The Luna He Failed to Protect novel · Chapter 16 of 32

Chapter 16: Firelight

I copied the line into my father's field book by lamplight.

Morwenna Ravelston, Luna, for the Alpha. At my brother's particular request.

Then Cale carried the roll up the stairs and woke the elder.

The elder sealed it with the account book in the iron chest behind the dais.

"Twelve days," the old wolf said, turning the key. "Try to live that long, girl."

He was joking.

Mostly.

I walked home along the river in the dark.

Cale walked me as far as the Vardy gate and stopped there, because that was the rule.

"Good night," he said.

"Good night."

Neither of us said anything about the shelves.

I went inside and lay down in the heap of wolves on the floor of the good room.

I fell asleep fast.

That was the mistake.

I was in the stone house.

The fire was going and the room smelled of whiskey and gun oil.

I heard the lock turn.

That was all.

That was always all.

The sound of a lock going over, heavy and oiled, and a big man's breath behind me.

I woke up on my feet with my back against the wall and my teeth out.

The room was dark.

Somebody was saying my name, over and over, low.

"Sorrel. Sorrel. It's the river house. It's us."

Edda.

She was sitting on the floor in front of me with her hands open on her knees.

Not reaching.

Just there.

Behind her the whole squad was awake and pretending not to be.

The cook had rolled over to face the wall.

The youngest had her blanket pulled up to her eyes.

"What was it?" Edda said.

"The lock."

"The lock," she said, like that was a reasonable thing to be afraid of.

It was.

She got up and went to the door of the good room.

There was no lock on it.

There'd never been one.

She opened it all the way and propped it with a boot.

Then she came back and sat down on the floor with her back against the wall next to me.

"Go on," she said. "I'll watch the door."

"You need to sleep."

"I slept six years on the Line with one eye open. I'm very good at it." She bumped my shoulder with hers. "Go on."

I slid down the wall until I was sitting beside her.

I didn't think I'd sleep.

The next thing I knew it was morning and my head was on her shoulder and she was snoring.

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