The Puppy and Prisoner
Rime’sstiff shoulder brushes mine with every long stride he takes down the hall. I rush to keep up with the quick steps of the queen in front of me. She guides us down endless brick corridors. The castle here seems to be made up of dark, maze-like hallways, each one colder than the last.
I can’t help but wonder if Rime knows I’m his mate. I don’t know why that seems important to me, but it terrifies me to think he might forget me during all of this. I feel it. I feel that bond between us like a knife forever lodged in my heart. It hurts with slicing emotion to be so near him to see he feels absolutely nothing when he looks my way.
And I just smile right through the pain.
When we near a large wooden door, Rime’s long fingers run over my bare shoulders as he covers me with a thick fur shawl. The pure white fur is warm against my skin, and it surprises me even more when he kneels at my feet and offers matching fur boots. It’s the strangest thing. Ellise must have told him to take care of me, but it feels oddly affectionate.
It’s…infuriating. I hate knowing that he’s not in there, but she’s manipulating me into making me feel all these things that are just distracting me from the real task at hand.
She’s good. She’s really fucking good in her evil-doer ways.
My palm meets his shoulder, and his body is rigid beneath my touch as he quickly prepares the boot. My body reacts the moment his fingers slide up my calf. I refuse to fall apart. I refuse to let my emotions tear me down when my mind is so determined.
When his fingers skim along my other calf, I shove his hand aside and tie the damn thing myself.
I smile at her as I finish. She stands at the door, her palm on the black metal handle, watching me closely.
“Ready?” I ask with just the right amount of enthusiasm.
Fuck her and her games. I will win in this snowball fight of evil wits.
She pulls her fur hood up over her pale-blonde hair, and the moment the door opens, a chill races over my flesh beneath the thick cloak. We walk out into the blinding whiteness of the world, and all I see is layers of emptiness. Mountain peaks angle up into the sky, but each line of the scene before me is blanketed in snow. This place is void of color—even the sky is a pale gray among the fresh ice of this land.
The only beautiful thing is Rime’s eyes.
A sinking feeling drops through my stomach, but I refuse to glance over at him.
My fingers brush his cold knuckles for a single second, and I pull my hands inside, wrapping myself up in the safety of the warm material. The shifter strides behind his queen with just a white shirt and jeans on, his boots leaving deep holes in the crisp snow, but he doesn’t seem to care or notice the harsh weather.
We stop in the middle of the whiteness. A valley dips low at the front of the castle. The land looks endless, and I can’t stop staring at it all.
There isn’t a tree or a marking of any kind, but the queen kneels in the snow, her pale hands digging into the coldness until a nice hole is formed. And then she takes out a small glass jar. It’s tinted red with a gold lid sealing it shut.
Inside is a single slip of paper.
The metal lid clatters when she twists it open, and she extends the little jar to me like an offering. I lift my fingers, bite back my hesitancy, and pull out the folded square. Writing etches along the creases in slashing red letters. Over and over again on every crease is the same blood-red word.
Barron.
“I originally planted a different kind of magic into this land, but it started to affect the wildlife. Some creatures lost their fur, others changed dramatically in bright colors, but when some of the beasts started to die off entirely, I had to change to a less harmful form of power.” She shrugs indifferently. “I have a few of these planted in different places around my kingdom. Different names, different things in each jar. Some have broken glass and sharp metal, some have frozen water, some simply have my deepest aspirations.”
The way my stomach twists up around itself is painful.
I ask the one thing that feels important.
“Is my name in any of your jars, my queen?”
The smile that angles across her lips is an eerie sight.
“Yes.”
I swallow hard at that but keep my features expressionless.
“Not everything I do is cruel, Arlow. I wanted good things for you. I am a woman with good intentions.”
That’s a wildly over exaggerated statement.
