Chapter 24: The Ten

A year later, the Founders' Ten came back to Gull Point House.

This time the pack paid for it out of the treasury, and I was the guest of honor.

I still ran the schedule, because nobody else could read my handwriting.

The wooden box of envelopes sat on the long table on the lawn, an ordinary box with a plain lid and no key.

The old founder had checked every seal himself that morning. He held each one to the window, one by one, and found nothing.

"Not a dent among them," he told the lawn. "The Alpha draws first."

I stood up from my chair.

Conal rose beside me, in a clean shirt, with salt on his boots.

"Rigged?" he murmured.

"Check the wax."

"I've checked the wax. It's plain."

"Then I suppose it's fate."

I put my hand in the box, and the whole lawn leaned in.

I drew a cream envelope, cracked the seal with my thumbnail, and read the card.

"Conal Cardross," I said.

The lawn erupted.

"That's not funny," Conal said, grinning, while the ferry crew pounded the tables.

"It's a little funny."

"It's your name I'd have drawn anyway."

Portia poured the champagne at the buffet, in a plain apron, and nodded to me from across the grass.

It was a small nod. It was enough.

She had served the pack's tables all year. Her twins ran between the chairs with the ferry woman's dogs.

Gisela did not come.

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