If I kill someone right now, will she jump through a hoop for me? Doubt it.
Eventually, she seems to get annoyed with me, or maybe just bored, and pads over to the course, facing it and readying herself.
It isn’t agreement. It isn’t teamwork or cohesion. I don’t hear her voice. It’s complete and utter rejection.
I don’t have two seconds to prepare myself before she hurtles forward at terrifying speed.
Clutching her fur tightly, I fight not to fall. Sprinting around the outside of the course is relatively smooth, but then she starts to leap over the hurdles. I nearly fall on the first one, yanking her fur to keep my balance atop her back. The pull of my weight upsets her own balance, and one of her feet tangles on the hurdle.
She barely catches herself, snarling, clacking her teeth angrily. Then onto the next hurdle, and it’s the same thing all over again.
I nearly slide right off trying to duck under the boards. When she leaps through the hoop, her tail whips against the rim and I end up fully dismounted from her back, clinging to the fur of her shoulder blade as my legs dangle and I try to scramble my way back up.
There’s no way I’m going to fall, though. I won’t let the other Rawbonds see my ass in the dirt.
I hold on to her. I’d rip all her fur out in my grip if it meant making it through this, and I think she knows it.
“Again!” Egith shouts, and I reconsider murder, if it means Anassa’ll at leasttryto help me stay mounted.
The other bonded pairs are flowing through the course. That’s the worst part. Some are faster than others, but not one of them is struggling like we are.
Even the clumsier ones struggle simply because their direwolves aren’t as tall or strong, not because their riders are struggling to stay mounted. I watch as one of the wolves even shifts its center of gravity to support its rider as she’s about to fall, tipping her back into her proper spot.
It’s grueling the entire way through.
My ass is entirely numb, my arms are limp and useless from clinging and pulling myself back up, and my head is poundingfrom the scraping, cruel pounding of the wall between my mind and Anassa’s.
I’m finally given a reprieve when class draws to a close. The other Rawbonds part lovingly with their wolves. When I slip from Anassa’s back, landing painfully on the flats of my feet, she turns tail. Almost instantly, she bounds away, disappearing.
No drawn-out goodbye for us, then.
If I wasn’t so exhausted from the complete and utter mayhem of that lesson, I’d be frustrated.
I’m here. I’m committed. I want to make this work, since I have literally no other options—even though, as I remind myself for the thousandth time, this bond was forced on me unwillingly. What else does Anassa want from me?
The other trainees start to head inside but Egith strides toward me before I can follow them.
“Meryn, I need to speak with you. Come with me,” she says sternly.
I ignore the curious gazes of the other Rawbonds as I follow Egith from the training yard without another word, heart sinking as I wonder just what it is I’ve done wrong this time.
At least she isn’t shoving a needle into my neck in front of everyone.
Or maybe she has news about the Nabbers? The thought only amplifies the churning anxiety in my gut.
We step into the Strategos quarters. My tattoo tingles as Egith stops in front of one of the private rooms just before the entrance to the bunkroom.
“It’s yours now,” she says, thudding her hand briefly on the door.
I stare at the door then meet her eyes. “Mine?”
She unlocks the door and swings it open, revealing a generous amount of space with a full bed and a pile of pillows, a tall double-doored wardrobe, an empty bookshelf, a floweringplant in the corner, and a generous window that looks out over a shivering tree.
It’s a bigger bedroom than I’ve ever had. And private, too.
“Since there was an attack on you last night, it has been determined that you are possibly being targeted. So you will now have a private room,” she says rigidly. She hands the key to me, dropping it into my palm.
I shake my head and try to hand the key back to her. “No. I don’t want this. It puts an even bigger target on my back.”
