Chapter 23: Sisters, Again

Dorian's trial took one day, and on Friday night the two packs sent him away in irons.

I did not go down to the dock to watch him leave.

At dawn on Saturday I walked to the Moon Cove alone.

The beach was grey and still, with the tide far out and gulls working the stones.

Lyra sat on the flat rock where the elder had stood at the Rite.

She had a suitcase beside her and her coat buttoned to the chin.

The bruise on her jaw had faded to a yellow shadow.

"You came," she said.

"I said I would."

"You didn't say. I wrote and I didn't know."

I sat down on the rock, a careful arm's length away.

Her thoughts were quiet for once, and I let myself hear them.

She is going to hate me. She should. Don't cry, you cried yesterday on the stand, don't cry.

"You said it in front of both packs," I said. "Everything. Three hours of it."

"I thought they'd stop me."

"They didn't."

"No." She wiped her face with the heel of her hand. "I kept waiting for you to tell them to."

"I didn't want to."

She flinched.

I did not take it back.

"I'm not going to say it's all right," I said. "I can't. In that other life you stood outside my window and never knocked."

"I was jealous of the house."

"You were jealous of a woman who was being killed."

Lyra put her hands over her mouth.

I heard it in her head, the snow and the lit window, and the door she had never knocked on.

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