Chapter 4

Mara's POV

Ronan still had glass in his hair when he brought me to the infirmary. A narrow cut ran along his jaw. I kept looking at it instead of the door, though every footstep in the corridor tightened my shoulders.

"Sit," he said as Maeve pulled back the curtain around an examination table.

I stopped. He followed my gaze to his hand on my elbow and let go.

"Please," he added.

I sat. The table was cold through my ruined dress. Until the arrow struck, I had believed crossing the border meant I had escaped. Now Tamsin was putting a guard at another door, and I didn't know whose uniforms I could trust.

Maeve, a silver-haired woman with the shoulders of a retired fighter, cut away the wet fabric around my ankle. "This trap is supposed to mark trespassers, not skin them."

"She crossed at full speed," Ronan said.

"Because men were chasing me with a severance blade."

Maeve's hands stopped. "A what?"

I told her about the chamber and the straps on the table. Then she asked why Gideon had ordered a severing, and I had to tell her about Vivian too. Saying it in this small, clean room was worse than shouting it in the hall. Here, nobody interrupted to explain why I deserved it.

When I reached the medicine, Maeve asked me to describe the taste.

"Bitter. Metallic afterward. It made my tongue numb if I drank it too quickly. Vivian called it a fertility treatment. Tonight she said there was moonroot and silverbind in it."

Ronan looked at Maeve. "What does that combination do?"

"Suppresses the wolf. In sufficient doses, it interferes with healing and scent recognition as well." Maeve looked at me. "How much, and for how long?"

"One cup every night. Two during treatment weeks. Six years."

She set down the scissors. I watched her face, waiting for her to look at Ronan again. She did not.

"Mara, prolonged exposure can also stop ovulation."

I had feared that answer since Vivian stood outside my cell. Hearing it from someone with no reason to lie still made me reach for the table's edge.

"Could it have stopped the treatments from working?"

"Yes."

Behind Maeve, someone closed a cupboard. The small sound startled me. I had been thinking of Gideon sitting beside my bed after the sixth specialist left, his thumb moving over my wedding ring while I apologized for another failed attempt.

"Can it be reversed?"

"Sometimes. I need to examine you properly before I can say what is possible for you."

I nodded as if she had given me instructions I knew how to follow. My hands were shaking. I slid them beneath my thighs, pressing them against the cold table until they stopped.

Six years ago, we had cleared the room beside ours for a nursery. When nothing happened, Gideon turned it into his study. I had helped him carry in the desk because I wanted him to see that I was being reasonable.

"Mara."

Ronan had come closer. I looked at the cut on his jaw again.

"Please don't tell me I can still have children. You don't know that."

"I know."

He pulled the spare blanket off the adjoining bed and laid it within reach. Then he stayed beside the table while I unfolded it over my knees. He did not watch my hands.

That almost undid me. I could argue with Gideon. I could bear Vivian's spite. I had no practice accepting kindness when there was nothing useful I could give in return.

Maeve waited until I looked up. "May I take blood?"

I held out my arm.

"When did you last shift?"

"I was twenty-four. A few months after I mated Gideon. The healers said stress could make a wolf withdraw."

"And you've heard nothing from her since?"

"Until last night. I fell through the river ice. She told me to swim."

Ronan's attention sharpened. Maeve set a filled vial in its rack and reached for another.

"Any heat now? Pain behind the eyes?"

"My skin feels too tight."

"Tell me if that changes."

She took the vials to the adjoining workroom. I waited for Ronan to follow her. He stayed where he was, studying the scrape on my wrist where Gideon had held me.

I drew the blanket higher. "You have questions."

"They can wait."

"The courier won't."

His mouth tightened. "He's being kept away from you."

"You still haven't offered sanctuary."

"I'm having Tamsin check the witnesses to the ceremony. If Gideon wants you surrendered, he will have to put his accusations before people he cannot order to agree with him."

It was a practical answer. I wanted something less practical from him, and the discovery embarrassed me. A day ago, I was still trying to keep my husband. Now I was watching another man's mouth and wondering whether he had felt anything when we lay on the floor together.

I looked away before he could notice. "Someone here helped the archer."

"Only six people had access to that tower today. One escorted the Ironwood courier. Tamsin is checking all six."

He hesitated. "There is also someone in my lower cells who may understand the command failure. Soren Kade. He used to keep the Concord's bloodline records."

"Why is he in your cells?"

"He stole some of those records and refused to explain why. I'd like to hear what he says about you."

The door opened. A young guard stepped inside carrying a folded cloak and boots. "Warden, the courier is demanding an answer."

"He can keep demanding."

The guard nodded, then looked at me. Recognition crossed his face before he could hide it. Ronan saw it too.

"You know her?"

"No, Warden."

Power entered Ronan's voice. "Look at me."

The guard's chin lifted. I felt the pressure pass over me, my body bracing for an obedience that never came.

"Did you fire the bolt?" Ronan asked.

"No."

"Did you help anyone enter the west tower?"

"No."

"Did you speak to the Ironwood courier?"

The guard's jaw clenched. Ronan stepped closer. "Answer."

"Yes."

Tamsin came in from the corridor. The young man looked toward her, but Ronan held his attention.

"About what?"

"He asked whether the woman was alive."

My fingers closed on the blanket.

"What did you tell him?"

"That she was in the border office."

Ronan released the command. The guard sagged against the doorframe.

"Take him downstairs," Ronan told Tamsin. "Keep him apart from the courier."

"I didn't shoot her!"

"Then tell Captain Tamsin everything you remember."

After they left, Ronan picked up the boots the guard had dropped. I watched him set them beside the table. He could be careful with me and still do that to another person; neither thing had seemed to cost him much effort.

"You enjoy that power," I said.

His eyes returned to mine. "Less than I used to."

Maeve came back with one of the vials. A clear reagent had left dark silver threads in the blood.

"Your body is clearing the suppressants too quickly," she said. "I need you to stay here until I understand why."

A sudden cramp pulled my fingers inward. I caught the table rail. Heat drove down my spine, and my nails lengthened against the iron with a sound that made Maeve put the vial down.

"Mara?"

I tried to release the rail. My hand would not open. A claw sank into the metal, then another, while pain spread up my arms.

Ronan moved toward me.

"Don't touch me."

He stopped. Maeve reached for a folded cloth and laid it under my wrist.

"Try to loosen your hand. Slowly."

"I am trying."

Something moved inside me, stretching into places that had been empty for years. Beneath the pain came an anger so deep I could not tell where mine ended and hers began.

Finally.

The word was clear. I gasped, and Ronan leaned forward.

"What did she say?"

"Finally."

Maeve looked at the gouges in the iron. "That is not a wolf waking normally."

The iron bedframe buckled beneath my grip. I tried to open my hand, but my claws only sank deeper.

“Mara.” Ronan stepped closer. “Can you let go?”

His hand settled on my shoulder.

I snarled and shoved him away.

My claws caught his shirt. I felt the fabric tear—then the flesh beneath.

Ronan struck the stone wall, catching himself with one hand.

“Ronan?”