ISKERA
A brave guard approaches me. He has removed his gloves, and his hand is outstretched toward me, a nervous smile playing across his lips.
He is surely both brave and terrified; he was among the guards who had physically thrown me out of the mating grounds when the sky first broke—back when Rian rejected me, when I was slated to be a sacrifice because the plague had just begun to take hold.
"I am sorry, Princess Iskera…" He says, dropping heavily to his knees. He lifts his hands toward me in a gesture of profound respect.
I know what that means. I know exactly what he is offering: his loyalty, his trust, his very life. He wants me to touch him, skin to skin; he wants me to take his hands and drop a symbolic kiss on them, accepting him as my personal royal guard.
Without even turning my head, I sense Seren's agitation vibrating through the air.
She isn't stupid enough to rebel here in front of the Prince and the pack, so her anger remains a private, simmering thing.
