Chapter 20: The Open Gate

I kept my word on the thirty-first morning.

My mother and I packed the car in the courtyard of Kincannon Hall while the sun came over the ridge.

It did not take long.

My children had one bag between them, and my mother had a tin of her own seeds from the infirmary windowsill.

"Mom," said my daughter, from the back seat, "Grandma is coming to live at our house. She said so."

"She did say so," my mother agreed.

"She can have my room."

"She'll have mine," I said. "You'll keep yours."

"That's fair," my daughter allowed.

The pack had come out to see us go.

They stood along the drive in their hundreds, the midwife in front with her hands folded, the elders with their hats off.

Nobody was asking me to stay.

I had braced for it, and I was not ready for how much it meant that they didn't.

Thane carried the last bag to the trunk and shut it.

Gareth stood at the open back door with my younger son, who was giving him a very serious lecture on the correct way to hold an owl.

Lorcan walked beside me down the drive to the gate.

They had said very little all morning.

I understood why.

They thought they were about to lose their wolves.

"You don't have to do this part," I said.

"We do," said Thane, behind me. "We opened it for you ourselves. Let us see it through."

The three of them took hold of the great iron gate and pulled it wide.

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