Lahat ng Kabanata ng My Second Chance Mate is a Barbarian : Kabanata 431 - Kabanata 440

LyraAs the door clicked shut behind us, Nadia strode right to my wardrobe and flung it open uninvited. She knew exactly where to find what she was looking for. I raised an eyebrow at her presumption, but didn't say a word. Let her dig out her own damn booze.She poured each glass until it was brimming with amber liquid, and while she did it she kept right on talking."Strangest damn breakfast I ever had," she said, "all of your father's guards lined up along the walls staring at everyone. You think they'd relax a little. Who's going to try anything in there?"She set the bottle down with a clink, picked up her own glass, and tossed it back in one swift motion. I watched this in mute disbelief. Before I could think what to say, she was rattling on again."And what in hell is going on with Odile's brothers? Gero and Rennick. Those are grown men, Lyra. Grown." She snorted. "I bet they're not that bad. Probably just shy around pretty princess types."Without waiting for a reply she was o

SeraBram's knock was barely more than a tap, delivered with the knuckles of his closed fist. I bade him enter, and he slipped in like a shadow. Without being asked, he shut the door behind him.He carried a stack of letters, trussed by a length of cord, his grip tight. The papers made him stand differently, shoulders square and his weight even under him. It was a posture I recognized from the guards marching the halls of Ironmaw. A man carrying a weight, and a secret."Luna," he said.Amara sat on a fur near the wall, working her fingers into the hairs of it and watching them spring back when she let go. She made a small sound at the back of her throat, at nothing."I want to see them myself," I said."I know." He held them a moment longer, and then he gave them to me, and let his empty hand drop to his side.I untied the cord and began to read. The pages were worn and dirty, the corners dog-eared, the ink gone brown at the edges. Mina leaned over my shoulder, her breath hot on the ba

Lyra"We'll go out there and see what needs doing," I said. "I can help with the harvest. Get things fixed up."Nadia grinned at me. "Daddy would love meeting you.""Would he?""He'd talk your ear off. You'd never get away from him." She reached over and squeezed my ankle. "The last few years have been hard on him. He'd take the help."Odile spoke up lazily from the bed. "I can see it. Princess Lyra, up to her knees in a field.""I'd be terrible at it," I said."You'd be terrible at it," Nadia agreed."I'll sort something out." I waved a hand at the ceiling. "We'll go when we can."The tang of the brandy sat on my tongue. The ceiling went hazy through my half-shut eyes and the rug tickled my cheek. Light glinted off something across the room, a glass, a buckle, I couldn't tell which.A rustle from the bed. Odile shifting her legs."So, Nadia," she said. "What do you actually grow out there? I've never seen a farm in my life."I pushed myself up on my elbows. "That's a lie."Odile tilt

FenrisI sat beside Jace at the fire, both of us wrapped in furs against the cold. The flames crackled and spat embers into the dark. I felt the heat on my cheeks and my back stayed cold, exposed to the night air. The smell of burning wood filled my nose, sharp and acrid.Jace huddled deeper into his furs, his shoulders nearly drawn up to his ears. My men were scattered about the yard, their laughter and muffled voices carrying on the breeze.At the entrance to the Alpha keep, Halvard stood talking with another man. Their words were too low to hear, lost beneath the crackle of the fire and the noise of my own men. They did not look like they were planning something. I watched them anyway.We had been back for hours. Corwin had given us nothing. No word, no name, no direction.And Halvard had not come to ask. Not once. A man sends you out to fetch a thing, he wants to know what you brought him. This one had let the whole evening go by and had not put the question to me, and here he sto

FenrisThe insult hit me in the gut. I felt it in my bones. I held still."Sera," I said.She tilted her head, not following. "What?""Her name. It's Sera."Something came into her face then, and I watched it arrive. She had been swinging in the dark all night and I had just put a lamp in her hand."Sera." She turned it over like she was tasting it. "She is a novelty to you now, Butcher. She will not last a winter up here."I said nothing."The women already laugh at her. Behind her hand, over the wash, every one of them." She came a step nearer. "She does not understand our ways and she never will. What will you do when she cannot hold that seat? You will tire of her. They always tire of the pretty foreign thing."I watched her and did not answer."Sera." She said it again, savouring it now that she had it. "Sera the soft. Sera the Southerner. Do you know what they will call her when she is not in the room? Because they already do."Her chin came up."She is weak and she is soft and