Never Reject a Wolf Princess novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: White Banner

Elowen meets Prince Alaric under a white banner and watches him shot dead on Brogan's signal.

My uncle let me go.

I had expected him to forbid it, and I had a speech ready for that.

Instead he sent two guards to the tower at dawn and told them to put me on a horse.

"The prince asked for you by name," Osric said at the stable door, rubbing his rings. "It would be an insult to refuse."

His voice was kind, and his eyes were not.

He wanted me to fail in front of Highcrest, and I knew it.

I climbed into the saddle on legs that shook with fever.

Garran rode beside me, scowling at everything.

Behind us, on the road, a hundred of the royal guard came at a walk under their crimson cloaks.

Brogan rode at the head of them.

He did not look at me once.

The Ford of Dun is a wide, shallow crossing where the river runs over flat stones.

On the near bank, the guard drew up and sat their horses in two lines.

On the far bank, two hundred riders in grey waited under a hawk banner.

One man rode out alone into the water with a plain white banner on a pole.

That was Prince Alaric.

I rode to meet him in the middle of the river.

The water came to my stirrups, and nobody could say whose land it was.

He was thirty-one, tall and fair, with a short brown beard and a tired, civil face.

He lifted the white banner an inch, a courtesy.

"Princess," he said. "You look unwell."

"I've been better."

"I was sorry to hear it." He hesitated. "I was sorry for how it ended."

"No one should be refused like that, in front of a crowd."

I blinked at him.

I had come ready for rage.

"You came to talk," I said.

"I came to ask whether anything can be saved." He looked at the grey flashing water.

"My mother wants war. My men want war. I'd like to give them something better to want."

"You're not angry that I tore up your contract?"

"I'm very angry." His mouth twitched. "Mostly I'm relieved. I had never met you. I didn't like the idea of marrying a stranger either."

I laughed, and then I stopped, because it hurt.

"Alaric," I said. It was the first time I had said his name. "Why are you being kind to me?"

"Because a war is thirty years of funerals," he said simply. "I'd like to start fewer of them."

He drew a folded paper from inside his coat.

"A new treaty. No marriage. The border stays where it is."

"Each side opens the Veil Pass to the other's traders. Your father could sign it from his bed."

"My uncle is the one holding the pen."

"Then your uncle can sign it," Alaric said. "I only need someone in your court who wants it to happen."

I took the paper.

Our fingers brushed, and there was no mark, no pull, nothing at all.

It was strange how relieved I was to feel nothing.

"I'll put it in my father's hand myself," I said. "Give me three days."

He smiled.

"Three days, then," he said. "Princess, for what it's worth, I hope he was worth it."

I opened my mouth to answer.

Something small and fast hissed past my ear.

Alaric's smile stayed on his face.

His eyes widened, a little.

A crossbow bolt stood out of his chest, just under the collar, with grey feathers on the end of it.

Dunmarrow grey.

He tipped sideways off his horse.

I threw myself out of the saddle and caught him before the water did.

The river was cold and he was heavy, and the white banner floated away from us.

"Alaric!" I screamed.

On the far bank, two hundred Highcrest horses reared and a horn bellowed.

Behind me, the royal guard stayed where they were.

Nobody charged and nobody shouted an alarm.

I held Alaric's head out of the water with both arms.

Blood ran down my sleeves, hot against the cold.

"Don't talk," I said. "I've got you."

"Elowen." His voice was wet. "Tell my brother."

"Tell him what?"

"That I kept my word."

He coughed, and a thread of red ran from his mouth.

"He'll know what I mean," he whispered.

His hand tightened on my wrist, on the black mark, and then it loosened.

His eyes went still, looking at the sky.

I looked up.

On the low ridge above the near bank, behind the royal guard, a row of crossbowmen stood against the dawn.

In front of them, on a grey horse, sat Brogan Strachan.

His right arm was raised in the air, and he was holding it there.

Slowly, he lowered it.

Then he looked straight down at me and Alaric's body in the river, and he smiled.

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