Finally, reluctantly, he pulls back.
“I need to get you home,” he says, and I can hear the struggle in his voice. “Before I forget myself entirely.”
I want to protest, want to ask him to stay, but I can see the tension in his shoulders, the way his hands shake slightly as he steps away from me. He’s fighting the bond with everything he has, trying to be noble, trying to protect me from a choice he thinks I’m not ready to make.
But I am ready. I’ve been ready since the moment I saw him standing in that road, golden eyes burning in the headlights of my truck.
“Aelin,” I start, but he shakes his head.
“Not here. Not like this.” His voice is steadier now, the partial shift receding until he looks almost human again. Almost. “You deserve better than a claiming in the snow.”
A claiming. The word sends heat spiraling through me, and I have to bite my lip to keep from making a sound that would probably shatter his control entirely.
He sees it anyway—the way my breathing quickens, the flush that climbs my throat despite the cold. His eyes darken, and for a moment I think he might change his mind.
Then he’s moving, scooping me up in his arms like I weigh nothing. “Hold on,” he murmurs against my hair, and then we’re running through the forest faster than should be possible.
The trees blur past in streaks of silver and shadow, and I bury my face against his throat, breathing in his scent. He smells like pine forests and winter storms, like magic and wildness and home.
Too soon, we’re at my cabin. He sets me down gently on my front porch, his hands lingering on my waist for a moment before he forces himself to step back.
“Go inside,” he says, but his voice lacks conviction. “Lock the door. Try to sleep.”
“What about you?” I ask, already knowing I won’t like the answer.
“I’ll watch. Make sure you’re safe.” He’s already retreating toward the treeline, putting distance between us. “Twenty days, Jessa. We have twenty days to figure this out.”
And then he’s gone, vanished into the shadows like he was never there. But I can still feel him, somewhere in the darkness beyond my porch light. Watching. Waiting.
Protecting me from himself.
Inside, I go through the motions of getting ready for bed, but I know sleep won’t come easily. My skin feels too tight, like it’s been stretched over a frame that’s suddenly too small. Every nerve ending is hypersensitive, aware of the magic that still hums in the air around me.
It’s not until I’m changing into my pajamas that I see it.
There, on my shoulder blade, is a mark that wasn’t there this morning. It’s about the size of my palm, intricate and delicate as lacework. At first glance, it looks like a tattoo, but as I twist in front of the bathroom mirror, trying to get a better look, I realize it’s glowing.
Softly, subtly, but definitely glowing with its own inner light.
The design is beautiful—sweeping curves that might be antlers or branches, interwoven with symbols I don’t recognize but somehow understand. It’s a claiming mark, I realize with a start. Proof of the bond between us, visible only to those who know how to look.
I trace it with my fingertips, and warmth spreads through me like honey. Somewhere in the forest, I know Aelin can feel my touch on the mark and knows that I’ve discovered it.
Twenty days.
I look at myself in the mirror—flushed skin, wild hair, eyes bright with anticipation—and smile.
Twenty days to decide if I’m brave enough to bind myself to a fae king. To leave my human life behind and step into a world of magic and winter and ancient power.
The mark pulses warm against my skin, and I can feel him out there in the darkness, watching over me with the patience of winter itself.
I’m already decided. I have been ever since the moment he caught me falling and I realized I’d been falling toward him my whole life.
Now, I just have to convince him that some choices are worth the risk.
CHAPTER 6
AELIN
