Chapter 17: The Night Before

The Blood Moon rose tomorrow night, and I could not sleep.

I lay in Evander's bed with the ledger locked in the study down the hall.

Gavin sat guard in the chair beside it.

Evander lay on his back next to me with his eyes on the ceiling.

"You're thinking," I said.

"I'm counting."

"Counting what?"

"The ways it goes wrong."

I rolled over and propped myself on his chest.

"Count the ways it goes right."

He was quiet.

"There's one," he said at last. "You walk out of that assembly alive and free."

"That's the good one."

"Then I stand on the platform and watch you walk toward a life I'm not needed in."

"What?"

"You'll have your name back. You'll have the pack's apology and a hundred places to go."

His voice was very even.

"My father's house won't be the best of them. I'm going to lose you, Seren, and I'm going to let it happen."

"No."

"You don't have to say it now."

"I'm saying it now."

I sat up and swung my leg over him.

His eyes opened wide.

"Seren."

"You have a lot of opinions about what I'll do," I said. "You've had them since September. Give me the scarf."

He reached for the black silk on the nightstand and held it out, puzzled.

I took his wrists and drew them above his head.

I wound the silk around both of them, and I tied it to the iron bar of the headboard.

He watched me do it, and his breathing changed.

"You can break that," I said.

"Yes."

"Don't."

His throat moved.

"Tell me what you want."

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