Fury Bound (The Wolves of Ruin, #2) — Chapter no 22

22

MERYN

enna and Noemi have the grace not to scream. Within moments, I canV tell they’ve both done a quick calculation—I’m not shocked or scared, and neither is Stark—and have schooled their faces back into neutral expressions.

I’m overwhelmed by all of it. My fear for my sister, the vicious spilling of blood, the terrible truth finally revealed to my friends. My body and mind are both wrung out.

And I’m aching from the rejection. Soldiers, who should’ve been my soldiers, whom I felt a duty to take care of—rejecting me full stop. How many like them are out there? How many more have deserted?

How many people refuse to recognize my rule because I’m a woman?

And how can I ever win their loyalty if they’re withholding it over the most central, unchangeable part of me?

“We should do something about the bodies,” I say in a daze, as if my sister was not feasting on one directly in front of us all. “It’s not right to just… leave them here.”

Anassa chimes in, “We wolves can dig a shallow grave and bury them.

That should suffice.”

I agree with this, although a part of me smarts. Despite how despicably these men behaved, they were people with families or friends—just as my father was. That they won’t come home—that no one will ever know what happened to them—will hurt someone, somewhere.

All four of the wolves start to dig and bury. Meanwhile, Saela finishes up her… snack… and seems like she’s in a disoriented stupor from the

meal.

This is the first time she’s tasted human blood since the day she turned. I wonder if it’s doing something different to her.

She pulls off the body and crawls back toward me. She looks like a nightmare—her hands and chin and clothes soaked in scarlet gore, her gaze unfocused, hair matted and slick with blood. Venna’s face twists in a way too complicated to read.

I hurry toward my sister and help her stand, mostly carrying her back to the edge of the clearing. Then I sit her down against a tree, where she promptly falls asleep.

After I’m sure she’s safe, I take a couple of quick strides over to Noemi and Venna.

“Would’ve been useful information to know we had a Siphon traveling with us before we departed the castle,” Noemi drawls, her arms crossed tightly across her chest. Her beautiful face is slightly pinched in irritation, and she stares off into the distance where Stark oversees the wolves’ work.

Venna’s gaze cuts me to the quick. Her eyes are hard, flinty. “How

long?”

Nausea roils in my stomach. “Ven—”

“How long, Meryn?”

“Since you freed her,” I say, resigned. “Killian turned her, at some point between when we found her in the dungeons and when you and Stark got there. She doesn’t remember it happening. He altered her memory.”

Venna’s face falls. “That poor girl.”

“I’m so sorry,” I tell her, my throat tight around the words. “I didn’t want to hide this from you but… I just didn’t know what else to do.”

“I’m not sure what you want me to say, Meryn,” she says. “I’m so fucking mad at you right now. Siphons are our enemies. They’re dangerous.

And you’ve had one living under our noses this entire time. You let me spend time alone with her, tutoring her, without telling me the danger I was in.”

I grab her arm, but Venna shakes me off.

“Ven, I trust you, I swear,” I plead. “But the fewer people who knew, the better. She’s my sister. My only living family. You know that I would do anything for her.”

She turns her head, watching Saela as she sleeps against the tree.

Hopefully seeing the same thing I do: a small, innocent, hurting child.

Someone to protect, not fear.

“We’ve been feeding her animal blood,” I continue. “She’s been under close watch at all times—yes, even when you’ve been teaching her sign language. Didn’t you wonder why Helene and Grigore were always keeping guard? Aside from the fangs, she hasn’t been a threat to anyone. And I’m trying to figure out how to reverse it. I’m going to save her.”

Venna’s lips flatten into a tight line, her dark eyes growing glassy. “I get it,” she says eventually. “There’s nothing more important than a sister.”

The words twist my insides into a tight, painful knot. I reach out again, but she holds up a hand, stilling me.

“I need some time to think about this, Your Highness,” she says, her

voice aloof.

My heart sinks. “Please, Ven.”

The wind blows her short strands of glossy black hair around her face, still turned away. “I understand from one sister to another, but friend to friend, I just… need space, Meryn.”

Noemi finally chimes in. “Why don’t Venna and I go ahead to Linsfall?

We’ll spend the night with the nobles there as planned and tell them that you and Stark had to keep moving.”

My gaze darts between the two of them. Venna still won’t look at me.

“That probably makes sense,” I say slowly. “Goodness knows we can’t exactly take Saela into town right now. Stark and I will set up camp somewhere nearby, and you can meet back up with us in the morning.”

Assuming they don’t both decide to turn right back around to Sturmfrost. I can’t say that I’d blame them for it, either.

Ephyse and Skaia pad over, their muzzles bloody and their paws coated in dirt from their horrific task. Stark follows, pulling Noemi to the side and talking in a low tone. Their bodies are pressed so close together, and I glance away, feeling like I’m intruding on something. When they part, Venna and Noemi mount.

Noemi nods to me, then the two of them turn tail and head toward the encroaching darkness.

Stark approaches me with Cratos and Anassa. “Looks like we’ll be camping tonight,” I tell him.

He grunts. “I have some packs for that. Dumped them off Cratos in the

woods when we realized what was happening to you two. Let’s go grab them and find a clearing that doesn’t reek of death.”

Stark helps me lift Saela’s listless form onto Anassa’s back, and then we both mount our wolves. Within an hour, we’ve found a suitable campsite slightly closer to Linsfall and have set up a campfire to keep us warm in the cool night air.

I pull the shadows down around us, an amplified form of the Kryptos rifting power. It masks our location entirely. The ease and strength of the pack powers will never cease to mystify me, but then, I know Anassa is helping me channel them.

Of the two of us, at least one is wise and skilled in the ways of the Bonded.

My direwolf has lain down on the opposite side of the fire. Saela is curled up in Anassa’s side, continuing to sleep. I pull a scratchy woolen blanket out of one of Stark’s packs and lay it over her. I’m not sure how long she’ll be out, but between Anassa’s warmth, the fire, and the blanket, she should be comfortable through the night.

Finally, I stop busying myself and plop down on a big fallen log we have set in front of the fire. Then I put my head in my hands, grounding myself in the warmth of my own palms.

If I think too hard about the look that Venna first gave me when she realized what was happening… I just might fall apart.

Stark throws another log onto the fire, and I look up in surprise at the sound. He looks every bit his reputation right now: His shirt and jacket are caked in blood and gore. There’s a ruby slash of it across his cheek, and I know it’s not his own.

I’ve seen Stark fight before, was awed by his battle strength at the front.

But today… Venna and Noemi helped, but Stark killed at least twenty of those men himself. Without thinking twice about it. Never flinching, never faltering.

His expert impelling was chilling to watch, even for me.

It’s astounding that any Bonded could have that much power without making some sort of corrupt bargain.

He senses me watching and turns to meet my gaze, then looks down at himself. “Probably should change out of this, huh? That’s one set of clothes ruined. This much blood doesn’t come out when it’s set.”

Spoken from experience.

A person with an ounce of self-preservation would be quaking with fear right now.

Instead, I swallow hard, a heat that has nothing to do with the campfire building in my core. “Yeah, I guess you should.”

First comes off the jacket, which he tosses into the flames. Then he reaches over his head and grabs the back of his shirt, yanking it off in one swift move.

And then Stark Therion is shirtless in front of the fire, and my needy brain wants to howl at the sight.

I thought I knew what I liked in a man’s body.

But then, I’ve never seen a man like this before.

His torso is as broad as the rest of him, narrowing slightly at the waist.

There’s a slight dusting of hair on his chest, and underneath it… muscles.

So many muscles. Does the human body even have this many muscles?

Apparently so, and Stark has perfected every single one. Noemi is a lucky woman.

His pecs are bulky and firm, leading down to what can only be described as abs for days. He looks like he has a forty-pack, pronounced enough that it could probably cut glass.

Beneath them is a V line, so perfectly defined that my stupid fucking mouth literally starts to water. I’m desperate to touch it, to find out where it

leads.

It’s lewd.

The sight of his shirtless torso is lewd; there’s no other way to explain it.

And then, of course, there are the kill tattoos—runic in style, applied by different hands. They litter his body in a dark, dangerous dance that only serves to emphasize how utterly deadly he is. Almost every inch of him is inked.

I’m so busy ogling him that I almost miss it… until I don’t. The tattoos

can’t quite hide them.

Scars.

Everywhere.

All over his front. He’s covered in deep, crisscrossing lines. They catch the firelight like spiderwebs.

And I know, with a sick churning in my gut—I know.

These are from before he was bonded.

The wolves heal wounds too quickly. Even deep cuts leave only a light scar. But he bonded when he was only eighteen… I draw in a sharp breath, and he looks down at me quickly, meeting my eyes.

A shadow passes over his gaze, and he turns away, heading to his rucksack.

“Stark,” I say. We need to talk about it. That many scars… He grabs a new shirt out and roughly pulls it on. “Leave it, Meryn.”

“No!” My voice comes out shrill. “Stark—”

He advances on me swiftly, fire in his eyes.

“I said, leave it.” He’s towering over me now, menacing. I forget, sometimes, just how much taller he is than me. I have to crane my neck to keep his gaze.

“Or what?” I say through clenched teeth, unimpressed by his attempt at intimidation. “You’re going to lose control on me? I’d love to see it.”

“I guarantee you, princess, you wouldn’t.” His words hold dark promise that do nothing to cool the inferno raging inside me.

Drawing a ragged breath, he tries to turn away from me.

Fuck. That.

He’s made me face hard things head-on. He doesn’t get to shrug off the same.

I grab a fistful of his black shirt, then yank it up his torso, exposing the scars once again to the firelight.

They’re even more brutal this close. The dark ink does a good job of masking things from a distance, but now I can see that the skin all over his torso is gruesomely puckered.

These weren’t an accident. Every one of these cuts looks intentional.

Anger starts to build, shadows dancing at the edge of my vision.

“Does it scare you?” His voice comes out as a viscous caress, and I shiver. “This reminder of violence carved into my body?”

Underneath his brusque tone, I can hear something else. I don’t know if it’s some wolfish instincts or the ties we have binding us, but I hear the real

question he’s asking.

Does it disgust you?

My eyes sting. How could he think that? How could he ever see himself

that way?

I place a palm flat on his torso, the heat of him and the bumps from the scars underneath my skin. He hisses. But I don’t move my hand, and he

doesn’t flinch.

“Who did this to you?” I demand.

Stark lets out a low laugh, pushing me off him. He turns swiftly, trying to walk away again. But I snare his wrist, yanking him back around.

He thinks he’s some tough, violent avenger.

Well, guess what, buddy? There are two of us.

I draw closer to him until he’s forced to stare down at me, to see how serious I am, to read it in the pain in my eyes. Then I breathe deeply, his amber musk filing my senses and lending me strength.

When I speak, it’s with all the depth of the darkness that thrives in my veins.

“Give me a name, and I’ll erase it from the earth.”

Stark’s nostrils flare with suppressed emotion. I notice every twitch in his jaw, memorize every eyelash as he blinks at my rage.

“I already did, princess,” he says, voice low. “You can stand down.”

“Who?” I demand again.

He lets out an aggravated sigh and shakes my hand off his wrist. I feel the loss of the contact acutely. “My weapons trainer as a child. He found me lacking.”

Horror roils inside me, cold and unrelenting. “Did Siegrid know? Why didn’t she stop it?”

“She hired him for a reason. She wasn’t around, anyway. The Sovereign Alpha was at the front, and I was given over to teachers who could make me, in her words, strong enough to survive the end of the world.”

The words hit me like a punch. She did this to him. His mother— The shadows are building now, starting to creep like leeches up my arms and legs.

He angles his jaw at me, and I can see it clearly, the scar I’ve always wondered about. “In fact, she did this one herself when I was twelve.

Haven’t you learned this about the Sovereign Alpha yet? She cares only about her own goals. She needed me to be stronger than I was and did not care what it took to get me there.”

“I’m going to end her.” A wind kicks up as the shadows start to spiral

around the two of us, darkness spreading through the campsite in a maelstrom. It’s inside of me too, coating my veins until all I feel is a pulsing need to tear something apart.

Stark leans his face closer to mine, something hard and frightening in his gaze. “Not everyone gets a loving family, Meryn. Some parents see their child only as a means to an end. This is how you make a monster.”

Then he blinks, taking note of the dark vortex I’ve whipped around us without even commanding it. As usual, it’s out of my control. I don’t know how I started it, and I don’t know how it will end.

Oh goddess, I can’t make it stop.

“Meryn,” he says, stern and commanding. The assertiveness in his voice makes my blood thrum, and the shadows respond in kind. “Stop that.”

I can’t. I can’t. But… maybe he can.

I have the strangest sense that if I just reach for him, he can funnel this

feeling away.

If he’s such a monster, well maybe— Only a monster can lead me out of the dark.

I reach and reach, but nothing.

“It’s not working,” I say in a gasp, tears starting to fall down my face.

“I’m furious, Stark. My rage is eating me alive.”

Anassa chooses this moment to finally nudge her consciousness against mine. “Meryn. Breathe. Get the shadows under control. Siegrid is not here to direct your anger at. Even if she was—you need her, for now. When the time is right, we will seek retribution.”

Her words calm me, and the shadows slip back down to the ground, sink into the earth.

Stark reaches up, roughly swipes a tear from my face with his calloused thumb. I want to take the pad of it into my mouth, relish the heat of his palm against my face.

“Don’t waste your tears on me, princess,” he murmurs. “I’m glad she did this to me.”

I startle at the harsh words spoken so plainly. “You are?” How could anyone be glad for something so horrific, so unnatural?

“Yes,” he growls. “I don’t waste time on sentiment now. I act. And it makes people fear me.”

I still don’t understand. “Why would you want that?” It’s the opposite of

what I’ve been seeking to provoke in people, with arguable success.

He presses his mouth to the shell of my ear. The warmth of his breath causes a buzzing so electric I’m sure I’ve never felt alive like this before.

“Their fear is a balm. I’ll be everyone’s villain to scare them away from you.”

He pulls back, catching my eyes with his dark, burning gaze, and there’s an avalanche from my head to my toes.

His face is so near mine. I can see all his stubble in the firelight, all the colors of his irises. They’re not a solid brown, I realize for the first time.

They’re ringed in black, and flecked with gold toward the center, so subtly that it’s easy to miss. My stomach swoops.

It would be easy to close the distance between us.

Two inches at most.

Does he kiss like he fights, with lethal force and incredible skill? Or would he be gentle with me, take his time and explore?

Saela coughs. We both startle from the sound, and he steps away. The loss of his heat is instantaneous and keen, like something precious has been ripped from my greedy hands.

What might have happened if I’d pushed Stark over the edge? Finally found out what it means for him to truly lose control?

I’m not sure I’d ever recover from it.

And what about Noemi, whom Stark claims to love? Maybe I imagined the spark between us. Maybe he has no interest in me like that.

Even if he did, I would never act until I knew for sure there’s nothing going on there. If they’re together… I couldn’t cross that line. I’d never do that to another person.

“We should get some sleep,” Stark says quietly. “We have a long journey tomorrow.”

We ready the sleeping pallets in silence. Get into them next to each other in silence. Close our eyes, pretending to sleep in silence. At least, I’m pretending.

Because all night long I burn and I burn and I burn.

Morning takes forever to arrive.

The fire has turned to coals, and the sky is barely lightening when I hear approaching footsteps. Anassa’s ears swivel. She lifts her head to inhale.

But I don’t need her nose to tell me the heavy footfalls are direwolves. I stand at the sound.

Taking a deep breath, I let the rift mask ease away, revealing the rest of the camp to a tired-looking Venna and an annoyingly beautiful Noemi. The woman looks like she didn’t miss a wink. I try not to watch as she and Stark embrace.

Venna moves toward me, saying nothing. When her arms go around me, painful emotions riot in my chest. It’s guilt for not telling her the truth. But it’s also sweet relief tinted with grief.

We don’t have Iz any longer, but we have each other. Thank the goddess, we have each other.

When we pull apart, her hands linger on my arms. “Are we okay?” I ask,

letting hope and fear show on my face.

Her expression is solemn.

“I know that you’re the queen now, Meryn, and I’m not always going to be privy to your decision-making. But your choices here hurt me. Can you promise you’ll let me in on anything you can, especially if it might concern my safety?”

“I swear,” I say instantly. “I’ll do better.”

Venna nods once. “Then we’ll be okay,” she says with certainty I probably don’t deserve.

I think she understands that it was fear that drove me, but I still resent myself for it. I was once so furious at Anassa for withholding the truth. To turn around and do the same thing to a close friend? It makes me hate myself a little bit, even if I had a good reason.

When Venna steps away, Noemi takes her place. “We’re good?” she asks

gently.

“Uh… yeah,” I say. “I mean… are we?”

There’s still so much I don’t understand about Noemi—particularly Stark’s relationship with her. What are they to each other? Does she love him, too?

And can I stop fucking obsessing about it every time my mind has a quiet moment?

Noemi shrugs an elegant shoulder and brushes her long red hair over it.

“Don’t let her bite me, and we’ll be fine.”

That seems about as positive a reaction as I can possibly hope for to a “hey, by the way, my sister’s a Siphon” reveal, so I shoot her a tight smile and start to break down camp.

Eventually, I wake Saela up from where she still sleeps against Anassa’s side. She looks down at her bloodstained clothes and then up at Venna and Noemi and starts to cry.

“It’s okay,” I tell her as I lead her into the woods to change.

It takes some coaxing to get her to come back out to the campsite. Saela is mortified and ashamed of what she is. But when we emerge from the trees, Venna holds an arm out and Saela goes to her. They cling to each other silently for a long moment.

Then it’s time to get back on the road. We ride hard, but Saela seems stronger. Or at least more alert and less withdrawn than she’s been since her transformation.

She still keeps close to Anassa’s side when we take breaks for her to stretch her legs, but a little flicker of secret hope catches in my chest.

Shadows lengthen across the cold ground as we ride toward Weisenstat.

Dawn turns to noon turns to evening. The landscape begins to change.

Forest gives way to open terrain, large segments of it divided into farms.

The first sign that we’re nearing the front is the smoke. We see it from leagues away. I don’t remember the choking haze the last time I came to the

active war zone with Stark.

It’s not a good sign.

I tap into the sea of communication in my mind, as lightly as possible.

The force of anxiety running through everyone stationed here almost knocks me off Anassa. It strengthens as we draw closer and closer.

We crest a hill, and take in the full extent of the disarray.

In the distance, the plumes of smoke rise from beyond the defensive line, marking successful Astreonan incursions into our precious farmland, territory that was previously secure. It’s an omen that swallows up the sky.

A wave of horror in the air that’s only going to creep closer and closer.

Slowly but surely, the Siphons are overtaking us.

A shiver runs down my spine, and I turn my head. Stark is already looking at me. I know he’s thinking it, too.

The situation is worse than we anticipated. Whatever awaits us inside that camp, we’re riding into a crisis that might already be beyond salvaging.

“What are we in for?” I ask Anassa over our bond.

She has no answer. She just moves forward, descending toward the chaos of the front lines.