LOGINElsie’s POV I woke three hours later, to the smell of honey and smoke and a warm weight pressed against my side. For a moment, I did not remember where I was. Then the memory came back all at once, the pain and the blood and Luciana’s voice, and I jerked upright so fast that the room spun. “Easy,” said Luciana from the chair beside the bed. She looked as though she had been awake for a week. “You lost a great deal of blood. The head healer says you are to lie still for at least two days, and she says if you get out of that bed before then, she will tie you to it.” “Where are they?” “Here.” Luciana nodded toward the cradle by the fire. Two small bundles lay side by side in the warm wool. One was sleeping with his fists tucked beneath his chin. The other was awake, blinking up at the ceiling with a look of outraged dignity. I held out my arms, and Luciana laughed softly and brought them to me. They were so light. I had imagined them a hundred times over the past months, but nothi
Quinn’s POVThe pains started in the middle of the night, during the eighth week of the autumn.I had been awake for some time. I had been lying on my side with my hand spread across Elsie’s belly, feeling the pups turn and push against my palm, and I had been counting the minutes between each small movement the way I had counted the days between the healer’s visits. When her breath caught and her whole body went rigid beside me, I was already sitting up before I understood what was happening.“Quinn,” she said, very calmly. “Get the head healer.”“Isn’t it too early?”“It is not. Get the head healer. Now.”I was out of the bed and across the room before she had finished speaking. My hands were shaking so badly that I fumbled the latch twice. Then I was in the corridor, shouting at the two guards on duty, and one of them ran for the healer while the other stood frozen with his mouth open.The head healer arrived within five minutes, pulling on her grey robe as she came. She took one l
Elsie’s POV Liliana came to the palace in the second week of the summer, with Holmer walking one step behind her and a face like a thundercloud.Luciana had gone to find her a few days before, and she had come back with a long list of rules. Liliana was not to be startled. She was not to be upset. She was not to be asked whether she had enjoyed the journey, because that was a stupid question to ask a female who was carrying a heavy belly. And she was absolutely not to be looked at by the King for longer than was polite.“She’s frightened of him,” Luciana said, pacing the garden path with her hands clasped behind her back. “She’s been frightened of him since the Iron Hold. She thinks he will have her locked up for what she almost did to you guys.”“Quinn would never do that,” I said.“I know. But she doesn’t. And she’s very proud, and very scared, and very pregnant, so you are going to be kind to her.” Luciana stopped pacing and looked at me sharply. “Are you going to be kind to her?”
Elsie’s POV Two months after the coronation, I was the size of a small house and I had never been happier.My feet were swollen, my back ached from sunrise to sunset, and I had given up on wearing anything tighter than a loose linen gown. The court seamstresses had made me three new ones in pale green and dove grey, and Quinn had told me, very seriously, that I looked like a summer meadow. I had thrown a cushion at him. He had caught it and kissed my forehead and told me that meadows were beautiful, which only made me throw another.The pups were restless. They kicked at my ribs at night and rolled over at odd hours, so that I would wake with a start and find Quinn already awake beside me, one hand spread across my belly, waiting for them to move again.“They’re doing it again,” he would whisper, in a voice full of wonder.“They’re doing it because they know you’re listening,” I would say, and he would laugh softly and fall back asleep with his hand still there.But the days were min
Quinn’s POV The coronation was held an hour later in the Wolf Hall, under the high stone arches and the banners of every pack in the kingdom.The hall smelled of beeswax and fresh rushes, and the moonlight came through the tall windows in long silver bars that lay across the crowd. I had been crowned many years ago, when I was too young and too angry to understand what the weight of the circlet meant. This time, I paid attention.Elsie stood beside the dais, dressed in a gown of pale silver, with a cloak of deep blue falling from her shoulders. Her hair was braided and wound with a thin silver band. Her face was calm, but her hands were clasped so tightly in front of her that the knuckles were white. Every few moments, I felt her nerves rise through the bond like a small, bright spark. I sent soothing emotions through the bond, hoping to calm her nerves.When the Lord Steward called her name, she stepped forward and knelt, and the whole court rose to its feet.The crown she wore was
Elsie’s POV The mating ceremony was held in the Moon Garden, at the top of the palace hill, under a sky so clear that the stars looked close enough to touch.I had been dressed since the middle of the afternoon. The helpers had spent three hours on my hair alone, pinning and curling and weaving silver ribbons through the braids until my head ached. My gown was the colour of pale cream, with a deep blue sash across the chest and long sleeves that were embroidered with tiny wolves and moons. It was heavier than anything I had ever worn, and when I looked in the mirror, I hardly recognised the female staring back at me.“You look like a queen,” said Ana, who had been allowed to help me with the last of the pins.“I feel like a bundle of flour,” I said, and she giggled.My family had arrived that morning. I had not been sure they would come. The journey from the Sunset Pack was long, but when I walked into the kitchens for breakfast, my mother was standing at the far end of the room with
Elsie’s POV I froze in my tracks. I had always been daring, stubborn, reckless even—but this? This was beyond rebellion. If I was caught, the shame would destroy my father. But if I stayed, the mating would destroy me. Nearby, an older woman pounded grain into a mortar with exhausted arms. A cry
Elsie's POVTheo nodded, his expression turning grim. "He brought a message for the Alpha and the Gamma. It's about war, Elsie. A real war.""War?" I repeated."Come on," Theo said, already turning back toward the village. "We need to hear exactly what he says."We ran, sprinting through the trees.
Elsie's POV As if the news from last night wasn’t enough to rot my soul, the next morning brought a fresh disaster. Oliver showed up at our front door, acting like the most dutiful son-in-law in the world.I watched him from the shadows of the hallway. He was dressed in a clean, pressed shirt, his
Elsie's POVA hand with wicked-looking claws sliced through the air toward me. I felt the rush of wind against my skin and only ducked at the last second. I could have moved sooner, but I loved the thrill of the danger. It made my blood hum.Staying low, I swiped my short wooden sticks, the ones I







