Chapter 14: The Hall

The Great Hall fills the whole ground floor of the tower, and by noon it held every wolf in the pack.

I came in through the front doors with Torin on my right and Joss on my left.

Torin stopped at the threshold.

"You said no Kensington roof," he said, very low. "That was your second term."

"I know what I said."

"You don't have to do this. I can take the charge for you."

"You'd take it quietly," I said. "I'd rather lose loudly."

I walked in.

Three hundred heads turned. Nobody spoke.

The aisle ran straight to the dais, where the Elder sat in the high chair.

Winifred stood below him in grey wool, with her hands folded over the square stone.

Camille sat in the front row. She gave me a trembling smile and mouthed, I'm so sorry.

"Orla Lowell," the Elder said. "You are charged with breaking into the healer's rooms."

He looked down at me.

"You forced her cabinet and took what was in it. How do you answer?"

"I answer with what was in it," I said.

I took the leather folder from my coat and set it on the table in front of him.

Winifred didn't move. That bothered me more than if she had.

The Elder opened the folder. He lifted out the Passing and read it, and I watched his old face change.

He read it a second time, and then he looked at the page beside it.

"Read it to the pack," Winifred said.

"Healer, I..."

"Read it, Elder. Let them hear what she brought."

He read aloud, in a voice that didn't shake.

The wolf was drawn from the girl. Willing: no. The girl is to be told she was born wolfless.

Three hundred wolves drew breath at once.

"Torin Kensington, age twenty-one, wounds mortal," the Elder finished. "Written in the healer's hand."

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