When Nelle Wychthorn was forced to sign herself away in marriage, she should have read the contract's fine print. Because she signs not with ink, but with blood. And that changes everything.
Season 1 'Of Crows and Thorns'
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Fiery Nelle, the isolat...
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FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK!
FUUUCK!
My ruined back was no secret. I didn't fuck with the light off or with a shirt on. Every woman I'd impaled myself in had seen the scars. They'd all asked about it, they simply couldn't help themselves after seeing the pain-marred flesh. I just didn't deign to offer them an answer.
I'd forgotten myself with Wychthorn.
She wanted to know who whipped me... But it was an answer she really didn't want to know. So I'd pushed her away. I'd been purposely cruel. But that was me, wasn't it? A weapon. A blade formed from flesh. This time the blades were words, and I'd cut deep to wound her pride, her heart, her soul. I made her go away and so easily too. That bet my brothers had was true. Fucking true.
Right now, I hated myself.
But it was better than telling her the truth, why those scars covered my back—the lashes, the bite of the whip—was all because of her. She'd done that to me.
When she'd been seven years old, locked up in the tithe prison, I'd just turned thirteen, and I'd endured a whipping every single week for a full year. A reminder never to fail again.
Ferne had really stuck it to me by choosing me for the Alverac. Maybe she did it because she thought it was my right to claim Nelle, but I had a feeling it all had to do with the fucked-up thing that hummed between Nelle and me. My sister sensed it—was amused and curious about it.
And my Aunt had assumed, though I'd been picked for the Alverac, I'd be impervious to Wychthorn. That with every lick of the whip, I'd hate her. And I had. My hate for Wychthorn had burned my heart to ashes.
But I'd come to know Nelle over the course of this year, as the Uzrek knew all too well.
Down in the dank chilly catacombs beneath Ascendria, the Uzrek had filtered through my mind, leafing through my memories, my deepest desires, my blackest thoughts, seeking the thing I feared most. His ancient voice—Such a delightful fear, Son of the Wyrm—and his awful bone-chilling laugh echoed inside my mind.
My darkest fear—that I would fall for Nelle.
Make it stop.
Make her go away.
Her discovery of my scarred back was a timely reminder I fucking needed. Today I'd given myself permission to shove aside who we were. No machinations—we were just a guy and a girl. But that was impossible, and it had been foolish of me to think otherwise.
From now on I had to keep my distance. Every moment I spent with her was dangerous. I could feel her unraveling me, and that I could not afford, not when my family needed her so godsdamned much.
It was simple. A choice I had to make—Wychthorn or my family.
