Sera
My voice came out flat, dead. "You. You're a rogue." I got the words out, but then started to feel like I was going to laugh. This had to be a joke. My mind had to be playing fucking tricks on me.
I was just so tired. Weeks of not really sleeping and the endless stress I had been navigating since I arrived at Ironmaw. My mind must've finally caught up to me.
Until the girl on the ground, who had been a rogue wolf mere moments ago, started to groan and move.
My heart did a leap as I jumped straight back away from her. Scared shitless. "What the fuck?" The words slipped from my lips before I could catch myself.
Fenris caught me. "Relax Sera," he said, but I shook free from him.
The girl on the ground was still moving, trying to sit up. She gave a low groan, and I turned my gaze away from her. It made no sense. It was absolutely breaking my mind. This was the full-blooded human form for a rogue. I felt my grip on reality begin to slip.
Yvara cleared her throat "We need to get her out of here before anyone comes looking."
Fenris agreed. Yvara whistled; immediately, I could hear movement from behind us, and a few men showed up and started to help the girl on the ground up.
The blanket Fenris had covered her with was used to wrap her up, but that wasn't before her naked tits were flashed to me. The two globes of pale flesh hung off before she was finally put together, and they started to haul her away. I just stood there in shock.
She was real. A rogue beast really took a human form. I felt my grip on reality tease further apart.
I stared at Yvara. "You really are rogue?" I asked, trying to process everything that was happening. "Just like her?"
Yvara held my eyes, her scarred face lit only by the flickering torchlight. The dancing shadows made her eyes gleam like a predator's. She gave one sharp nod. No explanations, no apologies. The unvarnished truth.
Fenris took my elbow, pulling me toward the stable's back door. His voice was low against my ear. "We need to move."
The two men strode ahead of us, carrying the body wrapped in blankets. The straw beneath our boots crackled in protest. Questions piled in my throat, choking off every word.
But Fenris led me outside into the icy dark before I could speak. The cold wind slapped against my skin. The woman moaned, her head lolling limply against her bearer.
Fenris didn't slacken his grip, steering me down a narrow path between the stable and the keep's outer wall. His voice was low and tight. "She won't remember much at first. Her mind will come back in pieces. By the end of the week, she'll know your voice better than her own."
Jace’s mouth twisted, like he’d heard the thought. He knew. Of course he knew what I was doing. But he had no way to fight me against it. That would be an offence, of course.
Mina stood against the keep wall, arms crossed tight, her face drained of color. She held my eye without warmth as I approached. I could feel the resentment in the air between us.
Mina's boots crunched through the packed snow as she strode toward me, her face a mask of desperation. She reached out, grabbing my arm, her grip tight.
"Sera, you have to talk to Fenris," she urged, her voice low and strained. "Please. You have to make him let Jace stay." Her eyes searched mine, pleading for intervention. "Please, Sera. Don't let him do this to us. To me."
I swallowed hard, then sighed. "I tried, Mina. I did try." The truth, even if it wasn't the whole truth.
Back in our room when Fenris told me. I'd told him it was a bad idea. That Mina would hate me for it. So yes, I'd tried. But the question was whether I'd tried enough to actually make Jace stay. The answer was no. But Mina didn't need to know that.
She shook her head, her eyes flashing. "You didn't try enough! You could have said something to me." Her voice was low but hard as steel. "The least you could have done was tell me the moment you heard Fenris was sending Jace away. Instead, you stood there in the yard, watching him get on the horse. Watching him go."
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