Chapter 10: The Rite

Leander didn't tell his father anything.

He drove back to the Hall alone, and two days later my mother came back with her ring on.

She kissed the King on the front steps in front of the whole household.

The housekeeper cried into a dish towel.

On the tenth of October the moon came up full over Mount Rainier.

I put on the dark blue silk.

It fit like he'd measured me, which he hadn't, which meant he'd asked my mother.

Rupert knocked on my door at seven in a tux that finally fit.

"Lee bought it for me," he said, and turned around so I could see. "He's being strange. He bought the housekeeper a car."

"A car?"

"A small one."

He looked at my face.

"You're really going to do it."

"I'm really going to do it."

"Okay." He offered me his arm. "Then I'll walk you in, so nobody looks at you like a joke this time."

The Moon Hall was fuller than the night of the Presentation.

Every Alpha who could get there, their mates, their heirs.

The Idaho Alpha's son was by the door with a swollen jaw and a gap in his teeth.

The gallery was packed with press, phones and cameras pointed down at the dais.

Somebody had set up a huge screen on the wall behind the gallery so the back rows could see.

My face was on it as I walked in.

The room didn't laugh this time.

My mother stood near the dais in her green velvet with the King's hand around hers.

She caught my eye and nodded once.

Leander stood on the dais in black.

No tie. No signet ring. His hands were bare at his sides.

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