Winter's Bride - Candace Wondrak Page 0,13

was that easy. As if I’d want to drain the color from her skin and dull the golden tones in her hair. Doing so would hurt her, just as it would hurt me.

I said nothing, taking another step toward her. Morana must’ve thought I was going to take my favor from her, for she let me grab her wrists. Instead of pulling anything from her, I pushed my heat inside her, filled her up with honeyed warmth, my fingers intertwining with hers. She let out the breathiest sigh I’d ever heard in all my days, and I knew right then I would forever be in search of a similar sound.

More. I wanted to hear more of those sounds from her.

I let my hands linger on hers, let my magic wash over her in every way, filled those pretty blue eyes with a glimmer of promise, of me. Of Summer himself. “I will do no such thing,” I quietly said, giving her a small grin. “I find it commendable, what you’re doing for your sister, but I cannot step aside and let you throw your life away with my brother.”

For that’s what would happen. Abner would never love her. He never loved any of them. He never grew to care about them, and that’s precisely why they never lasted long. Just the mere possibility of Morana fading, her losing her brightness, her spirit and her soul, I couldn’t stand it.

No, I refused to step aside and let this be. I’d watched my brother from afar for far too long; now, with the human that had earned my favor and my heart riding to his castle to become his bride, I would do the opposite of making myself scarce.

“Perhaps it is foolish to try to tell a god what to do,” Morana started, pulling her hands from mine as her will hardened, “but I’m going to do just that and tell you to leave it be. I made my choice.” She said nothing more as she turned and picked up her dress, stepping into it and pulling it up over her shoulders—which had long since dried, thanks to my heat—but when she glanced back to where I’d been, she saw nothing.

I was still there, of course, but I’d made myself invisible to humans once more. I stared at her, a dejected feeling growing in my heart. She was stubborn; that much I’d already known from keeping an eye on her all these years. But to wed my brother—that was insanity, pure and simple.

Taking her for myself, forcing her to go with me instead of with my brother’s messenger… she would hate me for it. I could never do something so awful to her, could not ever dare to force her into anything she did not want. I might be a god, but I was not a god of vengeance and pain. Summer was my home, and that meant warmth, fire, the sun, being surrounded by those who you loved.

I had to get through to her, had to make her see that this was a mistake, that she didn’t belong with Abner, but how?

Chapter Three – Morana

I kept Summer’s—er, Ishan’s—visit to me while I was bathing to myself, not knowing how to bring it up to the messenger. Plus, I had the feeling he was still there, somewhere, still watching me and trying to come up with an idiotic plan to get me to abandon my vow to take my sister’s place and become Winter’s bride.

I didn’t know why Ishan would want to step in; Winter was his brother. Did he not want his brother to have a bride? Granted, I knew I wouldn’t be his first bride, nor would I be his last, but surely coming between Winter and his bride was a big no-no.

What was it about me that garnered Summer’s favor? Nearly everyone in town had mentioned it before to me, how my skin never lost its color in the winter months, how I always seemed to be a bit warmer than everyone else—but I never really thought… I never thought it was actually possible.

Don’t get me wrong, I believed in the gods. I just didn’t know what it was about me that merited one’s favor. I never asked for it, never went searching for it. I simply had lived my life and been me, never pretended to be anyone else. If that was the sole reason Ishan had granted me his favor, surely there were countless others in the