Chapter 16: Not Going Back

He woke a little after midnight, and the fever had broken.

I was still sitting on the edge of the bed with my bandaged hands in my lap.

"You stayed," Ronan said.

"I told you to say it again when you were awake."

He looked at the ceiling for a while.

"If the bond pulls you back to him," he said, "I want you to go. I won't lock the gate."

"Why?"

"Because you were raised for that chair. Four years. You knew the ledger and the elders and every dinner."

His jaw worked.

"I have no right to ask you to want this instead."

"Ronan."

"I'm not asking. I'm telling you where the door is."

"I know where the door is," I said.

I leaned over him.

"I walked out of it. Do you remember who was standing on the other side?"

"Me."

"You. With a hand at my back and nothing on your face at all."

His mouth moved. It was almost a smile.

"I didn't sit in that chair for four years because I wanted it," I said.

"I did it because I was told a wolfless widow was lucky to be asked."

"And then?"

"I drove to Warrick's hall every week and felt nothing but tired."

"And now?"

"Now I run up a mountain with my teeth out, because the mark on my wrist hurts when you're hurt."

He took my wrist and kissed the crescent.

"Rule three," I said, and my voice had gone unsteady. "I decide when it ends. It doesn't end."

He closed his eyes.

"Say it again," he said.

"It doesn't end, Ronan."

I kissed him.

I meant it to be careful because of his shoulder, but the care didn't last.

He made a sound low in his chest, and his good hand came up into my hair.

I got my sweater off one-handed.

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