Page 35

I went to the window.

The moon was almost full, bright enough to illuminate the north side of the fortress, the cliff beyond it, and the dark stretch of the Hollow Wood outside the wall.

Something was moving in the narrow strip of grass beneath my tower.

A wolf paced below.

It was larger than any of the wolves I had seen in Shift Control, with a coat so black that most of its body disappeared into the darkness except where the moonlight caught along its back and shoulders.

It moved restlessly along the base of the wall.

Five steps in one direction.

Then it turned and walked five steps back.

After several passes, it stopped.

Its head lifted.

Then it looked directly at my window.

At me.

Its eyes reflected gold in the moonlight.

The ache beneath my breastbone pulled hard enough to make my breath hitch.

I had never seen Kaelen Vance in wolf form. I had no logical reason to know that the animal below me was him.

I knew anyway.

Whatever lived beneath my breastbone recognized him before my mind could produce an explanation.

He had rejected me in front of half the school.

So what was he doing beneath my window in the middle of the night?

Was he watching me? Guarding me? Making certain that even after rejecting me, he could still summon a response from something inside me that I did not understand?

My nipples tightened beneath my nightshirt, and a low, unmistakable pulse of arousal moved through me, the same humiliating reaction I had experienced in the Great Hall.

I stepped away from the window and pressed a hand against my chest.

I was furious with him.

I was even more furious with myself.

Some part of me still wanted to open the window.

I waited for nearly a minute before forcing myself to look outside again.

The grass below the tower was empty.

I turned away from the window.

The rose on my washstand had opened another petal.

Its thorns were still intact.