Chapter 5: Not Yours

"They're six," I said.

"They're not yours."

Torin stayed crouched in front of Hazel and did not take his eyes off her face.

"Whose are they?"

"Mine."

"Whose is the other half of them?"

"A man in Portland who left before I knew," I said.

"He's nobody you know."

It was the first lie I had ever told him, and it was a bad one.

I could hear how thin it was.

"Hazel, go upstairs and take your brother," I said.

"Why?" Hazel asked.

"Because Mommy asked you to."

"But he smells like us."

Nobody in the room said anything.

Torin stood up slowly.

"Say that again, sweetheart," he said.

"You smell like us," Hazel said.

"Like Jonah and me and a pine tree."

Jonah took one step forward.

He was six years old and came up to Torin's belt, and he stood in front of his sister with his small fists closed.

Then he growled.

It was low and rough, and it was nothing like a child's sound.

I had never heard it before.

His eyes went pale gold for one second and came back grey.

I felt the floor go out from under me.

Wolves do not shift until they are sixteen.

They do not growl like that until then either.

Torin looked at his son.

The line of his shoulders changed, and his whole body went still, and the room felt smaller than it was.

"Who taught him that?" he asked.

"No one."

"Ingrid."

"I don't know," I said.

My voice shook.

"I don't know, it has never happened before."

He turned to me, and his face was the one from the hallway at school, with every bit of the teasing taken out.

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