I hurried from the room right as Scythe went chest to chest with another male. “Hand her over,” the stranger ordered.

Scythe growled and shoved the male back. “Over my rotting fucking corpse.”

“Easily arranged, especially after a deception such as this.”

“A threat?” Scythe stopped before the male. “You should know better.”

“It’s you who should know better…” The stranger trailed off when I stepped forward from the darkness of the hall and into the dim light of the lamp burning between the armchairs.

His hair was a blond so light it was nearly white. Though he was just as tall as Scythe, he carried less bulk. I didn’t think that mattered. He might have been dressed in the black and crimson regalia of a warrior, but I knew that wasn’t all he was.

Menace dripped from the intruder’s blue eyes as he surveyed me, his features falling into shock.

He sniffed, then looked at Scythe with something akin to outrage and fear. “Of course,” he said to him. “It would just have to be someone like her for you, wouldn’t it?” Scoffing, he shook his head and turned for the door, his long coat sailing behind him. “Say your goodbyes. Her husband awaits.”

I sensed him before I saw him standing mere feet beyond the entry to the cottage, his two favored guards beside him.

Rorn.

Scythe looked back at me, a promise he could no longer keep within his eye. He just hadn’t realized it yet. “Wait here, okay?”

I shook my head, but he left before I could stop him. I followed, my heart in my throat and my pulse screaming in my ears when Scythe stalked outside, and I heard Rorn’s shocked laugh. “The fates are indeed delightful.”

Scythe stood just outside the doorway, unmoving. Perhaps not breathing.

“Scythe?” I whispered at his back.

He said nothing, but he flinched when I skimmed my fingers over his as I rounded him to leave the cottage.

Outside, the blond male stood a small distance from Rorn on the grass.

Rorn’s attention remained fastened on Scythe when I stepped between the waiting guards. “If you truly want to wound me, Astrantia, then find yourself a toy with two eyes.”

Roye, one of the guards, chuckled. Rollins remained stoic—poised and waiting and undoubtedly uncomfortable.

The blond male, of whom I’d now guessed was King Dade, sneered at Rorn. “Just take her and be gone.”

“You’ve been most helpful, king,” Rorn murmured, his gaze still upon my silent wolf, and Scythe’s upon him. “I won’t soon forget it.”

Although the words were polite, Vordane’s king understood the hidden meaning beneath them just fine, and he stiffened. “Careful now. It’s my understanding that your war-ravaged kingdom cannot withstand much more than it already has.”

Rorn tensed, his brows cinched with incredulity as he opened his mouth.