I Offered Myself for Their Peace, and the Lycan King Was Waiting novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Three Days Old

The contract is read before the Lycan court, Lucan sets his terms, and four black wolves howl her name below the sea-gate.

They read my father's contract aloud in front of two hundred Lycans.

Lucan did not ask me to come. He asked whether I wanted it read in private or in public.

I said public.

I wanted every one of those silver-eyed strangers to hear what my family had done.

The great hall of Stormhold was cut into the cliff itself.

Long tables ran down it, full of people who stopped eating when I walked in.

I wore a plain grey dress someone had found for me, and my hair was still damp.

My hands were wrapped in clean linen where my own claws had torn them.

Lucan walked half a step behind my shoulder. He did not hold my arm.

An old Lycan with a white beard unfolded the paper and read it in a voice that carried to the back wall.

"I, Henry Lamont, Alpha of Ashgrove, give my youngest child, a daughter, to the King of the Lycans."

"She is to be his queen when she has lived eighteen years."

My knees went weak, and I locked them.

"Until that day, the King will not set foot on Ashgrove land, and will not claim her."

"In return, the Lycan host will hold Ashgrove's borders against all rogues."

"This holds as long as the girl lives under the King's roof of her own free will."

"If she is ever taken from his roof by force, the guard ends."

He stopped. The hall was silent.

Henry Lamont, Alpha. A red seal. A second signature in a different hand, and the date.

Three days after I was born.

I stood in the silence and felt something go cold and quiet in me.

"So he sold me," I said.

My voice carried, and I let it.

"The man who couldn't stand to look at me. He didn't even wait for me to learn to walk."

"Keira," Lucan said.

"What did you pay him?"

"Nothing," he said. "Your father asked for no coin."

"Then what did the Lycans get?"

"You."

A murmur went through the benches.

I turned and looked at him. He held my eyes without flinching.

"I did not ask for this," he said. "My father made the other signature before I was old enough to be asked."

"I kept the oath for eighteen years. I will not pretend I am sorry you came."

"You are not asking."

"I am telling you the truth. What you do with it is yours."

I looked back at the hall.

Two hundred faces looked back, and not one of them looked at me the way Ashgrove did.

They looked at me with hope, and I did not know what to do with that either.

"I'm not your queen," I said, to all of them. "I walked into that water to die. That is the only reason I'm here."

"Then let me give you terms," Lucan said, "and you can decide whether to stay for them."

The old Lycan lowered the paper.

"One season under my roof," Lucan said. "Your own room, beside mine, with a door that locks from the inside."

I almost laughed.

"I will not claim you. I will not touch you unless you ask me. You will eat at my table and walk where you want."

"And if I leave?"

"There is a word. Say tide, at any hour, and I will carry you to the shore myself."

He paused.

"If you leave for good, the guard on Ashgrove ends. That part is your father's, not mine. I cannot change it."

So that was the price of the door.

"Why would you tell me that?" I said. "You could have kept it back."

"Because you would have found it in the paper tomorrow."

I breathed out.

"One night," I said. "I stay one night."

"One night," he said.

A woman in a white apron brought soup to a small table by the hearth.

She set it in front of me with a spoon and bread.

I sat down.

It was the first meal I had ever eaten without being told to finish before the family came in.

I picked up the spoon with my bandaged hand and it shook.

Lucan sat across from me.

Without a word he took the spoon from me and turned my hand over in his.

His hand was warm and rough, and it was the second time I had felt it.

He unwrapped the linen. The claw tears had opened again and bled through.

"This will sting," he said.

"I know."

He cleaned each palm with a damp cloth, slowly, and he did not look at my face while he did it.

My wolf went quiet and pressed forward against my ribs.

She liked this.

I did not. I was cold to my bones, and every place his thumb moved turned warm.

"Done," he said, and he did not let go yet.

Then the double doors at the end of the hall banged open.

A guard ran in with salt water running off his coat.

"Majesty," he said, out of breath. "Four black wolves on the cliff below the sea-gate."

Lucan's hand tightened on mine.

"They're howling a name," the guard said. "Over and over."

I already knew which one.

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