Captive Of The Warg, (Wargs of the Outland #2)

The Hunt

Reia had been dreading this moment. Noise in the Leikker Hall was as much from snoring as laughing. Even the fires were yawning.

Her eyes felt dry and achy, yet the moment Bayne had come for her, the furnace in her belly had erupted with renewed awareness.

He reached for her and her body tensed. Yet he surprised her with a cool demeanor, taking her hand in his to lead her outside.

Once they were out in the cold, the lights of the fires receding from their backs in farewell, she'd pulled her hand free. "I'm not a child." And then she'd promptly slipped on the ice and fallen on her rump.

Instead of laughing, Bayne snatched her up and looked her over. She eyed him coldly, expecting a snide remark. He made none. The temperature of his eyes dulled to a cool yellow as he dropped his hands and gestured for her to walk ahead.

Blinking in confusion, Reia huffed ahead. But now he walked behind her and she could feel the press of his eyes grazing her smarting backside. Her cheeks were aflame and the cold did nothing to tame that awful flush in her blood. It was equal parts flustered mortification and confusion. His demeanor was...foreign. This polite aloofness. It was unlike him.

The walk back to his hall felt like an eternity. When they entered the silent great hall for the second tie tonight, she wanted to collapse in exhaustion. The enervation of being so alert in his presence.

Reia hugged herself, her expression stony as Bayne moved past her. She watched him suspiciously as he headed towards the back. To his chamber. "I won't sleep with you, warg." Not anymore.

The wargrex stilled, his head turning to the side. But he didn't look at her. "No," he agreed, surprising her, "you'll have your own chamber."

Well...that was...easy. Too easy. Brow in a knot, she followed him, keeping her gaze fixed on his broad back. He was a wall of cold granite.

Bayne stopped suddenly, turning his back to his chamber. To a doorway facing his. He parted the drape and stood aside.

Without glancing inside, she faced him, her mouth mutinous. "Is this a dungeon?"

"Does it look like one?" He replied impassively.

She darted a glance inside, seeing that it wasn't. In the brief study, she found that it was femininely appointed. There was a fire crackling gently in the hearth. It was nearly as big as Bayne's bed chamber. "Whose chamber is this?"

"Yours," he said flatly.

She set her teeth. "To whom did it belong before now?"

He sighed, but it came out more like a growl. "It belongs to the wargrix of Ruinik's Hek."

She wrinkled her face. What in Maeda's name was a wargrix? She opened her mouth to argue...or ask, but he forestalled her with another gruff sigh and left abruptly.

Reia stood blinking in the hallway, watching as he disappeared into his chamber. She glanced back to her chamber. Hers. Rubbing her arm, she moved past the thick drape and stepped inside.

Without even taking her boots off, she fell into bed. And though she hated herself for it, she cried. She had no clue why she did so until a pattern began to form.

Every night thereafter, when Bayne would lead her back to her chamber, she'd stand there staring at her large bed. And her eyes would burn with tears of frustration. And confusion. Whelming angry tears. But what was anger except a hot bleed welling up from a deep cut? Anger was the slow death of hope.

There was no bluster from him. No flaring yellow eyes singeing her with lust or anger. No searing kisses peppered with soft bites. No lingering touches. Just his overarching inscrutability that, no matter how she tried to provoke him, he wore like an iron mask.