The coals within my chest glow with each step the warden takes towards my fate. A fate I can only hope the Goddess precedes over with grace and humility.
The shards lying in my dusty, dark chest cavity turn to slush as the coals glow brighter and brighter. This isn’t the first rhythm Argus has lent me his strength. Now, he lies in slumber, cloaking the large cave housing all my secrets. He’s given me life again in exchange for his own. I don’t know how far his well lies, but surely, it’s running low.
The surrounding air is quiet as the hulking wolf beneath me continues up the final staircase.
The shifter moves between thick, draped curtains, where I find flickering orange lights trailing shadows beneath my captor’s bare feet.
As I give a quick look up, I notice many velvet-robed figures in the crowd. By the size of the space, I guess we are in the temple receiving room—the very space Cardinal made her announcement last night.
Whispers follow my back, and I quickly shift my face so I’m looking at the hard muscles of the broad beast that has me slung over his shoulder.
In the flickers of the lamplight, I notice thin, white scars marring his smooth, brown skin. A sudden urge takes over my fingers, wanting to touch the raised white lines, but I hold the impulse firmly within.
The tension in my body holds me hostage, and to create some friction, I begin to squirm within the wolf’s stronghold.
A heaviness fills me as barbs are thrown my way.
“Killer.”
“Assassin.”
“Murderer.”
None of those words are the truth, though. None of the people surrounding me, rioting for my blood, will ever understand the depths of my despair. The endless abyss that houses every nightmare I’ve had to face in this life. The creature that was created from myth and legend by a hurt and abused child to find some semblance of safety.They will never understand.
The priestesses surrounding us gossip lowly, secretly in each other’s ears. I hear them loud and clear as the warden moves in the direction of the front of the large room, towards the dais.
My mind swims back and forth, swaying as strong hands grip tighter on my thighs.
I resolve to give the women around me nothing—nothing of my pain or rage.I have had enough of giving pieces of myself away just to survive. Because that’s all I have done since I threw myself at the feet of the high priestess: survive. Well, before that, too.
Surviving on the scraps of life. But you know what? I’m sick of surviving on scraps. I’m sick of people taking advantage of me.
The coals in my chest burn with wrath for all that was taken from me, the Goddess’s song on my lips.
My rage at an all-time peak, the shifter warden beneath me stops. The tight hold around my legs makes way for a light tug, and I slide over a hard shoulder and down a solid chest, where I’m stopped, strapped in by thick arms.
Shadowy amber eyes look down at me, encased in thick lashes and bushy, knowing brows. But what really catches me are two thin white scars over his left eyebrow, similar to the ones littering his back. I can tell he has a story.Maybe he knows of pain and loss, too.My body softens towards him at the prospect.
Melding to the heat of the body pressed to mine, I continue my perusal, meeting a slightly bent nose and a thick, short black beard covering the lower half of the wolfman’s face.
Finally, I find full lips, upturned canines on display.
“Behave yourself,” the roughest growl I’ve ever heard comes from the warden.
True to the rageful beast within and my newfound defiance, the steaming coals inside almost come alight with the prospect of a challenge, thinking it can take on this huge beast of a man.
Not even the fae can beat the dyre wolves that protect Haven. That knowledge is lost on me, though, as the simmering in my chest shoutsto not back down—to never back down, to fight. I look into his eyes and whisper for only him to hear.
“Make me, wolf.”
thirteen
Rivern
The light of themoon starts to filter through the tunnel ahead.Finally. The trek through the tunnel has taken longer than expected.
I am just grateful for my fae eyesight that allows me to make out the shapes within the darkness.
