Chapter 20: The Alpha's Stone

Wynne looked at the stone in its iron cradle.

She looked at the three hundred wolves on the benches, and at the pale scar on the wall where a name had been.

"If I lift it, I'm Alpha," she said.

"Yes," said the oldest elder.

"I have no mate."

"The stone has never asked for one."

"And my son's blood is on the shore of this pack."

"So is every Alpha's," he said. "It is why we ask."

She walked to the cradle.

Garrick stood three paces from it with his arm hanging.

He did not look at her, and he did not step aside.

She did not ask him to.

She put one hand under the stone, flat, and lifted.

It came up out of the iron without a sound.

She raised it to her shoulder, then above her head, on a straight arm, and held it there.

It was no heavier in her hand than a full pail.

A great sound went up from the benches, a roar of wolves, and it filled the hall to the roof.

Then the sound dropped.

One by one, they were going to their knees.

The elders first, then the armorer, then the guards, the maids, the steward.

Hester sat down on the floor with her shawl over her face and wept.

At the back, an old man stood and took off his cap, and bowed, and the whole hall followed.

Garrick was the last.

He went down on his good knee and put his forehead to the stone floor.

Wynne lowered the stone into the cradle.

It settled into the iron with a dull knock.

"Alpha," the oldest elder said. "Command us."

She thought about Eli, and the first thing she wanted was small.

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