The Scarred Prince (The Wolf's Pet Book One) by Aubrey Rose Read Free Book Online Page A

us, his wrists tied behind him around a support pole. His robes shrouded him like a dark spirit. The image came into my mind of a bat settling down, wrapping its wings around its body.
    “Blaise is sending Ziv over,” I said. The lie came out automatically. “I can stay here and guard the door until he comes if you want to go and speak with them. They’re all there.”
    Max frowned. I knew he hated being left out of things.
    “Are you sure?”
    “That’s what my dad said,” I said innocently. I’d never lied to Max before, never. He had no reason to distrust me, not at all. I counted on that—on my eighteen years of unflinching abidance by the rules. I was responsible. I was reasonable. He had to agree with me.
    I held my breath. Finally, after what seemed like an hour of waiting but must have only been a second, he nodded.
    “Alright, but you keep this blade,” he said. He pressed the wolf bone knife into my hands. “Just in case.”
    I took the knife from him. The bone handle was cold in my fingers. I clutched it tightly.
    “You can see him from here,” Max said, motioning. “You can see the knots from here, too. If he moves at all, you can just yell out. They can hear you from the longhouse here if you’re loud about it.”
    “Okay,” I said, anxious to see him go. I would only have a few minutes. Maybe not even that.
    “I’ll tell Ziv to hurry if I see him. Bye, Kinaya.”
    “Thanks, Max,” I said. I didn’t like lying to him. But some deeper strength inside of me had pushed me forward despite that.
    I needed to speak to the messenger. I needed to see if there was a way that we could avoid going to war.
    And like my dad said, there wasn’t much time left.
    I waited until Max had turned the corner, and then I turned. Gripping the wolf bone knife, I stepped into the open doorway.
     

Chapter Ten
    I stepped toward the messenger. He was huge. His legs stretched out in front of him, ankles tied. His wrists were behind the pole, and just like Max had said, they were tied up. The ropes were so tight that they cut into his skin, and blood welled at the line where the knot was tied. How he would get out was beyond imagining. I breathed out slightly.
    The fire in the hearth was a dull ember. The storage cabin was almost never heated, and the room was almost as chilly as it was outside. Shivers ran down my arms.
    He spoke without moving.
    “What do you want, Princess?”
    I stood up straighter. Moving past him, I studiously ignored meeting his gaze. Switching the knife to my other hand, I picked up a log and threw it in the fireplace. The fire began to candle up, the small flames illuminating the inside of the storage cabin. There were gaps in the logs, and I could hear the wind whistling past them outside.
    “You should always hold your blade with your dominant hand,” the messenger said.
    “I’m not a princess,” I said, switching my knife back quickly. “And how do you know I’m not right-handed?”
    “Your fork,” he said. “At the dinner table. It was lying on the left of your plate in the mashed sweet potatoes.”
    I stared at him.
    “I’m very observant,” he said. I swore I could see a flash of light in his blue eyes. They looked like darkened crystals in the dim flickering of the fire. His face was curtained by the black robes he wore. I had a strange urge to tear them aside, to see if he was hiding anything. But no, the guards would have already searched him and found nothing.
    “Are you?”
    “That’s why they sent me here as a messenger.”
    “As a scout, you mean.”
    “One and the same,” he said. “I’m the fastest runner in our land. That is why I am the prince’s messenger.”
    “Are you that fast?” I asked doubtfully. He smiled.
    “I fly on the howls of wolves. When a message touches my ear, it has the prince’s attention.”
    “You’re proud of that.”
    “Yes.”
    “Pride is a sin,” I said uncertainly. A sin I had committed many times.
    “Only if you