76

Now the king was angry. I could sense it radiating off him, and my wolf could feel it, too, hunkering down in my chest. He’d been playing with Griffin before, and now Griffin had proven himself a stronger challenger than the king had expected. The king growled, stalking closer. Griffin met his gaze steadily, head low and lips drawn back.

Then Griffin lunged forward again. In his confidence, he jumped high, aiming to get his mouth around the king’s neck. But the king saw it coming. He ducked low, so Griffin was nearly on top of him, then slammed his jaws closed hard on Griffin’s front leg, right at the top near the shoulder. The bone crunched under the pressure and Griffin yowled, high and pained. My skin crawled at the sound, and I leaned forward slightly in an attempt to see better. Blood stained the dirt of the arena.

The king released him, his teeth stained red. He growled again, hackles up and his head low— another space in the battle for Griffin to submit.

I squeezed my hands into fists so hard my nails bit into my palms. Griffin lurched heavily to one side, his mangled front leg dragging uselessly in the dirt. His eyes blazed with anger, and spit frothed at the corners of his jaws, giving him a look of madness as opposed to the king’s calm, bloodstained anger. He growled, low and furious, and the fixated crowd shouted their excitement.

My heart sank. The king had offered Griffin two opportunities to submit—that was two more than

he had to, by tradition. It was well within his rights to slaughter Griffin where he stood, and yet, he had given him the chance to leave this challenge alive. Yet Griffin either still clung to the fantasy that he could beat the king—or he would rather die than return home defeated.

Griffin charged forward, as best he could without collapsing onto his broken leg. With his jaws open and froth of spit and blood flying, he careened forward toward the king. The king shifted his weight to one side, then slammed his shoulder into Griffin’s body, easily knocking him off balance. Griffin yelped in pain as he crashed to the ground on his bad side, and then the king was on him, pinning him down. Griffin’s back legs pawed at the king’s body in a desperate attempt to claw him off. The king was unmoved and indifferent to Griffin’s desperate thrashing.

Then the king closed his jaws hard on his throat.

Griffin’s yelps and growls turned to gurgles as blood gushed from the wound. The king kept his jaws in place, then shook his head twice, hard.

The snap of bone echoed through the arena. Griffin’s body slumped lifelessly to the dirt. The crowd exploded into noise and the stomping of feet. The king raised his head toward the morning sky and howled his victory, a long sound that was mirrored by the crowd calling out their own shouts and howls in their human voices.

The noise was muffled in my ears, as if I was suddenly plunged underwater. Distant. Separated from the chaos of the arena. The king stayed in his wolf form, howling and pacing, staking his claim around the bloodied heap of motionless fur that was, once upon a time, the man I was going to marry.

The council members, and the duchess, all looked at me for my reaction.

Well, I wasn’t going to give them one. They didn’t understand this—this wasn’t just the death of a Daybreak wolf. This was the death of the life I’d thought I’d had, and all the plans I’d had laid out in front of me. I wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction of seeing me upset.

I stood up briskly. “I’ll take my leave,” I said curtly, and turned on my heel before anyone respond. No more was I just a visitor for the Choice—I was the king’s fiancée.

What that meant, I still wasn’t sure.

23

W

hen I opened my eyes, there was coffee cooling on the table in my bedroom, and a breakfast that had surely gone cold under its silver cover. For the past two days Amity and Rue had slipped in to provide meals and coffee and water, occasionally encouraging me to eat and

bathe, but I rarely acquiesced. I could do nothing but sleep fitfully, tossing and turning under the heavy covers, waking up to pick at the toast left for me and wipe the tears I’d shed in my sleep.

I’d left a part of my soul on the bloody dirt of the arena, alongside the motionless heap of Griffin’s body. Our last moments together had been—harrowing, to say the least. It’d been the realization that all we’d had together was a lie. Somehow, that made the loss of that past hurt even more. Not only did I mourn the man I loved, I mourned the life we had together in Daybreak. Griffin had been my only friend. The only one who listened to me. He was my foundation in Daybreak, my hope for a different and better life.

Even if it’d all gone to shit in the end, the years we’d spent together growing up—those were real. He’d cared about me once. He’d seen me as more than just a means to an end.

And now that man was gone. I’d never see him again. He’d sacrificed our relationship and then his own life in a stupid quest for the throne. It wasn’t just our past that had died—it was our future, too.

I wasn’t leaving Efra to see the world. I was still here, in Nightfall.

Still betrothed to the Bloody King.

I sat up and pushed my hair off my face. I wasn’t quite ready to get up, not yet, but the coffee was enticing even if it was cold, and I did need to eat something.