THIRTY-SEVEN #3
Three figures break through the trees. Bishop leads, sword out, Broderic and Laurel behind him. She’s breathing hard, the perfect picture of a woman who’s just run to fetch help.
Bishop’s eyes lock on me. He goes rigid for a heartbeat. Then he’s at my side, hand reaching for my arm, helping me to stand. I let him take my weight. “You’re bleeding.”
But I don’t feel it.
He looks over at Stefan’s body, and his mouth twists as his gaze snags on the vestiges visible on the man’s arm now. Then his focus shifts to the wolves beside me. The pup burrows into his mother, still howling, but each cry is softer than the last.
Laurel gasps. “Oh, Stars. Arden, I thought—”
She cuts off when I point at her.
“Enough with the lies.” I spit the words at her feet. “This was you.”
Broderic stills.
“What?” he says after a long moment.
“It was her. Patron Velesont sent her. She poisoned the sauce. The whole table.” I stumble over to the grass, my palms sweeping the ground until I find the bottle. “This is the antidote. She offered me a trade. My life for this.”
Laurel takes a small step backward, and more lies begin spewing out of her. “Broderic, she’s hysterical. She ran into the trees. I tried to stop her.”
Broderic looks at me. Then at her. And something sinks inside me. He’s actually deciding.
“Broderic,” I say to my brother, too tired to raise my voice. “It’s me.”
That has to matter. Even after everything.
His mouth opens as Laurel turns her hand. She doesn’t wait to see which side he lands on.
The postern flares in her palm. She drops it, leaping into the shimmering blue puddle. It winks shut behind her with a snuff of air.
Broderic stares at the empty space beside him.
And keeps staring.
Forcing myself back to my feet, I push the antidote into his hands. My mouth opens and closes, my heart searching for the right words to reach him. I settle on his own.
“You’re an Icaros,” I say. “Act like it. Go save our family.”
He blinks down at the glass. Then he’s moving.
But he pauses a few steps away and looks at us. “Bishop … Arden …”
“Go,” Bishop orders, reaching for me again.
Broderic dashes in the direction of the cottage. I watch him for a few seconds before I collapse against Bishop.
“Wait.” I pull back, panicked. “The antidote. You need it.”
He snorts. “I didn’t eat much, either. I’m fine.”
His eyes do a slow inventory of me—my arm, the loose collar at my throat, the dried blood on my hands. Then they flick past me to the guard.
“I have to,” he says quietly.
“I know.”
He grips my arm. “Don’t look.”
I nod.
He moves to the scion’s body. I drop beside the mother and her pup, unable to watch.
The pup is so small. His paws are too big for him. One of his ears flops, nearly covering the horn nub in front of it. He shivers, and I press a hand to his neck.
“Hey, little one,” I whisper.
A weight settles on my shoulder. The oscen’s claws are gentle as it folds its wings against its back. It tilts its head toward the pup.
“Yeah,” I say to the bird. “I know. I’ve got him.”
Satisfied, she rises in a flap of wings and lands on a nearby branch.
I slide my hand under the pup’s chest as slowly as I can, afraid I’ll spook him. He goes rigid, so I keep my voice low. “It’s okay. You’re safe.”
I lift him.
He weighs nothing.
The pup presses his face into the crook of my elbow and begins to shake. I tuck him against me and stand up.
Bishop is rising from the guard’s body when I turn. His gloves are off, the silver vestiges on his skin flowing. There’s a wet darkness on his palm he hasn’t wiped away yet.
He looks at the pup in my arms. “Arden …”
But this isn’t up for debate. “His mother saved my life.”
“That’s a horned wolf.”
“His mother saved my life,” I repeat, voice breaking on the words. “She died for me. I can’t leave him here. I won’t.”
Bishop looks at me. Then at the pup. Before his eyes land on the wolf lying in the dirt like she’s gone to sleep.
He doesn’t argue again.
“Come on,” he says. “We need to check on your family.”
He wipes his hand on his cloak, then starts to pull his gloves back on, but he stops and looks at the back of his hand, just above the knuckle of his middle finger.
A new line of silver is etching itself there.
Just one line. Then a second crosses it, and a third, each tracing the shape of something I can’t quite see yet.
He yanks his glove back on. Leaning down, he picks up my sword. “Let’s go.”
The pup squirms against my ribs until I whisper, “Shhh, little one. No one will hurt you. I’m your mother now.” He settles instantly, nestling against my heart.
Bishop says nothing. Smarter every day.
We walk in silence until we near the lights of the outpost.
Conscripts rush toward us. We pause long enough for Bishop to direct them to the body in the woods. Then we continue on to the cottage, where my brother is feeding our siblings the antidote and explaining that his fiancée was an assassin.
It’s over.
For now.
I cuddle the pup against my chest, his fur soft against my skin.
“I want to go home,” I say to Bishop.
He nods. He doesn’t ask which home I mean.
He already knows.