Chapter 10: Ronan's POV

Ronan's POV

I felt the silver before I saw it.

It was a prickle at the back of my skull, a cold hum, the same note my wolf makes when a hunter's trap is close.

I had my forehead against Eira's shoulder, and her hair smelled of pine smoke.

I would have stayed there until the Moon fell out of the sky.

Then my wolf screamed.

I opened my eyes and saw the knife turning over in the air.

It was flying at the back of my skull.

I was bent over Eira, with my face at her shoulder.

If I ducked, it would go into her throat.

I turned.

I don't remember deciding.

I put my body between her and the blade, and the silver went into my left shoulder just under the collarbone.

The pain was white.

It rolled over me like boiling water, and my knees went out, and I heard Eira say my name.

She said it twice.

She had not said it in three years.

I had thought I would never hear it in her mouth again.

Now it came out of her cracked and frightened, and I would have taken the knife a hundred times for that sound.

"Don't pull it out," I heard someone say, far away.

"It's silver. If you pull it out wrong, he bleeds out."

Hands grabbed me.

The Warden's guards had rushed the field, and behind them came the Compact's healers in their gray coats.

I thrashed.

I had not meant to.

My wolf had gone wild with the burning, and he was clawing at me from the inside.

My fingers split into claws, and one of the healers cried out and fell back clutching her arm.

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