Page 22 of White Horse Black Nights

To my surprise, he offers the other apple to Myst in his open palm.

She snorts.Poison apple?

Oh, stop being so suspicious,I say to her.There would be easier ways to kill you.

She snorts again, doubtful.

I take a theatrical bite to demonstrate to her it isn’t poison. Still dubious, she accepts the apple from him but bares her teeth as she does.

He snorts right back at her.

For a few minutes, the three of us enjoy the apples. The Sisters grew apple trees in the convent orchard, but I was rarely permitted a taste. Instead, they made me mash the fruits for long hours into fermented cider that they’d guzzle by the gallon, despite their abstinence vows. At night, the scent of the juice on my skin drew the bees that lived in my thatched roof. I let them crawl over me as I lay in bed, whispering to them that they were lucky to be able to fly away. They were always careful not to sting me—but one night, I rolled over on one accidentally. The prick of pain soon faded, but my face began to swell. My neck and chest itched so badly that I wanted to scratch my skin off. I’d heard of bee venom sickening certain people, but never knew I was susceptible. My throat closed up; I couldn’t breathe. In the morning, the Sisters found me unconscious, bees crawling over every inch of my skin to keep me warm. If not for them, I might have died. The Sisters drenched me with a bucket of cold water to shock me alert. Then, they made me return to work.

As the delicate juice now flows down my throat, my mood also sweetens.

The convent is behind me.

“So. Your name,” I say between bites. “Did your parents really name you Wolf?”

He shakes his head, keeping his eyes on the fire. “Didn’t know my parents.”

“Someonenamed you.”

He rolls his half-eaten apple from one hand to the other as distant thoughts scroll through his eyes. I don’t actually expect him to open his mind’s vault to me, so it’s a shock when he says, haltingly, “There was a—a thief. Jocki. He kept an eye on me as a boy. He used to set up street fights. Children aren’t allowed to fight for pay in Duren, but it happens.”

I raise my eyebrows. This situation feels delicate, like any sudden move will freeze Wolf up like a skittish rabbit. “I’m sorry to hear it.”

He looks at me oddly, like he’s never heard sympathy before. Then, he clears his throat. “Lord Rian saw me in one of Jocki’s fights. He decided a godkissed fighter around his age would make a good sparring partner, so his father, Lord Berolt, allowed me to train in the academy for the Golden Sentinels. That’s the Valveres’ private army. They gave me Bladeborn as a surname, then later, when they decided my skills were better suited as a hunter, changed it to Bowborn.”

“And your first name?”

“Rian started calling me that for my ability to track—like a wolf.”

I nibble the last scraps of apple flesh from its core. Softly, I ask, “What’s your real name?”

His head jerks to the side, an instant head shake. He doesn’t want to say.

“Tell me?” I swallow the last bite of my apple. “Please?”

His body flinches at that word as viscerally as if I had slapped him. I can tell now that kind words make him uncomfortable. They raise his defenses as much as if I’d drawn a knife. He throws his apple core deep into the woods, and I’m sure he isn’t going to tell me a thing for the rest of the night other than to bark commands.

But he quietly mutters, “Basten.”

The way he says it is rusty, like his tongue hasn’t made the sound in years. He immediately stands, as though ashamed, and finds something urgent to dig through his rucksack for. The patter of falling acorns, loosened by the wind, tap around us.

Basten, I repeat in my head. Something about it unlocks a door I didn’t see in him before. A godkissed boy on the streets, living on his own, blessed and cursed at the same time. Hell, it isn’t that different from how I grew up, only instead of the combat arena, I was caged by convent walls.

“It suits you,” I say encouragingly.

He snorts. “Basten the Bastard—you’re right.”

“That isn’t what I meant.”

Silence falls between us as the sun sinks further. The stars begin to make their debut overhead, one at a time like they don’t want to rush each other. We finish eating, and I take my apple core to Myst so she can savor the last bite.

He told me his real name,I tell her.

Doesn’t matter. Still don’t trust him.She sniggers derisively in Wolf’s direction before munching on the apple core.But the apple helps.

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