He Swore Flowers Would Kill Him, Then Came Home Smelling of Roses novel · Chapter 20 of 32
Chapter 20: The Red Book
The silver crescent did not fade.
I pulled on Torin's flannel and sat on the edge of the bed, staring into the mirror, while the mark pulsed in time with my heart.
"It doesn't hurt," I said.
"Does it feel like anything?"
"It feels like my wolf is standing up."
Torin's hand tightened on mine.
"I've seen this," he said. "I've only seen it once, in a book. My grandmother made me look at it when I was ten."
He was already reaching for his jeans.
We came down the stairs together.
Half the Redfern elders were still in the great room, eating bread and arguing about Rhett's jaw. They went quiet when I walked in with the flannel hanging to my knees.
The oldest of them was a stooped woman with a white braid down to her waist. She had been dozing in the corner chair.
She opened one eye. Then she opened the other.
"Show me your shoulder, girl," she said.
I pulled the collar aside.
The old woman stood up so fast the chair tipped.
"Fetch the book," she said. "The red one. Under the hearth stone."
Nobody moved.
"Now!"
Two men ran.
They came back with a bundle in oilcloth, and the old woman unwrapped it with shaking hands. The book underneath was thin, cracked and bound in faded red cord.
She turned the pages with one finger, until she found a drawing in faded ink.
A crescent. The same shape, the same silver.
Under it, in cramped old writing, was a single line.
"Read it," the old woman said to Torin.
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