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“Ye’ve been a right bastard these last weeks,” Torrag observed, wiping his mouth.
I scowled. “Ye’re all weaklings who need the work.”
“Ye broke Fennik’s practice blade.”
Bah.
“He didn’t raise it in time.”
One of the other males called out, “‘Tis because Maardok’s own blade is broken!”
From the mud, where he had unwisely remained, Mormmit spoke to the sky.
“‘Tis because he cannae fook his Mate.”
The growl that emerged from me came from my Kteer, which didn’t appreciate the mockery.
I had him up by the front of his kilt before he finished laughing, and I put him down twice more, and the second time I did it slowly enough that he had ample opportunity to consider his choices on the way. The rest of them were howling so hard that Torrag fell backwards on his arse.
Auld Garran was leaning on the fence with his arms crossed, watching me the way he’d watched me since I was a kitling with a stick. He didn’t say anything for a while, which is how I knew something was coming.
Deciding I’d rather hear it privately than give these bastards something more to laugh about, I ordered them into sparring pairs and stopped by the fence to wipe my brow.
After a few moments, the auld male hummed.
“Ye ken she’s already yers?”
I ken it.
She was my Mate, and whether or not she loved me wasn’t going to change that. So I just glared.
He hummed. “But ye want her to say it.” He scratched under his jaw. “They all take their time, lad. Mine took two winters, and I’d have done aught she’d asked. Ye cannae hurry a female to a decision. Ye can only be worth the deciding.”
I sighed, hearing the wisdom in his words. “That’s…verra true.”
“‘Tis. I’ve had thirty years to polish it.” He pushed off the fence. “Ye’ll want to breathe now and then. Ye’re nae good to her dead of temper.”
Except I’d spent a month breathing, and I was sick of it. I couldn’t imagine having to wait two winters for Cataline to realize what I already knew.
Aye, but ye’ll do it, if it means she’s in yer home and in yer arms.
‘Twas the truth. I was heartsick to consider she might not want to stay here in my world…but I knew I would follow her wherever she went.
Sighing, I scratched at my chest, only to realize my claws were trying to dig into my skin, as if I could quiet my Kteer that way. Something had to give, or I would go mad…
Wait.
The way my Kteer was growling right now wasn’t the quiet frustration I’d felt the last month. My hand dropped away and I straightened, brows drawing in as I glanced around the training ground.
Something was wrong.
I took two steps closer to my warriors and realized I was feeling a tug in the opposite direction. Toward the village.
Frowning, I swung about, as if my eyesight was keen enough to see through the trees. What was…?
Cataline!
I realized it a moment too late, judging by the sharp spike of fear and pain I felt across our Mate Bond, fierce enough to cause me to gasp and rear back. In the following heartbeat, however, I understood.
