Gilded Serpent by Danielle Jensen (top 10 novels txt) 📕

across the space between them, hooking her arm around the wolf’s neck. She dug in her heels, hauling backward, expecting to feel the sharp pain of teeth. It was so heavy—like …

Deadweight.

That’s when she saw her knife hilt jutting from the creature’s eye.

“Shit!” Marcus snarled the word, shoving the dead animal aside with Teriana’s help. Then his eyes landed on her blade and he went still. “Who taught you to throw a knife?”

Killian. Killian had taught her. Or at least as much as he’d teach any skill that might be attributed to his mark. “You look like you’re playing at darts,” he’d laughed at her. “No one has that much time to aim in a fight. Look at what you want to hit and throw the gods-damned blade!”

“A friend,” she whispered, watching as he jerked out the knife, wiping the gore off on the animal’s coat.

Fear clawed at Teriana’s insides as she stared down at the dead wolf. Another pack member that she had killed. “What do we do?”

“We go.” He started walking west.

“Care to justify that decision?” She mimicked his voice as she asked the question, earning a smile as they broke into a jog.

“They won’t give up trying to get in at us tonight. And I expect it won’t be only one wolf watching us tomorrow, but the whole pack. They’re smart. They learn.”

Teriana shivered, and it had nothing to do with the cold.

“This is their territory,” he continued, stumbling in the snow before catching his balance. “There’s nothing to drive them off except for their own need to eat. If we stay, I think we’ll be trapped.”

“And you think things will be any better twenty miles from here?”

“It’s a move in the right direction.” He pulled his hood back in place. “Twenty miles west won’t get us into another pack’s territory, but forty might. Sixty definitely will.”

“Great, more wolves,” she muttered, wondering how the Sibernese survived in this place.

“More wolves that are likely to take issue with another pack invading their territory.” He cast a backward glance over his shoulder. “It’s a long shot, but it’s something.”

 51MARCUS

It was like running in sand.

But worse.

The snow shifted and moved beneath his feet, the crust catching at his toes and tripping him up, making it difficult to tell whether his next step would send him ankle deep or up past his knees.

By the time they passed the first mile marker, Marcus was already dripping with sweat and wishing he could shed some of his clothes, but there was no time. At any moment, the pack might discover their dead scout and decide to give chase.

So they kept the pace.

By the third mile, Marcus’s sides were cramping, the muscles in his legs burning and the scent of his own sweat heavy in his nose with each gasping inhalation he took.

“Make it to the next milepost, then we walk a mile.”

Keep. Running. Keep. Running. He silently chanted the words with each step, helping Teriana up when she fell only to have her return the favor a few strides later.

Never had he felt more relief as they reached the post embedded in the earth, a three carved on one side, a seventeen on the other for those traveling in the opposite direction, and both of them fell into a walk.

As they trudged toward the next mile marker, the wind picked up, tugging at his hood and piercing through his woolen clothing. But Teriana was shivering, so he moved next to her to block some of the wind.

And probably because she was close enough to hear the faint wheeze to his breath, she asked, “Will running like this cause one of your attacks?”

It was a valid question, given the circumstances, but it still made his cheeks burn hot and his temper flare, reminding him of how it had felt to be the weakest before he’d learned to compensate for his limitations. “If it does, just leave me and carry on. No sense in both of us dying out here.”

Teriana stopped in her tracks. “What is wrong with you? Why would you say something like that?”

He kept trudging forward, glaring at the snow and half-wishing the wolves might catch up and spare him from this conversation.

“It wasn’t a damned criticism,” she snapped, jogging to close the distance. “It’s not like you choose for it to happen. It’s not your fault.”

Bloody platitudes. His temper burned hotter. His sister Cordelia had always said the same sort of things, as though being blameless would somehow make him feel better about his situation when it was the exact opposite. He wished he’d done something to cause his illness, because then he’d have somewhere to direct the blame other than bad luck, which only made him feel powerless. “Doesn’t mean it isn’t a problem.”

“Aye, fair enough. But maybe instead of getting defensive, you might inform me how best to prevent it from happening.”

He slid to a halt, rounding on her. “How best to prevent it from happening? Do you think if it were so simple, that I wouldn’t do just that?”

The eyes staring out from under her hood were the grey of storm-tossed seas, the bow of her lips drawn into a tight line as she glared back at him. “Surely there are certain things that trigger you.”

“This conversation, for starts.” Turning round, he picked up the pace, feeling an irritating combination of frozen and overheated. It was not the time for this conversation given the wolves could be hot on their heels. Though he supposed it mattered little if the pack came upon them in a full-blown argument or running for their lives.

“Given that I nearly killed you with a conversation, maybe that’s a good place to start.”

“That wasn’t your fault. You didn’t know.”

As soon as the words passed his lips, he cursed at himself, already feeling her smug satisfaction at having won the argument. Lifting his head, he eyed the next mile marker, where they’d again have to pick up the pace. “I don’t want you walking on eggshells