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Lady Glennis led us into the tree line. We walked single file on a path so narrow I could hardly see what she was following. The rich, earthy scent of the woods filled my nostrils, making my wolf perk into alertness in my chest. The trees were so tall overhead, topped with green despite the cold weather, and the sun fell in golden columns through the overhead branches, dappling the earth in light. The dirt was soft under my bare feet, save for the winding, knobby roots. I held the hem of my dress up just enough to keep it from the ground, though from what I could tell, none of the Nightfall wolves would’ve been displeased to see a bit of dirt on the hem. It might even be expected.
“Where is everyone?” I whispered.
“Shh,” Glennis said.
I saw no one, but I felt them. My wolf knew there were other wolves nearby. A lot of wolves. I could feel them, their presence prickling over me and making the hair on my arms stand up. Where were we going? I’d run through these woods once, but the woods as a human and as a wolf were very different places.
Finally, after walking for what felt like nearly a half hour, we reached a small, unfamiliar clearing. It was not a natural clearing—it had been grown this way, with the trees planted in a half-circle around the open, mossy space dotted with mushrooms.
It was in a half-circle because it was on a small cliff, no taller than a two-story building. Even from where I stood with Glennis, Fina, and Adora behind the tree line, I knew where the sensation was coming from. The wolves were under the cliff. It felt like all of Efra was here, the same crowd that filled the stadium for the challenge, but this time they were in their animal forms. My own wolf roused with anxiety, wanting to spring forth, as if she was pulled by the presence of so many others.
A violinist in the clearing began to play a delicate tune, the strings lilting through the air as if following the birdsong overhead. Fina and Adora walked into the clearing first and took their places a few paces from the edge of the cliff, to an audience of high-ranking court members in their human forms.
Then I was standing at the tree line with just Amity and Rue in their wolf forms at my back. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do—no one had told me exactly how this was supposed to go. I couldn’t see the king either, half-hidden as he was by the officiant as they both overlooked the crowd under the cliff. I glanced around, looking for some sort of instruction, when my father stepped into the tree line with a scowl on his face.
“What is this?” he hissed, sneering at my gown. He was dressed in his ceremonial finery, linen layered against the cold along with a cloak, all in the pale colors of Daybreak.
“It was designed for me,” I whispered back, briefly and thunderously frustrated. That’s what he was worried about now? The color of my gown? “Take it up with the king if it bothers you.”
It clearly did, what with the way his eyes flashed clay-red. He squeezed my wrist hard enough to hurt then roughly dragged my arm into the crook of his own. “Fine,” he said. “Try not to embarrass my court any further.”
I swallowed down my anger and steeled my expression into a pleasant neutrality. After today, I’d be rid of this man who called himself my father for good. There was no point in causing a scene over his childish behavior now.
The music changed into something even slower, more romantic, and my father led me out of the tree line and into the clearing.
The guests all turned to face me. There weren’t many guests in the glade itself, maybe two dozen, but I could feel the wolves beneath the cliff moving and peering up, their presence calling my own wolf as she reached out curiously toward them. Her interest warred with my sudden swooping panic.
What was I doing? Marrying the Bloody King of Frasia? Was this really happening?
He was supposed to be a monster. And yet now, given the choice between him and ruling alongside my father, I could only choose the king. If I couldn’t have my freedom, I could at least be free of the duke.
But how was I supposed to rule? I barely knew the intricacies of the Daybreak court. I knew nothing of the Nightfall court, of the wolves who filled the forest below the cliffs, with their strange rituals and flashing eyes. And now I was expected to rule them along with the other unfamiliar wolves across the country. Marrying the king was only part of the expectation. Panic tightened my throat as I stepped one bare foot in front of the other in small, delicate steps toward my fiancé.
Finally, the king turned away from the crowd below the cliffs. The turning away was marked with a few yips and short howls from the crowd below, which quickly faded into the anticipatory silence broken only by the delicate calls of the birds.
He looked stunning. He was dressed in in all white, so unlike the dark clothes I’d grown used to seeing him in, with fine loose trousers and a silk shirt. Over his shoulders hung a heavy cloak, lined with fur and fastened over his chest by a delicate white-gold chain. The chain matched the crown resting across his forehead which tamed his dark hair. It wasn’t the standard gold crown he’d worn at the finer events, but a white-gold crown like mine, with the metal weaving together like vines.
There was an openness to his expression too, one that I’d never seen before. I’d gotten a little better at reading his face, cataloging the quirks of his brow and twitches of his lips when something amused him, but this was different.
As he watched me, his lips slightly parted, and the king’s eyes widened and sparkled with a hint of gold. There was no amusement, no hidden agenda I could detect. Just adoration. Something like awe. Something closer to the way he’d only looked at me in the privacy of his quarters.
And now, that expression was on display in front of all his guests, and all the wolves of Frasia.
What that meant, I wasn’t ready to grapple with. But the panic in my chest wasn’t so intense under his gaze. My wolf settled instinctively when he was close.
He extended his hand. Even as frustration radiated off my father, he dropped my arm and stepped back into his place with the guests.
I took the king’s arm. He smoothed his thumb over my knuckles and smiled.
“Welcome,” the priest said warmly.
Finally, I looked up at him, ready to return his smile, and almost reared back in shock. I’d been to plenty of services in Daybreak venerating the gods, but the priests there were human, just like the rest of us. This priest was a lycaon – an in-betweener. He wasn’t fully human, nor fully wolf, but hovering in the place between them. His eyes glowed yellow, his teeth were elongated, and his fists were big and knobby with sharp claws at the end. His hair was closer to the texture of fur, extending down his cheeks, and it grew across his shoulders like a ruff.
I’d heard stories of lycaons like these, from the storybooks in Daybreak, but I’d never thought they still existed. Lycaons were supposed to be out of control, not fitting in life as either wolf or human, and eventually torn apart internally by the tension between their forms. But this man seemed perfectly comfortable, standing barefoot in plain brown pants and a shirt, in a place of honor at the edge of the cliff.
What else had I learned in Daybreak that was a lie?
“Your Majesty,” the priest said, “my lady. We gather here today under the watchful eyes of our gods to join both of you together in matrimony as leaders of Pack Nightfall and the Kingdom of Frasia. The Choice has guided you to your queen, and now you may enter the rest of your lives together.” He cast his yellow eyes around the guests. “With your court and your pack as witnesses, you will begin this journey.”
