Severed Ties: Rise of the Silver Wolf novel · Chapter 31 of 48

Chapter 31: The Key

Thea's POV

I was sitting on the Keep gate when he came up the track in the dark.

I had been there since moonrise, with my knees pulled up and Brigid's cat asleep against my hip.

He walked slowly, and he kept his hands in his pockets.

I knew before he reached me that he had decided to tell me everything.

"Come inside," he said.

"Say it here."

"It's cold."

"I'm not cold." I slid down off the gate. "Say it."

He told me.

He told me all of it, in order, and I stopped him only once.

"Did you drink any of it?"

"No."

"Then go on."

He went on, and my hands closed into fists inside my sleeves.

I listened to the rest without moving.

When he got to the last part, he stopped and looked at the ground.

"My wolf wanted to kneel," Ewan said.

I waited.

"I have never knelt. Not to the Council, not to my father. I stood there with his hand on my collarbone, and everything in me tried to fold." He lifted his head. "I didn't, but I wanted to. I wanted you to hear it from me."

"Why?"

"Because I'm afraid I'll lose."

It was the first time I had heard him say it.

I walked across the frozen grass and put my arms around his waist, inside his coat.

He was shaking, very slightly, from the cold, or from something that wasn't cold.

"Good," I said, into his chest.

"Good?"

"You told me. You didn't walk home and pretend it was nothing." I tipped my head back. "He said I sleep deeply when I'm tired."

"I know."

"He thinks I still do. Judith told him how it was."

"I know." His jaw went tight. "Thea, if I lose..."

"I'm not leaving. I'm not swearing. And I'm not asking you to stop."

He closed his eyes.

"Come inside," I said, and this time he did.

We climbed the four flights of stairs without a word.

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