Chapter 12: The Mark

We sat on the dock with a wool blanket from the boathouse around both our shoulders.

It was the only warm thing in a mile, and neither of us mentioned that we were sitting close.

He told me in a flat quiet voice, looking at the water.

"At the circle, I was twenty-seven.

"I'd sealed forty-one breaks in six years.

"I stood at the edge with the iron ring, and I felt nothing, because I never did.

"Then you stepped forward, and your mark came up, and I felt a hook in my ribs.

"I thought it was the cold."

"Then you took my hand."

"Then the bond broke under my hand, and I felt it reach for something.

"It jumped.

"It went from you to the nearest living thing, and that was me.

"It happens once in a thousand breaks.

"The law says a Warden who finds himself the new mate of the wolf he's sealing must stop, declare it, and step down.

"I knew the law by heart."

"And you didn't."

"You were eighteen, and you were bleeding in front of two hundred people.

"You had just watched your mate choose your bully.

"You looked at me like I was a wall.

"I couldn't say, 'By the way, the bond you hate is on my wrist now.'

"I couldn't be one more man claiming you in the worst hour of your life."

The water lapped at the dock.

My hands were gripped together in my lap.

"So you let me leave."

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