Chapter 23: The Question

At noon I stood on the kitchen steps with the king's paper in my hand.

The whole Hold had come into the yard.

Ewan sat on the edge of the well with his horse and swung his boots.

I broke the seal.

I had learned my letters from my mother's recipe book, and I read slowly.

"By the Crown of Hartmoor," I read.

"From this day, no wolf in this kingdom shall be sentenced to any lash, chain or banishment."

"Not until the Crown has asked her one question."

A murmur ran through the yard.

"The question shall be asked to her face, and written down in her words."

"It shall be read out before the court before any sentence is passed."

I stopped.

My voice had gone odd.

"The first-lash law of the kin is struck from the book," I read.

"No wolf shall lay a chain on another for any crime."

"The silver posts are to be pulled from Cinder Row's road within the year."

"They'll never," said the old porridge woman.

"They will," said Perrin. "I've seen the wagons."

I looked down at the last line.

It was in a different hand, a large black scrawl, not a clerk's.

It said, I did not ask. Let every Alpha who comes after me be made to. Lucan Hartmoor.

The yard was quiet.

I folded the paper.

I put it in my pocket, and I walked out of the gate.

I did not run.

I walked across the moor in the afternoon light, between the heather and the stones.

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