Chapter 19: The Ring

Kjell's POV

I have fought in thirty-one challenges, and I had never been on the wrong side of a rail.

The wood was cold under my hands.

I did not know the grip had cracked it until Asta put her fingers over mine and said, "You're bleeding."

A splinter had gone into my palm.

I did not take it out.

In the ring, the elder's cane came down.

Solveig shifted first.

She dropped and the white coat came up over her, and then there was a wolf standing on the frozen yard, long-legged and pale, her grey eyes steady.

The Beta took longer.

He was an old, heavy wolf, scarred across the forearms and the chest, and when his coat came in it was iron grey, and he stood broad and low.

He outweighed her by half.

The pack murmured.

They had never seen her coat.

Her father had kept her in a cellar yard at night for nineteen years so that no one would.

"Gods," said the old elder, under her breath.

They began to circle.

I watched her feet.

She was fast.

Faster than I had known, and I had seen her run the whole river valley.

The Beta lunged, a flat slow heavy lunge, and she was not there, and her teeth had raked his flank before he turned.

A cheer went up along the rail.

The Beta shook off the blood.

He came again, and again she slipped it, and a third time, and each time she tore a little more away from him.

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