Severed Ties: Rise of the Silver Wolf novel · Chapter 14 of 48

Chapter 14: Her Price

"No," I said.

My mother's smile stayed exactly where it was.

"Think before you say that, sweetheart. Think what the other choice is."

"I know the other choice. The Hold. A cell in the mountain, and no one asks me anything."

"Then you understand. If the knot is tied again, there's no silver wolf. No Writ, no hunter, no hearing on Friday. You'd go home and sleep and be safe."

"I'd sleep," I said. "That's the part I know."

"And on the Council you'd have a vote."

"I'd have a vote and no wolf."

"You'd have a seat," my mother said. "I got you a seat."

She said it proudly, as a mother says she has bought a gift.

I looked at her through the bars and understood that she was telling me the truth as she saw it.

She had gotten me something. It had cost her nothing, and it needed me to lie down again.

"What happens to Daphne?" I asked.

My mother's eyes flicked to the side.

"Daphne keeps what she has."

"The gold."

"It's hers. She earned it."

"She earned it by being tied to me."

"She's your sister."

"She's got her own wolf now," I said. "A small brown one with big ears. She came out this morning and she was wonderful."

My mother's face changed.

For one second it went slack and lost, the face of a woman hearing that something had died.

"Brown," she whispered.

"Brown."

"Oh, my poor girl."

"She's fine, Mom. She's laughing. She's the first one of us who has been."

Mom's hands closed on the bars.

"You don't understand what you're giving up," she said, and now the soft voice was gone. "They won't leave you alone. You think that big man will stand in front of the Council for you? Ask him what they offered him this morning."

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