The Alpha Rejected His Scentless Mate at the Altar, So She Came Back as the Luna He Kneels For novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: Her Gate

I went back to Iron Ridge alone.

I told the Speaker I needed a week.

She said she was eighty-four and could wait a week, but not much more.

I told Tiernan I needed it too.

He was still in bed in the Ravensdale house, grey under his beard, with the healer guarding his door.

He didn't argue.

Go, he said in my head. I'm not going anywhere.

You can't go anywhere, I told him. You can barely sit up.

That too.

The Ironclaw Beta drove me up the mountain road in one of the black trucks.

The young wolves rode in the back in the cold, singing.

Iron Ridge looked the way it always had.

Steep streets, tin roofs, coal smoke.

But every porch we passed had someone standing on it, and every one of them lifted a hand.

Theron's house sat at the top of the town.

It was empty now.

His coats were still in the hall closet.

His chessboard was still set up by the window, halfway through a game against himself.

I walked through every room.

In the closet of the bedroom where I'd had my fever, I found the white fur coat.

The one he had held open for me on the bridge.

I had worn it all that first winter.

Then I took it down to the street and gave it to the first woman I saw who didn't have a good coat.

For three days I walked the town.

I listened to the young wolves and the old guard argue about who they were now.

At night I sat on Theron's porch, my porch, and looked down at the lights.

The two halves of the iron crown lay on the boards beside me.

I could feel Tiernan through the mark the whole time.

Faint and steady, across the river and down the mountain.

Getting stronger every day.

On the fourth evening, the mark felt closer.

Then the young grey female from the ice came running up the hill, out of breath, her cheeks red.

"Luna," she said. "There's a man at your gate."

"What man?"

"The Ashenveil one. The big one." She made a face. "He walked."

I went to the window.

He was standing at the iron gate at the bottom of the garden, in his black wool coat, in the snow.

Alone.

No truck behind him.

No warriors.

No title.

He'd crossed Greyfrost Bridge on foot, from their side to ours, and walked the whole mountain road up.

He didn't open the gate.

He didn't call out.

He just stood there, with his hands in his pockets, looking up at the house.

Why did you walk? I asked him.

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