Chapter 21: The Ring

Dane's head turned toward me for half a heartbeat.

That was all Ernest needed.

He hit Dane square in the shoulder, and the two of them went across the snow in a roar of teeth.

I ran for the edge of the ring.

Two men stepped in front of me, shoulder to shoulder.

I knew them. They were Ernest's men, the ones who had moved the pine on the ridge road.

"Stand back, Miss Thackeray," one of them said. "A challenge is clean. Nobody crosses."

"His claws are poisoned!"

"You can't say that," the other said. "You're his ward and his lover. Nobody will take your word."

"Then take my nose!" I shouted at the elders. "Smell him!"

The eldest elder had both hands on her cane, and her face was gray.

"Girl," she said. "I can't stop a challenge on a smell. The only one who can stop it is the Alpha, and only by yielding."

"Carrie!"

"I know." Carrie was beside me, fighting the second man's arm. "I know, I'm trying!"

In the ring, Dane tore himself loose and came back low and fast.

He was fast. He had always been fast.

He hit Ernest's flank and his teeth went in, and a bellow shook the torches.

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