Chapter 14: Found First

The Elder tied the blindfold on me himself, and his fingers smelled of honey.

"Fifty wolves in the ring, child," he said. "Three of them are the men you claim."

"Find all three before the moon clears the pines, and you've won the first night."

"A nose could do it," Beck said from somewhere behind me, tight with anger. "Normally."

"A nose could," the Elder agreed. "Yours won't be asked."

Pine oil lay thick on the whole Stone.

It sat in the back of my throat and in my eyes, and I couldn't have told a wolf from a log.

I had never shifted, so my nose had never been anything special.

That was the point of the trial.

He wanted me standing in the dark, sniffing at fur, getting it wrong in front of everyone.

I took one step forward, and something in my chest pulled left.

I stopped.

It wasn't a smell. It was a tug, low behind my ribs.

I knew that tug.

It was the one that came into my chest whenever Stellan laughed in the next room.

I moved through coarse fur and warm breath, and I put my hand out.

A shaggy head shoved up under my palm and a cold nose pressed into my wrist.

The wolf started to shake all over.

"Hello, Stellan," I said.

The pack made a sound.

I heard the Elder's cane tap the rock once, hard.

"A lucky first guess," he said.

I let the tug swing me around.

Beck was ninth in line by the lake side, and he butted my hip with his big warm head.

Torsten stood motionless at the far edge of the ring, and he didn't move even when my fingers touched his ruff.

I felt him lean into my hand anyway.

"That's three," I said, and pulled the blindfold off.

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