The room at the end of the east wing had one bed, one window, and one guard.

He planted himself outside my door like a tree.

"Is he going to stand there all night?" I asked. "To keep me in? Or to keep you out?"

Thorne's mouth didn't move. "To keep you from wandering into rooms you don't belong in."

I untied the sash of the robe a servant had left me and let one side slip off my shoulder. Slowly. I took one step toward him, then another, until I could smell cedar on his collar.

"You sent riders for me," I said softly. "Kings don't do that for women they plan to throw out."

I lifted my hand to his chest.

He caught my wrist before I touched him. His grip was warm and absolutely steady.

"Fix your robe."

He pulled the fabric back onto my shoulder himself, the way you'd straighten a blanket on a sleeping child. Then he released me.

"I know your plan," he said.

My face went hot.

"You want to ruin Elias? Good. He deserves it." His gray eyes went cold. "Do it yourself. Don't treat me like your knife."

"And if I'm not strong enough on my own?"

"Then get stronger." He turned for the hall. "Goodnight, Vesper Lorne."

The door clicked shut. The guard shifted outside.

---

The moon wasn't due to fill for two more nights.

It rose anyway. Swollen. Red-gold.

The howl came first. It started low, somewhere deep in the castle, and climbed until the glass in my window split corner to corner with a crack like river ice.

Then the whole fortress answered. Hundreds of wolves, howling back.

I yanked the door open. The guard was gone. Boots pounded somewhere below, and men shouted.

I followed the sound to the north tower.

Gareth stood outside a heavy oak door, his back pressed flat against it. Long gouges ran down the wood from the inside.

"Go back to your room," he barked.

"What's happening to him?"

"The early moon. His heat came with it." Something slammed into the door, and Gareth's whole body jolted. "It happens to the strongest Alphas. He locks himself in and he rides it out. Alone."

"How long?"

"Until it breaks." His jaw was tight. "Or he does."

Another blow. The hinges groaned.

"He's going to tear through that door," I said.

"He won't. He'd rip his own hands off first."

I stared at the claw marks. At the blood smeared across the lowest one.

He'd sent me home with his coat. He'd sniffed nightroot in my veins and gone rage on my behalf.

And he was the most powerful weapon in the north.

"Move," I said.

"Absolutely not."

"Gareth. He's bleeding." I set my palm on the wood. "If he wants me gone, he'll throw me out himself."

He stared at me for a long beat. Then he slid the bolt.

---

The room was dark and burning hot.

Thorne crouched against the far wall, shirtless, his chest heaving. His veins stood out like cords. His knuckles were raw. When he lifted his head, his eyes weren't gray anymore. They were molten silver.

"Get. Out."

His voice came out wrecked, half human.

"No."

"Vesper." He dug his fingers into the stone floor. "I will hurt you."

"You sent me home untouched when I was drugged in your bed." I stepped closer. "You won't hurt me."

I stopped holding my scent back. I let it pour off my skin, warm and sweet and wild, the scent I'd kept locked down my whole marriage because Elias said it was too much.

Thorne went rigid. A growl rolled out of his chest.

"Don't," he rasped. "Don't do this for revenge."

"Maybe I'm doing it because you're bleeding all over your floor." I knelt in front of him. "Tell me no, Thorne. Say no and I'll walk out."

He didn't say no.

He said my name instead, like it hurt.

I kissed him.

He froze for one heartbeat. Then his hand fisted in my hair and he kissed me back, hard and hungry, his teeth catching my bottom lip.

"Last chance," he growled against my mouth.

"I don't want it."

He tore the robe open. His mouth found my breast and sucked my nipple hard, and I arched off the floor with a cry.

"Fuck, Vesper. You smell like you're already mine."

"Then fucking take me."

He lifted me like I weighed nothing and pinned me against the wall. I wrapped my legs around his hips. I felt his cock, thick and hot, pressing against my wet pussy.

"Look at me," he said.

I did. Silver eyes. Scarred brow.

He pushed inside me in one long, brutal stroke.

The stretch stole my voice. My nails dug into his shoulders.

"Thorne—fuck—"

"Too much?"

"Don't you dare stop."

He didn't. He fucked me against the stone, deep and relentless, every thrust jolting a moan out of me. His mouth dragged across my throat. His teeth grazed the spot where a mark would go and stopped, shaking.

"Not the mark," he gritted out. "Not tonight."

"Harder, Thorne."

He carried me to the floor, flipped me onto my hands and knees, and drove back into me from behind. His hand spread across my belly and pulled me back onto his cock.

"Come for me, Vesper. I want to feel you."

I came screaming his name. My pussy clenched around him, and he swore and came hard inside me, his forehead pressed to my spine.

It didn't break his heat.

It barely dented it.

He took me again on the rug. Again with my back on the cold stone. The window turned from red to black to gray. Somewhere around the fourth time, my arms stopped holding me up.

I felt him lift me. Felt soft sheets under my back. A blanket drawn up to my chin.

"Sleep," he murmured.

My last clear thought before the dark pulled me under was almost funny.

Elias had never once lasted past midnight.

---

I woke to sunlight and silence.

Thorne stood by the cracked window, fully dressed, buttoning his cuffs. His knuckles were wrapped in clean linen. His eyes were gray again.

"You're awake," he said.

I sat up, clutching the sheet. Every muscle I owned ached.

"Thorne, about last night—"

"Breakfast is outside the door. Gareth will walk you back to the east wing." He turned. His face gave away absolutely nothing. "Eat something."

That was all.

No mention of anything that had happened last night.

He reached for the door handle, then paused.

"Two days left," he said without looking back.

Then he was gone.

And that was when I noticed the thin silver chain on the pillow beside me. It held a small pendant, a wolf's tooth bound in wire.