The Alpha Divorced Me, Now He Begs at My Grave novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: My Father's House

Her parents tell her to accept the match for Ansley's name; Rosalind takes her ledgers and learns the supply seal is signed in her name alone.

My father met us in the front hall of the Larchmoor house with both hands out, smiling.

"Rosalind. Come in out of the cold. Your mother has been baking since noon."

I let him kiss my cheek.

Keely carried two ledger cases behind me and kept her face blank.

Over the fireplace hung the old king's gift to my father, a silver-framed map of the northern line.

Beside it stood a new letter in a frame, from the Crown.

My father saw me looking.

"That came this morning. The new king thanks Larchmoor for its patience over the family arrangements."

"Family arrangements," I said.

"The Ostrow match." He rubbed his hands together. "Tarn Valley is an old, quiet pack. Caleb has no debts and no scandals, and he outranks every wolf in Alastair's ranks but the Beta."

My mother poured tea. Her hand shook a little on the pot.

"Ros, it's a kindness," she said. "Alastair came himself to ask us. He said he wanted you settled before the wedding."

"Whose wedding?"

"Ansley's, darling."

I set my cup down.

"You've both known since yesterday."

"Alastair came to us first," my father said, as if that were a gift. "It would shame your sister if you refused him. The whole northern council would say she took your husband."

"She is taking my husband."

"Rosalind."

"I'm only agreeing with the council."

My mother's eyes filled. My father's smile didn't move.

"You will accept Caleb Ostrow, and you will accept him in public," he said. "A divorced Luna with no new match is a Luna the packs will pity, and that's worse for you than for her. Do you want to be pitied?"

I looked at the two of them.

Six years of Larchmoor wagons rolling north under my signature, and nobody had once asked me what I wanted from them.

Alastair was standing in the doorway of my father's study.

I hadn't heard him come in.

His coat was damp from the yard, and he held his hat in one hand.

"I thought you'd come here," he said. "I wanted to be sure you had your family with you."

"You came to be sure I'd do what I was told."

"I came to make sure you wouldn't be alone."

"You sat by my bed all night when I had the fever," I said. "I remember every hour of it. And you were already planning this."

He didn't answer.

His hand tightened on the brim of his hat.

My mother made a small noise. My father looked at the floor.

"I'll see you in seven days," Alastair said to me, and left.

Nobody spoke until the front door shut.

"That was unkind," my father said at last. "He's been generous with you."

"Where are the supply books, Father?"

He blinked.

"The northern line contracts. The ones I drew up and carried to Stonecrown myself. They're in your study."

"They're Larchmoor's, Rosalind."

"They're mine. Mine and Alastair's. I want the originals."

My mother stood up and went to the study without a word.

She came back carrying a flat black case and set it on my knee.

I opened it on my father's good table while he stood over me.

It was the seal agreement, forty pages, with the old king's wax at the bottom.

I knew it by heart. I had written it.

Keely found the clause first and read it out in a low voice.

"The supply seal binds Larchmoor's wagons and Stonecrown's border forces for the term of the marriage. It may be renewed or withdrawn only by the signature of the Luna of Stonecrown."

"You gave the Luna the seal?" my father said.

"I wrote it so the Luna held it," I said. "The old king signed it drunk. Nobody read past the first page."

He bent down and read it with one finger on the line.

His face went slowly grey.

"If you withdraw your signature..."

"Every Larchmoor wagon stops at the southern gate," Keely said. "And Alastair's border wolves go without grain and medicine by the first hard frost."

"Until the Crown processes the dissolution," I said, "I'm still Luna. It's my name on the seal."

I took the case from the table and shut it.

My mother put a hand over her mouth.

Keely stood up straight beside me with the second case in her arms.

My father said, in a different voice, "Don't be hasty."

"I've given Alastair seven days," I said. "I'll be careful with every one of them."

I walked out to the cart with the black case against my chest.

Halfway across the yard I stopped and pressed two fingers under my left collarbone.

The ache was still gone.

I thought about a man in a soldier's coat, standing very still, saying he hadn't asked for that file.

"Who is Caleb Ostrow?" I said to Keely.

She turned her head slowly. "I'd never heard his name before yesterday. Neither had you, my lady."

"That's what I thought."

Then a rider in Stonecrown grey came through my father's gate at a gallop and reined in so hard the horse slid.

"Lady Rosalind," he said. "Headquarters has been told not to let you in."

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