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You have the same drive to prove everyone else wrong. Maybe you’re a commoner. Maybe you’re stuck. But who cares? Fight harder.”
It’s the Dire Blade. The fabled weapon that supposedly gives him power over all direwolves, Bonded and unbonded alike.
Crown Prince Killian descends to the balcony while I stand there frozen, my whole world crumbling around me. And then, seated at his father’s side, he lifts his head and looks right at me, dark blue
eyes filled with regret. My heart cracks. Lee.
Is Anassa protecting me?
This place is a theater of death.
He wants me dead. I know it with bone-deep certainty. He called for this display because he knew the wolves would choose me. I was supposed to be the cull today—the one torn apart for all to see.
East garden at midnight. Please, kitten.
but when riders have sex, it can help their wolves figure out if
they’re mated or not. So of course everyone uses the Trials to try to find their direwolf’s mate. Cool, right?” “Cool,”
“Don’t you realize?” he says ferociously. “My love for you is as unwavering and steady as the winds from Mount Wolfsbane. I’d give it all up if you told me to. I’d abdicate tomorrow.”
Because truthfully, I love him, too, even as I hate him. The warring emotions threaten to crater me where I stand.
“You’re the most powerful woman in Nocturna, Meryn.”
“You can bring this kingdom to its knees with just a word.”
“I’m here for Saela and Saela only,” I say, reminding him and myself at the same time. “That’s all that matters to me.” “I know,” he says, his voice filled with regret. “And I’ll do everything I can to protect you and help you find her while you’re here.”
“I don’t expect your forgiveness. But I hope to earn your understanding.”
I thought I’d skate through these Trials by avoiding being killed, not by becoming a killer. But something has unlocked inside me, a monster I didn’t know existed. I’m not sure if it’s been formed out of the seething, quiet wrath that’s been building in me all day, or if this is some side effect of bonding with a ravening beast.
Instead of disgust at my own actions, all I feel is… calm. Horrible, stony calm.
“It was self-defense to choke someone to death with their own severed hand?”
“Because unlike the Siphons, the Bonded cherish life. We get tattoos to remember the steep cost of war.”
Then, without warning, he forces my head to the side. He leans down, his breath now hot against my neck. And his tongue streaks over my skin.
“What was that?”
“A tattoo for your kill,”
“No, why did he l...
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“Oh, we lick one another’s tattoos when we’re done. It’s an instinct to help
heal the surface of the skin.”
“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,”
try to hand the key back to her. “No. I don’t want this. It puts an even bigger target on my back.” “That it does,”
“But this order comes from above my head. There’s nothing I can do about it.”
“Everyone’s heard about your room, commoner,” she says. “Out with it. Who are you fucking?”
“Why are you asking?” Izabel cuts in. “Are you worried there’s someone here you haven’t banged yet?”
I’ve never just laid down and taken anything, and I’m not starting today.
“I’m sure that you’re used to these other Bonded bowing to you and tearing themselves apart for your approval, but as you’re so clearly aware, I am not one of them. Try kicking me again, and I’ll cut your foot off at the ankle and feed it to my wolf.”
“The connection works by linking together our thoughts and our emotions. The direwolves are not actually in our minds or our bodies, it only feels that way because they hear it all.”
“Well, mostly correct. The most powerful direwolves can see through their riders’ eyes, but that is very rare and requires an enormously strong bond. For the rest of us, it’s just an unending exchange.”
“The strongest bonds are selective.”
Wolves choose their Bonded based on compatibility of that unnamable, many-named part of us that defies all true classification. They know, instinctively, who we are. Every part of us. And that initial recognition, like calling to like, deepens over time, like a river carving a winding path through the hardest of stone. Shared experiences, emotions. Trust. You will only become closer to your direwolf.”
“As you may have learned by now,
the wolf/human bond cannot be severed once it is formed—and if it is, it results in death for both beings. Sometimes, wolves reject their chosen during the Ascent, but the bond hasn’t solidified at that point and the wolf survives.”
“I meant the spiri...
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“That… no, a wolf recognizes all of us from the beginning. It’s not a decision they make lightly. It’s intimate. It runs deeper than whim and passing moods.
“Oh, you’ll find this part interesting. You’ve heard of mate bonds?”
“A bond connection betwee...
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“Precisely, recognized in moments ...
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“The key of what you just said is between wolves. The direwolves, once mated, mate for life. Their riders do not need to be together romantically, although it makes things easier...
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“I wanted to tell you. Everything, Meryn. I want…”
“I want to be with you.”
“You want to fuck me and then discard me when I’ve grown tiresome?”
“Don’t ever talk about yourself that way, Meryn,”
