The night before the new moon, the sky was streaked with stars. It should've been beautiful, but she was nervously watching the last blink of moonlight. Watching it glint like a reaping hook, ready to cleave her heart.

She was twisting the silver ring around and around on her thumb, her pulse barreling out of rhythm. She tried to let the silver soothe her. Tried to let it steer her thoughts to happier times. It was all she had of her father. Memories of him were all but faded, though. She treasured it as though it held his scent or an echo of his voice from the other world.

It was the only nixrath in this silverless, monster-ridden patch of wilderness. She straightened, her chin lifting. Now all she needed was a horse to see her plan through. Maeda bless her, she'd ride a spiny boar home if she had to!

Under Thesta's watchful eye, she hadn't been allowed to brood much, or devise a means to find a horse. Nor a spiny boar, for that matter. Thesta had kept her so busy that the hours and days had flown by. Rowan was either learning wargish, skinning hares, hunting fowl, or foraging for roots. She'd found a tick on her arm today and had squealed in disgust. This place was for animals!

But Thesta had calmly shaken her head and pried the thing off her with a disapproving cluck. "It's just a tick, Rowan. Sometimes life throws ticks at you."

She'd shuddered in revulsion. "It was sucking my blood!" She'd never seen one before.

"Yes," Thesta had replied, feeding the tick to the fire, "and there are worse things in the outland after your blood." When Rowan had started to cry, Thesta had sighed. "Maybe if you use the rosemary soap I gave you and take a godsdamned bath, the nasties will leave you alone."

Rowan had sniffed softly as Meera checked her scalp. Thankfully it'd just been the one. But it wasn't only the parasites making her miserable, her muscles were so sore that she gritted her teeth every time she moved. She couldn't even undress or squat over the chamber pot without wincing.

Warg life was exhausting. At night, when the stars blinked awake, she was usually falling asleep. But not tonight.

She closed her eyes and listened to the music floating across the lake, coming from the drinking hall. Somewhere out there, Thrax was feasting with his wargs.

Thesta had pointed the drinking hall out this morning. The bathing house, too. Rowan had declined vehemently when Thesta had tried to coax her to take a bath. Even with the small deer carcass draped over her shoulders and staining her hair and dress in smelly blood, she'd declined. The prospect of stripping down in front of a crowd of wargas was too intimidating. Although, that tick had nearly swayed her.

Thesta had shaken her head in disgust. "You will have to bath on the morning of the new moon, Rowan."

Rowan had ground her teeth. "I might have to do a lot of things, but I will choose if and when I take a bath." Frankly, if she stank, it was to her benefit. Maybe her stench would keep Thrax from kissing her again. And other things.

"No, it's part of the ritual," said Thesta. "It's the washing away of the old self before joining with your mate, body and soul." She went on, oblivious of Rowan's flushing face. "You will become one half of a new whole."

She ignored the heat sweeping up her neck and made a point of rolling her eyes. "It sounds pretty when you rhyme like that, Thesta, but I'm still not getting naked in front of a bunch of strangers."

The Warga looked affronted. "These are your people now, too, not strangers!" But Rowan had remained steadfast and soon, Thrax's sister had given up with a wargish grumble.

That ought to have been the end of it. But no, Thesta had merely enlisted the help of a more formidable force—Thrax himself.

Rowan sat glaring at the scythe edge of waning moonlight, when she felt the foundations shudder beneath her feet. Stomping on the stairs rang out like an invading cohort. Despite her stiff muscles, she shot to her feet, adrenaline spiking.

Rowan wasn't sure whether to be relieved or leery when Thrax appeared on the landing, three other wargs right behind him. He was carrying a half cask under his arm and was holding a large pail of water in the other hand. The wargs behind him were, similarly, carrying loads of water that was sloshing and steaming in the night chill.

"Well," he said gruffly in lieu of a greeting, "where does her ladyship wish to bath? Out here in the dark or inside?"

Rowan was too shocked by his appearance to speak at first. And then his meaning penetrated and she turned scarlet. "I told Thesta I'm not—"

"I know what you told my sister. You've an aversion to nakedness." He gestured for the other wargs to head inside, though he remained outside with her.

Flustered, she watched his wargs strut past. They ducked under the lintel, a trio of hulking brawn and fearsome eyes. Well, Torgon's eyes were a little less fearsome than the other two. One was that sullen creature called Thresh, but the third warg was unknown to her. One by one, they deposited their many buckets by the wood stove under Thesta's direction.

Her brow furrowed when she noticed a coy-looking Meera approach Thresh. What in the name of Brek did her maid have to say to the likes of that one?

"Any other aversions, Rowan?" Thrax's voice sent her heart into a gallop. He was standing much too close.

"Yes, you." The shock of his nearness made her wits scatter, or she never would have answered as she did.

The slight tightening around his eyes signified she'd struck a nerve. The brief twinge he'd failed to hide was quickly subsumed by coldness. "I see." That was all he said and stepped away.

Why couldn't he have said something else? Something offensive to dampen the unexpected twinge of guilt. The ensuing silence twisted her stomach into knots.

Torgon came back out to retrieve the half-sawed cask under Thrax's arm and the pail in his other hand. He glanced knowingly between them and then, with brows wiggling, he took his oafish self back inside.

The male laughter that followed shortly after grated on her nerves, prompting her to end the silence with a heavy sigh. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

"I see the nettles haven't come out yet," he muttered, sounding surly as usual.

Her lips quirked at that, which was at odds with how nervous he was making her. "If I nettle you so, why did you take me for your mate?"

"The goddess Mother has the choosing of mates, not I," he growled. "I would never..." He stopped himself, turning away to look over the darkness. "It doesn't matter."

He would never have chosen her? She swallowed, disturbed at just how much that sentiment stung. "I'm sorry to disappoint you." She was used to being a disappointment, yet the humiliating sting of being a constant bane to everyone except Merritt was turning her numb.

"Maeda's proven to have a wretched sense of humor," he said.

"Yes," she murmured, taking a deep breath. Without Thrax's forbidding glare on her, she was able to study him more closely. To really look at him.

Her eyes tracked over his profile. The stalwart contours of a face estimably handsome...were she inclined towards admiring rugged wargs. Like Meera obviously was. This warg in particular wore too many stern expressions far too often, so it was no wonder Rowan had taken this long to look at him...like a man. A man with a monster inside him, she reminded herself.

His hair in human state was nigh as black as the fur he wore in his other form—his darker half. Here, in the soft glow spilling out from the kitchen, the dark waves were thick, windblown, and wild.

Thrax was young, but his fierce scowls made him seem so much older. The exact antithesis to Merritt who was blond and full of sunshine, whose perpetually smiling face made him seem forever boyish.

Rowan bit her lower lip, trying to remember the details of Merritt's beloved face. His dear cornflower blue eyes were fading already, and that scared her. When she tried to picture Merritt, his countenance always devolved into the withering glare of a brooding face. The very face she was watching now.

When Thrax looked her way, she chased her gaze to the side at the darkness beyond. But his eyes had caught hers briefly. He'd caught her watching him, and now her cheeks were on fire. She'd captured every ember bright shade in his gaze in that stolen look.

Why did she have to notice the strangely beautiful freckles in those deep, amber depths. Like cinnamon flecks swimming in clover honey—her two favorite flavors.

Stop it, Rowan! Hopefully she didn't look as moonstruck and stupid as Meera did with Thresh. She rolled her eyes. Of course she didn't! She disliked the wargrex as much as he obviously disliked her.

She blew out an unsteady breath and turned her whole body away, giving him her back. Now only Nixra, the night goddess, could see her hot face and restless gaze.

She knew he wasn't watching her now. She was always aware when he was, his gaze like a blaze licking over her flesh. As in this moment, she could feel when he cast those hot looks elsewhere.

"I'll be sending a patrol out in a few days," he said. More silence followed. Then, "Their route will take them close to West Gate."

What was he saying? Was he going to let her go back home? A sudden searing hope took hold. She spun around to face him.

"You humans like writing letters, don't you?" he asked, meeting her eyes. "Write one to your mother, and Barthac will see it delivered for you."

Oh. Her shoulders slumped with acute disappointment.

When she said nothing, he turned around to catch her in his glare. His brow climbed up on one side. "You look disappointed?" His hot grunt of annoyance misted in the cold air between them.

"I have nothing to say to my mother," she muttered.

"You hate her?" With a hooded look, he studied her. Then his gaze dropped to her mouth. "What about me, Rowan?" He moved closer, swift and stealthy on silent feet. "Do you hate me?"

"Yes." Was that her breathy voice? Her lips parted and her belly tumbled with nerves. Her gaze dropped to his mouth, waiting for him to speak again.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes." Her eyes fluttered a moment and she had to swallow before she trusted herself to speak again. "I hate you." But her voice wobbled like a weak flame and he was the night gale shaking her foundations.

He smirked, holding her trapped in his gaze. Before she could punish him with another "I hate you," he swooped in, silencing her with a forceful kiss.

At first, she was too shocked to do anything, her lips parting on a gasp. And then it was too late, her thoughts scattering and her head swam with light. Her eyelids swept shut under the force of tingles swirling under her fingertips as she gripped his biceps.

He pulled her close, wrapping her in his wild male scent. His mouth slanted over hers, firm and warm and unexpectedly soft. It stirred a wildfire in her loins. That familiar, consuming fire which seemed to blot out her logic in hot smoke. His touch always did that to her, even a brush of his fingertips.

The touch of his lips, however, was tenfold as potent. So powerful that it stole her outrage and lobbed it inward, using her own fury against her, firing her senses with lust instead of rage. His tongue plunged in, and the kiss turned deep and primal. It was a kiss so smelting hot, it engulfed the wall she'd shored up between them. She moaned into his mouth, the sound fetched from whatever animal he'd awakened within her. Her eyes snapped open in shock, and she was instantly caught in his fiery gaze. Realizing the sounds had been of her making, she snatched her mouth away, chest heaving.

He let her go, his eyes igniting. It was a look that made her stomach drop.

It'd been a punishing kiss and she hadn't even known it till now! He'd made her a liar. What woman kissed a man she claimed to hate?

She backed away, her eyes turning flinty. She couldn't speak, she was so mad.

"You don't hate me, min skani." His mouth turned mocking. "I wonder what else you're lying bout."

Her hands curled at her side, itching to slap him. "Just keep your mouth to yourself, warg."

"Yes, I think I will." His nose flared as he sniffed the air around her. With a disparaging smirk, he said, "Take a bath, you stink." With that he departed in his usual abrupt way, stepping off the edge and disappearing without a sound.

Heat swarmed her face. Only the soft thud way down below told her he'd landed like a cat.

Rowan closed her eyes and covered her warm lips with trembling fingers. She could still feel his bruising kiss as the other wargs left Thesta's kitchen and filed out past her. Torgon was last through the doorway. With a farewell salute, he and the other two vanished over the edge just as their wargrex had done.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

Did warg males never take the stairs?

All was silent after that. Just the sound of Thesta chopping wild rosemary. Meera humming as she poured the bath water into the cask.

Neither of the two women were aware of the tumult still firing off in Rowan's breast. A tumult of aching flesh and a throbbing head. The desire he'd stirred refused to abate no matter how long she stood there cutting the dark up with her glare.

Elgret never would've let a man make a fool of her as Thrax had just done to her. Her mother's armor never chinked, and it never failed her. Yet Rowan had crumpled like a house of sticks. Just one kiss and she'd practically opened the gates and welcomed the wolf in to run amok in her head! She wanted to scream.

"Your Highness!" Thesta called out, startling her, "the bathwater is getting cold!"

Good, she thought. She needed a cold dousing after that kiss. And, truth be told, she was tired of her own stench. Tired of feeling grotty. Tired of attracting ticks. The sweat of fear and humiliation, accumulated over days, was making her skin itch. And evidently her reek did nothing to fend off Thrax's wicked mouth, so what was the point?

Her fingers were clumsy with ire as she ripped the brooches off that held her overdress in place. When she'd yanked her overdress off, followed by her shift, she climbed into the makeshift tub and sank into the fragrant water with a weary sigh. Instantly, her muscles unraveled and her belly unclenched.

She eyed the soap and the wash rag a moment, almost too exhausted to scrub herself. With another sigh, she lathered the rag and dragged it over her sore shoulders. Her arms felt like iron weights.

An unexpected gasp fluttered from her lips as the coarse rag skidded over her breasts. Her nipples puckered, still reeling from Thrax's kiss.

Rowan sank deeper into the water, her cheeks hot as she glanced towards the other two women. But Thesta was shrugging into her mantle, ready to head down to the drinking hall for the night, it seemed. Meera was plying her bone needle, mending Rowan's shift with flaxen thread and humming quietly to herself.

Swallowing hard, Rowan dipped the wash cloth lower, pressing it to the ache between her legs. Oh, gods! She tensed, a groan stealing out as her sex stirred with need.

What had that beast done to her! She gritted her teeth and chucked the rag over the side of the tub with a hiss of fury. The soap, too. Meera and Thesta glanced towards her with matching looks of surprise.

She turned away, her mouth pursed below the water. She vented a bubbly sigh as Thesta came over to stoke the flames and feed more logs into the brazier.

"Are you sure you don't wish to come?" the warga asked Rowan, heading to the door.

And see Thrax? Just so he could turn her into a tangle of knots with a single look? No, thank you. She shook her head, keeping her mouth below the water.

Thesta shrugged and waved goodnight.

Meera watched the door close with a longing look. It was clear she wanted to leave, too. No doubt she was eager to make pretty eyes at Thresh in the drinking hall. Or flirt with Torgon and Thurstag by the feasting fire.

"Go with her," Rowan muttered. "I know you wish to go."

Meera's eyes darted to her and then back to the door. "Are you sure?"

Rowan drummed her fingers along the rim. "I'm fine, I don't need you tonight." She would only stifle her friend with her dark mood. "Go, have fun." But her eyes narrowed suddenly. "Just not too much fun, do you hear?" They both knew she was speaking about Thresh. Meera was a pretty girl and Rowan had noticed the way Thresh watched her.

"Yes, Mother," Meera grinned, her face flushing with excitement.

"I mean it." Her friend was no virgin, but she was far from home and these wargs were far different from the men of West Gate. "Be careful."

Meera hurried to the door. "I won't stay long!"

Rowan answered with a dubious snort. She watched Meera snatch a cloak from a hook and fly out the door to catch up to Thesta.

Alone in the tub, Rowan squeezed her thighs together, trying to ignore the pulse beating in her sex. But it was impossible. Thrax had stirred such a fire there that even the cooling water did nothing to calm it.

She bit her lip and skimmed her hand down her hip, to the aching vale nestled below dark curls. Her lungs emptied in a whoosh and her head dropped back. Her eyelids flittered down as her fingers moved delicately between her folds. Oh, gods!

She summoned Merritt to her thoughts, her body undulating as her legs turned slack, her knees dropping against the sides of the tub. But it wasn't Merritt who materialized behind her eyelids. A broad looming shadow emerged in her mind's eye. Thrax's fierce yellow gaze watched her with stunning heat as her sex quivered under her fingertips. She gasped and yanked her hand away, her eyes flying open.

She sat bolt upright and searched the longhouse with quickened breaths, expecting to see Thrax bent over the tub, watching her. But the room was empty and the darkness beyond the door quiet as ever. That didn't stop the blood sweeping into her face, scalding her skin.

Worst of all, the humiliation rising to the fore did nothing to calm that blasted ache he'd evoked. Her anger seemed only to fuel it. She might not hate him, she admitted, but she hated that she had no control over her own body—the traitorous thing wanted Thrax and didn't care that she was already married to Merritt. It didn't care that she loved another.

"Gah!" she slapped the surface, sloshing water over the side and into the brazier. The flames hissed and spluttered, the light wavering.

How was she to be wargrix here? The female equivalent of Thrax. A High Lady like her mother. It was impossible, she couldn't be. She wasn't anything like her steely mother! They were all setting her up to fail. Thrax never should've stolen her away from Merritt—from home! She wasn't cut out for this stark life.

Through the doorway, a sliver of moonlight peeked in. Mantor's silver eye was nearly shut tight, but, even so, his gaze was sharp. Nigh as sharp as the wargrex's.

Tomorrow night his light would be extinguished and all the world shrouded in full, ominous darkness. Except the frosty starlight of Nixra's hair, curling like diamonds across the night sky. And no Mantor eyes to guide her home. She was stuck here until the full moon.

There was no escaping tomorrow. No escaping the raw, obliterating dark of the Mating Moon.

Thrax's voice murmured from the dark of her mind. "I wonder what else you're lying bout."

He would find out soon enough, wouldn't he? When her virgin's blood spilled across the mating bed tomorrow night.

Maeda help her!