Dominic Silvermane's Arc

Chapter 6 of 9

The border was quiet now. Scarlett was gone, and the trails were closed. But Dominic knew safety was not the same as loyalty. His mate wore his colors. The moonstones had glowed for her. Still, two of his wolves watched her cross the yard each morning with cool eyes. She had the title. She did not yet have the pack. A luna who could not lead a hunt or settle a quarrel would never hold them. So Dominic took her somewhere the doubters could not watch. He brought her to his family estate, far from the cabins and the patrols. The old stone house had raised generations of Silvermanes. Inside its high, empty halls, no wolf could see her stumble. "You know the words," he told her. "Now you learn the work. How we hunt. How we judge. How a luna holds a room when the alpha is gone." She nodded. Her long white hair fell over her shoulders. Her green eyes did not look away. For three days he trained her. He taught her the old hunting calls. He taught her how to read a wolf's stance before it spoke. He staged quarrels between imagined pack members and made her rule on each. At first she hesitated. By the second day she cut clean judgments without pause. Dominic watched her stand straighter in the great hall and felt something loosen in his chest. On the third day, a rider came. Fenrir Shadowpaw, the rival alpha, dismounted at the estate gate. His fur-trimmed cloak was gray with dust. Dominic tensed. The last time he had seen this man, they had stood over Scarlett's ruin at the border. "I told you to make her worth what she cost," Fenrir said. He did not smile. "I came to see it for myself." "Then judge," Dominic said. He would not hide her. Fenrir turned to the white-haired woman. He did not soften his voice for her. "A wolf of mine took shelter on your land last winter and never repaid it. My law says the debt falls to your pack now. What is your ruling, Luna?" It was a trap and a test. Dominic held his breath. His mate did not. "The shelter was given freely," she said. "You do not take what is not freely given. You told my mate so yourself." She met the old alpha's gray eyes. "There is no debt. But your wolf may hunt one season with my pack, if he wishes to give something back. That is my ruling." The hall went still. Then Fenrir dipped his head, the first bow Dominic had ever seen him give. "She uses my own law against me," Fenrir said. "And she is right." He looked at Dominic. "She is worth it. Bring her home. Your doubters will follow now." Dominic took her hand. She was ready. But Fenrir's word would mean nothing until his own two wolves heard her rule with their own ears.