Chapter 157: What I Lost

The east came into the room and the whole of the room was full of them and there were more in the tunnel and more in the mill and the whole of it was east and the whole of it was silent.

The speaker of the east stood in the middle of the east circle with her staff in her hand and looked at the Alpha of the Alphas.

“The Council has been told that the east is a territory,” she said. “The east is not a territory. The east is the Council’s first seat and the east has been the Council’s first seat since 1802 and the whole of it has been kept by the east for two hundred years.” She put her staff on the stone. “And the east has a bargain and the bargain is this. The line gives the east the curse and the east gives the line the land. And the whole of it has been going on since 1802 and the whole of it is going to go on for another two hundred years.”

I stood in the room with Elias beside me.

“The line is not going to give you anything,” I said.

The speaker of the east looked at me.

“The line has no choice,” she said. “The line is the Luna and the Luna is the ground and the ground is the land and the whole of it is the east’s.” She put her staff on the stone. “The east has been keeping the whole of it since 1802 and the east is going to keep it until the whole of it is finished.”

And then she raised her staff.

The whole of the east moved.

It was not the ground and it was not the stones and it was not the light. It was the east. It was three hundred wolves in the east circle and three hundred more in the tunnel and the whole of it was silver and the whole of it was blades and the whole of it went for the line.

Elias took the first one and I took the second and the whole of the room was full of it.

I do not remember the whole of it.

I remember June with her hands on her stomach and her back against the wall and Mary the keeper of the room standing in front of her with a chair leg in her hands. I remember the twelve from the room in a ring around the whole of the line with their hands up and their faces set. I remember the keeper of the east on the floor with a blade in his shoulder and his hand still on the stone.

And I remember Elias.

He was in the middle of the room with a length of chain in his hands and he was holding the gap where the east had broken through and he did not go back.

And then the speaker of the east came through the gap.

She came with her staff in her hand and she went for me.

Elias stepped in front of me.

The staff came down and the whole of it was not the staff. It was the silver in the staff and the whole of it went into his chest and he went down.

“Elias,” I said.

He was on the floor of the east circle with the silver in his chest and his eyes open and he was not moving.

I went down on my knees beside him.

“Elias,” I said.

He did not answer.

And then the whole of the room went quiet.

The whole of the east stopped and the whole of the line stopped and the whole of the Council stopped and the whole of it was silent.

And then the speaker of the east said, “The keeper is taken. The line has no keeper and the line has no circle and the whole of it is the east’s.”

I sat on the floor of the east circle with his head in my lap.

And then the ground answered.

It came up out of the flat stone and out of the whole of the room and out of the whole of the mountain and the whole of the east went down on their knees and the whole of the Council went down on their knees and the whole of it was white.

And then the ground said a thing.

It said: The keeper is the land and the land is the keeper and the whole of it is one. The whole of it has been taken and the whole of it is going to be answered for.

And then it went out.

The room was dark and the whole of it was silent and the whole of it was cold.

I sat on the floor of the east circle with his head in my lap and I could not feel the mark on my shoulder and I could not feel the rope between us and I could not feel anything.

“Wren,” June said.

I did not answer.

“Wren,” June said again. “Wren. He is breathing.”

I looked up.

“What?”

“He is breathing,” June said. “Maeve has her hand on his chest and she says he is breathing.”

Maeve was on her knees beside me with her hand on his chest and her face gray.

“He is breathing,” she said. “The silver went into his shoulder and it did not go into his chest. He is breathing.”

I put my hand on his face.

“Elias,” I said.

He did not open his eyes.

“He is not going to wake,” Maeve said. “Not tonight and not tomorrow. The silver went deep and the whole of it is going to take a week.”

I sat on the floor of the east circle.

And then the speaker of the east got up off her knees.

“The east has been answered,” she said. “And the east is going to withdraw.”

I looked up at her.

“What?” I said.

“The east has been keeping the whole of it for two hundred years and the east has been answered by the ground in front of the whole of the Council,” she said. “The east is going to withdraw and the whole of it is going to be answered for at the full moon.”

She turned and walked out of the room and the whole of the east went with her and the whole of it was gone.

The room was quiet.

And then the Alpha of the Alphas came and stood in front of me.

“Alpha,” he said. “The Council has ruled. The east has withdrawn and the whole of it is going to be decided at the full moon in the Palouse circle.” He put his hand on his chest. “And the Council has ruled on the whole of it. The Alpha of the Circle Pack is stripped of her rank and the whole of the line is stripped of its name and the whole of it is going to be given to the east at the full moon.”

I sat on the floor.

“Why?” I said.

“Because the keeper has been taken,” the Alpha of the Alphas said. “And a line with no keeper is a line with no circle and a line with no circle is a line with no land.”

I sat on the floor of the east circle with his head in my lap.

And then I said, “Then I have lost the whole of it.”

“The whole of it,” the Alpha of the Alphas said.

He went out.

The whole of the Council went out.

The whole of the line stayed.

And I sat on the floor of the east circle with my mate in my lap and my rank gone and my name gone and the whole of the land gone and I did not get up.

June sat down beside me.

“Wren,” she said.

“Do not,” I said.

“Wren.”

“Do not tell me it is going to be all right.” I put my hand on his chest. “I have been telling the whole of the territory that it is going to be all right since the calf in the combine yard. I have been standing in squares and circles and chambers and telling the whole of it that the line is going to hold and the ground is going to answer and the whole of it is going to be finished.” I put my head back against the stone. “And I have lost the whole of it. I have lost the rank and the name and the land and the whole of the line and my mate is on the floor of a room in a mountain and the whole of it is gone.”

June put her arm around me.

“Then sit,” she said. “Sit for a while.”

I sat.

The whole of the night went past and the whole of the line sat in the room and the whole of it was silent.

And at dawn the keeper of the east came and sat down in front of me with his arm in a sling and his white beard.

“Alpha,” he said. “There is a thing I have to give you.”

“I am not the Alpha,” I said.

“You are the Alpha,” he said. “The Council can strip a rank but the Council cannot strip the ground. And the ground has been keeping a thing for you since 1802.” He put a book in my lap. “It is the Luna’s journal. The one the whole of the line has been looking for since Boise. It has been in the east circle since 1802 and the whole of it is in my keeping and the whole of it is yours.”

I looked at the book.

“I do not want it,” I said.

“The Luna did not want it either,” the keeper of the east said. “And she kept it anyway.”

He went out.

I sat on the floor of the east circle with the journal in my lap and my mate in my arms and the whole of the line around me.

And then I opened it.