Page 36 of The Forbidden Wolf King
Fear.
What was he scared of? Our next fight would be hard with me injured but I heard the girls were near dead so it wasn’t going to be that difficult.
Axil cleared his throat to make an announcement and the wolves quieted.
“The third team that made it back from the dead lands and was supposed to fight the winners has fled to Cinder Mountain, forfeiting—”
Boos filled the space and a shock ran through me.
“They are now outcasts and will be torn apart if they ever return. That makes Eliza and Zara our final two champions.”
I knew now why he looked fearful.
Nausea roiled through me as I came to the realization that my next fight would be against her. My pack sister.
No.
She seemed to realize it at the same moment.
“I won’t,” she said quietly beside me and my brother stiffened.
I nodded. “I won’t either. Don’t think of it. For now, we celebrate.”
She dipped her chin, but the sickness in my stomach didn’t leave me.
The mead started to flow then, the packs from all over began to pour it down my throat since I couldn’t use my bandaged hands.
Every hour on the hour Eliza and I were hoisted into the air and carried around the tented field while everyone chanted, “Champions.”
By the fourth pint of mead, Eliza and I were cackling in laughter at any small thing. Axil had even come to join the party which had assembled at the bonfire in front of my tent. It was hard to get drunk as a shifter: we burned it off too quickly, but I was well and truly buzzed right now.
“You throwing the dirt in her eyes was so cool!” a little wolven girl told me. “I’m using that move one day when I’m chosen as champion.”
I smiled at her. “We’ll make sure you have a good coach.” I tried not to slur and the little girl nodded.
Her mother gave me a knowing smile and told the child it was time for bed.
By the time two more hours had passed, it was late and most everyone else had gone to sleep. Eliza, Cyrus, Axil and I were stomping around the fire in a circle, singing songs of old while shaking our half-drunk pints of mead. Everything felt numb and good and the blood-soaked gauze on my hands was a distant memory. A few wolven from my pack were playing songs on the drums when Axil asked me to dance.
Eliza knew that my heart belonged to him and so I knew she wouldn’t mind if we danced. Though relationships with the king were forbidden, surely a dance wouldn’t prove anything to anyone.
I threw my arms around his neck, careful of my healing hands as he gripped my waist and we swayed to the music. With the mead flowing through my system, I had no filter left to cover my words.
“I never stopped loving you,” I whispered into his ear as he gripped me tightly. “Even when I hated you, I loved you.”
There had been an Axil-sized hole in my heart that was never going to be healed by anyone except him.
His lips brushed against my ear. “I’ve loved you from that first day at camp, Zara,” he said and my stomach fluttered. “And that’s why you have to kill Eliza tomorrow.”
My body went rigid and I pulled back with wide eyes. I shook my head vigorously and Axil leaned his forehead against mine. “Only the last wolf standing can be my wife, Zara,” he said and the mead suddenly flushed from my system. Sobriety, mixed with horror, rushed through me.
Could I kill her? To be with the love of my life?
I glanced across the fire to see Eliza laughing and with my older brother. She was so carefree, her smile so genuine and her laugh full of such innocence. She wasn’t made for this competition and yet somehow, she had fought her way to the top.
A sister for a husband?
I dropped my hands from around Axil’s neck and took a step back. “I’m beat. I need some sleep,” I told him.
