Chapter 87: The Beta Falls

Ada did not let it go.

She came down the steps with her stick in her hand and she stood in front of Dale and she did not look at me.

“Beta,” she said. “You used silver in a challenge. That is not a fighting matter. That is a matter for the Alphas.”

Dale did not move.

“I know,” he said.

“Silver in a challenge is the same as silver on a fence. It is not a fight. It is a killing with a thing the pack cannot see.” Ada put her stick on the ground. “You have been a wolf in this territory for thirty-four years and you have been the Beta for six and you have used silver on a wolf of your own pack in front of seven Alphas. There is no rank in this territory that you can hold after tonight.”

“I know,” Dale said again.

“Then give me the knuckles.”

Dale picked them up out of the snow and put them in her hand.

Ada turned them over.

“Where did you get these?” she said.

“The Council sent them to me in 1973,” Dale said. “They came in a box with the money and a note that said they were for the wolf who could not be caught with a rifle.”

The square was silent.

“The Council has been arming its Betas,” Ada said.

“The Council has been arming its Betas since before I was born,” Dale said. “There is a box in every pack house in eleven territories and there is a set of silver knuckles in it and every Beta knows where the box is.” He looked at Ada. “And there is a thing in that box that is worse than the knuckles. There is a small silver blade with a handle of wood and it comes with a note that says it is for the wolf who will not kneel.”

I stood in the middle of the square with my arm hanging and my shoulder burning.

“A blade,” I said. “A small silver blade with a wooden handle.”

“Yes,” Dale said.

“Do you have it?”

“It is in the pack house. In my office. In the bottom drawer of the desk under the ledgers.”

I turned and looked at the pack house.

“June,” I said. “Go and get it. Do not touch the blade. Bring the box.”

June went.

Ada turned to the seven Alphas.

“The Beta is stripped of his rank,” she said. “He will be held until the Alphas have heard the whole of it and he will answer for the silver and for the money and for the murder of Owen Halloran. And the box in the pack house will be brought before this tribunal and every Beta in every territory will be asked whether he has a box of his own.”

The square was quiet.

And then Halloran stood up.

He was the old wolf with the white beard and the scar through his eyebrow and he was the man who had written the letter.

“Ada,” he said. “I am going to say a thing before this tribunal rules on me and I am going to say it once.” He put his hands on the table. “I wrote the letter. I ordered the boy brought in. I did not order him killed. I told the Beta to bring him in for questioning and I told him that if the boy resisted he was to use whatever force was necessary. I did not know the Beta would put a knife in him.” He looked at me. “I am not going to say I am sorry. I am going to say that I have been on the Council of Alphas for thirty years and I have signed four hundred claims and I have taken land from eleven packs and I did it because it was easy and because nobody ever asked me a question. And then a Gamma in a wheat pack asked me a question.”

Ada looked at him.

“Halloran,” she said. “You will be held and you will be tried by the Alphas and if you are found guilty you will be stripped of your rank and your seat and your territory.”

“I know,” Halloran said.

“And your family name will be struck from the Council register.”

Halloran looked at me.

“It is already struck,” he said. “The moment I wrote that letter it was struck.”

They took him out of the square and they took Dale out of the square and the pack stood in the snow and watched them go.

June came back with the box.

It was wood and it had the Council mark on the lid and it was lined with red cloth and there was a set of knuckles in it and a small silver blade with a handle of wood and a folded paper.

Ada took the paper out and read it and put it down.

“It is a note from the chief clerk,” she said. “It says the box is for the Beta and it is not to be opened in front of the pack.”

She turned to me.

“Beta,” she said. “The pack is yours. What do you want to do with the box?”

I looked at the blade.

“I want it in front of the Alphas when the Council is tried,” I said. “And I want every Beta in every territory to be asked whether he has one.”

Ada nodded.

“It will be done,” she said.

The square began to empty.

I stood in the middle of it with my arm hanging and the silver burn on my shoulder and the pack going past me and every wolf who went past looked at me.

And then Harlan came down the steps with Maeve on one side of him and he stopped in front of me and put his hand on my good shoulder.

“Beta,” he said.

“Alpha,” I said.

“The Beta position is a rank under the Alpha and it puts you under the Council’s watch. The Council will know by morning that you are the Beta and they will know that the Beta is the Luna’s blood and the wolf who took the ridge.” He looked at me. “The Council is going to come for you now. Not with a cull order. With everything.”

“I know,” I said.

“And the new moon is in two days.”

“I know that too.”

Harlan looked at me for a long moment.

“Then go to Boise,” he said. “Tonight. Take the register and the photographs and the crates and the knife and the box and the three Lunas and go. I will hold this territory with what is left of the pack.”

“And if the Council comes here while I am gone?”

“Then I will be the Alpha who stood in the square,” Harlan said. “And that is more than I have been for twenty-two years.”

Elias came and stood beside me.

“The truck is at the co-op road,” he said. “Mrs. Bell has it and she has filled the tank and there is a can of gas in the back.”

I looked at the pack house and the square and the snow and the wolves going home.

“Then we go,” I said.

And then a wolf came running down the co-op road with a lantern in his hand and his coat open and his face white.

It was Harold.

“Beta,” he said. “There is a truck on the north road. It has just come through the gap and it is not one of ours and it is not one of the Council’s. It is a big truck and it has a canvas over the back and there are men in it.”

“How many?”

“I counted twelve in the back and two in the cab.”

I looked at Elias.

“The Council did not wait for the new moon,” I said.

“No,” he said. “It did not.”