Unwanted Shewolf novel · Chapter 18 of 24

Chapter 18: Without the Bond

I took Elias up from the cell myself, with two warriors behind us and no chains on his wrists.

The Moon Hall was empty, and one torch burned by the dais.

He stopped at the foot of the oak chair and looked at it for a long time.

"She used to sit me on the arm of it," he said. "I was five. I'd fall asleep there during the rite."

I didn't say anything.

He put out one hand and did not touch the wood.

"That's all," Elias said hoarsely. "I wanted to see it with nobody watching."

"Take him back," I told the warriors.

I did not feel better, and I did not feel worse.

Rafe was waiting at the doors with his coat around his bare shoulders, and he walked me to Marrick House without a word.

At the top of the stairs there was a room I had never been allowed to enter.

It had a carved bed, a window seat, and a dressing table with a silver comb laid out on it.

"This was hers," I said.

"Yes."

"Nobody's touched it."

"Dustin says your father kept it locked from the night she died."

I picked up the comb and put it down again.

I took my mother's hairbrush from my pocket and set it next to the comb, and they looked right together.

Rafe stood in the doorway with his hand on the frame, not coming in.

"Rafe."

"Yes."

"Ask me what I want."

He frowned.

"I know what you want," he said. "You want your seat and your pack, and you have them now. I'll walk you anywhere you want to go."

"That's not what I asked you."

"Hazel."

"I'm asking you something." I turned around. "If there were no bond, no Goddess, no Warden's rule. If I'd walked up to your gate and you'd never felt a thing. Would you want me?"

His face did not move.

Then he came into the room and shut the door behind him.

"I never told you about the climb," he said.

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