JAYNAYAH

The dark did not fall.

It closed.

One moment I stood in the low hall with Mace’s breath warm against my temple and his arm locked around my waist. The next, every candle died, the hearth bent sideways, and the shadows stretched toward me like hands.

Mace pulled me tighter against him.

“I’m here,” he said.

I knew he was. I felt his heartbeat through my back, hard and furious, as if it wanted to fight the room itself. His wolf pressed against the bond, all teeth and instinct, but beneath that violence was fear.

For me.

Always for me.

The whisper came again.

Open.

My fingers curled into...