Chapter 44: The Rogues at the Border

I opened the door and Ronan was sitting up on the cot with his back against the wall and his face grey and his eyes open.

"You should be asleep," I said.

"I heard the shouting." His voice was a scrape. "What happened?"

"Lorcan came to collect me. Petra had a paper. The pack would not let them through the door and Maeve told him it was an act of war and he left." I sat down on the edge of the cot. "You have been asleep for three hours and the house has changed hands twice. It has been a busy afternoon."

He looked at me for a long moment.

"You did not go with him."

"No."

"He offered to clear the debt."

"He offered to clear the debt if I left you to take the second mark and be owned by the Council for the rest of your life." I put my hand on his. "That is not a cure. That is a purchase."

Ronan shut his eyes.

"I have been lying here thinking," he said, "and I have come to a decision and you are not going to like it."

"Go on."

"I am going to yield the seat to Maeve."

I did not say anything.

"Not because I lost the challenge," he said. "Because the challenge proved what I already knew and would not say out loud. I cannot lead this pack through the twenty eighth. I cannot fight and I cannot run and I cannot stand up in front of the Council and hold my own against Lorcan, and if I stay in this seat I will drag the whole pack down with me." He opened his eyes. "If Maeve is Alpha, the Council cannot say the territory is vacant. She is strong and she is legal and she has a majority. She can go to the northern seat on the twenty eighth and argue the pack's case and she will do it better than I could."

"And you?"

"I become the Alpha's brother and the pack's healer's mate and I stay in this house and I let you do the rite." He looked at me. "It is the only way, Fiadh. It has been the only way for a while and I have been too proud to see it."

I sat there with my hand on his.

"You are not doing it because you think it is the only way," I said. "You are doing it because you lost a fight in front of your pack and you cannot stand the shame of it."

He did not answer.

"I am not going to argue with you about it now," I said. "You have a fever and a shoulder full of silver and you lost a challenge four hours ago. We will talk about the seat when you can stand up without holding the wall." I stood up. "Sleep. I will be in the corridor."

I got to the door.

"Fiadh."

"What?"

"Thank you for not going with him."

The shout came at ten o'clock.

It came from the north, from the ridge, and it was a whole pack of voices at once, and I was on my feet and at the window before the second shout came.

The north track was full of wolves. I could see them in the moonlight, twenty or thirty of them, and they were coming down the track toward the wall, and behind them on the ridge there were torches.

I got down the stairs.

The hall was already full of wolves pulling on boots and coats. Colm had his shirt half on and his boots in his hand. Padraig was at the door with his stick. Maeve was on the bottom step with her copper curls tied back and her face set.

"Twenty eight of them," she said. "Bran's rogues on the ridge and the Ravenscar wolves on the track. They have come down together."

"I thought Bran was with us."

"Bran is with himself," Maeve said. "He will make an alliance with whoever is winning and he will change sides the moment it suits him. That is what rogues are." She looked round the hall. "We have nineteen wolves who can fight and a hole in the roof and an Alpha who cannot stand up. Colm, take six and hold the north gate. Nessa, get the young ones down to the boathouse and bolt the door. Healer, you are with me."

I went with her.

They came at the wall in three places. The north gate was the worst. Colm held it for a while and then the Ravenscar wolves got over the wall on the east side and there was fighting in the heather and on the track, and I did what I always do in a fight. I got the wounded.

The first one was a young wolf from the boat crews with his arm open from the elbow to the wrist. I got him into the kitchen and put him on the table and sewed him up with Nessa holding the lamp and telling him it was not as bad as it looked. The second was a Ravenscar wolf who came over the wall and got himself cornered by three of ours and had his leg broken for his trouble, and I set it and splinted it and told him to lie still, and he swore at me and then he thanked me, which is how it usually goes.

The third was Colm.

They carried him in at midnight with a wound in his side and his face grey, and I got him onto the kitchen table and cut his shirt off and looked at it, and it was not as bad as the young wolf's arm but it was close. I worked on him for an hour with the lamp and the needle and my hands went steady the way they always do when there is work to be done.

Maeve came in at one in the morning with blood on her coat that was not hers.

"How many?" I said.

"Four of ours hurt and one of theirs dead and eleven of theirs hurt." She sat down heavily on the bench. "We held the wall. Bran pulled his wolves back to the ridge at midnight and the Ravenscar ones went with him. They will come again in the morning."

"Where is the Alpha?"

"He wanted to come out. Padraig sat on him." Maeve rubbed her face. "He stood at the window and watched the whole thing."

I finished Colm's side and washed my hands.

"Show me the four," I said.

It was nearly three when I finished. I went out onto the step for air and the sky was still black and the harbour was quiet and the north track was full of nothing.

Maeve came out and stood beside me.

"You sewed up eleven wolves tonight," she said. "Six of ours and five of theirs. You did not ask which side any of them were on."

"I am a healer," I said. "I do not ask."

Maeve was quiet for a moment.

"I have been thinking about what I said to you in the sickroom," she said. "About you not being one of us."

"I remember it."

"I was wrong." She looked out at the harbour. "You have been in this house a month and you have sewn up eleven wolves in one night and you did not ask which side. That is not a thing a stranger does." She turned her head. "I am still going to take the seat if he yields it. But I will not stand in that Council chamber on the twenty eighth and say the Blackthorn healer is not one of us. I will say the opposite."

Behind us, in the house, there was a crash and then Nessa's voice, high and frightened.

"Healer! Come quick. It is the Alpha."

We ran.