Chapter 165: The Last Truth

I read the page twice and then I read it again and then I put it down on the loading dock and put my hand over my mouth.

It was my mother's hand. It was dated the twelfth of July, 1975, three weeks after Owen died, and it had never been in the journal because my mother had never put it in the journal. It had been in the box in the tunnel with the crates and the photographs and the whole of it, and Ilse had found it in the tunnel when the whole of the line went down.

It said: My son is dead and the whole of it is not what they told me. The Council came to the co-op on the twenty-third of June and told me that Owen had died of a rogue attack and that the whole of it was finished and that I was to sign a paper that said the body was to be buried in a closed casket. And I signed it because I was afraid and because I had two daughters and because the whole of it was the same bargain I had made in 1953.

And then it said: On the twelfth of July a wolf came to the house. He was old and he had a white beard and a burn on his face and he said he was the keeper of the east and he said he had come to tell me the truth. He said my son had not died of a rogue attack. He said my son had been taken out of the field behind the mill road by two wolves in gray coats and put in a truck and driven east and drowned in the lake. And he said the whole of it was because my son had written to the Council and asked about the room.

I sat down on the loading dock.

“He was drowned,” I said.

“He was drowned,” Ilse said. “The whole of it was the east. Dale put the knife in him and left him alive and Erik came out of the trees and finished it and the whole of it was supposed to be the end of it. And then the east came to the field and took the body and put it in a truck and drove it east and put it in the lake.” She put her hand on my arm. “And the whole of it is why your mother never told you. The whole of it is why she spent twenty-two years paying rent on land she owned and keeping you out of the record and never saying a word. She knew the whole of it and she knew the east had taken her son and she knew the east would take her daughters.”

I sat on the loading dock.

“And the body in the field?” I said. “The body we buried?”

“There was no body,” Ilse said. “The east put a body in the field. It was a wolf from the room and the whole of it was a wolf who had died in the room and the whole of it was put in the field and the whole of it was buried in a closed casket so that nobody would look at it.” She put her hand on my knee. “The whole of it was in the casket and the whole of it was not your brother.”

The yard was silent.

And then Elias said, “Wren.”

I turned around.

He was standing at the bottom of the ramp with his face gray.

“The whole of it is why I came,” he said. “The whole of it is why I was in the field on the night your brother died. The whole of it was not the curse.”

I stood up.

“What?” I said.

“The whole of it was your mother,” Elias said. “She wrote to me in June of 1975. She wrote to me at the fishing boat in Oregon and she told me that Owen had written to the Council and that the east had found out and that the whole of it was going to be taken. And she asked me to come.” He put his hand on the rail. “And I came. I came east and I came to the territory and I was in the field behind the mill road on the night of the twenty-second of June because your mother asked me to be there.”

I stood on the loading dock.

“You were there because my mother asked you,” I said.

“I was there because your mother asked me,” Elias said. “And I was too late. I got to the field after Dale had gone and after Erik had gone and the whole of it was done. And the whole of it was the curse that put me in the field in July and the whole of it was your mother that put me in the field in June.” He put his hand on his chest. “And the whole of it is why I have been protecting you since the combine yard. The whole of it was not the curse. The whole of it was your mother and the whole of it was a promise I made to her in a churchyard in Walla Walla in 1968.”

I sat down on the loading dock.

“You came because she asked you,” I said.

“I came because she asked me,” Elias said. “And I stayed because of you.”

The yard was silent.

And then June came and sat down beside me and put her arm around me.

“Wren,” she said.

“The whole of it is a lie,” I said. “The whole of it. My brother is not in the churchyard and my mother knew and the whole of it is a lie and the whole of the east has been lying to the whole of the territory for two hundred years.”

“The whole of it is a lie,” June said. “And the whole of it is going to be answered for at the full moon.”

I sat on the loading dock with the page in my hand.

And then I got up.

“Then the whole of it is going to be answered for,” I said. “And the whole of it is going to be answered for by the whole of the line standing in the circle and letting go.”

I looked at the whole of the yard.

“Get the whole of the territory into the east field,” I said. “Get the whole of the line and the whole of the nine and the whole of the room and the whole of the north and the whole of the east. Get the whole of the Council and the whole of the Alphas and the whole of the territories.”

The yard moved.

“The full moon is in two days,” Elias said.

“The full moon is in two days,” I said. “And the whole of it is going to be decided in one night and the whole of it is going to be decided in the circle in the Palouse.”

And then a wolf came up the ramp.

It was the younger Corrigan boy and he had a wire in his hand and his face was white.

“Alpha,” he said. “The wire is from the Council. The Council has ruled that the whole of the line is to be taken to the lake and the whole of it is to be drowned in the lake at the full moon.”

I stood on the loading dock.

“Then the whole of the Council is going to have to come and get us,” I said.

“The whole of the Council is coming,” the boy said. “The whole of the Council and the whole of the east and the whole of the north and the whole of the territories. They are on the ridge road and they are four thousand wolves and they are coming down.”

I stood on the loading dock.

“Then the whole of it is here,” I said.

“The whole of it is here,” the boy said. “And Alpha. There is a thing at the bottom of the wire. It says the whole of it is going to be decided at the lake in the east and not in the circle in the Palouse.”

I stood on the loading dock.

“Then we are going to the east,” I said.

“We are going to the east,” Elias said.

And then the whole of the co-op yard went dark.

It was the ground. It came up out of the loading dock and out of the co-op yard and out of the whole of the territory and the whole of the yard went down on their knees and the whole of it was white.

And then the ground spoke.

It said: The whole of it is not the east. The whole of it is the circle. The circle is in the Palouse and the whole of it is going to be decided in the Palouse.

And then it went out.

I stood on the loading dock.

“The ground has spoken,” I said. “The whole of it is in the Palouse.”

And then the whole of the east field lit up.