13. Isolde
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ISOLDE
J udging by the watery light filtering through the cracks in the curtains, it was near midday when Isolde woke. There were more blankets than she remembered draped over her, a dense feather pillow cushioning her head.
She lay there for a long moment, dazed, as the memories from the previous night came flooding back: her conversation with Bastian on the roof, the ravaged, dying man, her sprint through the forest after the beast. The sting of a blade, the blackness eclipsing her vision, the panic before Bastian arrived, and then the sudden sense of safety she felt when he gathered her into his arms.
And everything that followed. His gentle treatment as he dressed her wound, the way he’d offered to let her feed from him, the things he’d done with his mouth to make her come like she never had before…
God, what had she been thinking , letting things go that far with him?
I hope it was perfectly obvious the night we met that I’m extremely interested in something physical between us , he’d said. And then: My cock’s been hard for you nearly every day since that first night.
Isolde hadn’t known Bastian long, but it seemed clear enough that he wasn’t a man who said things he didn’t mean.
So… at least she knew that what had happened between them wasn’t just a venom-induced accident.
Bastian had made it exceedingly clear before she’d bitten him that he was very willing, and been extremely enthusiastic in his pleasuring of her after the fact, without asking for anything in return.
Sure, he was a Wolf and she was a Vampire, and they were supposed to hate each other for that reason alone.
Worse was the fact that it was Bastian , who had held a damned knife to her neck the first time they’d met, and been surly and unpleasant ever since.
Except for last night, when he’d been kind and gentle and done a remarkable job of chasing away the fear and the memory of another, distant night where she’d been helpless and terrified in the snow.
That could never happen again. Not Isolde’s helplessness, and not the tenderness he’d shown her.
Isolde knew herself, and she’d never been able to separate sex from emotion.
If he kept being so gentle and kind, or—heaven forbid—he ever pleasured her like that again, it would open a door that Isolde had no interest in walking through.
But the thing she hated most of all, now that her vision had returned and the fear was gone, was that he’d seen her so vulnerable.
She’d been frantic when he found her in the woods, distraught, barely able to recognize her own name when he called it.
That was the sort of weakness she never wanted to let anyone see again—least of all Bastian.
Resolved to never show him another hint of emotion, Isolde sat up and looked around his lodgings, which he was conveniently absent from. She’d been blind when he carried her up here, and then too exhausted to inspect the place before she fell asleep.
The settee she’d slept on stood before the hearth, which had burned down to glowing embers overnight.
The rug at her feet looked to have once been ornate, but was now worn and faded.
Mismatched armchairs stood to either side of the settee.
The night before, she hadn’t been able to make out the trinkets on the mantel, but now she saw a pair of daggers that looked too small for Bastian’s sizable hands, a wooden carving of a Wolf, and two shiny, pale stones that glinted in the feeble light.
On the other side of the settee, there was a wide open space, interrupted only by a wooden table and another rug on the floor.
To one side of the space was a long sideboard, which held an array of food items, pewter mugs, and bottles of what Isolde assumed was liquor.
To the other side was a row of built-in shelves, laden with more knives, whetstones, and sheaths than books.
The opposite end of the space had a little step up, into what looked like Bastian’s bedroom.
The bed was neatly made, but the desk that stood across from it was cluttered with more weapons and baubles.
There was a glass cabinet beside the window which seemed to be filled with little bottles of herbs and tinctures, but Isolde didn’t feel right investigating more closely.
She also had nothing better to do. She couldn’t go home until the sun set, and while she’d have liked a bath, Bastian didn’t seem to have a tub.
No doubt he was bathing in some frozen creek, like the wild animal he was.
Most of the few books on his shelves seemed to be about smithing, which Isolde didn’t take a great deal of interest in.
Her only other option seemed to be going in search of Bastian, which was the last thing she ought to do.
Snooping, it was.
Isolde started toward the raised nook with his bed?—
And froze as she passed the top of the stairs that led to the shop below.
Shouted voices drifted up to her—Bastian’s, and another man’s.
“What the hell is so bad about being a Wolf? Yes, the shift hurts like a bitch for the first year, but after that? Your senses are heightened. You heal faster, you’re stronger. And one night a month, you’re free . Freer than you’d ever have been as a human. You get to run with your pack?—”
“Maybe those things are wonderful if you got to choose it for yourself. But I didn’t get to . It wasn’t my fucking choice to turn. Why is that so hard for you to understand?”
“Have you ever considered that Father was actually doing you a favor when he turned you? You’re one of us now, in a way that you weren’t before. You weren’t family—not really. Not until you became a Wolf.”
Silence.
Isolde frowned. Bastian hadn’t chosen to become a Wolf? Anselm Thessarian, his own father—adoptive father, but she couldn’t see what difference that made—had forced him to turn?
Isolde crept down the stairs to the first landing on silent feet. Well aware that she was eavesdropping, and feeling only a little bit guilty about it, she hovered out of sight to keep listening.
“I’m sorry, Bastian,” said the voice Isolde didn’t recognize. “I didn’t mean?—”
“It’s fine. I get it.”
“Bastian—”
“You said you didn’t come here to convince me to come home. Was that a lie? Or are you going to tell me why you’re really here?”
“I wanted to ask if you’d let me make the shift with you tomorrow night.”
Again, silence. This time, it stretched on and on for long enough that it verged on unbearable, even for Isolde, who wasn’t fully in the room.
Her feet moved of their own volition, carrying her around the corner and into the dimly lit shop.
“Bastian?” she called. “I heard shouting.”
Bastian stood with his back to her, his shoulders bunched with tension.
Isolde didn’t recognize the man who faced him. He wasn’t quite as tall as Bastian, but his frame was packed with dense muscle. He had a broad jaw and a bump in the bridge of his nose, like it had been broken at least once. Pronounced shadows darkened the pale skin beneath his eyes.
Those eyes narrowed as they landed on Isolde, where she lingered in the shadows at the back of the forge. Isolde saw him inhale, his nostrils flaring. He was scenting her .
The hair on the back of Isolde’s neck stood on end, the fear she should have felt when she learned Bastian had hunted her through the forest curling between her ribs now.
“What the fuck is a Vampire doing here?” he demanded of Bastian.
Isolde raised her brows, feigning a lack of concern for the danger Everett posed. “Who the hell are you?”
“Isolde, this is Everett,” Bastian said, turning halfway toward her, but never taking his eyes off Everett. “My brother. Everett, it’s not what it looks like. She?—”
“It looks like you’re fucking her,” Everett sneered, giving Isolde’s bare legs a derisive once over.
“Of course I’m not fucking her,” Bastian snapped.
Isolde tried not to flinch at the vehemence in those words—like the prospect was completely abhorrent to him. Even if she didn’t think anything else should ever happen between them, Isolde didn’t think he was that disgusting.
“She’s wearing your shirt, Bastian.” Everett gestured sharply to her. “And nothing else.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m fucking her. She?—”
“She what ? Are you letting her feed on you?”
Before Bastian could respond, Everett surged toward him, reaching for the collar of his shirt. Fabric tore and Bastian cursed, knocking Everett’s hands away.
But Everett had already seen the puncture marks in the side of Bastian’s neck. The wounds Isolde had left last night when she did, in fact, feed from him.
“You are,” Everett hissed. “You let that bitch drink your blood.”
Bastian shot a tense look at Isolde, his jaw clenched, before turning back to Everett. “Would you shut the fuck up for a minute and let me explain? Last night she was injured by?—”
“So, what? You brought her back here and tended to her wounds? She’s a Vampire, Bastian. You should have left her to bleed.”
Bastian took a step toward Everett, his fists curling at his sides. “She might be a Vampire, but she?—”
“ She is right here,” Isolde snapped, her patience dwindling. “And she would appreciate if?—”
Everett’s hazel eyes flashed with anger. “Don’t fucking speak, bloodsucker.”
Isolde couldn’t keep herself from snarling at him. “That’s the most original insult you could think of?”
That was apparently a bridge too far for Everett. Before Isolde could so much as blink, he was across the room, seizing her by the arms and hurling her to the floor.
Directly into a patch of watery sunlight that spilled through the shop windows.
Instantly, her eyes began to sting. She slammed them closed, hissing in pain. The skin of her face tightened, the heat of even that weak light nearly unbearable.
Isolde started to scramble upright. She had seconds, maybe, before the exposure would start to poison her. Minutes before the sickness she’d develop would become fatal.
Rough hands landed on her shoulders, pinning her to the floor. Something sharp pressed against her sternum?—
And then disappeared.
Isolde heard a grunt, and a clatter, but she didn’t pause to look. She shot to her feet, her adrenaline propelling her back to the safety of the shadows with supernatural speed. Her eyes streamed, her skin aching where the sun had touched it.
When her eyes had cleared, Isolde found Bastian with Everett pinned against a workbench, his hands fisted in his brother’s collar and his teeth bared in a snarl.
A moment of tense silence passed where the two men stared each other down, both of them seething, before Bastian released Everett with a rough shove.
“Get out, Everett,” he said flatly.
Everett stumbled upright. “You’re defending her?” he snapped, stalking after Bastian again. “A Vampire?”
“Killing her would start a war.” Bastian shoved Everett away—just hard enough to keep him back. “You know as well as I do that the Pact forbids us from killing them.”
“Fuck the Pact!” Everett growled.
He surged forward, lunging toward Isolde once more. She lurched away, darting for the stairs behind her?—
Bastian snapped.
He caught Everett by the collar and hurled him back toward the door—practically threw him through the air, as if he weighed nothing. “ You will not touch her, ” he roared, planting himself squarely between Everett and Isolde. “You will not ever lay a single finger on her again.”
Silence.
Isolde held her breath.
Everett stared at his brother for a long moment. His eyes were wide, all the color drained from his face, his jaw working. “You’re a fucking traitor,” he hissed.
He shot Isolde a hateful glare, then stalked out into the street.
Isolde saw it then, lying on the floor in that shaft of sunlight that had seared her eyes—the sharp thing she’d felt pressed against her sternum.
A hawthorn stake.