Chapter 142: The Grandmother's Warning

I sat down on the flat stone beside Elias and looked at the old woman with the cane.

“Say it again,” I said.

Ilse put both her hands on the cane and stood in the moss with the green trees above her.

“The curse is in the ground,” she said. “The whole of it. The bargain the old Alpha made in 1897 and the death of the boy in 1948 and the death of your brother in 1975 and the whole of the seventeen years your mate carried it. It all went into the ground at the full moon and the ground took it and the ground is holding it.”

“And?” I said.

“And the ground is the land and the land is the territory and the territory is going to be here for as long as there is a Circle Pack.” She looked at me. “The ground holds what it is given and it does not hold it forever. It gives it back. It gives it back to the keeper and the keeper gives it to the next keeper and the next. And every generation the ground is going to give back a piece of what it took.”

I stood up.

“Then the curse is not broken,” I said.

“The curse is broken,” Ilse said. “Your mate is free and the pack is free and the land is the pack’s. And the ground still holds the whole of it and the ground is going to give it back.” She put her hand on the stone. “Not all at once. A piece every generation. The wolf in the next generation is going to carry a piece of it and the wolf after that is going to carry a piece of it and the whole of it is going to come back to the line.”

“And my child?” I said.

Ilse was quiet for a moment.

“Your child is the heir,” she said. “The child is the keeper after your mate and the Alpha after you and the whole of the line is going to come to the child. And the ground is going to give the child a piece of what it holds.”

I sat down on the stone.

“How much?” I said.

“I do not know,” Ilse said. “It has never been done before. Nobody has ever broken the curse and kept the line and held the ground. The old pack did not break it and the founders did not break it and the Council did not break it. You broke it.” She looked at me. “And there is no record of what happens next because nobody has ever got this far.”

The circle was silent.

And then Ada of the north came forward.

“I have been in the room under the circle for eighty-five years,” she said. “And there is a thing in the chest that nobody has read. It is not the journal and it is not the letter and it is not the map. It is a page in the old tongue and it has been in the chest since 1897 and I have never been able to read it.” She put the page in my hand. “You spoke the old tongue at the full moon. You are the only wolf in this territory who can read it.”

I looked at the page.

It was old and it was brown and the writing was small and close and it was not a language I knew. And then I looked at it and the letters moved and the whole of it came into my head the way the words had come at the full moon.

“It is a warning,” I said.

“Read it,” Ada of the north said.

I read it out loud.

It said: The ground holds the curse and the ground gives it back. The keeper takes what the ground gives and the keeper gives it to the line. The line is the Alpha and the Alpha is the land and the land is the pack. And the keeper who does not take what the ground gives is a keeper who lets the ground give it to the pack.

I stopped.

“What does that mean?” Ruth said.

“It means the keeper has to take it,” I said. “The ground gives the curse back and the keeper takes it and holds it and does not let it go into the pack.” I looked at Elias. “It means you have to take it. Every generation. The keeper takes what the ground gives and holds it so the pack does not have to.”

Elias sat up on the stone.

“Then I am not free,” he said.

“You are free,” I said. “You are free of the curse that was on you. But you are the keeper and the keeper is the wolf who takes what the ground gives.”

He was quiet.

“And when I die?” he said.

“Then the next keeper takes it,” I said. “And the next. And the whole of it goes on.”

The circle was silent.

And then Ilse came and sat down on the stone beside me.

“Alpha,” she said. “I have been carrying this since 1891 and I have been hiding in the trees since 1897 and I have not told a soul the whole of it until tonight. And I am going to tell you the last thing and then I am going to go and lie down and not get up for a very long time.” She put her hand on my knee. “The ground gives the curse back to the keeper and the keeper takes it and the keeper holds it. But the keeper does not have to hold it alone. There is a second thing in the page. It is in the last line and it is in a different hand and it was added in 1897 by the old Alpha himself.”

“What does it say?” I said.

Ilse looked at me.

“It says the keeper and the Luna hold it together,” she said. “The keeper takes it and the Luna holds it with him and the two of them carry it between them and neither of them carries it alone.” She put her hand on my knee. “And there is a thing about the Luna holding it. The Luna is the Alpha and the Alpha is the land and the land is the pack. And a Luna who holds the curse is a Luna who can give it to the pack.”

I stood up.

“Then the Luna does not hold it,” I said.

“The Luna holds it with the keeper,” Ilse said. “And the whole of it is a choice. Every generation the keeper and the Luna choose to hold it together or to let it go into the pack.” She looked at me. “And the whole of it is going to come to your child and your child’s mate and the whole of the line is going to have to choose.”

I sat down.

“And if the line chooses to let it go?” I said.

“Then the pack carries it,” Ilse said. “And the pack has carried it before. And the pack has been afraid and the Council has used it and the whole of it has gone on for eighty-five years.”

The circle was silent.

And then June came into the circle with her face white.

“Wren,” she said. “There is a thing I have to tell you. I have been sick this morning and Maeve looked at me and Maeve says it is not what we thought.”

I stood up.

“What?” I said.

June put her hand on her stomach.

“It is twins,” she said. “Maeve says it is twins.”