Chapter 6: Hold Her

I knocked Ragna's hand off my chest.

She caught my wrist on the way down, quick as a snake, and twisted.

I went up on my toes.

"Torvald," she called over her shoulder. "Your human's here."

Torvald stood up at the far end of the table.

"The King refused her in front of this council," he said. "She has no right to touch him. Hold her."

Two men moved.

They came at me from both sides and took my arms, and Ragna let go and stepped back to watch.

I fought.

It was fighting two trees.

"He's dying," I shouted at the old wolves around the table. "Look at him. You're going to stand there again?"

The woman with the gray braid looked at the floor.

The white-bearded man half rose from his chair.

Torvald put a hand on his shoulder, and he sat back down.

Vidar's chest had stopped moving.

The frost was on his throat now, gray branches creeping up under his beard.

His lips were blue.

Then somebody behind me snarled.

It wasn't a human sound.

A black and white wolf came over the council table in one leap, scattering plates.

She hit the man on my left at the shoulder and took him down, her teeth sunk in his forearm.

He screamed and let me go.

I wrenched my other arm free and threw myself across the floor.

I landed on my knees beside Vidar and tore his flannel open.

My hands went flat on his chest.

Nothing.

He was so cold my palms stuck to his skin.

"Come on," I said. "Come on, you stubborn..."

His heart thudded once under my right hand.

Then again.

Then it ran, and the heat came up into my hands, and he arched off the floor with a breath that sounded like it hurt.

The frost pulled back from his throat in front of everyone.

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