“Easy,” the other male growled, and now there was no mockery in his voice. “I don’t want to kill you. But I will if I have to.”
“Try it.” He circled, looking for an opening. Every second this stranger stood between him and the cabin was a second Ember was in danger. “I’ll tear your throat out before I let you?—”
“Stop!”
The voices cut through the clearing like twin blades—one from the cabin, one from the trees. Both female. Both furious.
His head snapped towards the cabin door. Ember stood on the threshold, her face pale but determined, a kitchen knife clutched in her hand. She looked small against the doorframe, fragile in her borrowed furs, but her grey eyes blazed with a fire he’d never seen before.
“I said stop!” She stepped forward, planting herself between the two of them like she had any chance of surviving if they decided to ignore her. “Both of you!”
At the same moment, a human female ran over from the tree line on the other side of the clearing. She wasn’t much taller than Ember, with dark hair and a scowl on her pretty face. At her heels ran two adyani—the vicious mountain predators that should have torn her apart on sight—but they moved beside her like trained hounds, their ears pricked forward with alert curiosity.
“Korrin!” The female’s voice was sharp with exasperation. “What did Ijustsay about starting fights with strangers?”
Korrin straightened slowly, his claws retracting. His expression shifted from battle-ready to something that looked almost sheepish. “I wasn’t starting a fight. I was investigating.”
“You were antagonizing.” The female stopped beside Korrin, a small finger poking him in the ribs hard enough to make him wince. “I could hear you from the trees. ‘Your little pet?’ Really?”
“I was testing him.”
“You were being an ass.”
He stared at them, his beast still snarling for violence but his mind struggling to process what he was seeing. The female’s hand on Korrin’s arm. The way Korrin leaned slightly towards her, protective even as she scolded him. The adyani sitting calmly at her feet, watching the scene with intelligent yellow eyes.
“You have a human mate,” he heard himself say.
Korrin’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t deny it. “What of it?”
“You thought…” He looked down at Ember, and suddenly the stranger’s accusations made terrible sense. “You thought I was keeping her prisoner.”
“The thought crossed my mind.” Korrin’s voice was flat. “A lone Vultor with an unmarked human female who won’t open the door and who smells like fear and… other things.” His gaze flicked between them, sharp and assessing. “What was I supposed to think?”
His claws slowly retracted. The rage was still there, simmering beneath the surface, but it was cooling now, replaced by something that felt almost like embarrassment. He’d nearly killed another Vultor over a misunderstanding. Nearly started a fight he might not have won.
All because he’d been too busy wallowing in self-pity to stay where he belonged.
“Ember isn’t my prisoner,” he said quietly. “She was in a crash. I found her. She hasn’t been able to leave because the southern pass has been blocked ever since.”
“And the other scents?” Korrin’s eyes narrowed. “The ones that say you’ve been doing more than playing rescuer?”
“Korrin.” The human female squeezed his arm warningly. “Unless she’s unwilling, that’s none of our business.”
“I wasn’t unwilling.” Ember’s voice was soft but certain, her face calm as she regarded the two newcomers.
“Are you sure? Because if he’s?—”
“Korrin,” the female snapped, and something passed between them—a silent conversation he recognized from his own experience with Ember. The kind of communication that happened when two people had spent enough time together to read each other without words.
Korrin finally exhaled, the tension bleeding out of his shoulders.
“Fine.” He looked at Rykan, and for the first time there wasn’t any antagonism in his gaze. “Your territory. Your female. My mistake.”
“She’s not—” he started, then stopped. Because what was he going to say?She’s not mine?After everything they’d been through? After he’d nearly transformed and killed someone just because he’d stood between the two of them?
She was still watching them both, her knife lowered but not sheathed. Her eyes met his, and he saw the questions there. The hurt he’d caused this morning. The confusion over what had just happened.
He owed her an explanation. He owed her a lot of things.
