“Meryn, what have you done?” he shudders out, stepping away from me with wide eyes, hands shaking. Then, anger. His expression contorts into fury. “Guards! Seize her! She’s killed the king!”
“What?!” I shriek.
A flood of guards storms the platform. Those already here spring back into action. The arena trembles with sound as the crowd reacts to the scene. I try to retreat to Anassa’s side. Shetries to leap for me, eyes wild. But before she can get close enough to defend me, a hiss of a weapon tears through the air and impacts her side.
“Anassa!” I scream as I watch her fall. I whip back around, and for a single instant, I see something. IswearI see it. He covers it up quickly, but…
Killian’s lips turn upward. It’s a tiny satisfied twitch, his eyes glinting blue, his gaze calculating.
Then the pain. Something slams into the back of my skull, snuffing out my light.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
There is nothing but shadow. I feel it all around me, flowing through me, drawn into my lungs and seeping from my eyes. I float, not truly seeing anything yetsensingmovement in the dark. Slow and heavy, like the rolling of a thick fog over frozen land.
Then, from all around me, a voice I know. A voice I’ve heard before during the maddening seizures of my mind as I slipped towards my mother’s madness. It comes from nowhere and everywhere, from beyond and from within. It sounds like a whisper and a scream, hissing over my skin and vibrating through my bones.
“GET THE CROWN.”
I gasp awake, teeth chattering. The air is cold. I’m lying on freezing stone. Harsh beams of light cut like needles through the darkness all around me. There’s a smell of smoke in the air. As my vision focuses, I realize that there’s a recently extinguished torch glowing, a slow curl of smoke drifting upward.
The slow realization creeps over my skin as I stare at it. The rough stone wall. The darkness. The smell of dirt and mold. The silence.
My head pounds as I return to myself through the fog, a particularly sharp throbbing centered in the back of my skull where I was hit. As I turn my stiff neck, it’s clear.
I’m in the castle’s dungeons.
At first glance, the cell is discouragingly secure, with solid stone walls and thick iron bars separating me from freedom.
I swallow around the lump in my throat, tasting copper on my dry tongue. Slowly, I sit up, keeping my eyes shut to block out the swimming of my vision. I shiver, clutching myself, clenching my teeth.
Then a subtle warmth settles my swirling mind. Anassa. I turn, wincing when my head injury announces itself once again. The moment my eyes land on her, an instinctive calm settles over me. The bond settles as my eyes move over her massive, lithe form. She breathes steadily, sitting up and alert, staring at me.
I scan her for injuries, but she seems alright. She must have healed herself after that blow. Her fur is slightly dirty, but I expect that’s from the battle. Except… in the lingering light of the torches’ cinders and those sparse beams of light, I can make out a band of darkness around her neck.
Wincing again, I crawl closer. When I’m beside her, I can make it out better.
A collar. A ring of blood-red metal encircles her throat. My vision flickers when I stare at it too long, the air around it appearing to pulse and shiver with energy. My headache escalates to a stabbing pain as I study it, so I rip my gaze away, looking up into her eyes.
She says nothing, watching me closely. But when I crawl up to her side and sink my hands into her fur, she lowers her head and sniffs my hair. Her nose nudges the side of my skull, my injuries. Heat spreads across my scalp as she heals them.
I bite back tears and sink into her warmth, leaning against her massive side as she breathes in a comfortingly slow rhythm. I press my forehead against her fur, shutting my eyes.
The pain in my head has eased, but I can’t say the same for my heart.
Every time I start to think about Killian’s face when he betrayed me, remember that cruel look in his eye, the sheer horror of it…
No, I can’t even think about it, or I’ll be sick.
“How long have I been out?” I whisper, trying to focus on here and now.
“Too long,” she replies. She rests her head on her legs, curling her tail close. “The metal prevents me from communicating with Strategos. But it would seem our connection remains intact.”
I breathe out in relief, scrubbing the back of my hand over my face. It’s strange, after spending so much time resenting the bond, but the thought of no longer being able to hear and feel Anassa sounds like a… grievous violation. Being broken away from my pack, as Alpha, is terrible, but I know in my marrow that without Anassa, it would be worse.
Losing her would be like having my soul cleaved in two.
“Why are you relieved? I said I cannot reach our pack,” she says coldly.
