The Alpha Carried Her, So the Luna Cut the Bond novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Forty Squares of Silver

The armory ledger shows forty silver plates signed out in Calla's hand and only thirty-nine returned; Garrick orders Wynne confined, the guards step back from him, and the Saltmarsh Alpha rolls through the gate.

At first light Wynne wrapped the open cast in clean linen and walked to the Ashfall armory on one crutch.

Hester walked beside her, carrying the silver splinter in a twist of paper.

The armory sat behind the training yard, a low stone building with iron shutters.

The armorer was a heavy man who had been there longer than Wynne had been Luna.

He took the splinter, turned it under his lamp and swore softly.

"That's plate cut," he said. "We make it for border drills. Nothing else uses it."

"Who signs it out?" Wynne asked.

"Anyone the Alpha names. Everyone does it in the ledger."

He dragged the big book across the counter and opened it to last month.

Forty squares of silver plate were signed out on the third.

Wynne read the line twice.

The name beside it was written in a neat round hand she had seen on birthday cards for eight years.

Calla Greaves, on the Alpha's authority.

"And how many came back?" Hester said.

The armorer ran his thumb down the next page.

"Thirty-nine."

Nobody spoke.

Hester folded her arms. "One square is missing, and one square was in her leg."

"I did not know where it went, Luna. I'd have said."

"I know you would," Wynne said. "Who drove my car to the garage last week?"

The armorer blinked.

"I wouldn't know that, Luna."

She did.

Calla had taken it herself, three days before the crash, because Wynne had not been able to face the road that week.

Calla had said she was happy to.

"Wynne?"

The voice came from the doorway, soft and shaking.

Calla stood on her crutches in the morning light with her blonde hair tied back, her eyes already red.

She looked at the open ledger and put her hand over her mouth.

"Oh, you found the drill order," she said. "I'm so sorry. I should have told you."

"Told me what?" said Wynne.

"Garrick asked me to sign for the plate. He said he didn't have time to stand in the armory. I always sign what he gives me, I never think." Her voice cracked. "Please don't think I would do anything to hurt you. Not you."

She began to cry in earnest.

Hester's face did not move.

"Child," Hester said, "nobody said you hurt anyone."

"I know, I know, but you're looking at me like that."

Boots rang on the yard stones.

Garrick came in at a fast walk with two guards behind him, breathing hard, his face grey in the early light.

He went straight to Calla and put his arm around her.

Then he saw the ledger, and the splinter in Hester's hand, and the armorer standing very still.

"What is this?"

"A piece of Ashfall silver came out of my leg last night," Wynne said. "Hester pulled it. The ledger says your friend signed forty squares out last month, in your name, and thirty-nine came back."

"A hundred men sign for plate. Do you know how many pieces of silver are in this pack?"

"Not one of them was in my car."

He took a short breath.

"The crash was an accident," he said. "The road was wet."

"The road was dry. I was there."

"You were grieving. You weren't thinking straight."

He looked at the guards.

"The Luna is unwell. She is confined to her wing until the new moon, for her own safety. Take her back."

Both guards came forward one step.

Wynne leaned on the crutch and did not move.

"Do either of you know who wrote the household charter?" she asked.

Neither guard answered.

"I did. For six more nights, every guard in this house takes the Luna's word before anyone's except the Council. That is the law your Alpha swore to."

The guards looked at Garrick.

Garrick looked at the guards.

Calla hid her face against his shoulder and cried more quietly.

"Step back from my door," Wynne said.

The guards stepped back.

It was only a step, and Garrick saw it, and something moved across his face that was not anger.

"You think the pack will stand with you over a splinter," he said.

"I think they'll stand with whoever puts the silver in the ledger and reads it aloud."

She turned to the armorer.

"Keep that book where nobody takes it. If it goes missing, I'll know who took it."

"Yes, Luna."

She walked out of the armory with the crutch striking the stones, and Hester kept pace at her left.

Calla's sobs followed them as far as the yard.

A horn sounded at the main gate.

It was a long note, then two short, the signal for a visiting pack.

Every head in the training yard turned.

A line of black cars rolled through the open gate with a grey wolf crest on each door.

It was the Saltmarsh convoy, the treaty talks Wynne had signed three months ago and Garrick had forgotten.

The lead car stopped, and Alpha Bram Hollister stepped out and looked straight across the yard at her.

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