Chapter 18: Maple Answers

Maple rose through me, warm and fast.

Bones shifted, and fur came, and the cold granite under my feet became four pale gold paws.

The torches went bright and sharp, and the whole ridge smelled of pine and smoke and fear.

Seven years of silence went out of me in a single breath, and Maple threw her head back and howled.

The pack answered.

I heard it roll down the hill, two hundred voices, and I heard Soren's under them, low and rough.

Dane lunged first.

He was fast, because desperate things are, and his jaws closed on empty air where my shoulder had been.

I turned inside him and bit at his flank. I didn't tear. I only wanted him to know I could.

He spun, snarling, and came again.

His claws raked across my side, three hot lines, and Maple snapped at his muzzle until he flinched.

He was fighting with the last of his wolf, and every move he made cost him.

I could hear his breath going ragged.

"Finish it," a voice shouted from the crowd. A man's voice. I didn't know whose.

I circled him instead.

He stumbled, and I hit him in the chest with my shoulder, and he went down on the Stone.

I put a paw on his ribs and my teeth to the scruff of his neck, and held.

Beneath me, his whole body shook.

I felt the torn place behind my ribs where the old bond had been.

What was left of his wolf was pressed against it, small and frightened, looking up.

Maple growled, low.

It would have been so easy.

The pack waited. The three Alphas at the north edge didn't move.

I let go.

I stepped back off him and lifted Maple's head.