Chapter 24: Come Home

The Harvest Moon came up red over the eastern ridge, one year after Jasper's knees hit the stone.

The whole pack stood on the meadow, three hundred wolves in their good coats.

The moonflowers in my arms had opened an hour early.

I had grown them myself in Elin's bed, and I had cut them with her old shears.

The pack had chosen Jasper as Alpha at the first spring moon, and I had been there to hear it.

The Beta had put my name to the council the same night.

Every hand in the council ring had gone up before he finished the sentence.

I had turned the seat down once, and I had told them to ask me again at the Harvest Moon.

Lottie stood in the front row in a green dress, with a warrior's arm around her waist.

She was already crying.

"It's a good thing you can't hear me," she mouthed at me. "I'm going to be awful."

The Keeper came up the steps of the council stone with her stick and the old leather book.

Her hands shook now, but her voice did not.

"The Hundred is read at the Harvest Moon before the whole pack," she said. "The one who kept them is raised."

She looked at me.

"It has been one year."

"One year and a day," I said. "I checked."

A ripple of laughter ran through the meadow.

Jasper stood at the foot of the stone in his dark wool coat, with his hair combed and the mark of my teeth hidden under his collar.