I Was Never Their First Choice novel · Chapter 5 of 24

Chapter 5: Two Silver Pieces

I woke in the infirmary with a hot brick at my feet and Bram's face a hand's width from mine.

"She lives," he announced.

"Move," I said.

"No. I've been sitting here an hour, and I want my reward." He grinned. "Everyone wants to know what the Alpha said when he carried you out of the cave."

"What did he say?"

"Nothing. That's the point. He walked past forty wolves with a girl in his coat and didn't speak."

My face went hot.

"You're blushing," he said, delighted.

"I almost drowned. I'm allowed to be any color I like."

"Fair." He handed me a mug. "Drink. Then you have to come to the yard, because the sunburned one has bet the shaved one two silver pieces that you'll quit the log drill by noon."

"What's the log drill?"

"You'll hate it," he said cheerfully.

I hated it.

It was a row of round logs laid across a frozen pond.

You ran the length of them with a sack of grain on each shoulder, and the logs rolled, and if you fell you fell through the ice into a hole the instructors had cut for the purpose.

Nine of the Hold's wolves stood watching, with mugs of tea.

The girl from Silverbrook cupped her hands around her mouth. "You can do it, Sandiford! Mind your left ankle!"

"What's wrong with my left ankle?"

"Everything!"

I took the first step and the log rolled.

I fell on the second.

I fell on the third, and again, and the sunburned one began collecting his bet.

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