The eastern cliffs of the Iron Pass were not meant to be scaled by men. They were sheer, jagged faces of freezing black granite, slick with coastal mist and entirely devoid of natural handholds.
For the Crown Prince of Arindale, they were simply another obstacle in his way.
Aeron hung eighty feet in the air, his gloveless fingers wedged into a crack in the freezing stone. The wind howled through the narrow canyon below, a mournful, deafening roar that masked the sound of the seven men climbing alongside him.
He pulled himself up another two feet. As he moved, the heavy, matte-black leather strap of his climbing harness shifted across his left collarbone.
The rough leather scraped directly over the violent, plum-colored bite mark Kaia had left him hours ago in the armory.
A sharp, vivid sting flared across his skin.
