Chapter 5: Bitter-Moon

The wolf was still lying across the doorway.

I stepped over him in the quilt and pulled on Bram's coat from the hook.

"Stay," I told him.

He gave me a look that said he'd been staying for six years and would think about it.

I went out onto the porch.

The frost was white on the yard, and Imogen's breath hung in front of her.

"Oh, look at you," she said. "Barefoot. In his coat."

Her eyes filled.

She set the basket on the porch rail and came up two steps with her arms open.

I didn't move, and she stopped on the third step.

"Corbin hasn't slept," she said. "He hasn't eaten."

"He sat in the kitchen all night with his head in his hands, asking me what he did."

I thought about what he did.

"He'll live," I said.

"Sweetheart." She pressed a gloved hand to her chest. "I know you're frightened. The bond is a terrible thing when you're young. But this?"

She looked at the cabins, the woodpile, the one-eyed old man on his porch with the shotgun across his knees.

"This isn't a life. Come home. I'll fix it with the pack. I always fix it."

She did, too.

She'd fixed my whole life, every morning, with a cup and saucer.

"I'm married," I said.

"To a man with no wolf."

Behind me, the door creaked.

The black wolf's head came out past my legs, ears flat, a low sound in his chest.

Imogen's face didn't change.

But she took the step back down.

"Well," she said brightly. "Somebody's feeling better."

The wolf kept rumbling.

She looked at me again, softer.

"You still have your ring, darling? From your basket? I always worried you'd lose it."

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