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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Gods, I'd waited for this moment for years—to cut Nelle down and make her pay. Watch the life drain out of those vibrant gray eyes and pure terror erupt instead.
But deep down, I knew my own truth.
I cared for her. I always had. Even when I'd denied it, refused to acknowledge it—lied to myself about it.
Nelle waited nervously, the fierce spirit that lived and breathed in her gaze dulled with dread, while condemnation scorched through my body with the ruthlessness of wildfyre, leaving nothing behind but shame and self-loathing.
Nelle or my mother?
Every cell in my body rebelled against me as I fought against the need burning inside. To confess. To fall on my knees and beg forgiveness for something that had yet to pass.
Nelle thought she was the monster.
It couldn't be further from the truth.
I was.
I was the monster that lurked in a shadowed crack, preying on her, silent and still and waiting with infinite patience for her to pluck a silken strand so I could strike. I'd drag her into my lair and feast on everything good inside of her. Bleed her dry until she was a husk of hate.
And it was there, a monstrous chain around my heart, weighing me down and binding my soul in a barbed-wire embrace, almost about to roll off my tongue, my confession, the truth of the Alverac. My mouth parted—
The abrupt sound of hurried footsteps jolted us apart.
Someone who smelled of honey and orange blossoms rounded the temple and saved my fucking ass.
Mela Văduva.
Nelle reacted instantly.
She whirled away to face the two interlopers who stumbled across the cobblestones, elbows looped around each other, their laughter momentarily deadened by the boom of thunder.
As soon as Nelle saw Mela Văduva and Elyse Estlore, every muscle in her body tensed, but it was Mela whom her wolf-bright eyes were fixed on. Curiously, her fingers curled—nails biting into soft palms—lips thinning as she bared her teeth. Her freckles were a stark contrast to a complexion that had a waxen sheen.
The ends of my hair lifted as a bitter wind raked around us. Cooler and fiercer than the storm gusts, aether sparkled like spindrift on its wings.
Oh, fuck.
Nelle's eyes were slitted and she looked as if she wanted to gouge Mela's eyes out.
It was instinct to slide my hand beneath the moonlit locks of hair and wrap my large hand around her slender neck, right where she was vulnerable most. I didn't need to feel her humming dragonfly pulse against my fingers, because mine matched hers beat for beat. I forced her head around, and her body stiffly followed. I lowered my head, so there was nowhere else she could look but into my eyes. She was gone somewhere else inside that clever head, bristling as her nostrils flared with the sharp rapid breaths. The sliver of her eyes shone predatory and unblinking, and beads of sweat glistened along her hairline.
