The Mate He Gave Away novel · Chapter 17 of 40

Chapter 17: The Oath

The Adderley captain turned his horse as we rode up.

He was a narrow man with a long face, wrapped in a green cloak with the serpent on the shoulder.

"Corvin Ravenscar," he said. "You're no longer Warden here. By the king's order, Frostgate and the Wolfpass pass to the house of Adderley at the first snow."

He held up a gloved hand and let a few flakes land on it.

"It's snowing."

"I can see that," Corvin said.

"Your men won't open the gate."

"They're not my men anymore. You just said so."

The captain's jaw tightened.

Up on the wall, the sergeant hadn't moved.

"Sergeant," the captain called. "Open the gate, or every man inside is a traitor to the crown."

"Heard you the first six times," the sergeant called back.

Behind the gate, I could hear voices. A lot of them.

More than sixty soldiers.

"Open it," Corvin said quietly. "Let them see."

The sergeant looked down at him for a long moment.

Then he nodded to someone below, and the bar scraped back, and the gates swung open.

The yard was full.

The whole garrison stood in it, in their patched coats, with snow on their shoulders.

Behind them, crowding the kitchen door and the stable and the steps, stood the village.

Every family from the falls. The widows. The farmer who'd wept over the first flour. Children on shoulders.

At the very front, in her flour-white apron, with her arms folded, stood Agnes.

Davy was beside her, hopping from foot to foot.

The Adderley captain rode in through the gate with his forty men behind him.

He looked at two hundred faces looking back at him.

Nobody held a weapon.

Corvin swung down off his horse in the middle of the yard.

He didn't say anything.

He looked at Agnes.

She unfolded her arms.

She walked out across the snowy yard, short and solid, until she stood right in front of him.

"Hold out your hand, boy," she said.

He held it out, palm down.

She put her floury hand on top of it.

"I nursed you. I followed you up here when nobody else would. I've fed you for eight years and you've burned every pan I own."

Somebody laughed.

"I swear to you as my Alpha," Agnes said, loud enough for the gate. "Not the king's man. Mine. By my own choice, in the open."

← Chapter 16 · All chapters · Chapter 18 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend