before I said anything. She told me everything, in a level voice of someone reading an inventory, without being asked and without once looking at me. The drink she owed Damien for the lie about Madam Marlowe. She spoke very politely, and I had to question myself if she was really the one sitting before. What kind of version is this? She talked calmly, but it was suspicious. When she finished, the room was quiet. I had learned something in those two minutes of her report. She h







