Total pages in book: 247
Estimated words: 242728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1214(@200wpm)___ 971(@250wpm)___ 809(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 242728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1214(@200wpm)___ 971(@250wpm)___ 809(@300wpm)
The stranger fell into step with me. “I’m grateful for this. I hope you know that.”
“I know.” I caught his eyes as we stood by the river and faced one another. “I just hope I can give you what you want.”
His gaze darkened. “You’ve already given me what I want.”
Swallowing hard, I placed Natim down and jumped at the flash of yellow eyes in the treeline. Snapping upright, I whispered, “There are wolves watching us.” I narrowed my gaze at the silver and black beasts lounging beneath glossy leafed bushes.
“They never leave your side.” He smiled. “I asked them to keep you safe.”
“They’ve been there all along?”
“Today and yesterday.”
I huffed. “I must be blind.”
“Or maybe you’re finally beginning to see. Only to find there’s too much to look at all at once.” He dropped to his haunches and snatched a handful of kindling.
I stood stiff, once again speechless at his wisdom.
A thread of eagerness filled me. Despite my fear of doing this, I wanted to know who he was. I wanted to learn his name and remember everything I might know about him from before. Because the more time we spent together, the more my heart was convinced he was special. I was no longer drawn to him because of the potential of a shared past but because of the potential of a shared future. He was good and wise and kind—even if his shadows and the fire’s scaremongering had made me ask if he was evil.
I don’t believe he is.
Not even the smallest doubt.
The fire’s hisses had made me ask, and I cringed for how that would’ve made him feel.
With jerky tosses, he piled a smaller mountain of twigs directly onto the grass. “Let’s get this over with, before I change my mind.”
Dropping to my knees beside him, I stilled his hand with mine. My fingertips tingled with the current flowing between us. “If you’re attempting to make a fire, that isn’t how you do it.”
He tensed and leaned back, his eyes lingering on where I touched him. “I’ve had no need of a fire.”
“Come winter, you will.” I shuddered at the thought of snow, sleet, and frost.
“I survived a winter without any comforts.” His eyes turned hazy with history before shuddering like I had, remembering the desolate ice and chill. “This year, I’ll have the wolves for warmth...and I’ll have you.”
“Or you’ll be in a lupic, living with the Nhil.”
He didn’t reply straight away, but then he sighed almost regretfully. “The way I’m starting to feel about you, Runa...I can’t let you go. If you return to the Nhil, I won’t have a choice but to follow.”
I swallowed hard. “You always have a choice.”
He smiled with a tilt of his head, sending messy hair tumbling. “I’ve never had a choice when it came to you.”
My cheeks burned.
I didn’t know what to say.
How could I confess that such declarations terrified me but also...awoke something buried deep within my heart. That something grew with every skip, trip, and flutter. It warmed with every word we spoke and every look we shared.
I wanted to tell him I felt the same way. That the longer we spent together, the more the aching hollowness inside me filled with tentative happiness. But that would take courage and I’d already used every drop agreeing to this trance.
With stiff motions, I kept my attention on digging a small scrape in the dirt and stacking the kindling into a small pyramid, just like I’d seen Solin do so many times before.
We didn’t speak again, and I tried to picture the stranger living a Nhil’s way of life.
No matter how hard I tried to visualise him living the way other males did, with his hair braided with beads instead of tangled with brambles and his wildness tamed to fit in a clan’s hierarchy, I couldn’t.
He belonged here.
Belonged with this pack where the sun could kiss him and the moon could guide him and the wolves could run with him beneath the stars.
Does that mean you’ll stay, then?
My hands fumbled with a twig as the image of my future—of studying Pallen’s plant secrets, growing closer to Niya and Hyath, and being tutored by Solin morphed into a totally different one. One where I was as wild as the stranger with leaves in my hair and dirt on my knees. One where we touched in the river and kissed in the dark.
My belly coiled with sudden heat, making me suck in a breath.
“Runa...?” The stranger brushed back a lock of colourless hair that’d fallen from my rope-twist. “Your hands are shaking.”
I curled my fingers and laughed awkwardly, pushing away hopes, dreams, and worries. “I’m just nervous. About the trance. That’s all.”
“I’m sorry to make you do this.” He dropped his hand. “I wouldn’t ask if I could remember any other way.”