Page 33 of Fate and Fury

His jaw clenched. “It doesn’t have to be.”

“You’ve lost your mind,” Katerina said, ignoring the way her traitorous heart leapt at his words. “And for once, I’m sure Elena would agree with me.”

“Well,” Niko said, offering a rueful half-smile, “that would be a first.”

“Is it my fault I want more from life than to be a broodmare?”

Niko sighed. “You have an obligation to bear Dimichildren, too. And you know she doesn’t think of it that way. For her, it’s an honor.”

Katerina was silent, remembering what Elena had once said to her.The greatest strength of all runs through my veins—for without Vila, there would be no more of my kind and no Shadows, and without Shadows, evil would triumph.She might be a zealot, but she wasn’t wrong. And she had centuries of tradition on her side.

She’d never thought to find herself being jealous of aVila, of all people, but at the thought of Niko abandoning her hearth for Elena’s bed, envy gnawed at her. It was humiliating.

Niko cleared his throat. “Katya, what I saw in your eyes today when Baba promised me to Elena—it slayed me. And tonight, when—when we… You cannot tell me you felt nothing.”

She swallowed hard, remembering how he had knotted his hands in her hair and kissed her until neither of them could breathe. How he’d groaned when her witchfire had licked at his skin. She’d fled into the storm, hoping it would wash her clean of her desire for him. But it was her storm—a reflection of the turbulence inside her—and even though the wind had died down, the war inside Katerina still raged.

“The prophecy—” she said, but Niko didn’t let her finish.

“Damn the prophecy. Old wives’ tales and trickery. This is between us, not some words inscribed in a dusty book. I don’t believe for a moment that that’s what called up the demons on the road near Drezna. Because when they came—nothing had happened, Katya, other than the feelings I held for you in my heart.”

“Maybe,” she said, staring down at the severed elderflower stems, “that was enough.”

“If that’s all it takes, then I’m already damned. When you told me that the Kniaz wanted you, it took every bit of my restraint not to hunt him down, nobleman or no. And that night, when we lay together in the rowan grove, it was all I could do to keep from...” His voice cracked. “You were so warm. So beautiful. I lay awake for hours, memorizing the way you felt in my arms. I never dreamed you felt the same way, until last night.”

Shock broke over Katerina. Niko’s decision to leave Rivki, the way he’d held her in the woods…none of it had been for the reasons she’d thought. The whole time she’d been agonizing over her desire for him, he’d been doing the same.

It should have changed nothing. But yet?—

“Do you want me?” His voice was low, desperate. “Because if you do…then the prophecy be damned, Katerina. For the Grigori are already loose upon the world. And I already burn for you in the Light.”

Katerina dropped her head, teeth worrying at her lower lip. Maybe he was right, and the prophecy was no more than superstition. Still—what about Elena? And what if they were discovered? Where could this possibly end?

She hadn’t seen Niko move, but somehow he was in front of her, his big hands light on her upper arms. “Look at me,” he said, his voice hoarse, “and tell me you don’t want me. Tell me that, and I’ll never speak of it again.”

Slowly, Katerina lifted her head. His gray eyes filled her line of vision, the precise shade of the sky before a winter storm. She shook her head, unable to say the words. The wind spoke for her instead, lashing through the trees, bending the tender saplings to the ground.

His grip tightened, and the basket fell from her hand, spilling the delicate blue flowers. “Say it, Katya.” The words were a growl, his form flickering as his other nature rose perilously close to the surface. As a Shadow, he was taught exquisitecontrol. Katerina had never seen him look like this—the black dog barely leashed, threatening to break his hold. “Say it and set us both free. Or don’t, and I’ll do as you wish. In all things, as I always have. As I am sworn to do.”

The wind was a gale of her own making, the leaves and needles whipping around their feet, rising higher to swirl around their bodies. She reached up and locked her hands around his neck, twining her fingers through the rough silk of his hair. He smelled of ink and soap and sweat—and beneath that, the wildness of the forest itself.

When he spoke, his mouth brushed hers, sending shivers through her. “Say it.”

“And you’ll do as I wish?” she whispered against his lips.

“On my oath as a Shadow. No matter what it costs me.”

“Then kiss me,” she said, hands fisted in his hair.

He took a sharp, startled breath. Then his mouth closed over hers and his tongue traced the seam of her lips, tasting of mint and night and Niko.

His fingers caught her hips, tugging her closer. He outlined her eyebrows in the darkness, then ran a fingertip down the column of her neck. His palm came to rest above her heart, just below the amulet that held a drop of his blood. “Ah, Katya. I have loved you since we were children, playing, long before I took my oath. And when Baba Marked me, I thought first not of the honor—but that wherever I went, I would bear your touch on my skin.”

With his free hand, he pressed her palm to the tattoo on his arm that marked him as hers. A Shadow’s Mark was his bond, a promise made and a vow kept. To lay your hands on it was more intimate than a lover’s caress. Battles had been fought over the ignominy of such a touch. Even Elena would have no right to it when she and Niko married. It was Katerina’s claim, and hers alone.

She ran her nails over it, following the lines of the circles by the light of the Bone Moon. “One for the fire,” she whispered as the Mark burned beneath her fingers and the wind raged. “Two for the storm.”

At the words of their bonding ritual, Niko’s hand fell from hers, clenching into a fist at his side. He drew himself up, the way he had eight years ago, when they’d stood in Baba’s cottage and sworn their vows in blood. “Three for the black dog that guards against harm.” His voice was a rasp.

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