Chapter 18: Hushroot

Eira's POV

The Final Four ceremony began at ten, and I walked onto the turf with a shaved-headed young man beside me and my hands perfectly steady.

Four thousand wolves went quiet in a ripple, row by row, from the front to the back.

Behind me came Odessa, with her stick and a blue glass jar under her arm.

On the Blackpine side, the Beta sat in his box with his bandaged hand on his knee.

Calista sat next to him in plain gray with no locket.

She had been crying already.

I could see it from fifty yards.

"Warden," I said.

My voice carried.

I had learned that in the cave, shouting at the wind.

"I have a witness for the Compact. He was held in your cells and taken out of them in the night."

The Warden rose from her chair slowly.

"Let him speak."

The tracker's lips shook, and for a second I thought he would run.

I put a hand between his shoulder blades.

He told it plainly, in a cracked voice, with his eyes on the grass.

He skipped what the Bowl already knew and went straight to the rope in the corridor.

When he said Calista's name, the Bowl made a sound.

The Beta was on his feet before the boy finished.

"A liar and a traitor," he roared. "A rogue's creature who ran from a cell! He's been bought!"

"Bought with what?" I asked.

"With her bed!" Calista screamed.

She had come to the rail of the box with her hair coming down.

"You've taken my mate and my pack and now you want my father's name! You crept out of Blackpine like a thief and you come back with a story!"

"I have a story," I said. "You're right."

I stepped forward.

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