I jerked from sleep, hearing my name echo from my sister’s lips, my breath heaving and a cold sweat pouring from me as I sat up in the furs.
But my mind was playing tricks on me. Again. Because it hadn’t been my sister’s voice, it had been Hedna’s, mypujerak, who had ducked his head inside myvolikiand was regarding me from the entrance.
“Drokka,” he was saying. “Anotherthesperarrived.”
My heart slowed in my chest and immediately, I looked over to my left. I stilled, seeing Vienne was not in the furs with me, a frown pulling at my scar.
“Lysi, I will come now,” I told him, wondering what I had dreamed and why I felt such dread inside me. “Have you seen mykalles?”
Hedna’s shook his head. “Nik. Is sheyour kallesnow?”
I knew what he asked. “Lysi,” I murmured, rising from my furs, pulling up my trews.
“So you will finally take aMorakkari?” Hedna asked quietly. “AnothervekkiriMorakkari, at that,” he commented, knowing two otherVorakkarshad also taken them as their queens. “Perhaps I should find avekkirifor myself.”
“Thethesperjust arrived?” I asked, not wanting to speak of this now. It would be announced to the horde soon regardless. I kept my gaze on his as I strapped the holster, which contained my daggers, across my chest before shrugging on a fur cloak. The mornings were still crisp, though the cold season was long behind us. “FromDothikor one of the hordes?”
Looking back at the empty bed, I couldn’t help the frown that pulled at my lips but I stepped outside with mypujerak, my gaze scanning the encampment, looking for signs of a small, white-haired female.
I realized…I didn’tlikewaking up without her beside me. It made me restless, like my blood was buzzing under my skin again. She was like a drug, one I needed every morning, every afternoon, every night…and possibly all the other moments in between.
“Thethesperis from theVorakkarof Rath Kitala,” Hedna told me.
Thatmade me glance sharply over at him. “Rath Kitala?”
“Lysi. I have not read it yet.”
That could not be good. TheVorakkarof Rath Kitala had made it no secret that he disliked me.
Quickly, we made our way to the council’svoliki, though only Hedna and I were present as I unwrapped the thin parchment thethesperhad brought.
My lips thinned, anger rising when I read the words.
“Well?”
“He will be here by tonight. He sent thethesperas a courtesy,” I said, balling up the parchment and throwing it across the table. “He fears for mykalles’wellbeing under my protection.”
That insultburned, stoking my temper, but I knew he had reason to be wary. He’d walked in on us in my private rooms inDothik, after all, with her straddling my lap as I bit at her neck. She’d been afraid of me then.
My cock thickened with the memory—as I knew it would, considering I was so fucked in the head. But Vienne made meburnin an entirely different way. Back inDothik, she’d been fearful of me,lysi.I’d ensured that.
But she’d also been curious about me. Now I knew how deep that curiosity ran and all the things she did to me with that curiosity andthatwas what aroused me.
My claws scraped into the wood of the council’s table as Hedna regarded me.
“Shall I havevolikisprepared?”
“Nik,” I said. “Rath Kitala can sleep on hispyrokifor all I care.”
Hedna shook his head but he was all too used to the feuds ofVorakkars. Very few of us actually liked one another. All of us were too busy pissing over our respective territories for the season. All of us were so accustomed to being in charge of our own hordes, to leading in our own ways, that it was a wonder there hadn’t been more bloody battles between us all over the years.
“And what would your intended queen say about that?” Hedna asked, hitching a brow, smirking.
I stiffened, though the thought sent a strange, foreign thrill through me. Something that felt strangely like anticipation.
Vienne would frown at me if she knew I’d made theVorakkarsleep outside my horde, especially Rath Kitala, who had come to her aid inDothik. She wouldn’t have to say a word to show her disapproval. I would feel it, just as I would feel her soft heart, whereas mine was made of unyielding Dakkari steel.
I growled. “Prepare fivevolikisfor theVorakkarand thedarukkarswho travel with him but no more.”
