The Moon She Waited Under novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: Ninth Moon

Dessa's POV

The moon cleared the pines at a quarter to nine, and I stood in the middle of the ring and let it find me.

Nobody spoke.

The pack stood on the slope below with their coats pulled tight, the same people who had watched me stand here seven times.

This time they didn't look at their shoes.

Kari had brought a thermos and a stack of paper cups, and she was passing them down the rows.

Osric stood at the edge of the stones with his stick planted and his white head bare.

The notch in the pines sat empty.

I looked at it for a long time.

At ten, a boy near the front started to say something, and his mother shushed him.

At eleven, the cold came up out of the ground and into my boots, and I flexed my hands.

They were warm.

They were still warm, and I was glad of it.

I wasn't ashamed.

That was the surprise of it.

Seven times I had stood in this place with my face burning and my back straight, and all I'd wanted was for it to be over.

Tonight the slope was full of people who had come to stand with me, and it was a different place.

If he didn't come, I would be sad and furious, and I would still be standing here.

I would be all right.

I was sure of it.

At half past eleven, my wolf woke and stretched.

She wasn't angry and she wasn't afraid.

She lay along the inside of my ribs with her chin on her paws, watching the empty notch with me, and she was patient.

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