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He felt the wild now, closer than it had ever been. It howled in his heart. He kept it at bay the only way he knew how—by subsuming his heart and his desires in his devotion to saving his brother.
He searched the entire forest for Lev before he admitted defeat. The whole wood was devoid of life. With her witchery, Anna had frightened every creature away. Only the leaves stirred in the trees as he passed by.
Anna wasn’t Bell. The glowing veins in her hands and forearms proved it. Her face and form were all too familiar, and his human form reacted to her in startling and unacceptable ways. As a man, he was plagued with a better perspective of her eyes, and from them he thought he saw neither a witch nor the woman he’d known gazing back at him. She looked frightened. He’d seen her scared many times when they’d been trapped in the curse and fighting for their sanity and their lives. This was different. Back then she’d always been bold. She’d always seemed confident that she could handle whatever came around the next bend in the maze of the castle’s hallways.
How often had she taken a stand at his side against Ether-addled madmen or intruding Volkhvy? So often that he could close his eyes in the shadowy forest and remember her standing as a young girl and again and again on up until she was a young woman still standing, still fighting for him, for survival and for Bronwal.
She didn’t look confident anymore.
He opened his eyes beneath the trees, and yet he could see her as she’d been moments before. She looked afraid. Her uncertainty shook him to his core. As the red wolf, he would have leaped up to defend her from whatever threatened. But that was then and this was now. He was no longer her protector. His responsibility was to his beleaguered brother. He couldn’t protect Anna anymore. She was lost to the blood in her veins.
She was a witch.
He continued deeper into the woods, and the hunt for Lev helped distance him from Anna until he could trust himself to keep that thought in mind. She had driven his brother away. It had been such a relief to see the white wolf again. To know that he hadn’t vanished into the Ether. But his relief had been short-lived. Anna’s sudden use of her power had made sure of that. Now Lev was gone again and Soren could only go after him.
He no longer had Bell to protect. What he did have was an obligation to save his brother and a frightened and unpredictable witch claiming the Call of the emerald sword Vasilisa had forged for his mate.
Soren had never been a natural wolf. He’d also never gone feral like Lev. Even in the form of the red Romanov wolf, he’d had a human’s understanding. He’d watched over Bell as she grew—older, wiser and stronger. He’d cared for her deeply, as a wolf, but in his current form he was buffeted by sensations and emotions he wasn’t prepared to handle.
His body still hummed a secret song from her nearness. His heart still raced and his mouth went dry because his breath came too quickly between lips half-parted to utter words he could never allow himself to say.
He should only feel betrayed. His only concern should be finding his brother and saving him from the wild that Vasilisa had crafted into their hearts with her magical tampering.
But every step that took him farther away from the woman he’d left in the clearing seemed a lie.
How could you mourn someone who had never existed? How could you long to touch a witch you should despise?
She’d frightened Lev away, but when she’d said the emerald sword had Called her, Soren’s first feeling had been one of triumph, as if every cell in his body wanted to claim the connection.
No.
Bell was dead to him, and Anna was a dangerous stranger. Her acceptance of her heritage had changed her from friend to foe. The flare from her hands had been brighter than any use of Volkhvy magic he’d ever seen. For all he knew, she might have sent Lev into the Ether. As the daughter of Vasilisa, she couldn’t be trusted. She threatened his family. She had proved it by getting in his way as he’d tried to help his brother. He was no longer the Light Volkhvy champion, but he’d been standing against evil for too long to stop now. After all he’d endured, how could he see any Volkhvy as anything but evil? Even one that he’d once...
He tamped down whatever attraction he had for the green-eyed witch. He hardened his heart and his soul against any of the former softness he’d felt for the woman who must now be his enemy. She’d looked for that softness in his eyes when they’d stood face-to-face. He’d done his best to kill it right in front of her searching gaze.
He would forget the weakness that had threatened to claim him when her eyes had widened and moistened with pain and fear. He would forget the familiar righteous anger that had flamed to life in his chest when she’d been threatened.
The only way he’d survive the loss of Bell would be to send Anna back to her mother as soon as possible. Bell was gone and Anna would soon be out of his life, as well. He wouldn’t allow her to accept the sword’s Call. There had been a girl the Call had been meant for, but she was gone. He might be a man, but he was also a monster created by a Volkhvy queen, and the only woman who had ever made him long to walk on two legs again was gone.
By the time Soren returned to Anna’s side, every bit of softness in his heart was gone, as well.
Chapter 4 (#u740aa1bc-7ca5-5be8-8708-468e96d63461)
It was evening before Soren came back to the castle. She’d wondered if he would come back at all. If she’d had the ability to shift into a wolf, she might have chosen that option rather than face him again.
As the daughter of Vasilisa, she had to dress for dinner when she was summoned by the master and mistress of Bronwal. Ivan and Elena were trying to treat her as a guest rather than an enemy. The least she could do was meet their efforts halfway...even if it meant exposing herself to more of Soren’s scathing reception.
She’d packed light, but she’d also been conscious of the fact that she would be visiting a castle and its recently reinstated king with his newly wedded queen. Ivan Romanov had been every inch a royal even before the curse had been lifted. He’d ruled Bronwal far longer than his father, continuing as its master after all hope of surviving the curse was lost.
Bell had been one of his subjects.
He’d tried to help her survive, never knowing that she was the daughter of the witch who had cursed them all because of Vladimir Romanov’s betrayal.
The least she could do was pull the carefully rolled evening dress from her backpack and shake out its white silken folds. She’d chosen the color carefully as a gesture of truce. She was fairly certain her mother had it put in her closet for a night like tonight. Anna would be Vasilisa’s envoy in a place where the Light Volkhvy queen herself would probably never be welcome.
No pressure.
The dress slid liquidly over her skin and settled into place as a simple shift, although the shimmer of the exquisite material gave lie to simplicity when she moved to slip on her shoes. The satin slippers would have been ruined in minutes in the old Bronwal, but now the floors were clean and covered in finely woven carpeting.
It was strange to dress in a bedchamber that was clean and modernized in a castle that had been more haunted than functional for centuries. In addition to the cleanliness and the carpeting, running water and sweet-scented toiletries startled her. She felt far removed from the desperate waif she’d been as she tamed and styled her curls on top of her head. Tendrils of gleaming chestnut were the only ornaments around her face.
But she couldn’t resist bright ruby lips and lush mascara. To those dashes of color she also added contours of blush on her cheeks. She had been as pale as death since she’d encountered Soren in the woods. The cosmetics might help to disguise her continued reaction to his transformation as well as her own. Her preparations didn’t soothe her. She felt alien when a servant she’d never known came to escort her to a sitting room, where her hosts waited.
Elena Romanov wore a stunning dress crafted of pale peach layers in crepe and chiffon. As always, no matter what she wore, she looked as if she might still pirouette rather than step from room to room. Every movement from her smile to the turning of her head was graceful and artistic.
But the former dancer was no delicate swan.
She had been as hard as she had to be to accept the sapphire blade’s Call. Tonight, she wore glittering sapphires in her ears and around her neck in honor of the blade she’d left elsewhere. Thankfully, she also wore a genuinely warm smile for Anna. They had become friends before her parentage was revealed, and it seemed that Elena had chosen to continue that friendship.
Of course, she was new to Bronwal. Vasilisa had only been her enemy for a short time, and the curse had actually brought her and Ivan together.
“Soren is back,” Elena said. She approached on light steps and Anna allowed her to grasp both of her gloved hands without flinching. It was only dinner. There was no reason to fear that her power might flare. Elena didn’t mention her elbow-length gloves, even though they didn’t exactly match her evening apparel. She only squeezed her fingers and met her nervous gaze. “He hasn’t been back for months. I hoped you might have some positive influence.”
“According to Soren, she frightened Lev away. He searched the entire wood and the white wolf was nowhere to be seen,” Ivan Romanov interjected as he entered the room.
Anna pulled her hands from Elena’s and turned to face the alpha wolf in his human form. Unlike Lev, he had resisted shifting for centuries until the savagery of the black wolf gleamed from his dark eyes and his wild, wavy hair. Although the curse had been broken, he still looked barely civilized. Maybe because he was free to shift at will now with his warrior mate by his side.
He wasn’t smiling.
As he approached, his expression was guarded and his brows were heavy. He’d always looked as if the entire weight of Bronwal rested on his broad shoulders. That hadn’t altered, unless you could call the addition of more weight and more responsibilities a change. He now had a wife and a rematerialized people to stand for.
Not to mention a former charge turned witch.
“It was an accident. I didn’t want to be eaten. Lots of things have changed, but that remains the same,” Anna said.
“I understand,” Elena said. The feral white wolf had also threatened her when she’d first come to Bronwal. Maybe her understanding would remind Ivan of that fact.
“Soren says they’re leaving in the morning,” Ivan continued, as if Elena hadn’t spoken. But he did pause by her side and place a large hand gently on her petite shoulder. Anna was hypnotized by the giant man’s soft touch against his wife’s arm. His face was lit by concern for his brothers and a wariness for Vasilisa’s daughter, but it was softened by his love for Elena.
Anna suddenly realized that she might not have been welcomed at Bronwal if not for the tiny dancer turned fierce warrior. The sapphire blade was nowhere to be seen, but Elena had its glow in her eyes when she faced her powerful husband. She was his equal as well as his lover. And her friendship with Anna would be respected as much as the king could allow.
No matter his personal trust issues about the waif turned witch in their midst.
He had been the only liege Anna had known for centuries. She hadn’t been close to Ivan Romanov. No one had. He’d been a lone wolf even when he’d chosen to only walk on two legs. But even cursed, he had been the legendary champion of the Light Volkhvy and master of Bronwal in all of its dark, labyrinthine glory.
He saw her as the enemy now. That hurt. It also shook how she saw herself.
“He won’t give up on Lev, but there’s something we have to do,” Anna said. She hoped no one, least of all Soren, would mention the emerald blade to Ivan Romanov. His distrust might erupt into fury, and the tingling her hands told her that her reaction, even in self-defense, might be irredeemable.
Ivan was dressed in a black suit that matched his queued hair. His eyes glittered in the soft light of candles. The castle was being modernized, but even with Vasilisa’s magical help, updates took time. There were numerous silver candelabra that had been brought in to supply light to Elena’s sitting room. The doorway glowed in a soft, wavering spotlight created by fire. In the spotlight, Soren appeared out of the shadowed corridor.
He was not in a suit.
The tangle of his red hair was still in a wild mane around his face and shoulders.
His full russet beard still covered half his angular face. Above it, his amber eyes reflected a thousand flickering flames.
He didn’t need a suit to be striking. He was breathtaking in a homespun tunic, open at the neck, and leather leggings. Mainly because the clothing rode his muscular legs, arms and chest without covering up his masculine power.
If you haven’t noticed, I’m a man, not a wolf.
A woman would have to be dead not to notice, and Anna’s breathless reaction proved that, in spite of everything, she was very much alive.
He stalked into the room, and Elena gasped. Maybe because she still wasn’t used to seeing him in his human form. Maybe because he looked as if he should be out hunting for dinner rather than preparing to sit down and eat at a table with them.
Anna glanced at her friend and saw the queen’s eyes widen and her cheeks flush. She saw Elena reach for her husband’s arm and squeeze as if she was making an unspoken request.
“The witch is our dinner guest, brother,” Ivan said. His voice was calm, and Anna’s heartbeat sped up because she recognized it as similar to the voice Soren had used to try to reach Lev in the forest. Was Soren so wild that the king felt it his responsibility to soothe him?
The tingling in her fingers increased to an almost-painful gathering of electricity. Her breath caught. Every hair on her body stood to attention. Only Soren noticed. Elena and Ivan were completely focused on him. But he was looking at Anna. He stopped several feet away. His eyes met hers. She felt her eyes widen, and she fisted her hands. His gaze left hers to sweep from her head to her feet and then back again.
He stayed frozen except for the working of his throat as he swallowed.
“Shall we eat?” Elena said into the sudden stillness.
The electricity in Anna’s fingers faded as Soren held himself back. She wasn’t under attack. He wasn’t going to pounce. Not to harm her...or for any other possibility that suggested itself in the echoes of tingles that flowed along her veins for reasons other than magic.
And suddenly, as their gazes met again, his amber to her green, she realized he wasn’t going to throw her to the alpha wolf, either. He didn’t mention the emerald sword or its Call.
Her secret was safe for now.
* * *
He had charged into Elena’s parlor with concern for Lev fueling his every stride. He’d seen no sign of the white wolf, although he’d searched all day. Then he’d come back to Bronwal for the first time in months, only to be confronted by its obvious signs of healing. People bustled. People laughed. There was hot running water in a dressing room that had been converted to a bath off his bedchamber.
He eschewed it all.
Every guffaw. Every clean, sparkling corner. Every damned piece of perfect clothing tailored with modern cloth.
Lev was lost while Bronwal and everyone in it recovered.
And Bell was lost, as well. Long gone somewhere he could never follow.
Ivan had come to his room while he threw off the torn and soiled rags he’d worn for weeks in the forest. While he’d bathed and changed into his usual homespun shirt and leather pants, he’d told his brother about Anna’s use of magic and Lev’s disappearance.
He hadn’t mentioned the sword.
He hadn’t known why until he saw the petite witch standing beside the alpha wolf with panicked eyes and fisted hands.
And then he’d looked at Anna, daughter of Vasilisa, the Light Volkhvy queen—really looked from her beautiful chestnut curls to her figure-hugging silk gown—and his ability to reason had flown out the nearest window.
He didn’t know why she was frightened.
Maybe anyone in their right mind would fear the alpha wolf, the Romanov king, the once and present champion of the Light Volkhvy. Ivan was the largest wolf. The black alpha. The last one left standing on two legs when he and Lev had failed. Did it really matter that Soren’s failure had been on purpose to take care of his brother, the white wolf? That by sacrificing his human form, he’d given up the only years of living by Bell’s side as a man he might have had?
Ivan Romanov would be even angrier over the emerald sword than he was himself. Ivan’s truce with Vasilisa was uneasy at best. Nearly hostile at its worst. He needed her help as Bronwal recovered from the damage she had caused with her curse, but Ivan didn’t fully trust the queen. He probably never would.
Or was Anna afraid of the power she might unleash if Ivan Romanov shifted to protect them all from her claim on one of the Romanov blades?
Soren chose not to find out.
He swallowed his wolf. He controlled his concern for Lev. It helped that Anna’s appearance left him with barely enough energy to walk into the next room, where a small, intimate dinner had been set up on a long table he could remember as being covered in dust and debris.
It had been washed and sanded and polished. Candles filled the room on every surface. Elena must have commandeered every candelabrum in the castle and some from the towns in the valley below.
“Elena informs me eating at a fine table is like riding a bike. Although, as you know, I’ve never ridden a bicycle in all my long life,” Ivan said. He walked to the head of the table and pulled out the queen’s chair as if he hadn’t lived as a recluse in a cursed castle for more years than she’d been alive. Elena smiled at him, and Soren forgot how to breathe for long seconds as the love his brother had found punched him in the gut with the knowledge of the love he’d lost.
“Don’t worry. This is a family meal. No more. No less. No prying eyes as we learn how to do this again,” Ivan continued. He sat in a chair beside his wife at the head of the table. But the two other place settings were beside them in an intimate configuration that would be brutal for him as long as it lasted.
“Soren doesn’t consider me family. Not anymore. I’m an unwelcome guest at best. I’ll excuse myself. Perhaps I should have asked for some bread and cheese in my room,” Anna said. How often had he watched her nibble on a crust of stale bread? How often had he helped her forage for food or whatever else they needed?
Not her.
Bell.
He wouldn’t feel sympathetic for a witch who didn’t feel welcome.
“Sit. Eat. We are free to enjoy an actual meal at a table and we will enjoy it, by God,” Ivan said. But Soren’s spine stiffened, because he heard the alpha wolf’s command in the order. His brother, the king, wouldn’t be denied.
Nor should he.
If Soren’s main responsibility was restoring the white wolf to life and limb, Ivan’s main responsibility was restoring Bronwal and all the people in it to normalcy, or the closest thing to normalcy that people out of time and no longer cursed could have. He hadn’t worn the suit Elena had provided for him. But he would eat with his brother and his wife, even if they insisted that a witch princess sit at the same table, too.
* * *
Had she hoped a dress and some lipstick would soothe the savage beast?
Anna was angrier with herself than with the stubborn man who sat across the table from her. He tore into his chicken and potatoes with gusto, and she nearly did the same, pausing only to wash down large mouthfuls with sweet red wine. The sooner they finished, the sooner she could escape back to her room.
If one meal together felt like the end of the world, how would she survive the coming days...and nights...when they would be forced to travel together to retrieve the emerald sword?
Thank goodness for her ability to travel through the Ether.
The sooner they retrieved the sword and destroyed it, the better.
Elena was the only one at the table who picked at her food. She was as slight as a former ballerina would be. Not to mention she’d been sitting at tables to eat her entire life. Anna, like Ivan and Soren, was only now rediscovering what it was like to have an array of delectable food placed in front of her prepared for consumption. It wasn’t strange that they should all concentrate on chewing and swallowing, but their lack of pleasure was.
Anna barely tasted the perfectly browned roasted meat or the crusty bread. It all turned to dust in her mouth whenever Ivan looked up from his plate. The sword’s Call sounded deep within her hollowed chest. It pulsed with her heartbeat. It inhaled and exhaled on her every breath. As the alpha, how could Ivan not hear it, too? Her mother had known. She’d seen the echo of it in her daughter’s eyes.
