Page 36 of White Horse Black Nights

“So you want to fight dirty, is that it?” There’s an edge in my voice.

Her fist is balled tightly. “I want you to take me seriously.”

“Oh, I take your safety as seriously as a blade to my throat.”

She straightens, lifting her chin as she evaluates her small fists. “Now show me how to defend myself against a man.”

“A man? Lady Sabine—”

“There must be something I can do. You’re saying I should just take a man’s brutality?”

She’s already suggested I don’t take her safety seriously, so I want to give her what she wants. She’s such a little thing that it spikes anger in my veins to even consider how easily a thuggish man might overpower her.

“Your strength isn’t enough, so you’ll have to use other tools at your disposal. You can speak to creatures that bite and sting. Use that.”

“Use animals?” Her face pales. She shakes her head in a single, definitive bob. “No. I can’t.”

It takes me a minute to understand. “Ah. The dead wildcat. I see. You don’t want to put more animals at risk, is that it?”

Pain ripples across her face as she swipes at her nose.

Nodding to myself, I say steadily, “There are ways to giveyourselfclaws, then.”

She meets my gaze, very much intrigued. “How?”

I draw my hunting knife from the holster at my hip. It’s a wide, ten-inch blade with a heavy brass handle, given to me by Lord Rian as a prize when I slaughtered a wolf that attacked one of the Valvere’s prize horses.

I press the hilt into her small palm. “This hilt was made for my hand, not yours. When we arrive in Duren, I’ll have a properly sized blade made for you. Something small and sheathed that you can hide beneath your clothes.”

“Oh,” she says softly, wrapping her fingers around the brass hilt. “I can’t pay you.”

Pay me? For keeping her safe? I would payhera thousand coins if she only promised to keep a blade on her at all times. Even after crossing half of Astagnon together, she still doesn’t seem to understand that I exist to serve her, not the other way around.

I give a low laugh. “Consider it a wedding present.”

She gives me a wry look. “Not many people would associate weddings with knives.” She toys with the blade’s sharp point, pressing it gently against my heart. “I do, too.”

I swallow a dry breath.Because we’re the same, I think.Both abandoned. Both made to survive on our own.

A girl like that doesn’t want rubies and gold. She wants claws.

She applies slight pressure to the knife’s tip, bowing but not breaking my skin. “And what if, when we reach Sorsha Hall, I don’t have a blade at the ready? Should I scream?”

“Hmm,” I stall, not wanting to dismiss her suggestion immediately. Yeah, right. The chance of someone responding to a scream in Sorsha Hall is as fanciful as cloudfoxes. Sorsha Hall is no silent convent filled with soft prayer and incense. Screams are the fuckingstandard. There are always sporting fights in the ballroom, not to mention moaning from the bedrooms.

“Distraction,” I say instead. “That’s your best option. Divert your attacker’s attention and run.”

She squares her stance just as I taught her. “Like this?”

She raises her fist, ready for more sparring, but I hesitate as my eyes trail down her curves beneath my oversized shirt.

“I don’t mean to offend your decency, my lady, but there’s often only one reason a man would attack a girl who looks like you do. He’ll likely be able to overpower you physically, but such an attack also leaves him open to vulnerabilities.”

Her cheeks turn a pretty shade of rose as she puts together my meaning, and she lowers her fists slowly, but maintains her fierce stance. In a dry, steady voice, she says, “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Show me.”

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