Page 16 of The Howling (Monsters of the Yeavering #2)

I can’t…I just can’t…what the hell is wrong with Reavely?

“And I’ll be the one wearing a bloody sheet,” I grumble as he leaves the urinal/toilet/bathroom…whatever.

There’s a trough on one wall, where he was standing, long enough to take probably half a dozen or more Barghest. On the opposite wall is a long wooden platform with holes cut in it.

Given my bladder is absolutely bursting, I know beggars can’t be choosers, and after I’ve swept up my sheet, I plonk myself down on the hole.

It is quite the relief.

Until I hear the scraping sound outside the door.

I don’t think Reavely has left at all. I think he’s still there, somehow spying on me.

Part of me wants to shout at him to leave, but then a tiny voice points out he did get someone to treat me when I thought I was dying.

If he wanted anything else, I guess he would have taken it by now. Just like Lord Guyzance. The Faerie lord was only ever biding his time, I knew that well enough.

But Reavely…other than wanting to possess me, I don’t get the same vibes. In fact, other than fiddling with himself, but then complying with my recommendation he get the hell out of my personal space, he’s not done anything which suggests he’s a threat.

But if there’s one thing I’ve learnt in my brief time in the Yeavering, it’s not to trust even the evidence of my own eyes. This place is magic, and magic lies.

Having finished up and having to do a drip dry as toilet paper is not a thing in Reavely’s castle, I exit the urinal and find the source of the scratching sounds. Hung up next to the door on an iron spike is a long cream dress.

I touch the fabric. It’s a soft taffeta silk which feels ultra light under the pads of my fingers. So far, when it comes to clothing, all I’ve ever encountered in the Yeavering has been heavy cotton, which has not been much fun to live and work in.

This dress is something else. It has a glow to it which you can only get from pure silk. Reavely can’t have left this for me. It has to be for someone else.

And yet, so far, I haven’t seen anyone else.

I lift the dress off the hanger. Underneath there is a shift in fine linen which I consider wearing until I realise how fine it is and how much it will show.

So having donned the shift, I wrestle myself into the dress.

It fits, which is a surprise, as I would have thought any female Barghest would be bigger than me.

It’s fiddly, and by the time I have it on, I’m breathing heavily, but at least I’m no longer reliant on a sheet to cover me, an inherently unstable item.

No one is getting me out of this dress in a hurry. Once I’ve recovered some of my breath, I contemplate my next move.

I have a choice. I can go looking for Reavely, or I can go back to the room with the bed. I feel like I’d rather know where the Barghest is, as I’m not entirely sure if I trust my soul with him, so I make my way down the stairs and into the great hall.

It’s an understatement. It is a vast hall.

The vaulted ceiling is so high I’m amazed it doesn’t have its own weather up there.

Huge banners hang down, each one in scarlet and white with a symbol of the crescent moon and a howling wolf embroidered in thick silk.

The floor is of heavy slate flags polished to a shine, although they are covered in dust.

The only tracks are those of Reavely, who is leaning on the imposing fireplace, one arm raised and his head rested upon it. The great stone lintel is carved with dancing wolves. He stares into the glowing hearth until he hears the swish of my dress, turns and stares at me.

He blinks and pushes away from the fire.

A soft breeze blows over me. The scent of woodsmoke and of something else, something which has to be uniquely Reavely. A spice which somehow has my mouth watering and my body doing some strange things.

I still feel the grate of one broken rib, although a dull ache in the rest of me. The scent of Reavely makes things somehow feel better.

His eyes haven’t left me. I feel pinned like a specimen butterfly, and I rather regret putting on the dress. It feels like I’ve done something wrong.

“Wynter, at last!” A familiar voice rings out across the hall.

Instantly Reavely transforms into his were-form, growing in height and width, his dark snout appearing, along with teeth which would put a T-rex to shame. He releases a long, bloodcurdling growl.

“Lilburn?” I turn to face the little Hedley Kow who is walking towards me as if she’s about to ask me to put on the kettle.

“That one”—she points at Reavely—“left me behind.”

“Seems like you were able to get here of your own volition, trickster,” Reavely growls, keeping his were-form. “No doubt bringing the Redcaps with you.”

“Have a little faith in the Hedley Kow, Barghest.” Lilburn huffs at him. “I go where I want when I want and no one is the wiser.”

“Then why are you here?”

“I am here because this one needs me.” She reaches me and puts a hand on my arm. “As I am in her debt.”

“You are?”

Lilburn looks up at me. “You didn’t judge, and you did your job. In doing so, you freed me from a curse which bound me to Lord Guyzance for these past two centuries. Sometimes being a trickster doesn’t do you any good.”

I gape at her, she seems the last creature in the Yeavering to be the subject of a curse.

“I could not speak of it,” Lilburn says. “The curse itself meant even voicing it would have bond me closer to him. So I owe you.”

“You owe me nothing.” I put my hand over hers.

“I am a mischief maker.” She smiles at me. “The trick I played on the Faerie Lord was too much. He wanted my magic, so he took it. Cursing me until someone was prepared to see past my trickster nature.”

“The Hedley Kow is always beholden to someone,” Reavely growls. “But not my mate.”

“Wynter is your mate?” Lilburn gasps.

“I am not!” I burst out.

Both of them look at me as I take a step away, tripping over the gown I’m wearing and having to steady myself.

“So, when are you marrying her?” Lilburn says to Reavely as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.

“Marry him?” I gasp while staring directly at Reavely.

“As per the bonds of his pack,” Lilburn says, knowingly.

“I have no pack,” Reavely growls, his brow drawn low. He turns his back on us both and stomps off through a doorway next to fireplace.

I watch him go, my jaw slack and my mind running like a freight train. I sink onto a chair pushed up against the wall, one of very few in the entire vast space.

“What is going on?” I put my head in my hands.

“Oh, I thought you two had come to an understanding, given you’re wearing his dress and are in his castle,” Lilburn says airily.

“ This dress ? I found it.” I shake my head. “I haven’t agreed to marry him…he hasn’t even asked me. Basically he kidnapped me.”

“So, while I’ve been trying to find the pair of you, you haven’t been mating?”

“ No! ” I nearly yell at her. “I haven’t been doing any such thing…Lord Guyzance…” I swallow as the memories crowd in on me. “He hurt me. Reavely brought me here and got a healer.”

My ribs ache at me, as a clear reminder of how bad I was not so long ago.

“If you put on the dress, you get to be his bride. That’s how it works,” Lilburn says, peering past me at Reavely.

“That is the silliest thing I’ve ever heard,” I huff. “Putting on a dress doesn’t mean anything.”

“Yeah, but he took you with him when he escaped the dungeon, and that’s not how a Barghest takes souls. Then he put you in his dress.”

“I don’t know why you keep saying that. He didn’t put me in this dress. I found it.”

“So, his ancestors put you in a wedding dress,” Lilburn says. “They think you’re his mate.”

“His ancestors?” I look around. “This place is deserted. You heard him when you mentioned his pack.”

“You mean you can’t see them?” Lilburn stares at me, her huge eyes even bigger than usual.

“See who?”

“Oh, well, it doesn’t matter,” she says dismissively. “So, what does a Hedley Kow have to do around here in order to get a cup of tea?”