Chapter 24: Home to the Valley

The steel gates at the foot of Wintermere were chained, and I had the key.

Lucan stood beside me in his old black coat with six Crown guards at our backs.

We had buried his father three days before, and he had not yet slept a full night.

"Open it," he said.

"You do it. You're the king."

"It's your valley."

I put the key in the lock and turned it.

The chain fell into the snow, and the gates swung wide.

The sign that said GRAYMOOR MINING TRUST swung with them.

Lucan took it by the corner and ripped it off the post.

He threw it into the ditch.

"That was satisfying," he said.

"Do it again."

He laughed, and it was the first time in three days.

We drove up the road to the lodge with the guards behind us.

Behind them came the lowland trucks, one after another, forty trucks and cars with their windows open.

Men and women leaned out, with children on their knees.

They had been moved to farms on the plain seven years ago, and the Crown had sent word that they could come home.

At the first cottage the lead truck stopped.

An old woman climbed down with a bundle in her arms.

She looked up at the empty chimney.

Then she looked at me.

"Miss Morwen?" she said. "Are you Alpha Ainsley's girl?"

"I am."

"You have his jaw." She started to cry.

"We kept a lamp lit for you in the window at the farm. Every winter."

I put my arms around her, and I could not speak.

All that afternoon the doors of Wintermere opened, one after another.

Men carried in wood.

Women hung curtains.

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