Wolfkissed

Chapter 67

CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

ROSAMUND

A darkness clings to me as I rush through the yard and then the manor, heading for my room. My feet run, but my mind is a web, still and numb, and my thoughts helplessly fluttering, caught in it like moths.

Just like I’m caught inside this manor, this agreement.

Only one thought is crystal clear, and yet, it’s the darkest of them all:

You’re going to lose Valen. How can you live without him?

It’s absurd of course. I’ve lived all my life without him. Why shouldn’t I be able to keep doing so?

Someone steps into my path as I hurry toward the staircase, and I almost crash into him. A tall man. Familiar. Forbidding.

“Lady Rosamund.” Lord Eorl scowls down at me. “A lady doesn’t run.”

“I beg your pardon.” I glance at the staircase behind him. “I need to get to my room.”

“What you need…” He gives me a once-over, his scowl darkening. “By the Gods, were you rolling in the meadows? Your hair is loose and full of… of grass and twigs and…”

Startled, I lift my hands to my hair. I know I look a fright, but I didn’t think about the details that could betray me—like the bits of hay I now remove from my dark locks.

“You went out of the manor on your own?” he’s now saying. “Have you lost your mind?”

“I needed to clear my head.”

Fury flashes through his eyes. “You were not raised in a stable with the animals, by any chance? That’s unacceptable behavior.”

“What do you care?” I blurt out. “You only want my estates, nothing else.”

His face twists with fury. It’s so scary, I take an instinctive step back. “You don’t speak to me in this tone ever again, Rosamund, or so may the Gods help me, I’ll teach you a lesson.”

I gape at him. “How about the way you speak to me? And threatening me?”

“You are a woman. Know your place.”

“My mother ran our manor,” I snap, “and so did my grandmother before her. Why does this feel like we’re regressing? In our long history, women have fought for their rights, and I won’t give mine up!”

His laughter is decidedly ugly. At first, I’d thought Valen monstrous, but now he seems the most handsome man in the world, while this one… this one has been ugly from the start and getting uglier in my eyes with every passing day.

“I’m getting bored with your tantrums,” he says. “Your tantrums, your hysterics, and your lack of modesty and decorum. You’re going to your room and staying there.”

“I won’t!”

“It isn’t safe out there anyway.” He turns to go, dismissing me already. “Tomorrow I’m leading a hunting expedition. We’ve seen and heard wolves. They could even be dark fae. I’ll hunt them down and kill them.”

“No!” I glare at him and rush to get in his way. “You can’t.”

“I can’t?” Another ugly laugh. “I can’t?”

“If you go on a hunt,” I decide, “I’m going with you.”

His brows lift. “Certainly not. That’s not a lady’s place.”

“Isn’t it? That woman is going with you, isn’t she? The one you’ve been sitting with at dinners?”

“She’s not a lady,” he sneers. “The rules don’t apply to her.”

My hands ball into fists. “I won’t accept that you’re seen sitting with other women anymore. If you want respect, you show me the same.”

His cheeks flush with fury. “Mind what you’re saying. You don’t give me orders.”

“And the wolves protect us. They aren’t our enemy.”

“Are you crazy? Or are you a dark fae sympathizer now?”

I hesitate. I’m standing on a precarious edge. Or maybe it’s the void. I can’t tell how far I’ve overstepped. “Let me come with you on the hunt.”

“Or what? Will you cry? Tell me what I can and can’t do?” His face is now mottled with anger. “Cry me a river, lady. You’re not coming, and that’s final. You will stay at the manor. Better still, stay in your room and embroider, or whatever it is you do to pass the time.”

“Please, my lord,” I whisper, but he’s already walking past me and striding away.

You need time, I tell myself. You can’t know someone after just a handful of days.

But I knew Valen pretty quickly.

Nonsense. You hated Valen. You only warmed up to him during your journey. Surely, Lord Eorl also deserves that journey.

Right?

Lord Eorl told me to stay in my room. I didn’t think he’d hold me there by force.

In the early morning, when I try to open my door, I find that I can’t. Incredulous, I keep turning the handle, certain that it got stuck, but after a while of fruitless effort, panting with exertion and anger, I have to admit that it’s locked.

I’m locked up.

Locked up just like I was in the wolves’ den as a child, the den where my nightmares return me every night, lost in a darkness of teeth and claws.

It’s not the same, my rational mind tells me. Look! There is the window, letting in light and fresh air. You have a nice bed, a desk, and a mirror. Your things.

But I feel caged. I pace back and forth, occasionally stopping to bang on the door and yell for someone to open it.

To no avail.

How foolish to think this would work out. That he would be the hero I imagined, modeled on men from stories. I’ve observed terrible marriages from a distance. Hells, my stepparents’ marriage is a sham. Though I have also heard of arranged marriages that were successful.

Time to admit, though, that those are few and in-between. Novels and fairytales make you think that every girl who meets a beast will live a happily ever after, but who is the beast here? Lord Eorl is a monster compared to my wolf.

My wolf. Gods…

Wanting Lord Eorl was a childhood dream. An illusion. Wanting Valen is real. It’s what my heart desires. How can I deny it any longer?

A voice has me looking up. Someone is saying something behind the door, their voice high-pitched with what sounds like fear.

Valen?

But it’s not him. I know that, because the next moment the door is unlocked, and Lord Eorl appears at the opening.

My utter loathing for him has me rooted in place. I want to rake my nails over his face, gouge out his eyes. I want to slap and spit on his hated face.

“You,” I seethe. “You locked me up.”

“It was the only way to keep you inside the room,” he says calmly, obviously unperturbed, as if that’s the most natural thing in the world. “I trust you have spent your time productively.”

“You’re not serious,” I breathe.

“Oh, I am serious. I want to see what my future wife can craft. I was told your embroidery skills are good.”

“You want me to be a… a slave!”

His pleasant expression vanishes. “What’s the matter with you? I’m your husband-to-be. I have every right to direct and correct your behavior. Or did you think any other lord would treat you differently?”

“But…”

“This is a marriage of convenience, woman. I don’t know what you thought it would be like, and I don’t know how you were raised, but these liberties you take won’t fly here.

I have done my best. Overlooked the fact that you came in the company of a man, that your family has obviously disowned you and lied about your death.

Your estates are good, but don’t think for a moment I couldn’t do better. I am honoring an old agreement.”

“Bullshit. My estates were what you wanted from the start. The only thing that ever mattered to you.”

“What difference does it make?”

He’s right. What difference does it make? I don’t love him. He’s not the one I love.

“You will get what you want out of this, too,” he says after a moment.

“Like what? Being confined inside the manor? Forced to live behind closed doors?”

“What’s wrong with closed doors?” He lifts his hands. “I was given to understand that you spent most of your life locked up in your room. Now you want, what, to wander the wilderness like an animal?”

“The wilderness is beautiful,” I whisper.

“You’re crazy.” He scowls at me. “I didn’t ask for a crazy wife.”

“And I didn’t ask for you! I’m not a product for you to order and customize. I am who I am and always have been. Now was your chance to get to know me, and you dismissed it.”

In two strides, he’s right in front of me. He grabs my wrist and slams me back against the wall. “That’s enough!”

I struggle to free myself and fail. He’s stronger than me. Most men are. Yet, Valen is ten times stronger and never made me feel afraid.

This is bad and going downhill fast.

The girl I was a few weeks back would have blamed herself. But not anymore. This isn’t on me, and it’s unbearable to think I’m still here when I know there is happiness out in the world.

That Valen is out there.

“Why do you want my estates so much?” I grind out. “What’s so important about them?”

“Nothing.” He finally releases me and straightens his vest.

“Don’t lie to me. You made this deal long ago. Why would you want my land so badly?”

“Minerals,” he says after a long moment, going to glance out the window. “An old mine. I’ve had it evaluated and realized its veins of nightgold are mostly untapped. Plus, the farms and orchards, of course. It’s a good investment.”

Investment. That’s all I am to him.

“Now behave, and I’ll have no reason to lock you up. Obey me, be quiet and pleasant, and everything will be all right.”

My door unlocked, I hurry down the stairs. The sense of suffocation I felt locked up in my room persists. How dare he imprison me like that? Shove me and admonish me?

I’m filled with helpless rage, and it’s nothing new. I’ve felt it all my life. I’ve always strived to be a lady. The freedom Valen has shown me is an illusion. Being a lady is to be a prisoner of society. To live in a cage. I never even noticed the bars before, but now… Now they are all I can see.

Revenge on my stepfamily, regaining my estates, it all pales in the face of a future with this man. ‘That asshole’ Valen had called him, and he was so right.

That bastard.

Sitting at the table with that harlot of his, smirking at me. Only… he’s not. Lord Eorl is sitting alone in his seat, the chair beside him empty. Guests are seated along the long tables, watching as I stumble through the hall.

“Lady Rosamund,” Lord Eorl calls, his voice traveling over the guests.

“Come, be seated. The music is about to begin, the wine to flow, and the food to be served. Let us celebrate having you here. Only a few days are left for our wedding, when I will get to call you wife, and you will get to call me husband.”

My chest constricts. None of this is joyous. His excitement isn’t real. My excitement is gone. I can really see him now. The masks have fallen. The facades have crumbled.

Gathering my skirts, I make my way to him, through the ashes of my foolish dreams, and sit down beside him.

“Lady Rosamund—”

“The wolves,” I hiss. “Did you hunt them? Did you kill them?”

“That’s your concern?”

“Many things are my concern,” I say. “Tell me.”

“We didn’t find them,” he says and raises his glass to the guests, a flat smile on his face. “Caught a deer and a boar instead. Will you smile and behave properly?”

“As properly as you locking me up and shoving me against walls?”

“Suit yourself,” he says, his smile fixed. “You’re not making your life any easier, believe me.”

I do believe him. I’m realizing that finding your match is rarer than I thought. Finding your other half, your mate, the person you want to spend your life with.

I found mine, and I hadn’t realized how lucky I was. But I do now. I see it clearer than ever. No revenge, no punishment to those who deserve it can trump finding happiness with the right person.

“Look,” a lady to my left whispers way too loudly, “he’s arrived.”

Who? I almost ask.

“He’s so handsome,” another giggles behind her hand. “I hope he will ask me to dance tonight.”

And then I see him. He has just entered the hall, his silvery hair windswept, a formidable scowl on his face.

Valen.