"I was a hostage prince from a defeated kingdom. The duke’s daughter crushed the bones in my hand, drenched me in ice water, set dogs on me, and seared the flesh of my shoulder with a branding iron.
She wanted to flay my skin and spread it over her marriage bed.
But she did not know that the prince and I shared a bond of sensation.
Every wound I suffered would cross any distance and appear on his body.
On the border battlefield, bruises burst across the back of his hand, blood holes opened in his calf, and a charred mark burned into his shoulder.
He abandoned the enemy commander’s banner and led his black cavalry back to the castle, pressing his sword to his fiancée’s throat.
Even in death, she never understood.
She wanted to strip off my skin, but the shame branded onto my shoulder had burned through the bones of the man she loved most."
