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“You arenotgoing to sleep.”

“It’s just a nap.”

He hissed, “We are a stone’s throw away from a pack of wolves, and you are going to sleep?”

“If you ever shut up, yes.”

He would have to sleep later. I knew how he felt, every bit of himself humming with the need to survive, to find safety, and I knew it would take him time to truly relax. I’d give it to him.

I hugged the sword tightly to my chest and curled around it so he wouldn’t get any bad ideas, then settled into a bed ofneedles and earth. In that half-coherent space between awake and asleep, I finally understood what I was feeling, what that thing was pushing up on my chest.

It was relief.

Because I wasn’t just a tangle of secrets anymore. One person knew.

And it felt good.

Chapter Thirty-Two

Roan

Wolves. This was her secret. A pack ofwolves.

I couldn’t understand her. I sat there—tense, ready to spring to my feet—and looked back and forth between the pack and her. The one wolf watched, just like she said it would; she slept, like a baby.

Next to a pack ofwolves.

She was even wilder than I’d thought. That was scary to come to terms with.

My eyes slipped back to the wolf. He looked on intently, but I had to admit there was nothing threatening in his body language. The wolves behind him went about their business, even the big alpha who’d nearly scared me shitless. Some lounged, others preened. The lighter one who’d trotted in first was still hidden under what I now saw was a dilapidated structure, probably built around the same time as the hut Fen had made a home out of.

What was this place?

My heart was settling some, maybe giving in to the ridiculous notion that these wolves would not attack me and rip me to shreds the moment they got hungry, and I looked around, taking in my surroundings more fully.

The forest was thick with the old growth evergreens that were prominent in the region. They were wide, tall things that made a person stop and peer up into the canopy, wondering what the world was like when these trees were young. Roots pulled from earth to snake along the forest floor, tangling with each other before they slipped back under the soil and took their secret paths underground. Hidden among it all, half sunken in and half overgrown with moss and saplings, were the ruins. The Caed used to live here, and now the wolves did. They made their den under the old foundation of a Caed dwelling and lingered in the spaces where the Caed used to roam.

As I sat, trying to imagine my ancestors of long ago, pups came tumbling out of the mouth of the den. They were a jumble of brown fur, too-big feet, and mayhem. In an instant, they fell upon everything in their camp. One gnawed on a branch, another on an elder’s ear. Two approached the dark male, crouched in submission and wagging their tails, and fervently licked his jaw. The last ran between the others, tripping as it went.

I found I was smiling. I tried to scold myself back to sense but couldn’t make it last. The pups were a whirlwind of antics. Even when I straightened, it was only a matter of time before I settled back into a smile.

The adults took turns regurgitating meat, which the pups descended on enthusiastically. Once full, I watched them wrestle with each other, wrestle with the adults (who merely lounged and half-heartedly protested), and I watched them get tired. Finally, they laid in the bits of sunlight that filtered through the trees and slept.

Fenli had found this. She’d stumbled upon wolves and hadn’t fled, hadn’t hurried back to the hunters and told them where she’d seen them. She’d stayed. She’d watched. She’d gained their trust—thoughhow far it went, I couldn’t say—and she’d given hers as well. She’d kept them a secret.

Fenli and her secrets.

So, this was why she’d told me not to hunt the wolves. When she’d disappeared and I couldn’t find her, she was way out here. When I’d worried day and night about her being lost or torn to shreds, she’d been sitting quietly watching a pack of wolves.

I looked back at the wolf who seemed responsible for watching me, and I found myself growing uncomfortable. Not because I was afraid of him. It was worse than that.

When I looked him in his face, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Toke was looking back at me. Not that the wolfwasthe god—just that there was a piece of him there, in those eyes. Like the wolf was born of Toke just as much as I was.

I didn’t like it, and I looked away.

After some time, I nudged her awake. She led us back through the trees to her shelter, and we sat in silence as she brought the fire back to life. When the glowing coals had become proper flames, I watched as she cooked up some grains she’d stolen from the storehouse in a pot she’d stolen from the kitchen. Liar, wild woman,thief. I added it to the mental list of character traits I knew of hers, right next to ‘stubborn, sneaky, rebellious’, and ‘infuriating’.

Right next to ‘resilient’. Right next to ‘bewitching’.