Out of the Shadow at Last novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: What He Owes

Ivar's POV

The cairn stood on the hill above Northgate, thirty stones high, one for each wolf in the convoy.

I climbed to it that night alone.

I had come here every Hollow Night for seven years, with a bottle I never opened.

This year there was nothing to say that I hadn't said, so I stood with my hand on the top stone, the one for my father, and said it again.

"It wasn't a mistake," I told him. "It wasn't weather. A man sold it."

"The man's gone. The woman who held the border is alive, and she is the best person I have ever met."

"I tested her, Father. I stood in your study and decided to test her."

"I'd like you to say that I'm a fool."

The wind took it, and nothing else answered.

I stood there until my hand went numb.

For six days I had told myself that the cold in my chest was the old grief.

It wasn't.

It was fear that she would say no.

I had never had anything to lose in front of anyone, and now I had a great deal.

I heard her on the path before I saw her.

She walked the way she always walked, with a half step of hesitation at every turn.

She had a shawl over her nightgown, and the Seal on its cord.

"Bram said you'd be here," Linnet said.

"Bram is a gossip."

"Bram is a friend."

"That too."

She stopped beside me and looked at the cairn.

She counted the stones with her lips.

"Thirty," she said.

"Thirty."

"I held the border for the last seven years, and I never once knew these were on it."

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