Kaelric turned and looked down at my empty hands. Without a word, he placed his overflowing plate into them. A thick hunk of seared meat sat beside a generous heap of whipped potatoes and greens. The chocolate cake slice on top looked like it had its own gravitational pull.
“I’m not this hungry,” I said honestly, eyeing the mountain of food. “I’ll get sick.”
He frowned. “We’ll share.”
He grabbed two forks and led me to a quiet table tucked in the corner. I set the plate down, and hehanded me a fork. Then he waited, his fork poised in the air, specifically over the chocolate cake.
I couldn’t help the smile tugging at my lips. Just moments ago, I’d been fuming at him for pulling me away from my mother. But now…
“You can eat before me, you know…” I offered, amusement lacing my voice.
His expression twisted as if the suggestion caused him actual pain. “Trust me, I want to… but I can’t.”
Interesting.
He always let me eat first. I’d thought it was chivalrous, but now I wondered if it was something more. I slowly lifted a bite of cake on my fork, holding it near my mouth. Kaelric’s gaze locked on mine, his focus razor-sharp.
I held the fork there deliberately, teasing.
His eyes narrowed. “You’re wicked,” he murmured.
I laughed. “Wait. Can you really not eat until I do? Because this is so fun for me.”
A low growl rumbled in his chest, his eyes flaring yellow. “You really want to see what happens when you deny a hungry wolfkin food?”
I gulped and shoved the cake into my mouth.
In an instant, Kaelric seized the hunk of meat from the plate and tore into it, his eyes still locked on mine, golden and wild.
I wondered if it was a rule within all of the bonded initiates. I peered around the room but found that the Elite were just lining up for food as their wolfkin sat together at a table and scarfed food down without them.
I took another bite of chocolate cake.
“Why can’t you eat before me? Is it because I’m female?” I asked softly, my voice nearly lost beneath the clatter of silverware around us.
Kaelric didn’t answer right away. He tore a chunk of meat from the bone with sharp teeth, eyes flicking up to mine with an unreadable expression. “Something like that,” he muttered.
Chivalry in a wolfkin. Unexpected, and oddly charming. Especially for someone who spent eighty percent of his time acting like I was a thorn in his paw.
“You know,” I added, pushing my food around with my fork, “if you keep being a jerk to me, I might have to go on a hunger strike. I can go three days without food like it’s nothing.”
His entire demeanor changed. The meat stopped midair. His face drained like I’d just told him I’d buried his mother. His hand lowered slowly to the table.
I glanced over my shoulder, half expecting some threat to be creeping up behind me, but the train cabin was quiet. All eyes on their meals. No monsters. Except, perhaps, the one sitting across from me.
Did I say something wrong?
“I was kidding,” I said quickly, my tone light, awkward. “I wouldn’t do that to you. You’d probably eat me.”
Still, that haunted look stayed, shock bleeding into something sharper. Despair. Then… anger.
“You’ve gone three days without eating?” he asked, but it didn’t sound like him anymore. His voice was rough, guttural, almost torn from his throat. The beast was speaking now.
I swallowed, realizing too late that Kaelric had a… complicated relationship with food. And I’d just stepped on a landmine.
“Just once or twice,” I lied, keeping my tone casual.
He dropped the meat with a heavy thud and braced his hands on the table. White fur rippled up his arms like frost creeping over glass. His jaw clenched. He was trying to breathe, slowly, controlled, but his knuckles strained, and his claws extended slightly.
