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“When you first mentioned us camping, I was not enthused. I didn’t see the beauty in it. But being here with you now, I see it. This is amazing.”

“Trust your man, Baby Girl. I’ll never steer you wrong.”

Her laughter causes her body to shake. She leans her head back against my shoulder. I wrap my arms around her. She places her hands over mine.

“Why do you like camping so much?”

I think about her question for a moment. The easiest answer is to tell her because I am a wolf. The outdoors is a natural place of peace for us. It calls to our wolf nature. But that wasn’t the only reason for me.

“It was how I escaped my father,” I admit. “When he would get in one of his moods, I’d run out to the forest and camp out. At that time, I had nothing but a small lean to as shelter, but it didn’t matter. It was my place of peace.”

She’s quiet for a long time. Her breathing is even and steady.

“Trees were my sanctuary,” she whispers. “I’d climb the highest one I could find and hang out there for hours, sometimes a full day.”

This is the first time I noticed how much our lives paralleled.

“No more tree climbing for you. You’re safe now.” I pick up her hand and place a kiss on the back of it. Her sleeve slides down a little, showing me those gold cuffs. Even though I’ve seen her body up close and personal many times, this is the first time I’m paying attention to the accessories. They aren’t just solid gold, engraved into the metal are unique symbols.

As I look them over, something else crosses my mind.

“You know, everyone knows you were once part of the legion, right?”

“I know.”

“Well, why do you always wear these long sleeve shirts? You don’t have to hide it anymore.”

She stiffens in my lap. When she tries to sit up, I pull her back against my chest.

“Talk to me,” I encourage. I want to know why this subject is so touchy for her.

She swallows. “I don’t cover them to hide them from everyone else.”

She didn’t have to explain any further. The long sleeves weren’t to benefit others, it was to hide the reminder of what she once was from herself. It’s another reminder of how much of her past she regrets.

“Why not take them off?” I ask, glancing over the cuffs, trying to find a clasp. They fit so snug, I know they have to be uncomfortable.

“When you graduate the academy,” she starts. “Right before they send you off to become a part of the legion, they give you these cuffs. They pull you out of bed at the crack of dawn. Still in your nightclothes, they walk you in a straight line to this small brick building. They let in about five graduates at a time. While you stand outside that metal door, all you hear is screaming coming from the inside.”

She pauses in her story. Looking down at her face, her eyes seem to be so distant, as if she’s back at that academy standing in the line.

“The screams,” she continues, “are so loud you think they are right beside you. Then they stop and seconds later, the door opens and another set of five are ushered in.

“When your time comes, you walk through the metal door and immediately the smell of sweat, blood, and urine greets you. The guards shove you over to a blood-stained table sitting in the middle of the floor. Behind you are two guards. They grab your arms and lay your hands flat down on the bloody surface.”

Her heart beats faster now. I can feel the change through her back.

“They don’t explain anything. They give no warnings. Before you can wonder what is happening, they take large mallets and smash your hands repeatedly, breaking every bone. They don’t stop until there is nothing left but skin and chunks of meat. Then they shove your hands through these enchanted cuffs.” She holds up the cuffs for me to see. “The cuffs are sized and created to fit perfectly around your wrists. There is no opening. The only way to take them off is the same way they put them on. Because once a member of the legion, always a member of the legion.”

Anger boils up in me as I think of her going through that. And to know her father sent her there. Why would anyone treat their own kind that way?

“How old were you?” I ask, my voice sounding deeper because my wolf is at the surface.

“Nineteen,” she says softly.

A fucking child. At nineteen, she was forced to sign her life over to a service she had no business in.

“What made you finally decide to leave the legion?”