THORN
Ididn’t run into Ember at the baths this morning like I’d hoped.
Even though I saw the steam kissing her hair as she climbed the steps last night.
My wolf prowled restless beneath my skin all through the night, demanding her scent, her touch, anything.
Instead, I spent the morning pacing the length of my chamber like a caged beast until it was time for the Taste trial.
Even still, I’m early, walking out into the hall.
Thank gods, there’s no bells and whistles and extra trials this year. I don’t think I’d survive.
Aura is walking past, dark hair slick and glossy as a raven’s wing.
“Aura,” I grunt. “Are you headed to the temple?”
“Yes.” She tucks a curl behind her ear, the movement rehearsed. “Just on my way now.”
Her fingers trail to the flower pinned there. A small pink thing, almost delicate. “I was wondering if you could smell this for me? I wanted to wear it, but I don’t want it to throw off my scent…for my mate and all…” she points to a tiny flower in her hair.
Her eyes glitter, watching me closely.
An odd request, but I’ve had odder as an Alpha. Alpha’s can’t turn down a pack member for something so trivial.
“Fine,” I mutter, leaning in.
The flower is sickly sweet. The sweetness isn’t sweetness, it’s rot disguised as sugar. It overwhelms me, it invades my nose, my tongue, my chest, until it feels like it’s filling my lungs.
“What—?” I jerk back, coughing. The world tilts, the stone beneath my feet spinning. My muscles seize, trembling as if I’ve been dropped into the snow bare-skinned.
Aura smiles, a mischievous grin. “Is it too much?”
I try to snarl, but my jaw won’t cooperate. Heat floods my skull. My knees dip, the weight of me slamming into the doorframe. “What did you do to me?” I rasp, vision tunneling.
“Nothing,” she purrs, her voice echoing down the hall as though from a great distance. “I would never.”
The shadows close in. I dig my claws into the stone, refusing to go down — not here, not now, not when Ember’s out there waiting for me.
But the scent of my mate is gone, smothered beneath the poison sweetness. As darkness swallows me whole, the last thought that burns through me is of her.