Chapter 6: The Weak One

Wystan had me running the ridge at night to learn my new wolf's legs.

Two Silverfen scouts ran beside us, gray and brown, keeping pace.

I had never moved so fast in my life.

Every tree went by in sharp detail, and every smell had a color.

Pine, damp stone, a fox three hills away.

I could have run all night without tiring.

Then the wind turned, and I smelled blood.

It came from the north, from Iron Moon land.

I stopped on the ridge.

Below us, the Iron Moon fence line was on fire.

Rogues were coming through it in a ragged line, thirty or forty of them, wild-eyed and wolfish.

Iron Moon warriors fought them in the clearing, half shifted, half human, and losing.

*Go,* said my wolf.

*It's their fight,* I told her. *They threw me out.*

*Children are down there.*

I looked again.

At the edge of the clearing, beside the burning fence, a little boy about seven stood frozen in his pajamas.

He must have run out to see the fire.

A rogue the size of a horse had turned its head toward him.

I did not decide to move.

My legs just went.

I flew down the ridge, over rocks and roots, with the scouts howling behind me.

The rogue lowered its head and charged the boy.

I hit it from the side at full speed.

We rolled across the clearing, and my teeth found its throat.

It was over in two seconds.

I let the body drop and stood over the boy with my hackles up.

He stared at me with his mouth open.

"Moon wolf," he whispered.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Alpha Who Rejected His Queen from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.